Yo-Ling Chen

Global Solidarity Protest for Russia’s LGBT+ Community Held in Taipei

Yo-Ling Chen
Yesterday afternoon, on the first day of Russia’s presidential election, civil society groups hosted a solidarity protest for Russia’s LGBT+ community outside of the Moscow-Taipei Coordination Commission on Economic and Cultural Cooperation’s office in Taipei. The protest, organized by the Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights, was part of All Out’s “Global Speak Out for the Russian LGBT+ Community” campaign, which included coordinated protests in ten other countries across the world...
EnglishGender/SexualityMarch 2024Social Movements5 min read

When Will ARA Amendment Discussions Account For Transgender Reproductive Rights?

Yo-Ling Chen
This past Wednesday, the Taiwan Women’s Link hosted a press conference calling for opening up access to assisted reproduction and decoupling the issue of surrogacy from amendments to the Assisted Reproduction Act (ARA). As part of the press conference, TWL released a petition calling for prioritizing assisted reproduction access for single women and lesbian spouses, such that “all women who want to reproduce” may do so under a system that “ensures women’s reproductive autonomy.” While the TWL’s petition and press conference helped to raise awareness of reproductive rights in Taiwan, it failed to account for the reproductive rights of transgender people in Taiwan...
EnglishFebruary 2024Gender/SexualitySocial Movements7 min read

Transgender Issues Enter Third Party Politics

Yo-Ling Chen
In the past three months, transgender issues have gained unprecedented attention within third party politics in Taiwan, with the Taiwan Solidarity Union rebranding itself as the only political party against abolishing compulsory surgery for changing one’s legal gender and Green Party Taiwan putting forward Taiwan’s first transgender woman to run for office, Abby Wu, as an at-large legislative candidate. This is the first time in Taiwan’s history that transgender issues have been explicitly incorporated into party campaigning. While transgender issues have yet to become a campaign issue in mainstream party politics, the current standoff between the two parties offers a first look into how such politicization would likely play out as the struggle for transgender rights in Taiwan continues...
EnglishGender/SexualityJanuary 2023PoliticsSocial Movements12 min read

Supreme Administrative Court Rules Against Compulsory Surgery For Changing Legal Gender

Yo-Ling Chen
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...
EnglishGender/SexualitySeptember 2023Social Movements5 min read

Amendments of “Three Gender Equality Laws” Passed in Wake of #MeToo Cases

Yo-Ling Chen
Two months after the wave of #MeToo cases that began in late May, amendments were proposed and passed during the month of July to Taiwan’s “Three Gender Equality Laws”: more specifically, amendments to the Gender Equity Education Act were passed on July 28th, and amendments to the Act of Gender Equality in Employment and the Sexual Harassment Prevention Act were passed on July 31st...
August 2023EnglishGender/SexualityPoliticsSocial Movements4 min read

Lisbeth Wu Case Sent Back to Taipei High Administrative Court

Yo-Ling Chen
This past Friday, the Constitutional Court of the Judicial Yuan decided not to move forward with a constitutional interpretation for Lisbeth Wu’s case regarding regulations requiring proof of surgery to change one’s legal gender. The specific regulation under scrutiny is 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. Over the past few days, people following Taiwan’s trans rights movement have attempted to make sense of the Constitutional Court’s decision to send Wu’s case back to the Taipei High Administrative Court...
EnglishFebruary 2023Gender/SexualitySocial Movements6 min read

Fourth Annual Trans March Brings Visibility as Taiwan’s Trans Rights Movement Gains Momentum and Draws Opposition

Yo-Ling Chen
Over 3,000 people gathered in Ximending this evening to participate in the fourth annual Taiwan Trans March organized by the Taiwan Tongzhi (LGBTQ+) Hotline Association. This year’s march is the first in-person Trans March since the historic gains in Taiwan’s trans rights movement last fall. At the same time, trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs) have also mobilized, almost exclusively online, against the trans rights movement in Taiwan. As trans issues continue to enter into public discourse and legal reform proceeds at its own pace, visibility and support for Taiwan’s trans community has never been more crucial...
EnglishGender/SexualityOctober 2022Social Movements10 min read

Regional Forums Discuss Mixed Indigenous Identity and Legal Recognition in Taiwan

Yo-Ling Chen
This past Friday in Pingtung City, the Mixed Indigenous Youth Forum Working Group (MIYF) held its fifth and final regional forum on the life experiences of Indigenous youth from mixed backgrounds. Combined with the other regional forums held in Taichung, Taipei, Taitung, and Hualien, MIYF discussed and recorded over 50 participants’ life stories pertaining to their Indigenous identity journey and variable engagements with Indigenous legal status...
EnglishIndigenousOctober 2022RaceSocial Movements16 min read

Mixed Background Indigenous Peoples and Their Struggle for Legal Reform

Yo-Ling Chen
In 2017, Nikal Kabala’an, an Amis woman, carried her first newborn daughter to the Taipei City Da’an District Household Registration Office to register her baby’s birth. Nikal and her husband, who is Han, decided to register their child under Nikal’s husband’s Mandarin surname with the intention of simultaneously registering a traditional Amis name to continue her Indigenous heritage into the next generation. However, she was informed at the Household Registration Office that she could not register her child under her husband’s surname and a traditional Amis name, and thus had to choose only one...
EnglishIndigenousRaceSeptember 2022Social Movements17 min read
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Yo-Ling Chen