All hail the new kings, same as the old kings (or, the KMT double standard)

You all are getting taken for a ride.
You've taken this ride before, and you don't even remember that it made you puke. 

So everyone's going on about why the DPP lost so badly. It's a "rebuke" to the Tsai administration. Some are saying they weren't listening to their base (many of whom are center-right social conservative small-business owners and working-class people, generally Taiwan independence supporters). Others are saying they didn't deliver on progressive promises, so their other column of support - young Taiwanese liberals - abandoned them. Someone I know is saying that Taiwanese want a center-right society and will accept it being pro-China or pro-Taiwan. Another is saying Taiwanese vote with their wallets, and the KMT could offer more economic perks.

All of these things are true at once (though I'm not quite so sure about progressive deserters - some of them went for the NPP, true, but who else would they have voted for? The KMT? They know the KMT is even less progressive than the DPP, and voter turnout wasn't too low so they didn't stay home.)

But there's another issue which bothers the hell out of me. It's been said before, just not about this election, and yet it holds now too.

How is it that the KMT can screw up so spectacularly every time - like, every single time - and still get "a second chance" or "time for their ideas to show results", but if the DPP isn't immediately Jesus Who Descendeth From Heaven To Save Us All, they're angrily voted out before we can even see what the effects of their policies are?

Let's start with China.

ECFA was a joke - it didn't really do much for the economy except hollow out the job market as everything was moved to China (which was exactly China's intent). Exports grew more under Chen - whom China hated - than they did under Ma. Chinese tourism was a joke - it had little-to-no effect on the Taiwanese economy. It was one massive scam that made the country a noticeably worse place to live while offering no real benefit (unless cheap, tacky hotels spurting up like whiteheads across scenic areas or caravans of tour buses and the low-wage jobs they bring - but not more than that as most of the companies that own those hotels and tour/bus companies are based in China - can be called a "benefit". Which they can not.) Although it was great if you enjoyed getting locked out of purchasing train tickets.

And yet Ma got "four more years" to "give him a chance", the KMT remained strong, and didn't suffer any real wipeouts until halfway through Ma's second term when his "chance" came to fruition and it was shown to be a stinking heap of garbage, because a bunch of plucky activists drew back the curtain.

For a short while, it was clear to everyone that China's strategy was to parlay increased economic dependence into increased political integration. China didn't even try to hide this. For the briefest glimmer of a moment, people realized that the 1992 Consensus was a massive made-up turd bomb and they didn't have to agree that there was "one China" or that they were a part of it. They voted in a government to try something new.

So the DPP goes ahead and does exactly what we elected them to do, which was decrease Taiwan's economic dependence on China and pursue other strategies, while refusing to acknowledge a fabricated "consensus".

The effects were not immediate, and we always knew there would be drawbacks (Chinese money sure does look nice and smell like profit, but underneath that there's a whiff of political oppression that cannot be Febreezed away.)

And yet, because the exact drawbacks we knew would manifest did, Taiwan got mad and voted a bunch of DPPers out. We don't even know yet what the long term effect of the DPP's policies will be, because it's only been two years, and yet they didn't completely transform Taiwan into a perfect wonderland where everyone is rich. No matter that the KMT couldn't do in eight years what the DPP could not possibly have done in two. Let's have those guys back!

Now, newly-elected KMT mayors are talking about recognizing the 1992 Consensus. They will get an influx of Chinese capital for their obedience, and it will certainly smell like profit. These cities will become increasingly economically dependent on China, but will seem as though they are doing better than municipalities not governed by the KMT.

Never mind that this sets up a perfect system of economic blackmail. Do what we say, or we turn off the spigot. This isn't hyperbole or speculation. They did this with Chinese tourists to Taiwan and then spread fake news about what an economic disaster it was (it wasn't). They are doing it to Palau. They are likely to try it with Chinese students in Taiwan. They'll do it with everything from the Olympics (fuck those guys, by the way) to the Golden Horse awards. 

