Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition News and Article Release Issue Number: A206-O50
中国民主运动海外联席会议新闻与文章发布号：A206-O50
Release Date: May 20, 2006
发布日：2006年5月20日
Topic: Women's Issues in the Chinese Democracy Movement -- Impressions on Reading Ms. Huang Ciping's Article, 'Talking About the Issue of Women Staying at Home from the Perspective of a Human Rights Consciousness' (by Wu Zhenrong)
标题：中国民运中的妇女问题――读黄慈萍《从人权意识谈“妇女回归家庭问题”》感言（武振荣）
Original Language Version: Chinese (Chinese version at the end)
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Women's Issues in the Chinese Democracy Movement
-- Impressions on Reading Ms. Huang Ciping's Article, 'Talking About the Issue of Women Staying at Home from the Perspective of a Human Rights Consciousness'
By Wu Zhenrong
May 17, 2006
From ancient times to the present, Chinese society has always had male chauvinism. If we were to say that it still exists, then not only is it quite severe in an autocratic China, it also thoroughly exists in the democracy movement. If you look up all the articles in Chinese democracy websites, you would have a hard time finding but a few articles entirely devoted to women's issues. This is clearly a matter of great regret to the Chinese democracy movement. Yet when the "Beijing Spring" magazine published Ms. Huang Ciping's article "Talking About the Issue of Women Staying at Home from the Perspective of a Human Rights Consciousness" in their May 2006 edition, it helped to fill a void that the democracy movement has left in this area. Thus, I believe that this article is very well written, is something worthwhile for democracy advocates to read, and the issues raised therein are issues valuable for every democracy advocate to ponder.
Of course, if we objectively observe issues, we will discover that in today's China that research into women's issues has already achieved a certain scale. But research into women's issues from the democracy movement's stance and from the perspective of a human rights consciousness is practically nonexistent. If we take into consideration the fact that in the future, 50 percent of China's democracy participants are women, then we should realize how important women's issues are. If my viewpoint has some merit, then you would know that women are extremely active participants in politics and religion. During the Cultural Revolution, I got a sense that as soon as my female classmates got actively involved in something, they would become much more involved at it than men. At that time, there were quite a few people had same impressions as mine, so a few male classmates and I discussed this issue in a less-than-serious manner, and since we were just middle school students, we couldn't really make much progress on discussing this issue. After hitting middle age, I noticed when meeting and observing faith groups that women often had much stronger and enthusiastic faith than men. At that time, I was reading "Christianity and Women," a translated book which seemed to give me insight into an issue I had been pondering but whose main point I had been unable to grasp. I realized: if movements begin both in the two major areas of politics and religion, a natural and intimate relationship seems to exist between women and these movements. Thus, in pushing forward China's democratization through the democracy movement, how can our advocates slight women? Yet the fact is, among our democracy advocates, we do in fact slight women, and the situation is quite severe. You could say that we've hardly ever explored women's issues related to the democracy movement, much less given them special research.
In her deep dissatisfaction with this situation, Ms. Huang Ciping penned this article, saying, "People often have trouble understanding my method of giving democracy advocates a 'human rights consciousness' grade. I know that my method of grading people is different from others'. 50 percent of the grade is the person's attitude toward women - isn't 50 percent of the world women, after all? From this angle, as I see it, no one makes the grade. If they can't make the grade in terms of a 'human rights consciousness,' where comes their qualification for human rights and democracy?" Here, I believe that Ms. Huang's criticism is just right, and is not excessive at all. If, in comparison to the stuff of autocracy, the spirit and thinking of democracy deals with human issues with meticulous thoughts and feelings and subtle understandings, then it naturally follows that democracy advocates should give more attention and concern to the Chinese women who live in an autocratic society. Yet in reality, I have yet to come across this type of attention and concern. What I see in the reality is a different situation, one in which we seem did not discover, one in which the democracy movement sees no need to give women's issues an independent existence. From another angle, this shows the careless of our democracy advocates' way of thinking and our crude way of understanding issues.
