adevyish | gender, pop, and (geo)politics

I’ve joked that my knowledge of gender in Asian pop ends at short-lived Taiwanese idol group Misster. However, even that bar seems to be too high for the takes spawned by the recent news of the “sissy” ban. (I had to explain to a non-fandom friend that image bans like this weren’t unusual; it’s just that the tattoo ban a few years ago wasn’t the type of thing to make international headlines.) I wish for a good longread on the topic, but in the meantime there’s a decent Twitter thread on the intersection of gender and politics in Asian pop that starts as a decent summary plus link round-up and ends in economic policy.

In other news, the (1980) Hong Kong–born singer/actor Nic Tse, whose claim to fame includes being expelled from Saints with Tablo and a fairly watchable travel and cooking show, is now saying he’s going to give up his Canadian citizenship to prove his patriotism as a Chinese person. Other celebs who have been caught up in this latest Weibo hunt include American-born Taiwanese dude Wang Leehom, who holds zero (0) relevant passports. Usually when you see people publicly giving up citizenships it’s politicians running in federal elections. But you know — pop politics.

Anyway, here’s a short Vice documentary on China’s underground ballroom scene.