“I’ve been warned not to talk about it,” one woman wrote, before detailing the day she alleges she was arrested for publishing gay erotica.
“I’ll never forget it – being escorted to the car in full view, enduring the humiliation of stripping naked for examination in front of strangers, putting on a vest for photos, sitting in the chair, shaking with fear, my heart pounding.”
The user, Pingping Anan Yongfu, is among at least eight who have recently shared accounts on the Chinese social media platform Weibo of being arrested for publishing gay erotic fiction. As these authors recounted their experiences, dozens of lawyers have offered pro bono legal assistance.
According to a lawyer defending one of the writers, at least 30 authors, nearly all women in their 20s, have been arrested across China since February. While many are out on bail or awaiting trial, some remain in custody. Another lawyer told the BBC that numerous other contributors were summoned for questioning.
These authors had published their work on Haitang Literature City, a Taiwan-hosted platform known for its “danmei,” a genre of so-called boys’ love and erotic fiction.
Consider it a gay version of Fifty Shades of Grey: a BDSM relationship culminating in a happily-ever-after. This trope frequently appears across historical, fantasy, or sci-fi settings, and over the years, it has cultivated a fiercely devoted following, particularly among young Chinese women.
These authors are accused of violating China’s pornography law by “producing and distributing obscene material.” Writers who profit from their work could face imprisonment for over 10 years.
The law targets “explicit descriptions of gay sex or other sexual perversions.” Heterosexual depictions often have more leeway; works by acclaimed Chinese authors, including Nobel Laureate Mo Yan, feature graphic sexual scenes yet remain widely available.
While authors of heterosexual erotica have been jailed in China, observers note that the genre faces far less censorship. Gay erotica, deemed more subversive, appears to concern authorities more. Volunteers in a support group for Haitang writers told the BBC that police even questioned some readers.
Those who reported being arrested declined interviews, fearing repercussions. Police in Lanzhou, the northwestern city accused of spearheading this crackdown, have not responded to requests for comment from the BBC.
Online, the crackdown has ignited debate and sparked a rare pushback against the law.
“Is sex really something to be ashamed of?” a Weibo user asked, arguing that China’s anti-obscenity laws are outdated. Another user wrote that women never get to decide what is obscene because they do not control the narrative. Legal scholars have also expressed concern that as few as 5,000 views of anything deemed “obscene” qualifies as criminal “distribution,” lowering the bar for arresting creators.
The discussions have made Beijing uneasy enough that they are vanishing: #HaitangAuthorsArrested garnered over 30 million views on Weibo before being censored. Posts offering legal advice have disappeared, a story on a prominent Chinese news site has been removed, and writers’ accounts and handles are also disappearing.
After Pingping Anan Yongfu’s post went viral, she deleted it and wrote another, thanking supporters while admitting her writing violated the law. She then deleted her handle.
Prior to that final post, she wrote: “I was always the good girl in my parents’ eyes. But that day, I brought them nothing but shame. They’ll never hold their heads up again.”
These women have long operated in the shadows in China, where homosexuality and eroticism are stigmatized. Now, outed by police investigations, they face social consequences as brutal as the legal ones.
“In that moment, all I felt was shame,” wrote a writer whose Weibo handle translates to “the world is a huge psychiatric hospital.” She said the police pulled her out of class in college, and her classmates watched as they followed her to search her dorm.
“I earned my money word by word at a keyboard. But once it went south, it was as if none of that mattered. People treated me like I’d made money without ever working for it.”
Another writer wrote that the police had been kind, advising her to speak to a lawyer and return her “illegal earnings” to reduce her sentence. “I’m only 20. So young, and I’ve already ruined my life so early.”
A third said: “I never imagined a day would come when every word I once wrote would come back to haunt me.”
One author who has been writing danmei novels for 20 years was not questioned, but she said the crackdown will not stop her. “This is how I find happiness. And I can’t let go of the connections I have made with the community.”
Inspired by Japanese boys’ love manga, danmei emerged as an online subgenre in the 1990s. It has since become highly successful, with some novels appearing on international bestseller lists.
