China’s leaders evidently thought they could crush a nascent feminist movement by detaining five young women, but they were sorely mistaken. Four years later, against all odds, the fledging women’s rights movement has not only survived an intense crackdown by the government, but grown larger. At the time the ban was imposed, Feminist Voices had over 180,000 followers on Weibo and over 70,000 followers on WeChat. The shrinking public space for discussing women’s rights in China makes it even more extraordinary that a feminist movement is able to survive at all. The feminist activists have cultivated a networked community numbering into the thousands, revolving around university students and graduates.

Source: The Guardian March 07, 2019 05:48 UTC