Words outweigh parade team
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) greeted the Taiwan LGBT Pride parade on Oct. 31 with a supportive post on her Facebook page. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), for its part, had a contingent in the parade for the first time.
The KMT group was led by KMT Youth League leader Chen Po-hsiung (陳柏翰), Taipei City Councilor Hsu Chiao-hsin (徐巧芯) and a number of others, but Chairman Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) was not seen at the event.
KMT national committee delegate Wei Chen-yu (魏辰宇) responded by unleashing a tirade in a KMT insiders’ online group, calling the LGBT Pride parade “disgusting” and saying that he was against it.
Wei blasted Hsu, saying that if she supported same-sex marriage, she might as well find a woman to marry.
How can the KMT hope to dispel its reputation as the “prejudice party” if its members say things like that?
A year has passed since same-sex marriage was legalized in Taiwan. Let us look back at some of the anti-LGBT remarks made by KMT members over the past year or so.
Miaoli County Commissioner Hsu Yao-chang (徐耀昌) said at a campaign rally for KMT Kaohsiung mayoral candidate Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜): “Men originally joined up with women, not men with men or women with women. This thing [same-sex marriage] could leave us with no descendants.”
Hsu Yao-chang’s predecessor as county commissioner, Liu Cheng-hung (劉政宏) said: “I have a son who is 27 years old, but is still not married and has no girlfriend. I am worried about whether the marriage partner he eventually brings home will be a man or a woman.”
That is prejudice, too.
Former KMT chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) told a “model father” event that if voters picked the wrong candidate, in the future they “might not know whether a ‘model father’ is a man or woman.”
Han’s wife, Lee Chia-fen (李佳芬), was criticized for spreading rumors when she said that elementary-school students were being taught about anal sex and orgasms.
All these prejudiced statements coming from the KMT are still fresh in the mind. This country’s gender equality education clearly is not up to scratch.
In a public opinion survey by the Taiwan Equality Campaign, 92.8 percent of respondents said that the legalization of same-sex marriage did not affect them personally, but when asked if it had any effect on society, nearly 30 percent said that it had a negative impact.
However, 53 percent of respondents said that they could accept elementary-school students learning about homosexuality.
Notably, 67.6 percent of parents in the 30-to-39 age group and 55.1 percent of those aged 40-to-49 found such lessons acceptable, which is a slap in the face for the ridiculous anti-gay idea that “mothers and fathers will disappear.”
Taiwanese society and public institutions alike should uphold gender equality and provide pro-equality education.
The Enforcement Act of Judicial Yuan Constitutional Interpretation No. 748 (司法院釋字第748號解釋施行法), commonly known as the “same-sex marriage law,” which was enacted on May 17 last year, has sparked social confrontation and aggressive debate, but that is actually a good thing.
At least it is better than the old party-state system where the KMT’s opinions were the only ones that counted.
Control Yuan President Chen Chu (陳菊), who, like Tsai, belongs to the Democratic Progressive Party, says that loving one another is a human right.
In comparison, the KMT’s ideas about human rights need a little more enlightenment.
It will take more than having a contingent in an LGBT parade to wash away the KMT’s reputation as a party of prejudice.
Ku Chih-cheng
New Taipei City
US president-elect Donald Trump is inheriting from President Joe Biden a challenging situation for American policy in the Indo-Pacific region, with an expansionist China on the march and threatening to incorporate Taiwan, by force if necessary. US policy choices have become increasingly difficult, in part because Biden’s policy of engagement with China, including investing in personal diplomacy with President Xi Jinping (習近平), has not only yielded little but also allowed the Chinese military to gain a stronger footing in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. In Xi’s Nov. 16 Lima meeting with a diminished Biden, the Chinese strongman signaled little
On Tuesday, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) issued a statement criticizing Song Siyao (宋思瑤), a student from Shanghai’s Fudan University, saying she had offended the sensibilities of Taiwanese. It also called for the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation — established by former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) — which had organized the tour group, to remind group members to be careful with their statements. Song, during a visit to a baseball stadium in Taichung, said that the tour group “would like to congratulate China, Taipei team (中國台北隊) ... we wish mainland China and Taiwan compatriots can be like the team Chinatrust Brothers and
“Integrated Diplomacy” (總和外交) is the guiding principle of Taiwan’s current foreign policy. It seeks to mobilize technology, capital and talent for global outreach, strengthening Taiwan’s international connections. However, without a robust information security mechanism, such efforts risk being reduced to superficial courtesy calls. Security clearance serves as the “entrance examination results” for government agency personnel in sensitive positions, qualifying them to access sensitive information. Senior aides in the US Congress must also possess security clearance to assist lawmakers in handling classified budgets. However, security clearance is not an automatic right or a blanket necessity for accessing sensitive information. Access is granted only
The licensing of medical professionals with overseas degrees has again aroused heated debate, and many dentists held a protest in Taipei on Nov. 24. The controversy stemmed from an amendment to the Physicians’ Act (醫師法) in 2001 allowing people who studied overseas to be qualified to take the first stage of the two-stage national medical licensing exam. As more countries joined the EU after the passing of the amendment, overseas study agencies have advertised English-language medical programs in Europe, targeting people who could not qualify for local medical schools. Examination Yuan data showed that, from the late 2000s, the number
RSS