Nevermind that we figured this out in 2014 - it's like nobody remembered the lesson. Yeah, let's vote exactly those dudes we occupied a legislature to stop back in power to do the exact thing we all went downtown to make them stop doing again, because after giving them eight years to sell out Taiwan, we couldn't completely fix it in two years.

And we won't even know how well we might have fixed it, because for all this "we gave the DPP a chance in 2016", no my dudes, you did not. Not the way you keep handing Taiwan to the KMT like they're holding the magic key when really they're holding something far more flaccid. 

And there's the air pollution and the nuclear issue.

The KMT completely screwed us on air pollution, not giving a damn about it until they could hand the problem over to the DPP. Yes, we should have known under Chen Shui-bian that we needed to start investing in renewable energy technology, but it was still early then: most other nations hadn't fully begun to realize that yet, either. But it was glaringly clear that this was the direction we needed to take under Ma Ying-jeou, who promptly stuck his thumb up his ass and did jack-all about it for 8 years as the situation grew worse.

And yet the DPP gets voted out because they didn't fix air pollution in 2 years.

Everyone was willing to go ahead with the anti-nuclear activists (whom I still sort of blame for not concurrently pushing for a serious green energy policy, and who seemed happy to return to coal as long as Taiwan denuclearized) until they realized that would make air pollution worse, because again the KMT spent eight years doing jack-all about it so we had no better alternatives, and voted nuclear back in. Not that it matters: whether we denuclearize or not, air pollution here won't get better until the government takes it seriously, and neither party has taken it seriously. The only difference is the KMT gets eight years to not take it seriously, but the DPP is expected to make it all better in two.

This sucks, and not all of it is from China (some of it is).
But to blame the DPP for this after two years when it got this way under the KMT to begin with?

Even so, the DPP has both screwed up and shown glimmers of awareness. On one hand, pollution has gotten worse. In places like Taichung where it is especially noticeable, the government preferred to massage the air quality numbers rather than do anything, and they have been quietly reopening coal-fired plants. 

On the other, I recall that until fairly recently, power generated from green energy companies could not be sold directly to consumers. So, of course, nobody was producing it because there was no money to be made (if I remember correctly, the power generated had to be first sold to Taipower). That changed not long ago under Tsai, not the KMT.

Then there's wages. Sure. Wages have been stagnating and Taiwan's minimum wage is "unjustifiable" (to quote the News Lens above).

But again, the KMT let the minimum wage stagnate for four years, then got re-elected so it could stagnate for another four. Give them a chance! We don't know how well their ideas are working! people said. Nevermind that it was blatantly obvious that they didn't give a damn, because big bosses were doing alright and if they weren't they could just go to China.

The DPP raises the minimum wage more than it has risen in decades, and yet Tsai gets a "rebuke" for low wages. Do they really think wages will rise more under the KMT, when they didn't for eight goddamn years?

A screenshot from a Lu Shiow-yen campaign ad.

Seriously, you guys. Lin Chia-lung was imperfect and didn't fix the problems he inherited from Jason Hu.
But he took his job seriously and ran a positive campaign, and yet you elected someone who won't even hire interns who can spell "center" correctly?
ARE YOU KIDDING ME

And I could say something similar about labor laws. I'm not a fan of the 2nd round of labor law amendments, and the first round weren't great either. But, they were a substantial improvement over KMT policy, and yet workers immediately cried out that it wasn't enough, while bosses immediately cried out that they'd no longer be able to treat workers like slaves, and that will make us less competitive! WE NEED SLAVES!

The KMT knew this issue was a hornet's nest, so they basically threw workers under the bus for eight years because the Boss Class was enough to get them elected. The DPP made a mediocre attempt at addressing the problem, and suddenly they're the devil fucking incarnate.

And finally there's marriage equality.

