1268066

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CTP0010.1177/20570473241268066Communication and the PublicLiao

Special Issue
Communication and the Public
1­–8
Unpopular feminism: Popular © The Author(s) 2024
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in digital China
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Sara Liao
Pennsylvania State University, USA

Abstract
In this essay, I discuss feminist activism and gender politics in the #MeToo movement and post-MeToo environment
in China. I situate feminism in the country’s increasingly digitalized, commercialized, and controlled media ecosystem,
where unpopular feminism reflects the intentional control of feminist visibility and, therefore, the difficulty to access
feminist content and the disidentification of the feminist label. Also evident is the grip of the state-market complex on
the discursive rights for women’s emancipation and the struggle over meanings of feminism as only visibility or also as a
form of politics that divides us while simultaneously reimagining and rebuilding various forms of communities. Feminism
today is both a popular genre to be consumed and a minority political pursuit. I also document the interweaving
of feminist politics in contemporary China through gendered, classed, racialized, and ethno-national discourses in
transnational encounters.

Keywords
China, digital activism, gender politics, popular culture, unpopular feminism

Feminist activism in the 21st men as an official declaration of war against “extrem-
century: straddling the popular ist feminists” who are said to call for women’s privi-
leges. While the shrinking digital space for gender
and unpopular issues and feminist topics is not limited to China, the
In April 2021, the Chinese popular interest-based crackdown has not only continued the state’s tight-
platform Douban shut down more than 10 feminist ening grip on feminism and its discrediting and
channels as part of a government-sponsored crack- criminalization of vocal feminists but also opened a
down on “extremism and radical politics.” These fresh chapter of thriving anti-feminist discourses
censored groups mostly related to a rising feminist online. As feminist voices have been oppressed by
movement that is centered on the motto and practice
of “6b4t” and is driven by the belief that the empow-
erment of women must involve breaking away from Corresponding author:
Sara Liao, Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications,
activities centered on and benefiting men.1 The cen- Pennsylvania State University, 118 Carnegie Building, State
sorship has elicited a mass backlash from women College, PA 16802, USA.
online and, at the same time, has been celebrated by Email: [email protected]

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2 Communication and the Public 00(0)

the coordinated efforts of the state and the market/ technological powerhouses through the joint efforts
platforms, men’s rights groups and misogynistic of the state and private enterprises is often coupled
forums have mushroomed, further enhancing the with commercial participation in propaganda, politi-
networked effects of anti-feminism. Social issues cal persuasion, and information control as well as
related to marriage, property, relationships, and users’ evolving media production and consumption
reproduction are more crucial than ever in the dis- practices, which appropriate and exploit digital
cursive battlefield on which various participants affordances. Together, these developments render
contest for visibility orbiting around censorship and new forms of biopolitics possible, renewing govern-
profit. The knotted relationships among the state, ance practices that reinforce the combined effects of
digital platforms, and media users highlight the com- patriarchal nationalism, capitalist exploitation, male
plexity and nuances in the contemporary feminist supremacy, heteronormative sexuality, racism, sex-
movement and gender politics in China through ism, and xenophobia.
mediated discourses, as exemplified in the Douban As the #MeToo movement and other technology-
case. powered feminist activism have shown, digital
Since the #MeToo movement, feminist campaigns media, while clearly having the potential to chal-
and gender politics become highly visible in China’s lenge a range of oppressive ideologies and catalyze
increasingly digitalized, commercialized, and con- social change, also open up public space in ways that
trolled media environment. Taking shape in early allow for the proliferation of highly visible acts of
2018 in the wake of the sex scandal that rocked oppression, harassment, sexism, misogyny, and
Hollywood a few months earlier, #MeToo in China is other forms of reactionary discourse. Constrained by
a striking example of millennial feminist activists the techno-nationalist developmental ethos, digital
taking to digital media to engage the public in chal- feminist activism in China clings to survival, and
lenging the country’s sexist, misogynistic, and patri- seeks to develop on the margins of the state’s author-
archal culture (Lin & Yang, 2019; Ling & Liao, 2020; itarian governance. As the government has tightened
Yin & Sun, 2020). From the perspective of digital its censorship of free speech and restrictions on
activism, the #MeToo movement in China not only grassroots movements, the space for promoting pro-
echoes the global trend of growing hashtag activism gressive political agendas in general and feminist
and celebrations of technology empowering ordinary activities in particular has decreased. The arrest and
people but also manifests the continuities and changes detainment of five young feminists in China in 2015,
in China’s development of media marketization and the severe censorship of vocal #MeToo advocates,
digital technologies. Technocratic thinking in China and the aforementioned stigmatization of and crack-
reaches all the way back to the Opium Wars. Since down on online feminists and other progressive
China launched its reform and opening-up policy in communities are among the recent examples of the
the late 1970s, the development of media and com- top-down repression and public censure of feminist
munication technologies has been part of the policy activism. Simultaneously, the amount of media con-
orientation and business strategies for building a tent and social commerce and the frequency of char-
strong nation that can regain its status as the world’s ity campaigns and public events featuring implicit or
leading power, and technology has also served as a explicit messages emphasizing women’s empower-
form of governance and an essential component of ment, sexual freedom, independence, and confi-
the ruling ideologies that are part of daily life in the dence are increasing, facilitating consumption and
postsocialist transformation (Han, 2018; Ji, 2015; consumerism to boost the so-called “sheconomy”—
Schneider, 2018; Tai, 2006; Yang, 2012; Zhao, 2007). economy driven by women’s growing economic
The contemporary digital revolution and the highly power exercised through fervent online shopping
tactical surveillance scale and speed up worlding sprees, the buzz around “big heroine dramas,” and
around technologies, data, and bodies, thereby funda- feminist celebrity and influencer culture.2
mentally transforming life worlds, society, and soci- Feminism in China today is both a popular genre
ality. The construction of digital infrastructure and to be consumed and a minority political pursuit. By
Liao 3