Looking back at the 1950s, the time in which Chinese women were to "stand up for themselves," if we could say that this period had some value, it's in that great amounts of women - especially countryside women - were, to some extent, able to marry the partner of their choice. This matter relates to the slogan "women can hold up half the sky" that was popular in Chinese society at the time. If we could say that this was a social advancement of a sort, then during this current "reforms and opening up era", women's situation became even worse than it was originally. Just like Ms. Huang said: "Now we see in Chinese society phenomena such as 'concubines,' 'female escorts,' 'prostitutes,' and so on. These are all proof of the low status of women." This is to say that during a time when China is said to be advancing, we have yet to see a single aspect of women's lives and situations that would make us optimistic. Thus, if we use these phenomena to analyze issues after the Mao Zedong Era, we will no longer be mislead by the "reforms and opening up" language played up by Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and the like. Regardless of what you say, Chinese women are facing a typical "going backwards" situation, despite this being a time when things should be advancing. This is something that worries everyone that cares about China's future and about democracy. Thus, as the Chinese democracy movement progresses, we must give prominence to the democratic principle of the importance of women which is 50% of our population. Thus, Ms. Huang's article has given us a reminder, or in other words, she started a very good beginning.
Ms. Huang Ciping is one of the few people within the ranks of our democracy advocates who has expertise in women's issues, so her article discussing women staying at home was written very professionally, and touches upon many women's issues, both international and inside China, from women's education, marriage, employment, and child-rearing, to women who work both outside and in the home. She hopes that research into Chinese women's issues in the democracy movement can gain the same status as women's issues have in the international community. Since I lack expertise in this field, I can't make a valuable critique into the merit of the specific issues she touched upon in her article. I'm just saying that as soon as the issues raised in this article gain attention within the ranks of the Chinese democracy movement, and as soon as we begin to work on them, then those with expertise in this area will have space to bring their knowledge into play. And if we believe that our Chinese democracy advocates hold the final duty to mobilize and organize the people and to improve the people's understanding of democracy, then if we read "Chinese people" as "Chinese women," I think that Ms. Huang's article is spot on.
Looking at some historical clues into this issue, we the democracy advocators should reflect the fact that Mao Zedong paying attention on women's issue during a time of great social turmoil. When he was beginning his guerrilla-style armed rebellion, he had already come to realize that the historical importance of Chinese women's issues deserves consideration. In his 1926 article, "Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan," this "expert" in armed rebellion gained an intuitive understanding of the special importance of women's issues in the Communist revolution. In analyzing the suppression Chinese women faced at that time, he purposefully brought up the idea of a "husband's authority." We all know that what kind of an era they were living in these days. Looking comparatively, today's Chinese democracy movement, in reality, signifies the development of our people's politics, culture, and civilization. If we are to turn a blind eye to these issues over a long period of time, the Chinese democracy movement will be unable to escape this valley it's stuck in. In China, for the democracy movement to mobilize the people to participate, in the end, it comes down to mobilizing Chinese women. I hope that democracy advocates can understand my thought. If we want to find our faults in this area, I think that over a long period of time, the phenomena that Chinese democracy advocates separating themselves from the Chinese people is the same as separating themselves from Chinese women. In this short article, I say that I don't fear having problems but instead fear lacking recognition of the problem, lacking the interest to research it and lacking the enthusiasm to resolve it. If Ms. Huang's article can draw our attention and have us understand that both today's and the future Chinese democracy movement implies a movement of women, then our understanding of democracy will make a great stride forward!
Perhaps Huang Ciping's enthusiasm for women's issues and the expertise that she possesses in the field has to do with her womanhood. To speak of facts with her own words, "As a woman, I was fated to face countless injustices and slights in Chinese society." I wish Ms. Huang's words and topic will inspire us more for discussion.
Written in Seoul, South Korea
(The Wei Jingsheng Foundation is responsible for this version of the English translation.)
