Exploration Pack: Feminism
This week, the two readings that I focused the most on was the Sixth Tone article on the Chinese influencer suspended over her comments on comfort women, and the piece written by Ding Ling. What was most interesting to me was the way both women, despite the difference in their eras, are existing as feminists in an extremely patriarchal setting, which influences their philosophy and how radical they may be.
Ding Ling, writing 80 years before Ayawawa, was censored by the Communist Party for her writings on the hypocrisy of male party members. Despite the promises of egalitarianism and equity made by the CCP, the patriarchal power structures and systems of China still remained. Ding Ling points out a massive double standard that existed for women party members, expected to get married but then ridiculed for being married, expected to have children but then looked down on for having children. Women are also accused of being responsible for any political failings that their husband might have, pinning ideological or moral failings on the woman rather than the man’s own thoughts and actions.
Ding Ling does, however, point out the “failings of women,” and remarks that women (especially those in high places) have a responsibility to improve the lot for female party members and work to dismantle the power structure. Despite the fact that she points out the hypocrisy of the communist party, she goes a long way to but a lot of the blame on women, showing the ingrained patriarchal thinking of the time.
Similarly, Ayawawa, whose relationship advice is slated to help millions of Chinese women, couches her own brand of feminism in a patriarchal context. While she stresses the fact that life is hard for women, she sees the solution as finding them good husbands to take care of them, and views relationships as “business transactions.” Her comments about comfort women are just another brand of this type of thinking: lessening the female struggle so that she can fit in more easily to a patriarchal society. Certainly citizens of all genders suffered under the Japanese, but to claim that women had it better because they were not killed, when they were still experiencing horrific sexual violence (and were also being killed) seems to be about buying into systemic sexism and a strictly patriarchal society.
Works Consulted:
Fan Liya. “Weibo Suspends Relationship Guru Over ‘Comfort Women’ Comments.” Sixth Tone. May 22, 2018.
“Ding Ling: Thoughts on March 8, 1942.” In The Search for Modern China: A Documentary Collection, Third ed. Edited by Janet Chen et. al., W. W. Norton & Company, 2014.
