2024/08/14 New Bloom Newsletter
Olympics, Lin Yu-Ting, Ko Wen-je, call for support for Lumaq
Hi all, Yo-Ling here bringing you this next edition of the New Bloom Newsletter!
Like the last Newsletter boosting a call for support for trans activist Abby Wu (we were able to raise almost $60/month in Patreon subscriptions for her!), in this Newsletter, we want to boost a call for support for Bunun activist Savungaz Valincinan’s cafe, Lumaq. I originally put this call into this Newsletter but it got too long, so I made it into a separate Newsletter post, which you can read here and follow for transparency updates.
Back to the regular Newsletter content. We are going to be trying something new from now on with the “DAYBREAK Events” section. As mentioned in our Newsletter About page, we want this Newsletter to be a space where voices form the New Bloom community can be heard. Moving forward, we will be having community member volunteers write event summaries for DAYBREAK events. If you are interested in volunteering to write event summaries, please send me a Facebook message and I can give you the rundown on how to do so!
And now the news:
New Bloom News
Much news in Taiwan in the first half of August focused on the Olympics, with boxer Lin Yu-ting coming under fire from individuals such as JK Rowling with the claim that she is transgender. We published a review of what occurred, with Lin eventually winning the gold medal, as well as a short piece from trans activist and Taiwan’s first transgender women to run for legislature Abby Wu. In the meantime, we also published a belated article on the third case of a ruling by the Taipei High Administrative Court against compulsory surgery requirements for changing one’s legal ID, which actually happened in mid-July but has flown under the radar this past month perhaps due to this case not being litigated by trans rights groups as in other higher-profile cases.
In the meantime, former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je has come under fire in successive scandals linked to the dismantled Core Pacific City Mall as well as over campaign finances. It is to be seen if the scandal proves damaging to Ko’s political career going forward. The Control Yuan has also called on the ROC military to account for a 1987 massacre of Vietnamese migrants seeking asylum in Taiwan. Former president Ma Ying-jeou also lashed out at US arms sales to Taiwan in a speech given in Thailand.
DAYBREAK Events
Please see our Facebook page for all upcoming and past events. If you would like to volunteer to write event summaries, please drop Yo-Ling a Facbook message!
2024/08/01 | The Unique Experiences & Narratives of Re-Rooting Among Taiwanese Americans
Summary by: Michelle Yue (she/her)
This was the fifth and final talk in a series about the unique mental health challenges for Taiwanese and diasporic Taiwanese people as they uproot and re-root across different personal and cultural contexts. The event began with a one-hour talk, and was followed by a sharing circle where participants were invited to discuss their personal experiences and responses to the key themes.
The speaker, Evon Chiu (邱逸芳), a mental health practitioner with extensive experience working with Taiwanese-Americans, provided insights into diasporic identities and the distinct challenges they face. These identities included diasporic ‘returners’ to Taiwan, biracial / third-culture kids, partners of Taiwanese people, and more. For example, Evon spoke about how many diasporic children do not get the chance to truly be a child. Thrust into a new environment, they are expected to figure things out without much guidance: never allowed to be afraid, always under pressure to appear competent. Because of this, returning to Taiwan can offer an opportunity to heal the inner child through finding a sense of holistic self, safety, and re-alignment with their cultural surroundings.
In the discussion circle, several participants expressed relief at being able to recognize themselves in Evon’s insights. The participants supported each other through sharing personal experiences around cross-cultural struggles, establishing boundaries, and finding acceptance. Evon noted how the group showed the diversity of identities within the diaspora. In addition to our struggles, each participant was an example of our shared resilience, and how healing can feel different for each person.
2024/08/02 | Class Struggle in Taiwan: A Conversation with Taiwanese Labor Activists
Summary by: New Bloom community member Rey (he/him)
On Friday Aug 3rd, four distinguished speakers invested in union movements--NTU Sociology Professor Ho Ming-Sho, Deputy Secretary for the Taiwan Federation of Financial Unions Catta Chou, Deputy General Secretary of the Taiwan Labor Front Shu-Wei Yang, Director of Migrant Worker Policy at Serve the People Association Lennon Wong--plus Taiwanese American labor activist and panel moderator Tim Tia, presented the historical and cultural context of labor rights in Taiwan to a predominantly international audience. The speakers were pleasantly surprised at the number of attendees, most of whom engaged in lively discussion before the panel began.
The first presenter Dr. Ho lined out the political contexts to the history of labor rights movements in Taiwan. Large scale collective awareness and action was jump-started by observing international relations–inversely, the organizing that follows has been characterized by a general passivity. However, Ho notes, Taiwan’s recent 30 years displays labor rights holding strong, contrasted from the international trend for labor rights, which has been a race to the bottom. As a sociology professor at NTU, he also shared his observations on student attitudes: the effects of the Sunflower Movement are still seen 10 years later, with a subsection of 憤青 (“young people with consciousness”) paying attention and advocating for labor issues, while also noting the uptick of 反覺青 (“anti-wokeism”) as a symptom of the general public’s inclination to withdraw from social movements, viewing these efforts as a waste of time compared to technological and capital advancements.