Yes, the DPP wimped out on this one. Yes, they failed to grow a spine, and they lacked moral courage. They backed away from campaign rhetoric and disillusioned their progressive voters, thinking that their bigot voters could carry them through.

And yet, among them there are supporters of equality. Some DPP legislators have been trying to get it on the docket for quite a long time, before it was a mainstream topic. At least they were willing to try out the rhetoric, and I do believe their goal was to wait out the clock so the civil code would automatically be re-interpreted, knowing full well that a.) if this ever came to a vote, conservative Taiwanese would be mobilized by well-organized hatemongers and vote against it (and lo, that is exactly what happened), and b.) passing a 'separate law' would not satisfy progressive voters.

What did the KMT do? Eight years of not giving a shit about marriage equality, that's what (to be fair, twelve ago the mainstream wasn't about marriage equality, so this isn't just an issue of an uncaring KMT. Society at large didn't care, either). Sure, since then, a few pro-equality KMT legislators have made themselves known (though offhand I can only recall the name of one), but all-in-all it was clear in this election cycle that anti-equality campaigners and the KMT are hand-in-hand (and, again, I suspect this might be the result of a quiet alliance, not a coincidental convergence of interests).

So progressives, fine, you're mad at the DPP for being such cop-outs. I get it. But you know the KMT is going to be worse, and yet you let the DPP get slammed because they couldn't convince the more conservative elements of society to go along. Yes, they could have tried harder, but the KMT was and is never even going to try.

You blame the DPP for every single thing - even things that weren't their fault, from the nuclear/coal conundrum to the Taipei Dome. You voted Hau out because of the Taipei Dome, after giving him eight years to sit there jacking it in his office. Ko (not DPP but the point is, he's not KMT) just barely gets re-elected because he couldn't fix Hau's corrupt mess in four years, despite marked improvements in the city, from real bike lanes to an improved North Gate (though to be clear, I'm not a fan of Ko and absolutely do not want him to be president.) Yet you give credit to the KMT for things they didn't even do (the KMT routinely takes credit for improving MRT access in New Taipei, but as a friend pointed out, those plans were laid in the Chen administration) and keep re-electing them.

This has a basis in history too. The KMT stole from Taiwan for two generations, and then got a second chance in 2008 because they've "changed" (HOW DID THEY CHANGE EXACTLY?) Chen Shui-bian - admittedly not the greatest guy - steals a fraction of that and suddenly the DPP is evil and untouchable for more than half a decade.

I get that expectations are higher  - I keep hearing "well we expect that from the KMT but we wanted better from the DPP", but then give them a chance to do better just like you do with the KMT! 

Mark my words. The KMT is going to do a terrible job, because they always do. And yet they will get "a second chance", because they always do. They won't be able to fix pollution or wages - they won't even try to fix wages - they'll just tell you all to go to China for work. Same country anyway, har har har. Even if they could fix pollution, they won't try to do that either, because the only punishment for being lazy moneygrubbing China-fluffing wankstains the first time around was two years in the wilderness.

Oh but they will make Taiwan economically dependent on China, bring back attempts to force Taiwanese to say publicly that they are Chinese (that is what the 1992 Consensus is, after all), and work with Christian hate groups to ensure that the constitution can never be interpreted to allow marriage equality.

There will be a big battle for the presidency, and a peace agreement with China because we never learn our lesson, and we will become Hong Kong with no freedom or autonomy. People will start to believe - because the KMT will tell them to - that Chinese money is helping Taiwan, even if it isn't. They'll start to believe peace can be negotiated with the power that seeks to annex them. They'll give them "another chance".

And unless some new Sunflowers come 'round to teach us all a lesson again, we'll become Hong Kong. And then, when we don't comply, Xinjiang. The world will do nothing, because that's what it always does. Some people will even believe this is better for you or that it's a step in the right direction toward "peaceful reunification". The KMT won't even try to stop this disinformation leaking into international political discourse, because it serves their purposes for the rest of the world to be misinformed about Taiwan.

