Social Movements

Flight Attendant Union Criticizes Taoyuan Government Over Justifying Gendered Uniform Policy

The Taoyuan Flight Attendants' Union has criticized the Taoyuan city government’s gender equality committee for siding with EVA Air on a number of policies. This takes place at a time that the union is campaigning for an end to gendered uniforms for flight attendants, seeing as female flight attendants are currently required to wear pencil skirts, stockings, and high-heels, while pants are not allowed...

“The East Is Still Red” Book Launch Reveals Usual Tankie Denial of China as Capitalist, Imperialist

Friends of Socialist China's book launch for leading figure Carlos Martinez’s new book, The East is Still Red, proved to be an occasion for a collection of mostly Western leftists to once again illustrate their idealistic projection onto China. The event took place on August 13, 2023. In particular, the event was primarily focused on defending China from the charge that is imperialistic, while calling for uncritical support for China as continuing to advance the cause of socialist revolution...

Calls for Unionization, Improvements in Firefighter Safety, After Deadly Pingtung Blaze

There have been calls for improving safety measures for firefighters after a blaze killed four firefighters in Pingtung on Friday. Subsequently, the National Association for Firefighters’ Rights demonstrated on Ketagalan Boulevard on Saturday with a banner listing the names of the 39 firefighters who were killed in the line of duty in the past decade. The incident points to the need for a number of fundamental safety reforms...

Supreme Administrative Court Rules Against Compulsory Surgery For Changing Legal Gender

On September 21, 2023, the Supreme Administrative Court of the Judicial Yuan nullified the Kaohsiung High Administrative Court's ruling on a transgender woman’s legal gender change appeal and ordered a rehearing. With regards to Ministry of Interior executive order #0970066240, which requires people assigned male at birth to surgically remove their penis and testis and people assigned female at birth to remove their breasts, uterus, and ovaries in order to change their legal gender, the SAC’s decision clearly states that this rule “seriously infringes upon bodily rights, medical rights, human dignity, and right of personality”. Multiple transgender rights organizations, such as the Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights and Taiwan Non-binary Queer Sluts, have celebrated the ruling...

#MeToo Cases in Taiwan Spark Discussion of Deepfakes

In August, legal changes to the “Three Gender Equality” laws were passed by the legislature. This was in response to the wave of #MeToo cases that Taiwan has been swept by since late May. Nevertheless, though few of the high-profile cases touched on the issue directly, there has also been increased discussion of “deepfake” images, “revenge porn”, and digitally altered images, as they target women in particular...