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中文版
Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition News and Article Release Issue Number: A206-O50
中国民主运动海外联席会议新闻与文章发布号：A206-O50
Release Date: May 20, 2006
发布日：2006年5月20日
Topic: Women's Issues in the Chinese Democracy Movement -- Impressions on Reading Ms. Huang Ciping's Article, 'Talking About the Issue of Women Staying at Home from the Perspective of a Human Rights Consciousness' (by Wu Zhenrong)
标题：中国民运中的妇女问题――读黄慈萍《从人权意识谈“妇女回归家庭问题”》感言（武振荣）
Original Language Version: Chinese (Chinese version at the end)
此号以中文为准（英文在前，中文在后）
如有中文乱码问题，请与我们联系或访问:
http://www.weijingsheng.org/report/report2006/report2006-05/WuZR060520HCPwomenA206-O50.htm
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中国民运中的妇女问题
——读黄慈萍《从人权意识谈“妇女回归家庭问题”》感言
武振荣
中国社会自古以来都有一种所谓的“大男子主义”，如果说在今天它还是照样存在的话，那么别说在专制的中国它表现得非常严重，就是在民运队伍里也是完全存在的，如果你检索民主网站上的所有文章，很难发现有几篇文章是专门研究妇女问题的，可见，这的确是中国民主运动的一大憾事，但是，也就是在2006年最近一期《北京之春》上，刊登了黄慈萍女士《从人权意识谈“妇女回归家庭”》的文章，可以说是填补了民运在这一领域内的空白。因此，我认为这一篇文章很好，值得民运人士一读，文章中所提出来的问题也值得每一位民运人士思考。
当然，如果我们客观地观察问题，就会发现在目前中国，妇女问题的研究也已经形成了一定的规模，但是站在民主运动的立场上，从人权意识的高度上提出和研究妇女问题却是寥寥无几的，如果考虑到未来中国民主化运动的参与者50%是妇女，那么妇女问题的重要性就可见一斑了。如果我的看法有一定的道理的话，那么你就会知道在政治和宗教这两个领域内，妇女往往是非常积极的一类人。我在文化大革命运动中就产生出这样的感觉，就是说女同学一旦积极起来，要比男同学厉害得多。那时和我有同感的人的确不少，因此我和一些男同学们也曾经用不认真的态度谈论过这个问题，但因为我们都是中学生，也谈不出个名堂的。人到中年，我在接触和观察有信仰的人群时，又发现了妇女比男人在信仰上一般要强烈得多、热情得多的现象。那时我读了《基督教与妇女》这一本译著，对我过去思考而不得要领的问题好象有了一个理解的头绪：若说政治和宗教这两大领域都常常出现运动的话，那么妇女与运动关系之密切好象有着一种造物意义上的安排，因此作为要用民主运动的方式推进中国民主化进程的民运人士怎么可以轻视妇女问题呢？但是在民运人士中间，实际情况是，我们轻视妇女问题的现象非常严重，几乎可以说没有人进行有关民主运动方面的妇女问题的探索，更不用说有人在这一方面有过专门的研究。
