Former department of health minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良) yesterday refused to apologize for his comments from the day before, in which he said a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate was “useless” because she cannot bear any children at nearly 50 years old.
The comment came during a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) rally on Thursday, which Yaung attended to stump for KMT legislative candidate Chang Szu-kang (張斯綱).
Chang is running against DPP Legislator Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) to represent Taipei’s Beitou (北投) and Shilin (士林) districts.
Photo courtesy of Rosalia Wu’s office
Yaung said the DPP government was the cause of Taiwan’s low birthrate, then targeted Wu by saying: “She is useless now, at nearly 50 [years old], she cannot bear any children. She will have no kids and no grandchildren.”
He then turned to ask KMT City Councilor Hsu Chiao-hsin (徐巧芯) sitting nearby if she has any children, and after she said “no,” he told Hsu not to give a speech, but to “go home to make love [with her husband].”
Although Chang has since posted an apology saying he does not agree with the comment, Yaung during an interview yesterday refused to apologize.
“I was just stating facts,” he said. “I respect Wu’s decision to remain single... Each woman has the genes to become a mother. My remarks hurt Wu’s feeling, but why is she being so fragile?”
Wu said that Yaung is well-known for making slanderous remarks.
“He is a repeat misogynistic offender who hates women. Taiwan has made progress in gender equity, but the KMT is still full of old-guard conservatives and male chauvinists,” she said.
“Elections are for people to choose the best and most capable candidates. They should not be based on the perceived use of a woman’s uterus,” she added.
Wu also accused Chang of planning the incident as a smear tactic, saying that the candidate invited Yaung, knowing he would make personal attacks.
“It is not just about prejudice against women, but shows that negative campaigning is still useful in attracting public attention,” Wu said.
Separately, DPP Gender Equality Department head Lee Yen-jong (李晏榕) in a press release said that women “are not breeding machines.”
“Women need support from the government, society and their families to rear children. Politicians must not verbally harass and denigrate women, and must not use childbearing to impede women from participating in politics and public affairs,” Lee said.
The party also asked KMT candidates to oppose the views of their fellow members and speak out against the view that a woman’s proper place is in the home, Lee said.
Separately, DPP Legislator Lin Ching-yi (林靜儀), an obstetrician by profession, said that Yaung’s remark represents the “mainstream view” within the KMT.
“Yaung is known for making misogynistic remarks, but he still plays an important role in KMT campaigning and is a key member of the KMT’s think tank. It indicates that the KMT does not care about gender equity issues,” DPP Legislator Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) said.
Additional reporting by Kan Meng-lin
LOUD AND PROUD Taiwan might have taken a drubbing against Australia and Japan, but you might not know it from the enthusiasm and numbers of the fans Taiwan might not be expected to win the World Baseball Classic (WBC) but their fans are making their presence felt in Tokyo, with tens of thousands decked out in the team’s blue, blowing horns and singing songs. Taiwanese fans have packed out the Tokyo Dome for all three of their games so far and even threatened to drown out home team supporters when their team played Japan on Friday. They blew trumpets, chanted for their favorite players and had their own cheerleading squad who dance on a stage during the game. The team struggled to match that exuberance on the field, with
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. The single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, saber-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. A single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 800,000 to 400,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, sabre-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
RSS