After a brief, imperfect but also glorious window when the world seemed to be finally waking up to the reality of democratic Taiwan, they will be yet again hypnotized into believing that the Taiwanese want the 1992 Consensus or "Chinese Taipei". Doesn't matter that that's not true, and it's a hack interpretation to believe that it is (voting out of fear of IOC retribution is not the same as embracing "Chinese Taipei".)

And then we'll be dead and Taiwan will be gone.

The party's starting late (or: it's your country - save it yourself)

We are all Taiwan souls

Just some thoughts in the warm light of day. 

I'm a little hungover this morning, so I got up late and put up this flag just to remind myself that the fight's not over. 

I have less to say about the races so I'll talk about marriage equality. Honestly, I think that's the one we all cared about the most. 

First, yes, despite the deliberately confusing wording of the referendums, we were a bit too early to the party for marriage equality in Taiwan. The old folks came out and voted, and they showed that the wrong side of history still holds sway here. 

But let's remember a few things. We were early to the party, but what we heard last night wasn't the voice of eternal conservatism in Taiwan. What we heard is that the party is still on, it's just going to start later than expected. 

Young people are more disenfranchised in Taiwan's voting system: they're broke, they can't vote absentee even though they're less likely to live where they are registered, they work long hours so it's hard to travel back. Some perhaps didn't vote because they knew they'd be harangued by their elders for voting the "wrong" (actually the right) way. It doesn't change the fact that the younger generation DOES think differently for the most part, and unlike views on things like fiscal policy, this isn't a view that grows more conservative with age. They got complacent perhaps, because all their friends are pro-equality too so it seemed like the country was more firmly on their side. They thought 10, 11 and 12 would be defeated, so it didn't matter if it was inconvenient to vote. But the old folks will die and the younger ones will do better. 

Let's remember as well that the pro-equality side had far less funding - why aren't you guys donating, by the way? - and young people are too busy and broke to volunteer. You could see it in their materials: their brochures weren't as glossy or thick, or as great in number, because they didn't have the cash. Unlike the bigots, who could recruit housewives with nothing better to do, their supporters work long hours just to get by and so they couldn't get out and volunteer as much. But that doesn't mean supporters don't exist. 

People might say "Taiwan is a conservative society" and I have to admit there's some truth to that. But it is not conservative across the board: older folks still hold a lot of cultural power, but the winds of change are blowing. They were blowing in the US in the 1960s, even though most people still opposed civil rights (the majority were against the Civil Rights Act when it passed). They were blowing in the 1970s and 80s, when most people thought the participants of the Kaohsiung Incident were ruffians and 'bad elements', because the KMT dictatorship portrayed them that way in the media. Now we know better. Both the US and Taiwan still have a long way to go, but we have come some distance. 

And yes, some people were tricked. My student on Friday was talking about how a "separate law" could still be "equal", and I had to set him straight (he'd heard misinformation). A former student said the referendums were so confusing that they seemed to have been written by "an elementary-school student". A lot of people who theoretically believe in equality but are still coming to terms with this new world of LGBT acceptance thought the wording of #12 sounded tempting. A lot of people were misled to believe that the problem with sex education in schools is that it starts too young (it doesn't, by the way) - that's what the commercials said - and don't realize that the intention is to ban it from school altogether. 

While the anti-gay referendums might still have gotten more votes than the pro-equality ones had the wording been clearer, I honestly doubt they would have passed. That's what the anti-gay Christians had to do to get votes: to deliberately confuse people. If Taiwan really agreed with them, they could have written three clear proposals. It says a lot that they didn't. 