In 2021, 60 danmei novels were optioned for film and TV adaptations. The most expensive IP reportedly sold for 40 million yuan ($5.6 million; £4.1 million). Some of China’s biggest stars, such as Xiao Zhan and Wang Yibo, began their careers on streaming shows based on danmei novels.
In short, it is the rebellious royal of pop culture—too popular to ignore, too controversial to honor.
And it is a signature offering on Haitang, which, in Mandarin, refers to a flower that blooms in every shade of pink.
Appropriately, Haitang and danmei have flourished as uniquely female spaces, although they center on male protagonists. In a culture where female sexual desire is routinely policed, danmei has become a coded, creative outlet—a space where women can write about female desire for other women.
That is precisely what makes danmei so “subversive,” according to Dr. Liang Ge, who teaches digital sociology at University College London. It allows women to “detach from gendered realities” often associated with marriage and motherhood.
For instance, in danmei stories, men can become pregnant and are comfortable with being vulnerable – a stark contrast to the often unequal relationships many Chinese women grapple with in real life.
“Danmei frees me from thinking about all those potential dangers in relationships in traditional heterosexual romance,” explains one writer who has been active in the danmei world for a decade.
Danmei novels are not without their critics, as some contain extreme and violent scenes. “As a parent, how many of us can accept our children reading novels like this, let alone writing them?” asked one Weibo user.
The age of the authors has also raised concerns. A handful of those the BBC spoke to stated that they started reading and writing gay erotica before they turned 18, some as young as 11.
This is a problem the community should acknowledge and address, said Ma, a danmei writer who only shared her surname, adding that this is a problem for all adult content because China does not restrict content by age.
But danmei has increasingly come under attack in the last decade as Beijing launched a series of campaigns to “clean up” the internet. In 2018, a danmei author was jailed for 10 years for selling 7,000 copies of her book titled *Occupy*.
As marriage and birth rates plummet and China’s leader Xi Jinping encourages a national rejuvenation, state scrutiny of danmei has intensified, according to Dr. Ge.
“The Chinese government wants to promote traditional family values, and liking danmei novels is seen as a factor in making women less willing to have children,” Dr. Ge explains.
This marks the second wave of mass arrests in less than a year. In late 2022, around 50 Haitang writers were prosecuted, and a famous author who earned approximately 1.85 million yuan was imprisoned for nearly five years.
According to a lawyer who represented some of the defendants last year, the two crackdowns are similar, “but this time, even those with minor involvement weren’t spared.”
A lawyer offering free legal advice said that more than 150 people requested consultations in just two days. Many of those contacting her had not yet been charged but were terrified of the possibility.
“This is classic offshore fishing,” says a lawyer who authored a “practical guide” to assist Haitang writers. The term refers to overreach by local police, such as the Lanzhou police summoning writers in various locations, arguably beyond their jurisdiction.
Several reported paying out of pocket to fly to Lanzhou. One posted that the 2,000 yuan earned from two books on Haitang paid for the flight.
Last year, all the arrests were also made by police in Jixi County in eastern China.
Indebted local governments have done this before to generate revenue through fines, sometimes prompting warnings from the central government. Cybercrimes are particularly susceptible to this, “as long as they claim a local reader was corrupted,” the lawyer says.
Danmei writers are aware that tolerance can be fickle, which is why they circumvent censorship through metaphors. “Making dinner” means sex; “kitchen tool” is code for male genitals.
Still, the recent crackdown stunned them. “A phone call shattered my dreams,” is how one writer described the call from police.
They accused police of searching their phones without warrants. They said their crime was assessed by adding up the views for each chapter—a method they argued was misleading, as it likely exaggerated readership.
Another danmei author posted: “I wrote on Haitang for years, with only a handful of readers. Then, those overlooked stories accumulated over 300,000 clicks, and the 4,000 yuan in royalties sitting in my account became evidence of my crime.”
It remains uncertain whether this signals the end of their careers on Haitang.
“If I could go back, I’d still choose to write. And I will keep writing,” wrote the user Sijin de Sijin.
“Right now, I can only hope the law will see beyond the words on the page and see the girl who skipped meals to save money, the girl who sold her hair to buy a pen, the girl who believed her mind could carve a way through fate. I hope it gives all of us a fair chance.”
Additional reporting by Grace Tsoi in Hong Kong
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