aging | we didn't know then

It was a dream eight years ago, and the dreamer was violently shaken awake in a rude way.

At that time, when I first arrived in Guangdong, which is also the seaside city of Zhuhai, the humid and hot weather all day made me a little overwhelmed. The plane trees and the dry climate that I grew up with were replaced by the flaming banyan trees and the torrential rain that seemed to never stop. It was my first month in Zhuhai. I didn’t know when to predict when the sudden rain would fall. I was always drenched by the sudden rain while riding my bike, and even the people and the car were blown over because of the strong wind. land. It wasn't just the tropical climate that caught me off guard, it was new, different cultures. At that time, I didn't understand Cantonese at all, like a passenger who was suddenly parachuted into a foreign country, listening to the people around me happily conversing in Cantonese, and I was equally excited to listen to this language that was only heard in movies before. This is the beginning of my new university life. Everything seems to be filled with new hope.

Before applying for this university, I searched for information about this university on the Internet, and the news evaluation of this university is basically "free school spirit". Located in Guangdong, where the sky is high and the emperor is far away, innovation and openness should be synonymous here. What caught my attention was a piece of news about the establishment of the Rainbow Group. I was excited to read that old news, and with longing, I chose it as my first choice university.

On the night of the college entrance examination, I finished reading the "Montmartre suicide note" given to me by a good friend overnight. Qiu Miaojin wrote in this book:

"I was deformed by the headband of gender."

I thought so when I read it. Since junior high school, my best friend only liked the same sex. At that time, I didn't have the concept of "sexuality", I just thought that everything was going with the flow. And myself, although not bothered by the gender of the person I like, I have always thought of myself as a neutral person. What binds me, my friend, and Qiu Miaojin closely is each other's neuter tendencies.

"We may be willful rebels of the gender marriage system, or we may be bewitched by taboo desires, and our refusal to be defined is what we have in common. However, I am more indulged in the ease and pleasure of taking off my gender. My gender is what I take off. The night street lights seen behind the glasses will never see the clear luminous point, only a hazy halo."

With the hope of finding a partner like mine, I came to Zhuhai. On the day I obtained the qualification to borrow books from the library, I began to look through the books on the topic of "Gender Studies" and "Feminism". I also started to search, what happened to the "Rainbow Group" that was established a few years ago.

On a night when the night military training was cancelled due to heavy rain, I found the "Rainbow Team after the Rain in XX University". I remember that it was a QQ group with hundreds of people. After joining the group, I was so excited that I took the initiative to add the numbers of several active members at that time. I learned that the "Rainbow Group" that was established a few years ago is no longer there. But they are planning to establish a new rainbow group. To commemorate the difficulties encountered by the previous rainbow group and pay tribute to him, the new group is named: Rainbow group after the rain.

At that time, I was enthusiastic, expressed my enthusiasm and various opinions on "theory", and was immediately invited to join their offline meeting. The first meeting was in the cafeteria at night. The main "person in charge" and I arrived first. While waiting for a few other members, we ordered sugar water and chatted. He told me that they were going to officially launch next month. Apply to the school to establish the Rainbow Group after the rain in the "official form" of the school club. I can join them if I want.

"I'm very happy."

So we increased the frequency of meeting, and together we planned the trivial things that need to be prepared for the establishment of the community. Finally, a month later, I have the following photos.

That day, like every summer in Zhuhai, was unbearably hot and the sun was dazzling. We wore six-color rainbow clothes and raised the rainbow flag in front of the campus landmarks. The first sentence of the speech I prepared at that time was:

"The fact that we are all human is absolutely far more important than all the minutiae that separate us."

---- Simon Beauvoir

It is unimaginable now that we were approved by the school at that time, and even received the support of teachers from the philosophy department and literature department (or foreign language department), and some teachers volunteered to be the “teacher leaders of this club.” At that time, I was very happy We thought that everything would be better in the future, and we have taken the first step.

The establishment of the Rainbow Group after the rain aims to allow more people to view the LGBT community with an objective and rational attitude. 'Only awareness can reduce prejudice and discrimination. "But we don't have to be victims. Now that we've been established, we've taken the first step, and through advocacy, we can make more people aware of the LGBT community and diverse human sexuality, and we can work to change those destructive views and institutions of inhuman and inhuman conduct.

After the club was established, we held an event almost every two weeks, a movie viewing session or a "gender book club". He also applied to give public lectures, inviting famous LGBTQ movement figures from both sides of the strait at that time, such as "gay mothers", to give speeches at the school, and to jointly hold gender issues conferences with other universities in Zhuhai.

Although the quarrel within the community never ceased - like all gender movement groups, the radicals and the academics have always had huge differences even on key issues. We have been at book clubs to ask questions about "sexual fluidity," "whether, and to what extent, differences between men and women are biologically based," and "whether it is possible, if voluntary, for psychotherapy to change sexual orientation." And whether it’s ethical” and so on, the quarrel was blushing, and even some members quit because of the quarrel. But there are still more and more people interested in our group and joining our activities. In this way, in the midst of criticism and concern, the Rainbow Group gradually developed.