The fact that the bigots had to deliberately make the wording fuzzy and spread lies to get votes, that they had to pour so much money into their campaign, and that they had to move from trying to "portray LGBT people as morally degenerate" (to quote a friend) to "we support a separate law to protect LGBT rights and interests" shows that they had to pretend to care about equality to get all those votes. Taiwanese people did not vote "WE HATE GAYS" last night. The Christian jerks lost that battle. They voted "we're scared of change, so let's pick this thing that seems like equality so we don't feel too terrible. After all, aren't we still protecting LGBT rights if there's a separate law?"

(No, but I can see why some people were convinced that this was the case.)

Someone else I know pointed out that conservative forces in Taiwan have been studying US electoral politics, and I agree. The deep green conservatives who want global recognition for Taiwan got played with a bunch of needless 'culture war' garbage that has actually set back their goal. Marriage equality was one way to get Taiwan into the headlines, and now Taiwan looks bad. I hope they're happy. They pulled a Trump in Kaohsiung (Han Kuo-yu is not only terrifyingly right-wing populist, he can barely answer questions and never gives details, and beats people up for no reason at all). They're doing a really good job in getting us lefties to all hate each other for no goddamn reason. 

The US voted right-wing in 2016 too, and those of us who are trying to bend the arc of history towards justice realized we weren't fighting hard enough, and we weren't fighting well enough. We realized that marching around with signs is only part of the equation, and we needed to start politicking (again to quote a friend) and stop shitting all over every incremental improvement that was not the total change we wanted. I think Taiwanese youth will realize this too, and stop thinking that only 100% moral purity will do, or that anything less than 100% victory is defeat - and it's time to start politicking. 

We should have learned this in 2014, when the Sunflowers stopped CSSTA and effected a huge electoral change not because every one of their demands was met, but because they ended the occupation after a sufficient victory. Their slogan was 自己的國家，自己救 (it's your country, save it yourself) - and we should have learned from that and not just trusted politicians to do the right thing or for 10, 11 and 12 to fail.

Or we could have learned it during the Wild Strawberries, where they were broadly ignored in their time but have had a big influence on Taiwan in the 2010s. Or we could have learned this during the Kaohsiung Incident, which broadly failed in its day (many participants went to jail, some were tortured), but they kept fighting.

Culture wars work to get out the vote, and as I do suspect that the KMT cut a deal with churches to quash marriage equality for votes (I can't prove this; I just suspect it), which with the deep green conservatives, pushed the anti-equality initiatives over the top. But neither the US nor Taiwan is homogenously bigoted. We might be post-Sunflower in Taiwan now, but Taiwan is not only a 'conservative society'. Remember that it was the Christians - people who follow a Western religion - who spearheaded this. They got others to agree, but non-Christian Taiwanese were not leading the fight. 

And it's ridiculous to let Christians define what it means to be Taiwanese. Taiwan is not a Christian nation. Even if you consider Taiwanese culture to be an outgrowth of Chinese culture (which I don't), Chinese culture was not particularly traditionally opposed to homosexuality. While things may have been different for everyday people, rulers often had gay lovers and nobody cared as long as they produced heirs. There's an entire opera - The Butterfly Lovers (梁祝) - in which a boy falls in love with a girl dressed like a boy, and is conflicted (in the end she's to be married to someone else and they both commit suicide.) In the opera, his confusion over his feelings is merely described; it is not condemned. Being anti-gay is not inherently Chinese (if you think Taiwan has Chinese heritage, which, again, I don't). It may be Neo-Confucian and Christian-tinged authoritarian (the Chiangs were Christian), but it is not "Chinese". 

The 100,000+ people who have turned out for pro-equality events are Taiwanese too. The few million who did vote for equality are Taiwanese too. Those who got tricked into voting for 'a separate law' but are actually not bigoted are Taiwanese too. People say that ascribing certain 'Western' values to Taiwan makes white folks like me 'culturally imperialist', but I'm not the one doing it. I'm describing what they are doing, and they have just as much of a say in what is or is not 'Taiwanese' as the old conservatives.

