Category Archives: Explore

Best LGBT Movies from Western and East Asia Countries

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The movie is called “The Wedding Banquet” released in 1993, China. The movie is showing an inner conflict of the main character, who has to marry with a woman for his family (traditional), while he is having a man partner in his social life (modernity).

This movie shows a clear cultural difference between Western country and Asian country in 1993. This could be the best movie in my website to effectively show the difference between Western countries and Asian countries’ attitudes toward LGBT. Especially when the main character’s parent came on the scenes, the perspective, the idea, of homosexuals changed in 180 degrees. This movie is a romantic comedy that you can both learning and enjoying the different perspectives of LGBT.

 

 

This movie is called “Bu I’m a Cheerleader”, released in 1999, America. It is about a girl who has everything until she falls in love with the other girl. Her parents bring her to “rehabilitation” centers when they find the signs of their daughter may like girls. However, rehabilitation centers do not work in the end, because she falls in love with a girl.

This is a movie from a negative perspective of homosexuals. The reason why I choose this movie is because the main character’s sexual orientation is treated as a mental illness, which would give a real perspective of parents. Even though the main character is the girl who is lesbian, the highlight would be how her parents treat her as their child in the movie that is from America.

 

 

This movie is called “The Handmaiden”, released in 2016, South Korea. The story is about when the time Korea was under Japan’s control. It is an interesting and thrill film that many characters’ thoughts and expectations are mixed and tangled up around the main character and her lover.

Since the released date of this movie is newer compares to the other two movies, it has some erotic scenes, which is allowed at that time, brings the film more realistic and interesting. The last two movies were more related with normal lives that everyone could have, however, this movie is a psychological mystery movie that has different taste from other two. The reason I choose this movie in this website is because the works and efforts putted on this film shows that South Korea is being open about LGBT communities to its society. This is an improvement of equality in Korea, and it is also a change, where people should give back some very traditional ideas, and familiar with modern ideas.

Current East Asia Countries

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“Just Two hours’ Vacation” by Hikaru Utada feat. Ringo Shiina

This is the most recent LGBT song released on September 28th, 2016. The two singers are two of the legends who are representing today’s Japan’s Music society. People in the society understood this song in two ways, one said this song is for LGBT community in Japan, and the other said the lyric is just describing housewives, not about LGBT. As similar to Taylor Swift’s “You Need To Calm Down”, this song influenced the society largely underground, since both singers are famous in Japan.

This song brought many of the nations’ attentions. Some of people believed the lyric is about two housewives’ friendship, some of people think it is about two housewives’ romantic relationship. It did give some negative impression for those who are not welcome LGBT community, however, it gave more positive impressions to the society. Some of the people started to think LGBT is not a special sexual orientation, and they even didn’t know why they were not accept them. So this item is important in Japan’s society and in this website, it gives a change of the attitudes toward LGBT.

 

 

Gay Pride 2019 in Asia, credit

This is a website written by an organization called “IGayTrips”, which is an organization that give some suggestions for LGBT communities when they are going to travel foreign. In this website, it is also having a calendar for LGBT events in 2019. In East Asia region, it is almost 13 places that are going to have events.

As you can see from the number of events, East Asia is still not as LGBT friendly as Western countries. However, in the other perspectives, the number of locations are increasing, which means East Asia is slowly, but spreading more equal opportunities to LGBT society. This is the comparison I would like to show in this website.

 

 

First Gay Marriages in Taiwan, credit

This is an article written by William Yang in May 24th, 2019. The article is about the first gay marriages in Taiwan after same-sex marriage is legalized. The marriages were historical moments in Asia, in which, the law itself was the first idea in the Asia history. In Asia, the topic of same-sex marriage was talking for almost a month even after the law was legalized.

This is the most recent news and the advancement in Asia’s LGBT society, which shows an improvement of attitudes toward LGBT. People believed that this could be a trigger for Asia countries to accept more about sexual orientations. This event also shows Asia is changing in a positive way, and will be LGBT friendly regions like Western countries. So it is one of the important item in this website.

Current Western Countries

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“You Need To Calm Down” by Taylor Swift

This is the most recent song that sing about LGBT, and become a famous song over the world. The singer, Taylor Swift, is one of the most famous singer around the world. The lyric is talking and encourage about homosexuals, and because of the song was sang by Taylor Swift, it has a strong influence to all the people and countries include countries that are not prohibit the lgbt but not welcome lgbt. For example, in Japan (since it is one of the posts in this website), the song is welcoming, and even playing in the streets.