popular, I borrow from Banet-Weiser (2018) to con- one hand, feminists and activists have drawn on the
sider feminism “as media visibility and accessibility, abundant theoretical and empirical resources to
as popularity, and as a struggle for meaning” (p. 6) in deploy creative practices through digital technolo-
the contemporary media landscape governed by the gies and cultivate progressive feminist cultures. On
neoliberal ideologies of privatization of politics. the other hand, the assemblage of digital technolo-
From this perspective, the visibility of feminism sig- gies, the platform economy, patriarchal cultural con-
nals the end of politics, as if visibility is politics itself. ventions, the state’s regulatory imperatives, and
Many similarities can be drawn between the entre- media users’ practices has also spawned a powerful
preneurial endeavors in China and other parts of the and oppressive set of digital discourses and acts
world to foreground feminist politics in popular cul- characterized by witch-hunting, sexism, and misog-
tures and digital media that nonetheless individual- yny. Moreover, the hostility toward, anxiety about,
izes gender equality and engenders the effect of and trolling of feminists have been shaped by both
“liberation through capitalism” (Ferguson, 2017, p. external anti-feminist forces and internal ruptures,
230). Whereas my approach is informed by the conflicts, and ambiguities among feminists and
insight that certain feminisms are popular as instru- activist groups that share the overall goal of wom-
mental to the attention economy, I go beyond these en’s emancipation but occupy various positions
diagnoses and analyses by scrutinizing the multifac- along the spectrum of feminist theories and prac-
eted spectrum of feminist thought and practices in tices. Technologies shape and are shaped by cultures
which platform-based and technology-aided sexist that foster not only convergence, solidarity, and
and patriarchal rhetoric and practices illustrate the diversity but also, and equally importantly, diver-
convergence and divergence of feminism and misog- gence, dissonance, and provincialism that impede
yny that are both neoliberal and postsocialist. the emancipatory project of feminism.
Thus, unpopular in the Chinese context demon- My aim is not, of course, to create a rigid frame-
strates the intentional control of feminist visibility work for distinguishing “good” from “bad” femi-
and media accessibility by the state-market complex nisms. Rather, I seek to identify and account for the
for the purpose of commercializing and hollowing rich nuances in the platform-based, technology-facil-
out the political pursuit of feminism and encouraging itated feminist activism in China. For instance, while
the public to disidentify the feminist label. Unpopular Western scholarship often critiques the “lean-in”
also exposes the dynamic within feminist visibility feminism popularized by former Facebook COO
and popularity, for the commercialization of gender Sheryl Sandberg that encourages educated middle-
in popular media includes only a fraction of women— class White women to climb the corporate ladder for
specifically, young, urban, well-educated consumers. self-empowerment as a concession to neoliberalism
Nevertheless, even the most apolitical and hyper- and an enforcement of racialized gender hierarchy,
commercialized forms of feminist expression have some of the feminists whom I have interviewed, by
the potential to disrupt mainstream gender norms and contrast, actively embraced some aspects of this form
values and reclaim discursive rights to women’s of feminism by organizing online events to empower
emancipation, and, therefore, have some appeal to women with career skills and create virtual commu-
women from all walks of life. Unpopular further sig- nities. They have integrated radical and lesbian femi-
nifies the struggles among feminists in a techno- nist ideas, inspiration from Korean feminist
nationalist context in which certain types of politics movements (such as the aforementioned 6t4b), and
—nationalist, state-aligned, and techno-developmen- Marxist feminist thought from Japanese scholar
tal—crowd out others. Unpopular feminism divides Ueno Chizuko to Italian American activist Silvia
yet simultaneously reimagines and rebuilds different Federici, and have focused on improving everyday
forms of communities. life for women, particularly at the grassroots level,
Straddling popular and unpopular, contemporary and helping them achieve financial independence.
feminist activism and gender politics are the prod- Most importantly, these communities have promoted
ucts of two prolonged processes in China. On the a strong ethic of women supporting women as a
4 Communication and the Public 00(0)