Sadly, for personal reasons, I was not able to participate in Rainbow Group's second year, which was its best year ever. However, this story can only be told by my friend, who was also the main person in charge at that time. In the third year, the school's obstruction began to increase. The direct reason is the change of the principal and the change of policy, and the school's censorship system has begun to tighten. The school will even send students as "spy agents"/"undercover agents" to infiltrate the group's QQ group to get the latest information on each activity and conduct it. In this way, almost every event is interrupted or terminated by campus security personnel. Later, the trend of the story became more and more outrageous. The participants and leaders of the event not only faced the frustration that the event could not be carried out as scheduled, but they even faced the threat of dropping out of the school.

Once you have experienced the power of this iron fist, you will no longer have any hope for the school. The underlying political significance behind these actions deterred powerless students, and the group members were forced to silence. Those who had planned to live abroad earlier left without looking back. And those who can only continue to stay within the system have to adapt to the environment and work hard to live their own lives.

Everyone living abroad has their own new troubles. "Asian racial identity and sexual orientation stereotypes", "identity politics and discrimination" have become new issues that everyone has to face.

As an East Asian, there are always embarrassing situations in the LGBTQ movement in Europe and the United States. The interaction between sexuality and race, which has never been considered before, has gradually become the most concerned topic for adherents who are still "pursuing the dream of equality and freedom". Racial discrimination and sexual orientation discrimination are not two separate issues. There are many LGBTQ fighters in Europe and the United States who discriminate against Asians. Some of them cannot distinguish between "government", "partisan", "culture", "nation" and "individual". They think that people with Asian faces are all gender-specific Conservative and uncommunicative on issues. Such face-based stereotypes will, from time to time, hurt zealots who aspire to participate in the democratic movement in a "democratic society".

In the face of racism, many people choose the easiest way. That is the turn to unthinking "nationalism". Of course, I can understand their difficulties. Living alone overseas is not easy anymore, and because of race and sexuality, they have become a marginalized group among marginalized groups, and they may often encounter obstacles in love and work. The hard work of life will gradually wear away one's courage and fighting spirit. Therefore, in order to protect their self-worth and not be so easily hurt, many people choose to join a "powerful group" and use established rhetoric and simple and crude generalizations to lighten their emotional and cognitive burdens. It is a pity that since they are already so cognitively lazy, they will probably be the same as those who discriminate against them. It is not uncommon for LGBTQ groups who have lived overseas for a while to suddenly turn around and blame the domestic LGBTQ movement.

Such an embarrassing thing happened to me too. At that time, the main person in charge of the Rainbow Group posted a comment a few days ago regarding the bombing of domestic LGBTQ groups, arguing that those organizations were all "lacking dogs" that used money from foreign forces to help Europe and the United States control China. After reading his comment, I was very surprised and wanted to ask him if he still remembered the original intention of mobilizing us to establish the Rainbow Group, and whether he remembered the simple and firm hope in his heart when he held the rainbow flag that day.

"It's all about sex. Except sex. Sex is about power."

Whether or not this is what Wilde said. Sex is indeed about power structures. What is normal and what is abnormal, what is free and what is not, is all determined by those in power. However, if you want to add a crime, there is nothing to worry about. A game of power between nations can be played on any excuse. If you want to sanction China, do you have to collect intelligence through those small school associations? Are there no universal values above international disputes? Is it absolutely worthless to help an individual who is discriminated against, isolated, excluded because of something he himself cannot change? Can the dignity of the individual be completely ignored in one's own land in order to fight a violent group?

Those days, when we worked hard to de-stigmatize LGBT people on campus, are just a thing of the past. And this behavior has also become worthless under the narrative of the grand collective dream. I don't know if college students in colleges and universities still have the opportunity to openly express their views that are different from mainstream values. Perhaps now, this is a dangerous and stupid thing to do. I also gradually found that it was difficult for me to understand many yin and yang words in the online community. Perhaps they are under the strict censorship system, packaging their views into a form that will not be directly censored, and still bravely insist on "self-expression".

"At that time I didn't know

The days are bright

The arrogance hidden in the eyes

It will never be the same again" --- My Little Airport

Friends who worked in the Rainbow Group before, almost all of them no longer pay attention to the development of gender clubs in colleges and universities. We are no longer young and young, worrying about the trivial matters in our lives, and have lost a cavity of loneliness. Looking at these depressing news, at most, I can only make a small cry within my own social circle. However, I did not completely lose hope. Because I believe that there will always be new young people who follow one after another, regardless of pressure, are willing to speak up for minority groups, and are willing to think about what is "fairness and justice" - although this is too difficult, perhaps only by virtue of Young blood can do it.