This is an important item in this website, it is influential and it shows a lgbt positive attitude toward the world. This is different from East Asia, because music is a public media, where every nation can listing. So in East Asia like China, it won’t be released or playing in the public. So this is an interest finding in the comparison of Western countries and East Asia countries.

 

 

Calendar for Gay Pride, credit

This is a website written by Andrew Collins, and it listed the calendar of gay pride in western region. From this website, we know there are over 70 places where is going to have a festival for homosexuals in 2019 – 2020 year. In each listed festival, it has a hyperlink to bing the visitors to go more specific description about the event.

This website gives the most recent events in Western countries, and the fact that over 70 places are going to have gay pride events in this year shows the current attitudes toward LGBT in western countries. It is very different from East Asia, which will shown in “Current East Asia Countries” post that the numbers of the events are lesser than westerns.

 

 

The White House Passed a New Bill, credit

This is a news released on May 17, 2019, that presenting the bill of anti-discrimination towards LGBTQ community was passes to the White House. This is aiming to extend the protection of LGBTQ people in America who should have rights equally as others. In the news, it talked about the problems of sports, economy and moral aspects for the current situations, and this bill could improve the problems.

This news is an important news for United States as well as this website. It is a current law related movement, and by the answer of this bill, LGBTQ community has even more freedom and rights in the society. This is a good news that came with the news of Taiwan, which allowed same-sex marriages. It gives two perspectives of actual events on the different regions, but at the same time.

China

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According to Pew Research Center in 2013, 21% of the populations think the society should accept homosexuality. This number is less than the numbers compare to South Korea and Japan in East Asia.

 

LGBT history of China, credit

This is a timeline of the history of LGBT in mainland, China. It published in December 22, 2015 by Jack Smith in the website of TimeOut Beijing. It showed that China became homophobia since it opened Silk Road. Many new ideas came from foreigns to China, as well as homophobia. It provided a history outline of China.

This is an overview of the LGBT history of China in this archive, and it gives comparisons between the timelines from Spain and South Korea. Since it is a timeline, it gives the readers a quick idea of how Chinese people think about LGBT.

 

The facts of homosexuality in China, credit

This article was published in March 24, 2010 by Tom Mountford from OutRight organization of human rights for LGBT. It insisted homosexuality became legal in 1997, and removed from the list of mental illnesses in 2001. Before 1997, none of the nations could talk about homosexuals in the public, it was strictly illegal and unacceptable things. However, after the 2001, people still could not openly reveal the identity and talk about it. This article provided more information about that time regards the education, society, health, laws, and more.

I put this in my archive because it is a big fact that China legalized the homosexuality in late 20th century. It shows a great difference from other East Asia countries and western countries. Even though those countries prohibited homosexuality, there were still some resources about LGBT community at that time in online. However, Chine did not have any of the resources as I researched, which shows the strong disagreement towards LGBT community in China.

 

This is a video published in October 8th, 2015 by Channel4.com. It talks about a cure for homosexuality in China, even after 2001. This tells the readers that even after China removed homosexuality from list of mental illnesses, people still believe that it is a mental illness, and it should be cured. Shock Therapy is the most common way to cure the “illness”.

It is an important item in my archive to compare the reality of homosexuality in China compares to all other countries. Even though it legalized homosexuality, it is still an unnatural act in China. This is a completely different reactions from Western countries. But in some point, shared the similarity with Japan.

United States

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In 2013, 60% of the population of United States think the society should accept homosexuality (Pew Research Center, 2013). United State has lots of LGBT history, and it is a place where most of the people will study LGBT community.

 

Without a doubt, Stonewall Riots was the first event that gay people revolted against the polices in a way against to the society. This video was published in May 31, 2017 by History.com Editors. It was an important history of LGBT history in the United States because this event evoked lots of important LGBT movements in United States and around the world.

This item belongs to my archive because it showed the historical moment of LGBT community in United States, and importantly, the date of this riots was happening from June 29, 1969. At that time, Canada was slowly accepted the homosexuality in the society, which illustrated a comparison. However, it gives another comparisons between East Asia. East Asia started to be actived as an LGBT community was later than 1969, while United States started many gay rights movements after Stonewall Riots.

 

A transgender jazz musician, credit

This picture comes from an article “Billy Tipton and the Question of Gender” published in September 9, 2017 by Laura Mills. Billy Tipson was a transgender jazz pianist, who hided his identity until his death. His career was around 1950s, which at that time, the society was not as friendly to LGBT community as now. This is a story of a transgender who hided his identity in his whole life.