I mean, when America sort-of voted for Trump, liberals didn't think "oh, I guess that means we don't have any say in what it means to be American". We re-evaluated what we thought we knew about our country, realized we needed a new strategy, and kept fighting, because we were and are just as American as anyone from Trump Country.

What's more, in the US once marriage equality was made law, it ceased to be a relevant issue. Just as with every other country in the world - and even in the US's own past with abolition, suffrage and civil rights - often popular opinion follows law rather than preceding it. That's not the typical order in Asia (generally things don't change here until popular opinion supports a change), but that doesn't mean it's impossible. In fact, I suspect in the years after May 2019 when some sort of same-sex unions become law, they will then become normalized. Then, the groundwork will be there for true equality. 

And yes, a lot of young people also voted against equality, because they grew up in conservative families. Because Taiwan is more "filial piety"-oriented (well, Neo-Confucian obedience-oriented - Confucius never envisioned 'filial piety' this way) it will take longer, but more will break free as they grow, and the ones who do not will not be the definitive voice of the next generation. 

So we need to support them - with our time, our advice from the battles we've fought in our own countries, and our money (DONATE, YOU GUYS) - so they can make this party happen for real. We need to engage with them and they need to figure out how to engage with their elders. 

Let's remember as well that the DPP may be spineless, and they don't all support us, but they didn't want marriage equality to be decided by the electorate for just this reason. They knew how it'd turn out, and they knew what the more conservative wing of their base thought. So they may lack moral courage, but we do have allies among some of them. We can't make the mistake of thinking that electing them will fix everything again: it's your country, save it yourself. 

The good news is that their conservative base is pro-Taiwan, and Taiwan stands for equality and human rights. I do believe that some of them can be convinced in the coming years, if we make the right arguments about marriage equality being good for the country's international profile, for Taiwan's economy, and for Taiwanese values, of which equality is a part.

Another bright spot as well is that the NPP won several city council seats, and Miao Poya, the first openly LGBT city councilor, was elected last night in my district. We do have allies. The old people don't get to define all of what it means to be Taiwanese. The Council of Grand Justices has already said their ruling stands. 

That shows we've already pushed the conversation a little bit in the right direction. The "gays are degenerate and have AIDS!" argument no longer works here. And no matter what, there will be some form of same-sex partnerships in May. This is not a 100% victory, but it's a step. Once that happens, and people realized that AIDS doesn't start falling from the sky, then we can actually get this party started. 

I'm here in my party dress and I have to believe it will start. 

In other words, that flag above and the people who fly it are *just* as Taiwanese as any old bigot at the polls. And we've got one thing that most of Asia doesn't: actual democracy. China says "'Chinese' [by their definition] people are not ready for democracy", but although we don't like the results, and some outcomes seem straight-up stupid, you have to admit: people were engaged and talking about the races and referendums. People turned out to vote. They didn't vote the way wed've liked, but Taiwan can still prove that 'Chinese' [again, China's definition, not mine] can and have built a democracy. We only have to hope that it stands, because there are some huge tests coming.

Well. We are all Taiwan souls. Some of us were born into it, some of us are not actually Taiwanese but this is our home. I don't get any say in what is or is not "Taiwanese", but our liberal Taiwanese friends do. We need to support them. Now. 

I am deeply disappointed in Taiwan today. I still love this country, but I don't like it very much right now. But this is my home and I may be crying and hungover, but I have to keep fighting for it.

Whatever Happens Tomorrow

I'm back, just in time! My last pre-dissertation paper is in and I've caught up on sleep, so hopefully it'll be less of a wasteland in here while I get back into writing (though I have a backlog of things I need to write for other people, so it may not be the frenzy that was October).

So, I awoke from my post-academic-writing stupor to realize, oh crap, the election is tomorrow! I can't vote so it shouldn't matter to me, but it does.

