台灣驕傲: Taiwan Pride and Tongzhi Diplomacy
plus Taiwan Pride flags and pin, everything's on sale, and zong zi for Dragon Boat Festival
This is Yun Hai Taiwan Stories, a newsletter about Taiwanese food and culture by Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉, founder of Yun Hai. If you aren’t yet a subscriber, sign up here.
Celebrating Pride is very important to us here at Yun Hai. Not just because of who we are and who we want to be as citizens of the world, but because we’re proud of the way Taiwan has continued to incorporate LGBTQ+ rights into Taiwanese values. So often, Taiwan’s progress in this regard is boiled down to the (very cool but simplified) statistic that it was the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage. But there’s much more going on than that; read on for more on the state of sexual equality in Taiwan and the concept of tongzhi (LGBTQ+) diplomacy, as observed by activists, journalists, and anthropologists.
Happy Dragon Boat Festival, too! It’s the store’s two-year anniversary, and we’re offering two different kinds of traditional rice dumplings, or zong zi, that are ready for your steamer. They’ll be available at the shop this weekend and next; scroll down for details.
Finally, we’re launching a Taiwan Pride flag and enamel pin online and in the store, and running a sitewide sale to celebrate—use the discount code TAIWANPRIDE15 at checkout for 15% off site wide, from Friday, June 7th to Monday, June 10th. Zong zi sales excluded.
On May 15th, Taiwanese-American drag queen Nymphia Wind performed at the presidential office in Taiwan, fresh off winning RuPaul’s Drag Race in April. The Yun Hai crew was following Nymphia’s progress throughout the season; and we were thrilled when she took home the crown and scepter; a historic moment as the first East Asian drag queen to win Drag Race over 16 seasons. This was especially meaningful to us given how often Nymphia references Taiwanese cultural elements and identity in her performances.
Since becoming the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage almost five years ago, Taiwan continues to make strides in marriage equality. Initially the same-sex marriage legislation didn’t allow for transnational marriages in Taiwan, meaning that if one’s home country didn’t recognize same-sex marriages, Taiwan wouldn’t allow a citizen of that country to marry in Taiwan. Same-sex couples were also barred from being able to co-adopt non-biological children, allowing only one parent to be on the adoption certificate. Both of those limitations have recently been amended. Transnational marriages have been recognized since January 2023 and co-adoption became legal for same-sex couples in May of last year.
There’s more work to do for true marriage equality in Taiwan, particularly around reproductive rights for same-sex couples and single women. In Taiwan, women can freeze their eggs, but can only use them if in a heterosexual marriage; same-sex couples don’t have access to assisted reproductive technologies at all. And, despite being the first country to have a transgendered minister (badass Minster of Digital Affairs Audrey Tang who also hosts this great show on Taiwan Plus about tech, politics and culture), trans rights have a long way to go. Some progress has been made: recent positive developments include court rulings against the requirement for surgery in order to legally change one’s gender—this one dates to just last week.
The progress Taiwan has already made in marriage equality, compared to its neighbors in Asia, is a cornerstone of Taiwan’s international identity as a progressive society. Being able to point to Taiwan’s leadership as the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage is easy to understand, groundbreaking, and speaks to most people’s basic understanding of legalized equality—marry who you choose. But this popular fact, in my opinion, tends to overshadow other aspects of the fight for LGBTQ+ rights in Taiwan, and the sagacious, evolved dialogue around it.
Since the lifting of martial law in 1987, the monoculture of the KMT regime has given way to a Taiwanese identity that is working toward inclusivity, diversity, social progressivism, and freedom. You can see this in the way people participate in the Mazu pilgrimages: a celebration of Mazu, but also a frenetic and ebullient expression of freedom of (and diversity within) religion. Everyone’s invited.
The fight for and progression of LGBTQ+ rights in Taiwan are often closely connected to the expression and exercising of its sovereignty. This is covered in a Nikkei Asia article published in 2022:
"For people in this country born after martial law ended, being pro-LGBTQ is key to us in expressing our Taiwanese identity. We see ourselves as members of a progressive and democratic society. Our understanding of Taiwan as a burgeoning and vibrant democracy is intertwined with this country's acceptance of our sexuality and identity," said Daniel Yo-ling, a millennial Taiwanese American who was marching with Taiwan Asexual Group at the pride event… "There's a certain semiosis between being pro-Taiwan and being pro-LGBT.“
Yo-ling refers to the phenomenon as "tongzhi (LGBTQ+) sovereignty." The term tongzhi 同志 originally means “comrade” or “same will” in political and communist discourse, but in Taiwan mainly refers to members of the LGBTQ+ community. The concept of tongzhi sovereignty or tongzhi diplomacy refers to their “increasingly central role in Taiwan’s international public diplomacy.”
An excerpt from Taiwan Insight:
“While it is not formally part of Taiwan’s diplomatic agenda, tongzhi diplomacy has nevertheless enhanced the island’s reputation on the global stage, broadening the areas within which it is allowed to participate and subverting the established international order, which has long ostracised Taiwan in formal global institutions. There is significant potential for this form of diplomacy to become a crucial tool for Taiwan to develop informal diplomatic relationships across the globe.”
Taiwan’s progress regarding LGBTQ+ rights has won it outsize recognition in international circles, with a political identity distinct from its neighbors. And, it’s evident that many leaders in this space care deeply about Taiwanese identity as part and parcel to LGBTQ+ issues.
For example, in 2022, Kaohsiung was selected to host World Pride 2025 by Interpride, an international association of pride groups, but withdrew from hosting when Interpride insisted on changing the name from World Pride Taiwan 2025 to World Pride Kaohsiung 2025. It was not acceptable to represent international pride without also representing Taiwan as a country.