viable solution to the hardships and violence that they guardian, dictator and peacekeeper, and traditional
encounter in the prevailing sexist and patriarchal patriarchy and modern misogyny, among many oth-
environment. Buttressed by the various digital plat- ers. The writing and discussion of stereotypical free-
forms on which this integration reproduces and rein- dom fighters in illiberal China also fall short in terms
forces neoliberal ideologies in postsocialist China, of considering various modes of interactions between
these communities simultaneously negotiate the state the state and activists, such as collaboration, non-
control over mass mobilization and question the confrontation, and queer complicity, and the space-
social values and gender norms that are enforced in and meaning-making practices by other actors such
popular discourses. I consider this negotiation part of as the media, non-government organizations, and
the everyday resistance and minor politics that fur- other publics (Gordon, 2023; Tan, 2023; Wang,
ther feminist care and alternative visions of feminist 2019). Such a reductionist framework not only cre-
activism, though no better political futures are guar- ates rigid binaries but also assumes resistance a pri-
anteed. As Wajcman (2007) tellingly observes, nei- ori that is always from below to above.
ther technophobia nor techno-utopia should distract Reinscribed in these binary structures is an all-
attention from efforts to understand the importance of too-familiar emphasis on “the major-resistance
the mutual shaping of women and technology, for mode of cultural practices” (Lionnet & Shih, 2005,
“feminist politics and not technology per se is the key p. 7). Thus, the most dominant and the most resistant
to gender equality” (p. 287). become valorized in knowledge production in light
of the escalating geopolitical tensions manifested in
Transnational encounters and hot and cold wars, where the demise of grassroots
coalitions and the intensified political polarization
feminist epistemology coupled with the rise of fascist populism and far-
Examining the tension between popular and unpopu- rightism pose palpable threats to millions of lives
lar feminism in digital China involves challenging across various terrains. Accordingly, I see resonance
the tendency to manufacture and highlight a repres- in my investigation of Chinese feminism with
sion-resistance convention of contemporary Chinese Lionnet and Shih’s (2005) conceptualization of
feminism. This is particularly apt in the digital era, in minor transnationalism as a challenge to the main-
which “an ‘authoritarian determinism 2.0’ which stream theorization of transnationalism that “denies
focuses on struggling relations between the repres- the complex and multiple forms of cultural expres-
sive state and digitally armed (albeit otherwise pow- sions of minorities and diasporic peoples and hides
erless) groups has prevailed within the research their micropractices of transnationality in their mul-
framework of ‘liberation and control’” (Guan, 2019, tiple, paradoxical, or even irreverent relations with
p. 739). Some popular Anglophone media outlets the economic transnationalism of contemporary
and publications have embraced this tendency to empires” (p. 7). In recognizing the plurality of femi-
explain certain salient aspects of Chinese feminism nisms and the multiplicity of Chineseness, I respond
in which somewhat clearcut entities, such as the to the call by Zhu and Xiao (2021) for “a broader use
repressive state and rebellious feminist individuals of ‘feminisms . . .’ to contest and open up ‘Chinese
and groups, are posited to exist in confrontational characteristics’ as a notion constrained by racism,
and conflicted positions (Fincher, 2018; Wong, traditionalism, nationalism, or hierarchical spatiali-
2022; Yang, 2021). Without dismissing the reality of zation and biopoliticization in different historical
repression-resistance and censorship and surveil- periods” and a view of “the ensemble of Chinese
lance, there is a need for caution regarding the risk of feminisms . . . as a transnational product that seeks to
producing and reinforcing a set of knowledge about situate the imaginary notion of Chineseness in the
binaries opposing contemporary China to the West, global context” (pp. 3–4).
including authoritarian and democratic, repression The reductionist framework has also gone viral as
and liberation, censorship and freedom, illiberal and the epistemology for Chinese domestic public con-
liberal, human rights violator and human rights sidering emerging social issues and gender relations,
Liao 5