I don't like...any of the candidates, just about anywhere. So I'm not even bothering - the major races are a mess and that's that. Taipei especially has no good options. Sooo, whatever. Most of all, I'm worried about marriage equality. And pissed, because while I understand that the DPP wussed out in part because their more conservative supporters weren't having it on changing the civil code, if they'd acted swiftly and just pushed it through, we would not be in this position now, with a vote coming up on people's basic human rights.

This is related to my worry about the candidates, though: the KMT candidates are just...so anti-equality, and anti-gay groups are apparently showing up at their rallies according to friends of mine who have attended (I've been too busy to attend, because I'm a cut-rate blogger.) I have to wonder if the KMT cut a back-room deal with the pink-shirted church jerks: bus your sheep parishioners to our rallies and get them to vote for us, and we'll make sure there's no change to the civil law. We don't actually care, but we want your votes so we'll throw them under the bus for you if you show up for us. 

It doesn't seem likely that the two pro-equality referendums will pass, simply because although at least 25% of the voting population supports them, a fair number are young and can't return 'home' to vote either because they can't afford it or they have to work. Of the big, soft center of Taiwanese society of decent folks who aren't opposed to equality, but aren't passionately for it, I worry that many just won't vote, or will vote for the anti-equality referendums because they've been tricked by those horrible church people.

But, if we do win, the church people aren't going away. We won't have really beat them until we change the civil code and normalize equality to the point that they won't be able to get support for changing it back.

If we lose, there are a few things to take comfort in.

First, that the old out-vote the young, because the young are busy and broke. Even if the anti-equality referendums pass and the pro-equality ones don't, that won't be a complete reflection of Taiwanese society.

Second, they may be trying to put a barrier in our way - ironically making life more difficult for the next generation while braying about how they are trying to "protect" the youth - but the youth of Taiwan overwhelmingly support marriage equality, and while people may grow more conservative as they age, that's never struck me as a view that tends to change once someone realizes equality is right. Those old church people will die - some of them soon, because they're old - and their legacy will not live on. It's too late for that. This particular arc of justice may be long, but its trajectory is pretty set.

Third, even if we do lose, there will be some form of civil partnership by May next year. That doesn't satisfy me - inequality is still inequality and it's not good enough - but it's a step, and then we keep fighting.

What worries me on this end is that politically, Taiwan stands to benefit a great deal from equality: think of the headlines once it actually goes through! It's been great PR for this country already, and started to wake the world up to the ways in which Taiwan is a bastion of (comparative - in certain ways only) liberalism in Asia. The longer we delay that, the worse it will be for Taiwan. And if we delay too long and are not, in fact, the first country in Asia to pass actual marriage equality, we'll lose a huge opportunity to make massive global headlines. All those pro-independence greens who say they want the world to notice Taiwan as Taiwan, but who are conservative and maybe even Christian (the DPP has strong ties to the Presbyterian church) are shooting themselves in the foot, and they don't even seem to realize it. We not only need to do this soon for the sake of LGBT people, we need to be the first in Asia for Taiwan's political sake.

And finally, it's not particularly clear to me that the results of any of these referendums are binding (I've heard people say they are, and that they aren't, and I've been too mired in school work to research it on my own.)

So, whatever happens tomorrow, the march toward equality in Taiwan continues, and there will be progress. There has already been progress: from a few years ago when the anti-equality side was trying to stop any sort of civil partnership for LGBT people and attempting to paint them as moral degenerates, to now when even the anti-gay camp being forced to support some sort of civil partnership law, the conversation has changed. If we lose, we can't accept the bottom line of the church people, but we have shown that the conversation can keep changing.

100,000 or so people showed up to Ketagalan Boulevard this past Sunday for a pop-and-metal-star filled afternoon of music and cheering, when estimates had been for a far smaller crowd. It was bigger than the rally for any of the Taipei mayoral candidates, and bigger than anything the anti-equality crowd has been able to put together. Interestingly - from my perspective anyway - the way marriage equality has been approached in Taiwan feels unique. I can't imagine, before it became a nationwide law in the US, a pro-equality rally featuring a black metal band as one of its most famous acts. I guess in the US we just don't Metal For Our Rights (to quote a friend). I sat through the whole thing writing my paper while splayed out on the pavement, protesting and doing my homework at the same time...and I have never felt more Taiwanese.