Nymphia Wind references Taiwanese culture throughout her performances: she won Rupaul’s Drag Race in a bubble tea fit; performed an homage to Taiwanese and Chinese opera (Taiwan’s oldest cross-gender performance tradition); and found costume inspiration in a critically endangered flower endemic to Taiwan—the yellow water lily 台灣萍蓬草—a flower she described as “growing out of the mud, unstained.”
Check out her presidential performance here, and her speech about it. I also really love the classic Taiwan thumbs up Tsai Ing-wen gives Nymphia Wind when she returns to her seat. Taiwan #1.
Tongzhi sovereignty has both its proponents and detractors. Adam Chen-Dedman provides history and context in this paper, published in the International Journal of Taiwan Studies in 2022. Some see tongzhi diplomacy as appropriating LGBTQ+ identity to further Taiwan’s standing internationally, especially with regard to the China factor. But, according to the Chen-Dedman, many view it as a true fight for an inclusive society and Taiwanese values, from within:
Chen-Dedman writes:
“During fieldwork in Taipei amid the 2020 Taiwan presidential election, one tongzhi postgraduate student retorted: ‘I find it both offensive and essentialising when the international community interprets our votes for President Tsai Ing-wen and her more progressive vision of Taiwan as nothing more than a reaction against Chinese pressure. On the night of President Tsai’s re-election, he further added: ‘I am just worried that people would take it [her re-election] at face value and call it a win for Taiwanese nationalism. I haven’t seen many conversations about how we are voting for an inclusionary identity instead of an exclusionary one.’ This calls attention to a key theme among my informants who consistently spoke of the need to amplify ‘Taiwanese values’ (台灣價值, taiwan jiazhi), which they understand as a progressive-oriented liberalism that foregrounds social inclusion and multiculturalism over exclusionary forms of nationalism.”
Later on, Chen-Dedman makes the point, based on the work of Caribbean anthropologist Yarimar Bonilla, that “another way of thinking about sovereignty [is] as residing in the people as opposed to being constituted solely by the state.” This suggests Taiwan Pride really speaks to both Taiwanese and LGBTQ+ identity at the same time; as an act of self-identification outside of sparse official channels.
Taiwan Rainbow Pride Merch and Sitewide Sale
We’re obviously proud of Taiwan, and feel that it’s of utmost importance to us to stand for, support, and do what we can to further LGBTQ+ rights in Taiwan and in the rest of the world. As an expression of this, we’re now offering Taiwan pride pins and Taiwan pride flags; sales support the Taiwan Equality Campaign. Their goals include: advocating for marriage equality, promoting diverse narratives of love, eliminating all forms of gender inequality, and realizing a more diverse, inclusive Taiwan. Pick these up online or in store.
We are also excited to announce a limited-time sale for Pride. From today, Friday, June 7th to Monday, June 10th, you can get 15% everything on our site with the code TAIWANPRIDE15.
Zong Zi 粽子 for Dragon Boat Festival 端午節
The origin of zong zi for Dragon Boat Festival 端午節 is often pegged to the death of the political martyr Qu Yuan, who drowned himself out of an overwhelming sense of patriotism during China’s Warring States period. Villagers allegedly dumped zong zi into the water to distract the fish.
For me, the origin of zong zi for Dragon Boat will always be Auntie May’s house in Sugarland, Houston, where she would make them with her daughters while I took advantage of their Prodigy Online subscription to play Mad Maze. I can’t eat one without thinking of it.
Either way, we’re offering this very special holiday food at our brick and mortar store this weekend and next. Community holiday foods are something that defined my Taiwanese-American experience growing up, and it’s always a pleasure to have seasonal specialties like this at the shop, though I’m sad to say we can’t offer the Prodigy login.
Stop by this weekend (June 8-9th) and next weekend (June 15-16th) to stock up on frozen zong zi, as well as sample small bites from 12-4pm. We‘re featuring two styles: the classic pork and egg yolk style and the harder-to-find Kueh or Hakka style. These are easy to reheat; just steam on the stovetop or in your Tatung (if you have one).
The classic style 古早味燒肉粽 is a traditional northern Taiwanese zong zi packed with a trove of ingredients: sticky rice, chunks of savory pork belly, shiitake mushrooms, salted egg yolk, small dried shrimp, and fragrant chestnut and peanuts.
The Hakka style 粿仔粽 features minced pork, umami shiitake mushrooms, and salty, piquant preserved radish (aka cai bo 菜脯) stuffed in a sticky, mochi-like glutinous rice wrapper.
Available:
Sat, June 8th & Sun, June 9th
Sat, June 15th & Sun, June 16th
170 Montrose Ave, Brooklyn, NY
We’ll be sampling the classic style zong zi from 12-4pm. Frozen classic style and Hakka style zong zi will be available for purchase throughout our opening hours (10am-6pm).
Please check out the What’s On At Yun Hai page for the latest Yun Hai updates, including a full list of our upcoming events.
With love,
Lisa Cheng Smith 鄭衍莉
Written with editorial support by Amalissa Uytingco, Jasmine Huang, Luke Miller, and Lillian Lin. If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with friends and subscribe if you haven’t already. I email once a month, sometimes more, sometimes less. For more Taiwanese food, head to yunhai.shop, follow us on instagram and twitter, or view the newsletter archives.
what a beautifully written piece. thank you for sharing, and happy pride!
Thank you for this wonderful piece. Deeply appreciate it.