where “gender antagonism” (xing bie dui li, 性别对立) Humanism can represent him/itself as the centre” (p.
has been finessed by the state-market complex into a 81) that can and will save the peripheral, the Others,
palatable truth to marginalize, stigmatize, and demonize the East, and the Women. A more recent manifesta-
feminism as a progressive, justice-seeking politics. tion of this White Man complex can be seen in the
This finessing has constructed a rigid dichotomy moral crusade to rescue oppressed Muslim women
between men and women in a static binary of gender, a that has swept the public sphere especially since the
scapegoat of feminism and feminists responsible for US invasion of Iraq. Abu-Lughod (2013) points out
masculine and patriarchal crisis, and a range of tech- the dangers of the cultural essentialization and ethno-
nologies of palpable misogyny. While misogyny is nei- centrism in the Anglophone stereotyping of Muslim
ther new nor unique in China, and generations of women as weak, vulnerable, and abused victims
Chinese advocates and activists for gender equality under the religious and patriarchal tyranny of the
have felt uneasy with feminism as an imported so- Islamland, which not only buttresses the military
called Western terminology, the contemporary mani- foray into Iraq but, more importantly, sustains
festations of gender antagonism are nonetheless Western colonial hegemony partly through “polariza-
symptomatic of a historical juncture characterized tions that place feminism, and even secularism, only
by the revival of Confucian paternalist authoritarian- on the side of the West” (p. 44). More than 30 years
ism upheld by Xi Jinping’s administration. Also after Mohanty’s acute critiques and nearer to Abu-
feeding into this revival is the faltering of socialist Lugod’s, the discursive colonization of the East and
ideologies amid the ever-expanding state capitalism, Women continue to characterize the hegemonic rhet-
the growing social injustices and inequality with oric of the West, albeit sometimes in more implicit
respect to class, gender, and the urban–rural divide, and scattered ways regarding the Western sense of
the strengthening of technological social control and being, belonging, authority, and moral conviction. In
surveillance characterized by patriarchy, jingoism, depicting Chinese feminists, Western media champi-
sexism, and misogyny, the violations of the human ons their spirit of resistance but ends up discussing
rights of beleaguered ethnic minorities, aggressive their vulnerability, if not failure, in the face of the all-
relationships with other countries (such as “wolf compassing state machinery of oppression, suggest-
warrior diplomacy”), and, of course, the multiplica- ing that only in the liberal and democratic West can
tion of contentious opinions and vehement confron- resistance be creative and continue. For example, a
tations among members of the public regarding recent episode of Reporters on France 24 described
Chinese society and the Chinese government.3 “being a feminist in China” as “a battle lost in
To be clear, the reductionist framework is not only advance” (Kisiela et al., 2024). The problem is not
gendered and classed but also racialized, for the that these depictions are not fact-based but that they
Anglophone imagination of a legion of rebellious are one-sided, cherry-picking from various forms of
underdogs against the powerful Chinese state appara- feminist organizing and practices to invent versions
tus is replete of familiar tropes that reinforce not only of Chinese feminism that they present to the
the dichotomy of the democratic-liberal West against Anglophone public. The political effects thus
the dictatorial-communist China as a legacy from the entrenched amount to no less than white wo/men sav-
Cold War, but also the perpetual post/colonial epis- ing Chinese/yellow women from Chinese/yellow
temic violence of authorizing Western humanist dis- men. The understanding of unpopular feminism in
course and the white savior complex. In an influential digital China could benefit enormously from a trans-
analysis of the feminist texts in the United States and national perspective on feminist praxis that engages
Western Europe in the 1980s, Mohanty (1988) force- seriously with “feminist critiques of the Western
fully illustrated how this scholarship collectively model of sisterhood in the global context” (Grewal &
upheld the Western hegemony of humanism, objecti- Kaplan, 1994, p. 4; emphasis in original).
fying women as a category of analysis without regard In addition, the racialized characteristics of the
to context, employing methodological universalisms reductionist framework are also showcased through-
as “the necessary recuperation of the ‘East’ and out China’s modern struggle to overcome the “century
‘Women’ as Others” so “that (western) Man/ of humiliation”—a constructed narrative of its
6 Communication and the Public 00(0)

