China bans parts of gay festival

[FreeState]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8093695.stm

The organisers of China's first Gay Pride Festival have been told to cancel two of their sessions.

The news came on the very day a state-run newspaper described the Shanghai festival as of "profound significance".

Officials have warned the owners of two venues planning to hold a play and a film screening they would face "severe consequences" if they went ahead.
Homosexuality was illegal in China until 1997, and officials described it as a mental illness until 2001.

Since then the government's attitude might best be characterised as "don't condemn, but don't promote".

So a front-page article that discussed how many gay people there might be here, and an editorial in the state-run China Daily that highlighted the tolerance of a city like Shanghai seemed to represent a shift towards a more tolerant attitude.

A few hours later, however, officials in Shanghai were visiting businesses that planned to hold events as part of Pride Week and ordering them to cancel....

[GodlessBiker]

1. "Don't condemn, but don't promote" sounds eerily familiar. Hmmm. What could it be?

[enlightenment]

2. So they can still have the festival, they just

have to eliminate the gay part?

:eyes:

[Bluenorthwest]

3. Censoring the Theater and Film portions

Chinese Communists fear thought and ideas more than anything.