Homosexuality can be considered “a psychological disorder” in the eyes of Chinese law.
Citing controversial academic literature, a court in eastern China’s Jiangsu province ruled that a book that defines queerness as a disorder is not a “factual error” but a divergent “academic view,” reported the South China Morning Post . The decision, from the Suqian Intermediate People’s Court, maintains the decision of a lower court.
China’s LGBTQ community criticized the decision. Or Jiayong, 24, who filed the lawsuit as a college student in 2017 to get the book’s publisher to withdraw its “low quality work” from circulation, called the decision “random and baseless”.
Ah Qiang, a spokesman for PFLAG, a support group for the Chinese queer community and their families, accused the book’s editors and the courts of being out of touch with contemporary culture.
“The editor of the book apparently used views that do not correspond to society’s perception of sexual minorities today,” Ah said in a statement.
Officially, homosexuality was decriminalized in China in 1997 and was no longer classified as a mental illness in 2001 – with the exception of homosexuals who are particularly plagued by their sexuality, according to the Chinese Classification of Mental Disorders.
Now, a social worker, Ou, who prefers the nickname of Pee, discovered the questionable text in a 2013 edition of “Mental Health Education for College Students” (Jinan University Press) during her first year at South China Agricultural University in 2016 The book described homosexuality between “common psychosexual disorders” and declared same-sex relationships “are considered an interruption of love and sex or perversion of the sexual partner”.
Xixi sued the publisher and retailer of the book JD.com, demanding that the company withdraw the reference and publicly apologize for the homophobic content, which was disseminated by universities in China.
The court’s first ruling argued that the attorney’s case also lacked academic support, according to the SCMP, calling the matter a difference of opinion.
In November, Xixi filed an appeal that has just convicted her. She disagrees with the lack of evidence and plans to continue her fight.
“Perhaps this decision is to reduce the controversy,” she said. “But it also allowed textbooks that pathologize homosexuality to continue to circulate, which is a shame.”