This is an important item in my archive because this is the first item I found that a LGBT person hided the identity in his life. His life showed the readers an another way of living as a transgender compares to other people in my posts. In East Asia and western countries, whether the society accepted the homosexuality or not, most of people in my items were revealed their identities, and influenced the society. However, Billy Tipton was not, he continued to hide the identity from others, which gives a comparison to my other posts.

 

 

The first person who executed by sodomy law, credit

This is a file of the case of the sodomitical sin. It did not show the date it published, but it  comes from OutHistory.org. This website posted the testimonies of people who knew Richard Cornish, a master forced his steward to had a sexual intercourse. This is a significant item because Richard Cornish was the first person who was executed by sodomy law in Virginia at the time 1624.

I put this case in my archive because this is the earliest event happened in LGBT history in United States, and it shows a different attitude towards homosexuality compares to Japan at that time. But it also shows the similar attitude towards homosexuality with South Korea. This event also put the LGBT community in a disadvantaged situations, which may caused LGBT people to hide their identities.

Canada

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According to Pew Research Center, 80% of the population agreed with the society should accept homosexuality in Canada. Even though this data was from the research in 2013, which was 6 years ago, Canada is still a LGBT friendly country. In fact, there was a research to ask what countries are friendly to LGBT people, and Canada becomes the first place of gay friendly countries. (Nomadic Boys, 2019)

In this post, I want to talk about the one of the first Canadian who revealed the identity in the society, a song and a magazine that influenced Canada.

Robert Ross at age 24. credit

Robert Ross, a journalist and art critic, who was the first lover of Oscar Wild. He was open with his identity, which gave a great impact to Canadian society. The picture comes from a blog that published in May 2011. It talks about Robert Ross’s life experiences after the death of Oscar Wild, as his lover, and as a homosexual. Even though most of his working areas were in Europe, his family was from Canada, and so he was considered as Canadian, and influenced the Canadian society.

The reason I pick this item is because he was definitely one of the most influential LGBT persons in Canada history, who changed the view of homosexuals. His life was harsh, he was almost arrested because of his identity, and he was bullied by his identity. His life experiences could give a contrast between monks who lived in Japan in early history, as well as other countries.

 

 

This is a song called “Any Other Way” by Jackie Shane, released in 1962. Even though the singer was an American, her song was popular, and be in the top 10 best hit songs in Toronto, Canada when she first released the song. This song became a significant song in Canada history because of the lyric and the singer. At that time, Toronto and Canada took large populations of homophobia people. But the singer and the song were very openly revealed to the listeners that she was a transgender and in a LGBT community.

It is an important item in my archive because this song influenced the society in Canada as a best hit song to spread the idea of LGBT. It diminished the antipathy towards homosexuals. This song also provided similar effect as an item “Homosexuality in Joseon Kingdom era”, which posted in Korea post. It was a clue to changed Canada to the most friendly countries over the world.

 

The first magazine that titled with word “gay”, credit

This article was published in January 26, 2010 by Emily Rose Antflick. It analyzed a magazine: “Gay Magazine”, that was published in 1964. It is a significant item because this article described the details of one of the first LGBT magazines in Canada.

It is a critical item in my archive because “Gay Magazine” was one of the first LGBT  magazine published in Canada in 1964. This told us that in 1964, the society was started to accepted homosexuals, which evident the influence of “Any Other way” song, and Robert Ross. It also gave a comparison of the acceptance of LGBT from East Asia.

Spain

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In Spain, 88% of the populations agree with the acceptances of homosexuals in the society (Pew Research Center, 2013). Nowadays, people say Spain as most LGBT friendly country, and in, fact, it is friendly. In previous posts, the time period was quiet new (Taiwan), so in this post, the time period would be as close as 1980s.

 

Even though the post is going to be around 1980s, Spain has a long history oh LGBT since 1931. This article shows detailed explanations with each timeline, it is called “LGBT in Spain”. Unfortunately, the date of this website and the author is not shown. From the timeline, in 1980, there was an event that made Chueca to be a LGBT friendly city.

This item is important because it is impossible to talk about all the histories of Spain about LGBT, however, this timeline saved the time of reading other events that happened in Spain at different time periods. In addition, the timeline could also show how busy the society was at each time. frame.

 

 

“A quién le importa” by Alaska y Dinarama (1986)

Alaska y Dinarama is a Spanish band, after released the song, it became one of the representative songs of the LGBT community from Spain. Since the song is asking questions of who cares to be different from others, and the lyric has a strong voice of being who they are, so it was recognized as an anthem of LGBT community.

