Clothing that “hurts the nation’s feelings” could soon be banned in China, according to a recent draft law whose vagueness leaves much room for interpretation.
The bill stipulates that clothing and statements that “harm the spirit of the Chinese people” or “hurt the sentiments of the nation” will be punished with fines or even imprisonment.
However, the text does not define exactly what types of clothing are prohibited by this legislation.
In China, people who wear clothing or banners and convey politically controversial messages are already routinely punished for provoking “disputes and unrest.”
The aim of the project is to give the authorities more power to crack down on any clothing that is considered to be against morals.
In early September, a video shared on Chinese social media showed a man being interrogated by police in the southern city of Shenzhen after he filmed himself wearing a skirt.
Many Internet users supported police intervention because they feared that this behavior would “make people uncomfortable.”
“It goes against common morality,” one user wrote on Weibo, the Chinese social network.
Several lawyers in the country have publicly spoken out against the draft law, for which the public consultation period runs until September 30.
This would result in an “overly vague punishment standard, which would easily lead to an arbitrary expansion of the scope of administrative sanctions,” Lao Dongyan of Tsinghua University wrote on Weibo.
For similar reasons, Ms. He, a 23-year-old Beijing resident, advocates for “carefully establishing criteria before making such proposals.”
She believes it will take “more time” to “determine who has the authority to make decisions and how to make judgments” when it comes to crimes that “are not as clear-cut” as theft, “where true and are false and irrefutable”.
“Historical reasons”
But like most people interviewed by AFP in Beijing, Ms He attributes this reform more to incidents arising from the wearing of Japanese clothing at historical sites or on commemoration days.
In 2021, state-run tabloid Global Times claimed that a woman was “severely criticized” after she wore a kimono in public on December 13, the national day of remembrance for victims of war crimes committed by Japan in 1937 had.
Last year, a woman said she was arrested by police in the eastern city of Suzhou while wearing a kimono.
“Clothing is everyone’s choice and freedom, but there are also special (circumstances),” Ms. He said, ruling that certain behaviors “that are offensive in front of a statue or on a certain day” are “100% intentional.” are and must be punished.” ”
“If a person wears a kimono (…) at the monument to the victims of the Nanjing Massacre by the Japanese invaders, I think it would cause significant psychological damage to the Chinese people,” said Yang Shuo, a 25-year-old programmer . .
Such an act “should be punished,” he criticizes.
“There are historical reasons and I think the emotions of the local population should be taken into account,” said Mr. Gu, a 35-year-old man.
On the other hand, the thirty-year-old “doesn’t think it’s necessary to initiate proceedings in most cases.” Like “for example, if a person (in a kimono) just walks into a shopping street.”
In addition, Jeremy Daum, a researcher at Yale’s Paul Tsai China Center, believes it is “almost certain that the wording (of the project) will be heavily modified” to look more closely at “heroes, martyrs, the history of the party and its followers.” to deal with the numerous comments that this text provoked.