Taiwan Faces a #MeToo Wave, Set Off by a Netflix Hit

Up to now few weeks, a wave of #MeToo allegations has raced to the very high of Taiwan’s political, judicial and humanities scenes, forcing a brand new reckoning of the state of girls’s rights on a democratic island that has lengthy taken delight in being amongst Asia’s most progressive locations.

Practically every single day, contemporary allegations emerge, setting off discussions on discuss reveals and on social media, with newspaper commentaries and activist teams calling for stronger protections for victims.

In some ways, Taiwan stands out for the numerous strides that girls have made that helped elect the island’s first feminine president and bolster legal guidelines in opposition to rape and sexual assault, earlier than #MeToo took off in the USA. However the flood of latest sexual harassment accusations factors to what activists and students say is entrenched sexism that leaves ladies weak at work, and a tradition that’s fast accountable victims and canopy up accusations in opposition to highly effective males.

The outpouring of complaints was set off by a well-liked Netflix drama about Taiwanese politics known as “Wave Makers,” which featured a subplot a couple of feminine member of a political celebration telling her boss that she had been sexually harassed by a celebration member. Her boss guarantees to assist her report the harassment, and in a sign of how typically such politically inconvenient complaints are ignored, says, “Let’s not simply let this go this time.”

That quote from the fictional supervisor turned a clarion name, inspiring greater than 100 accusers, principally ladies, to talk out on social media, sharing their accounts of undesirable kisses, groping and in a number of circumstances, tried rape. They described the indignities endured on the office, together with inappropriate touching and undesirable advances by male colleagues and executives, in addition to lewd feedback. A few of their posts have been shared hundreds of instances.

The stakes are significantly excessive for President Tsai Ing-wen’s governing Democratic Progressive Occasion. Senior celebration and authorities officers have been among the many first accused of harassment and of in search of to silence accusers, forcing Ms. Tsai to apologize twice for her celebration’s mishandling of inside complaints. The criticism runs counter to the celebration’s file as a champion of liberal values, which incorporates legalizing same-sex marriage in 2019 and granting homosexual {couples} the fitting to undertake earlier this 12 months. And it poses dangers to the celebration’s credibility with youthful voters forward of a presidential election subsequent 12 months.

“The Democratic Progressive Occasion has regarded itself because the governing celebration that helps gender equality,” Fan Yun, a celebration legislator who can also be a professor specializing in gender points at Nationwide Taiwan College, mentioned in a phone interview. “The Netflix present was seen by others as a snapshot of what’s occurring throughout the celebration, and it has led to nice affect.”

Among the many most senior figures accused of harassment is Yen Chih-fa, who denied the allegation however resigned from his publish as an adviser to President Tsai. Taiwan’s highest authorized physique mentioned it might examine a criticism in opposition to a former chief justice, Lee Po-tao. Tsai Mu-lin, a high-level celebration official, has been accused of bullying a feminine celebration workers member into silence when she reported {that a} male colleague had tried to enter her resort room.

Mr. Tsai, who will not be associated to the president, has since stepped down. The girl who accused him, Chen Wen-hsuan, mentioned she felt empowered to talk out publicly by the opposite ladies who had shared their experiences. “This motion has taught me that no injustice needs to be swallowed,” she mentioned. “In any case, we will’t simply let it go.”

Allegations have additionally been made in opposition to males from the primary opposition celebration, the Kuomintang, in addition to throughout Taiwan’s society extra broadly, together with in academia, journalism, and most lately, leisure.

Mickey Huang, a TV persona, apologized after being accused by a girl he met at work of kissing her with out her consent and forcing her to be photographed nude. Aaron Yan, a pop star, apologized after an ex-boyfriend accused him of secretly capturing movies of them having intercourse, when the ex-boyfriend was 16, a minor. Native prosecutors mentioned this week they’d examine the allegation.

In some methods, the #MeToo motion factors to a generational shift in attitudes led to by the hard-fought advances gained by ladies’s rights activists in many years previous. Taiwan’s youthful technology began studying about gender equality in elementary college, as a part of curriculum modifications enacted in 2004, and have since come of age.

However workplaces are struggling to maintain tempo.

Taiwan’s youthful technology has “a better consciousness of gender variety and equality than the older technology,” mentioned Wei-Ting Yen, an assistant professor of presidency at Franklin and Marshall School in Pennsylvania. “Nevertheless, the office that younger persons are getting into remains to be dominated by the older technology.”

Lawmakers have pledged to shortly move modifications to legal guidelines to make workplaces and faculties safer by holding organizations accountable for safeguarding victims of harassment. The modifications would require organizations to trace complaints and supply impartial, third-party evaluation panels if wanted. Ladies’s rights teams have known as for Taiwan to increase the statute of limitations for sexual harassment complaints, presently at one 12 months.

However activists additionally say extra must be finished to handle the tradition of sexism that underlies the misconduct and deters many ladies from talking out. A survey by Taiwan’s labor ministry final 12 months confirmed that solely a tiny proportion of feminine respondents who mentioned they’d encountered sexual harassment at work had filed complaints. Activists and students in Taiwan say that males in energy, whether or not they’re supervisors in workplaces or cops or judges, are sometimes seen as sympathetic towards different males in energy, and prone to blame the sufferer.

This month, Lai Yu-fen, 27, accused a Polish diplomat, Bartosz Rys, on her Fb and Twitter accounts, of what Ms. Lai described as sexual assault final 12 months. She mentioned that when she filed a police report, investigators requested why she had apologized to the diplomat as she rejected his advances, and why she had not advised her household in regards to the encounter. She mentioned a protection lawyer gossiped about her to mutual associates. “I need to take again my very own story,” Ms. Lai mentioned in an interview.

The Polish Workplace in Taipei, Poland’s de facto embassy in Taiwan, confirmed that it cooperated with the authorities. Prosecutors determined to not cost Mr. Rys, whose posting ended final 12 months and who later left Taiwan. He didn’t reply to an emailed request for remark, however mentioned on his Twitter web page that Ms. Lai had sought cash in alternate for dropping the accusation. (She mentioned the request for cash was a part of negotiating a authorized settlement.)

To these working in Taiwan’s civil society, maybe probably the most regarding of allegations are these directed at activists seen as influential leaders within the rights group. Lee Yuan-chun, 29, an activist, this month publicly accused Wang Dan, a veteran Chinese language pro-democracy dissident, of urgent him onto a mattress and asking him for intercourse in 2014. He mentioned he was suing Mr. Wang.

In an announcement, Mr. Wang mentioned he hoped that the general public would reserve judgment till a court docket dominated on the lawsuit. “As a public determine, one’s personal life will likely be topic to extra stringent scrutiny,” he mentioned. “By this incident I’ll pay extra consideration to this sooner or later.”