It is important in the archive project because among many Latin LGBT musicians, they were the only Spanish musicians and made a significant hit song in the LGBT community. In the lyrics, it was encouraging the lives of LGBT people in Spain, and telling the audiences to lived strong as much as possible. Moreover, most of my previous posts are related to movie or drama, so this could be a good contrast of pop cultures between South Korea, Taiwan and Spain.

 

This is an another history article written by Theresa Pyrce, called “Homosexuality’s History and Cultural Impact in Spain” in 2016. It has a detail history of LGBT community in Spain, and it talked about time period around 1975~1979, and 2005, which is quiet close to the time range of what this post wants to have.

It is important in the archive project is because in this time range, it can compare the different movements happened with the history of Taiwan and Japan. Also it has more details of history in Spain, so it can provide more deeper knowledge of the history to the audiences. Spain is a LGBT friendly country, but it was not necessary friendly from the past time, and this article successfully explained how Spain became a LGBT friendly country.

Taiwan

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First of all, Taiwan took the largest step of LGBT. On May 17, 2019, Taiwanese won the right of same-sex marriage, and it was legally effected on May 24, 2019 (Hollingsworth,2019). This is the first step and victory for all the LGBT community in Asia and also give Taiwan to have an honor of the first place, all over in Asia, legalized the same-sex marriage🌈

Taiwan was actually established in early 17th century, but the Republic of China (Taiwan) government was relocated in 1949 with around 1.2 million people from China to Taiwan around late 1940s and early 1950s (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of China (Taiwan), 2018). So the history of LGBT community in Taiwan might be quiet new compare to other places. So in this post, it would be a brief history archive of Taiwan. You’ll see the similar and different movements happened in Taiwan from Japan and other countries.

 

 

This is a novel written by Pai Hesien-yung, called “Crystal Boys” (1983). The story is about the main character’s life after being discovered as a gay. It was a critical literature in Taiwan since this was the first book talked about gay, and directly mentioned the social status of LGBT in the society and its history. This book became one of the classic LGBT literatures today, and made into drama, movie, and stage. The following link is the first episode of the drama.

This item is important in my archive is because it gives a point of perspectives of the society in early 1980s. Even though the time period is different from South Korea and Japan, this book provided a great influence of the concept “LGBT” from both countries. Moreover, the book could give you an idea of “family” as blood-related and as a community of LGBT at that time.

 

 

This is a website of an organization which created for all the LGBT people in Taiwan on Jun 28th, 1998. The website has 4 missions; “LGBT Peer Mentoring, LGBT Support Network, LGBT Community Center and LGBT Rights Education” (June, 1998) It is aiming to support LGBT community in the technology, social roles, and to be inclusive, reduce the rate of suicides.

This is an important website in this archive is because it recorded more events that happened in Taiwan, and also the organization took the lead of revealing the sex orientations that people had and less hesitated to come to the hospital. So from the website, you can get more small details of LGBT at that time.

 

This item is a little different from other items, it is a future parade, and this is the promotion of “Gay Pride Taipei, 2019”. It is going to happen in October. An interesting fact is this gay pride parade is the largest scale of people in this Asia. So the website provides you the route of parade, hotel booking promotions, and a video of the parade to encourage people to come.

This is another important item in this archive, because from the video in this website, you could see the differences of the parade happened in Japan. Even though the event is not happened yet, it will give you some sorts of ideas of gay parade. In addition, it will be happened after the same-sex marriage, so it would .be a remarkable historical event in Taiwan.

South Korea

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According to a statistic data in 2013, homosexuality is legal in South Korea, and 39% of the population think the society should accept homosexuality (Pew Research Center, 2013). However, back in the history, Korea was also having lots of homosexuals people in historical figures. This post of Korea is going to be mainly focus on Joseon Dynasty (1392 – 1910). The time range of the dynasty was close to the time when samurais were ruling the society in Japan. So you may find some differences while reading the archive!

“Sejong, the 4th Choson ruler, convened a meeting of his Cabinet on October 24, 1436, to discuss the rumors that his daughter-in-law had been sleeping with her maidservant. ” (Utopia)

This is an archive that gives 4 historical figures who were homosexuals. The website shows back in the past, most ruling people were tended to be homosexuals by giving the names and eras of the history. The author and the date of this article is not shown. However, it is a credible website by looking at “About Utopia”. It says the website is recognized by TIME Magazine, Lonely Planet, Yahoo!, Gay Times, Advocate and BBC World Service. (Homosexuality in the Korea Historical Record)

It is a significant item in this archive because it gives you the real examples of historical figures in Korea at different time periods. In this website, you may find the similarity between Korea and Japan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a movie called “King and the Clown” directed by Lee Joon-ik in 2005. It is a 2 hours long movie, and it gave a great influence to the society at that time. The movie took place in Joseon Dynasty, and the story is about the homosexuality relationships in the court. It’s said that the movie is about homosexuality, because it actually had some scenes that you would connect to the sexuality.