semi-colonial past and an important element of its Likewise, gender struggles have always already been
nationalist mobilization—from techno-nationalism to incorporated into the struggles for national independ-
complex contemporary entanglements of nation, gen- ence and self-determination, anti-Western colonialism,
der, sexuality, race and ethnicity, class, and technolo- imperialism and invasion, and anti-feudalism, includ-
gies and environments, in which we are all implicated. ing feudal patriarchy and fettered gender relationships
In the Chinese mainstream narrative, feminism and (Liu et al., 2015). That which outlines today’s Chinese
feminists have been stereotyped as a monolith associ- feminist subjects and subjectivities lies in their multi-
ated with the Western political agenda, making certain plicities and ever-expanding entanglement with trans-
types of feminisms and feminists an easy target amid national flows and popular/populist movements,
the contemporary populist-filled nationalist fever and global capitalism, state-market ideologies and maneu-
agitprop against “foreign hostile forces,” an official vers, and the digital assemblage of technologies,
enemy that supposedly attempts to sabotage China affordances, governance, and labor. Understanding
and threatens the peace and safety of the Chinese peo- popular culture and unpopular feminism invites fresh
ple. Meanwhile, commercialization, social transfor- discussion of how the theories of popular feminism,
mation, and digital technologies have given rise to a postfeminism, neoliberalism, and other forms of femi-
range of postfeminist practices through which women nist theorization related to decolonialization, radical
are encouraged to commodify their physical and emo- second-wave feminism, and abolitionism inform pub-
tional labor and practice self-responsibility to survive lic debates in China. The discussion has also explored
and succeed in a market economy that extends from how ordinary Chinese practice feminism and actively
public to private and generates tangible effects on engage in feminist struggles against gender-based vio-
women’s lives, gender politics, and, undoubtedly, lence, nationalistic patriarchy, chauvinistic misogyny,
feminist praxis and theorizations. Furthermore, when among others, in everyday life and in resistance to
“feminism” is stigmatized as a sabotaging force from broader socio-political and cultural constraints. In this
the West in China’s populist conspiracy narrative, the sense, the contemporary struggles of feminism and
urge to co-opt it for the nationalist agenda is simulta- feminists in China not only echo the longing and
neously palpable, with “pink feminism” representing search for self-determination and emancipation from
the possibility of women’s identification with the national patriarchy and state violence by third-world
national pursuit of gender equality. The “pink” in women but also share missions and sentiments with
“pink feminism” differs vastly from the postfeminist their first-world counterparts in seeking individuality,
sensibility and “girl power” rhetoric associated with freedom, liberty, and independence amid market sex-
the color as a symbol of empowerment manifested ism and racial hierarchy.
especially in the iconic commodity of pink pussyhats
in feminist movements such as the Women’s March Declaration of conflicting interests
(Genz, 2009; Zweiman & Suh, 2020). The “pink” The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest
here relates to China’s homegrown “girlish” national- with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication
ists, the xiao fen hong (小粉红),” literally “young of this article.
fans of the red”—red being the color of the Chinese
polity—and widely circulated in Anglophone dis- ORCID iD
course as the direct translation “little pink.” Thus, Sara Liao https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9410-5270
“pink feminism” in China refers to the particular joint
forces of practices of women’s liberation and patriot- Notes
ism of Chinese women, a heated yet contested topic 1. The 6b4t movement originated in South Korea and
also known as fen hong nv quan (粉红女权; Angelica, has gained momentum in China. In general, it refers
2021). Once again, feminism is imbricated into the to the practices of not marrying, not bearing chil-
national project. dren, not engaging in romance or sexual relationships
Chinese women have always already been femi- with men, not consuming misogynistic products,
nists in a complicated web of transnational encounters single women helping each other, rejecting rigid
that traces back to the late 19th century (Barlow, 2004). beauty standards, and rejecting forms of religion,
Liao 7

celebrity culture, and fandom that sexualize and Ji, M. (2015, June 3). Science and technology in modern
exploit women. China: A historical and strategic perspective on state
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women-centered content, usually with powerful http://yris.yira.org/essays/1551
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tings. Such dramas target the growing women audi- J. (2024, June 7). Being a feminist in China: A
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21(7), 1176–1192. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777 Author biography
.2020.1837908 Sara Liao is a media scholar and feminist, researching the
Zhao, Y. (2007). After mobile phones, what? intersectional area of digital media, feminism, globaliza-
Re-embedding the social in China’s “digital revolu- tion, and East Asian popular culture. She is currently
tion.” International Journal of Communication, 1, working on theorizing and writing of digital feminist
92–120. activism and the culture of misogyny in China.