正是对上述的问题非常不满意，黄慈萍女士才在这一篇文章中说道：“平时人们常常不理解我对民运人士‘人权意识’分数的打分方式，我觉得我的打分方式不同，在我这里对女人的态度算做总分的50%——世界上毕竟有50%的女人么？这么一来，我看都不及格了，‘人权意识’不及格，还有多少资格来谈人权搞民主呢？”在这里，我认为黄女士的批评恰倒好处，一点儿也不过分，如果说民主的精神和思想与专制的东西相对比有着一种对人的问题的精细的感触和细微的理解的话，那么民主人士或民运人士对于处于专制社会中的中国妇女们应该给予更多的关注和更多的关心就理所当然，但是现实情况是“理所当然”的情况我们是发现不了的，我能够看见的是另一种情况，就是妇女问题好象没有在民运中独立存在的必要，这就从一个侧面说明了我们中国民运人士思想的毛糙和认识问题的粗糙。
在20世纪50年代，被认为是中国妇女的“翻身时期”，这个时期如果说也有一定的价值的话，那就是广大妇女特别是农村妇女赢得了某种程度上的婚姻自主权，与这样是事情相联系的是中国社会上也流行着“妇女能顶半面天”的口号，如果说这多少可以算是一种社会的“进步”的话，那么在“改革开放”的这个时代，妇女的处境反而更加糟糕，如黄女士所言：“现在中国社会出现了‘包二奶’、‘三陪女’、‘卖淫’等现象，是妇女地位低下的一个左证。”这就是说，在我们中国被看成是一个“进步”的时间中，妇女的生活和处境却看不到一丝可以令人乐观的现象，因此我们若就这个现象来分析后毛泽东时代的问题的话，我们就不会为邓小平、江泽民、胡锦涛等那些人所鼓吹的“改革开放”的话语所迷惑，无论怎么说，在一个本当进步的时间上，中国妇女面临的这一种典型的“倒退”局面，是每一位关心中国前途和民主的人士所忧虑的，因此，在中国民主运动的进程中，无论如何都要突出妇女这50%的人的重要性可以说是一条民主的原则；而在这一方面，黄女士的文章就给我们提了个醒，或者说开了一个很好的头。
黄慈萍女士是民运队伍中少有的对妇女问题具有专门知识的人，因此这一篇重点讨论妇女回归家庭的文章写得很专业，其中涉及到了国际、国内妇女的许多问题，从妇女的教育、婚姻、就业、养育孩子等问题甚至说到了“全职妈妈”，欲使民运中的中国妇女问题研究与国际的水准衔接，我个人因缺乏这方面的专门知识，所以对她的文章所涉及的具体问题就不可能发表有价值的评论，我只是说一旦这一篇文章所指出的问题在中国民运队伍中引起人们的重视，一旦可以开一个好的头，那么在这一方面有专门知识的人就可以获得用武之地，又如果认为我们中国民运人士负有最终地发动人民、组织人民、提高人民民主觉悟的任务的话，那么，在这里我们把“中国人民”解读为“中国妇女”——我看就非常的正确。
我们民运人士若要在这个问题上寻找出一个历史的线索的话，那么，生长在“社会大动乱”时代的毛泽东，在一开始从事自己的“丛林原则”的“枪杆子革命”时，就已经注意到了中国妇女问题的重要性的历史值得我们深思，在写于1926年的《湖南农民运动考察报告》一文中，这个玩“枪杆子”的“专家”就对共产党革命中的妇女问题的特殊重要产生了一种直觉式的理解，在分析当时中国妇女所遭受的压迫时，还特意地提出了“夫权”，要知道那是怎样的时代啊！对比地看，在今天当中国民主运动事实上意味着我们民族在政治、文化、文明上的发展与进步时，我们若长期对此问题熟视无睹，中国民主运动就会如目前的这个状态一时还走不出低谷。在中国，民主的运动要最终地动员人民的参与的事情事实上可以说是动员中国妇女的参与，但愿这样的意思能够为民运人士们所理解。如果我们要寻找这一方面的失误的话，那么我以为，在一个相当长的时间内，中国民运人士脱离了中国人民这种现象也可以说是脱离中国妇女。在这一篇短文中，我说不怕存在问题，只怕我们对存在的问题缺乏认识、缺乏研究的兴趣和缺乏想解决它的热情。如果黄女士的文章能够引起我们大家的注意，使我们认识到在今天和未来的中国民主运动中本身就寓于着一个妇女的运动的话，那么我们对民主的认识就迈出了一大步！
黄慈萍对妇女问题有抱着如此高的热情，并且具有相当的专业知识，这也许与她是一位女性有关，用她自己的话讲：“身为女儿身，命中注定要我面对无数中国社会对女性不公与不尊敬”的事实发言，但愿这一套言论和话语能够供更多的人讨论和谈论。
2006-5-17于首尔（原汉城）
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