This is an important item in the archive. It is a movie, which can provide some visible pictures of how people were thinking about  LGBT during Joseon Dynasty. Not only that, this movie is also an representative pop culture of LGBT in 2005.

If you click the link from the name of the movie, it will directs you to the website of the full video. If you are also interesting to look at the film analysis, the link is “The King And The Clown|Analysis” written by a student who was in Film Studies class in UK.

 

“They were generally young widowers who took young good-looking teenage boys as lovers. ” (Neff, 2013)

This is an article, “Homosexuality in Joseon Kingdom era” written by Robert Neff in April 5, 2013. The article is talking about what kind of relationships Korean had in Joseon Dynasty. The article often mentions Western people who went to Korea at that time and talking what they saw, and how the society noticed the homosexuality.

This is also an important item, because it has a perspective of Western countries. Also in the article, it gives one of the evidences that made the society realize homosexuals, and this evidence became to a problem of homosexuals that is still existing in Korea. This might be the key of changing in the society’s attitude towards the LGBT community.

Japan

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In Japan, it is legal to being LGBT and 54% of the population are thinking the society should accept LGBT community in 2013 (Pew Research Center, 2013). However, some people still think LGBTs are sexual minorities in Japan, and there are bullying like violences, exclusions, ignored, making fun of, and avoid. About 33% of the population feel unpleasantness toward LGBTs, in fact, there were several cases happened in Japan for LGBT people. The most remarkable news was a male graduate student was committed suicide in 2015 because of the psychological harassments he had from other students because of his friends who exposed the sexuality he had into public. Another case was happened in 2000, a group of people attacked/murdered some amount of homosexuals. But the most horrified thing was one of the perpetrators said it would not be a case to attack homosexuals (Nagayasu, 2016).

From this brief introduction of the LGBT community in Japan, you will have some sorts of fears toward Japanese society. However, most of the things in the world have their own reasons. So the questions were how and why do Japanese start to think in this way? What about the past and what is the current condition in Japan?

 

“In the Shinto creation story, sex precedes the birth of a nation and her people.”, “Nanshouku, male homosexuality” (Koichi, 2015)

It is an interest fact for now that back in the past, homosexuals are normal and unlike now, people were very open with it. Why? The question can be found in the article called “The Gay of The Samurai“. This article was published in September 30, 2015, written by Koichi. The article gives the history of people’s positive behaviors toward homosexuals and how the idea changed into now.

It is a significant item for this website is because it explains everything that you want to know in LGBT community back in the history. It has gives you the cultural, historical, and behavioral reasonings for the community. So you can get the idea easily with full understandings. In addition, it would also give you a comparison between LGBT community in the past of Western. The article also set up a cushion for the community in modern society in Japan.

 

“Suicide-Related Events Among Transgender People” (Katsuki, 2019)

The graph came from “Things to Know About the LGBT Community” published in March 20, 2019 written by Harima Katsuki, a director of the Harima Mental Clinic. The article talks about the reality of the current society in Japan and the serious problem of the numbers of transgenders who committed to suicides due to the malicious attitudes from outsides and “internalized homophobia”, which blaming themselves as abnormal by outside resources, such as televisions. The article appeals to the society to change the behaviors toward the sexual orientation.

After reading the first article, “The Gay of The Samurai”, you might think the acceptance of the LGBT community is not as very bad as other countries, because the article is focusing on the history more than modern. However, the truth of Japan society is not like that. This article is an important article to shows you one of the perspectives of the modern LGBT community in Japan.

 

Recent activity for supporting LGBT in 2019|Photo taken by Ryusei Takahashi (Tanaka, 2019)

There is a news, “With spirits high, the LGBT community and supporters marks Tokyo’s 25th pride march“, came out last month, April 28, 2019. The author, Chisato Tanaka, wrote about a current event happened in Japan for the rights (human rights and marriage rights mostly) in the LGBT community. In the article, the author interviewed the organizer of the activity and some participants who are considering themselves as LGBT. It gives you some common perspectives from the community, and you will find the status of the LGBT community in the current society in Japan.

It is another significant item because it provides the most recent event and the perspective of the LGBT community in Japan. Since it published in April 28, 2019, which is quiet new. It is important to know about the history of LGBT community, but it is also important to know about the current community. So that you can get a full perspective of Japan community and easier to find the differences from other countries.