In any case, we draw crowds. We change conversations. We push forward. The generation that is on its way out is the last generation that will keep us from marriage equality in Taiwan. Even if they win this battle, they have emphatically lost the war.

That doesn't make me happy per se, but it's keeping me away from the bottle tonight.

Yes, Ko Wen-je said a sexist thing again

The ladies of Taipei according to Ko Wen-je

So, it's time we all just admitted frankly that Ko Wen-je is a sexist jackass.

This time, it's over comments that "Japanese women make themselves up more beautifully" than Taiwanese women, with Taiwanese women not wearing makeup "go directly outside and terrify people", and that being aesthetically pleasing not only shows dedication but is a responsibility (presumably, of women).

I mean, I totally understand. What with Ko Wen-je being such a well-manicured hottie, he sure takes great care of his 'aesthetics' and women can't help swooning over him, I mean, just look at that carefully-maintained visage that makes ladies' hearts go a-flutte - -

Oh yeah THAT guy really has standing to talk about how women need to make themselves prettier. 

Oh, wait, that's not him. Sorry. The other guy is Ko. Hmm. Gotcha.

Do you like gardening, Mayor Ko? Because that is one massive glass house ya got there.

Obviously, it bothers me that the mayor of the city I live in, who is likely to be re-elected, is a sexist jerk.

It bothers me that he remains popular despite being a sexist jerk (if he'd committed actual sexual harassment he'd probably be a goner politically, but apparently stupid, sexist comments aren't enough), and that the media seem to cover for him.

I mean, there's no excuse for his recent comments, but please enjoy some smokescreens for sexist comments in the past:

Ko "clarifies" that both unmarried women and men over 30 are a "national security risk" (note verb choice)

"Gaffe-prone" Ko says he's "still learning to be a politician", which sounds like apologia for comments that are shitty even when non-politicians make them - note the way the prominence of Ko's "explanation" and the use of "gaffe" downplay the nature of what he actually said. And not just one thing - this is over two separate comments, both of which were horrible!

It also implies, from Ko's perspective, that everyday men say these things and that's OK (men I know have assured me they and other men typically don't, even in all-male company), but politicians shouldn't. No, dude. You shouldn't make comments that a woman is "so pretty" that she's not fit to be mayor but that she should instead "be a receptionist or model for tourism promotion materials", or "I didn't become a OB-GYN because I'd have to make a living between women's legs" even if you are not a politician. So there's nothing to "learn" to not say about women in order to be mayor. You're just an asshole.

You really think after these sorts of comments that the women of Taipei think you can do a good job as their elected representative? What woman would want to be governed by you?

So, this time around, let's not do that, okay? Let's call it what it is. Ko Wen-je definitely has his distinct personality and so he makes off-color remarks. Fine. I do that too! I live for off-color things (as long as they're not mean to the wrong people). But can we just admit that off-color sexist remarks belie sexist beliefs no matter your personality? Thanks.

But what bothers me more is that he's the best choice we've got in the upcoming election.

I don't care about one stupid comment, not really. I care that he keeps making them and yet there's no other solid choice to vote for.

I'm not writing this stuff because I want to trash Mayor Ko for no reason, and I'm not writing it because I want him to lose the upcoming election (what I say here won't matter in that regard anyway). I'm aware that the other two choices are worse: Ting Shou-jung is a China-loving, anti-independence sack of empty slogans and Pasuya Yao...I mean, lol.

If anything, that's the problem: Ko is a jackass - a smart, hardworking jackass, but a jackass nonetheless - yet we don't have a better choice. We finally get the first non-KMT mayor since Chen Shui-bian and he's...a jackass. It burns.