The next speaker, Catta, introduced her work starting with her beginnings from NGOs and then dove into the history of the organizations she’s powered. Before beginning, she noted humorously that bank robbing was a big problem in the 80s, and organizations similar to unions started as a response to this situation, providing safety and protection. She started by explaining the origins of the Nonprofit Organization Industrial Union (NPOIU); after the catastrophic effects of earthquakes, the government, in need of urgent help, gave out subsidies to civilians supporting those most affected. However, most participating civilians consisted of those without a financial safety net to fall on, and were vulnerable to exploitation. Due to receiving money from the government through subsidies, this group was not protected by labor rights. Next, she introduced Youth Labor Union 95 (YLU 95), a collective formed when the minimum wage was frozen for 10 years in Taiwan. The number 95 commemorates their victory of pushing the hourly wage from 66 NTD to 95 NTD in 2007! The people involved were students, scholars, activists, as well as those who worked part-time and those who are at the mercy of their employers and the Minimum Wage Act.
Shu-Wei Yang (楊書偉) chose to speak in Mandarin, with Catta live translating alongside him. He explained that in Taiwan, social work is associated with labor-intensive hands-on service for the elderly and disabled. While majoring in social work in college, Yang was less interested in the work associated with these stereotypes and leaned towards policies and reformation, studying the systematic forces that push people to the margins, creating the need for these social workers. He continued with an analysis of unions from the perspective of law, highlighting how the Legislative Yuan elections post-martial law gave street-smart, grassroots leaders a chance to become politicians. Currently, he’s focusing on liberating people from exploitation with his work in Taiwan Labor Front.
The last speaker, Lennon Wong, the director of Migrant Workers Taiwan, brought up the current exploitation of migrant workers in Taiwan; of the 11 forced labor indicators from International Labour Organization, most migrant workers in Taiwan tick off all boxes. On top of all of this, with labor rights organizing in this current state, migrant oriented union initiatives are facing countless challenges. Migrant workers are in a vulnerable position, and fear retaliation due to their already unstable employment, while cultural and language differences deepen the lack of mutual understanding between Taiwanese labor activists and migrant workers. These are all large obstacles to organization, discouraging action in an environment that has not yet seen successful long-term solidarity.
After their respective talks, the speakers answered questions from the audience and gave hopeful notes. Despite many factors barring Taiwan from more internationally familiar forms of labor unions, labor activists are rising to these challenges with creativity and tact.
2024/08/09 | A Deal With the Universe Screening
Summary by: trans activist and snail enthusiast Yo-Ling Chen (they/them)
New Bloom co-hosted a screening of a Chinese-subtitled translation of Jason Barker’s 2018 documentary, A Deal With the Universe, as part of a larger documentary tour across Taiwan co-organized by Queer Margins, the Taiwan Alliance to Promote Civil Partnership Rights, and Taiwan LGBT Family Rights Advocacy. The DAYBREAK screening was done in collaboration with Trif Tran Bar and Taiwan Non-binary Queer Sluts, with New Bloom member and Trif Trans Bar founder Trif providing bar service as part of their weekly Friday night trans bar pop-up, and Taiwan Non-binary Queer Sluts founder and trans rights lawyer/activist Lingwei Li serving as a discussant alongside yours truly.
A Deal With the Universe tells the story of Jason Barker, a transgender man from the UK, and his cisgender wife Tracey’s 8 year long journey trying to get pregnant through various assisted reproduction methods in the 2000s. I shared with audience members that the reason we are screening this documentary in Taiwan now is to bring more attention to transgender fertility and reproductive rights, especially as cisnormative draft amendments are being proposed to Taiwan’s Assisted Reproduction Act that could potentially result in certain transgender groups (such as trans men and non-binary people with healthy uteruses who are unmarried and whose legal gender is not female) being excluded. After the screening, I and my fellow friend/discussant Lingwei Li shared about our experiences navigating Taiwan as transgender people who are keen to preserve their fertility and are currently excluded from assisted reproduction access. The audience Q&A mainly revolved around the medical and legal plight facing transgender reproductive rights in Taiwan. Below is a photo of folks who were willing to be publicly photographed!
2024/08/10 | Travel Unbound: A Screening Series with The Kitchen Collective
Summary by: New Bloom community member Rey (he/him)
Accompanying the Travel Unbound exhibition as a satellite event, this screening showed films by three artists: Lin Yi-Chi, David Blandy, and Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai.
Reaching towards her grandmother’s generation, Lin Yi-Chi depicts a trans-island migration and its impacts on her family through the span of three generations in Nanyang Express I: Trans-driftin and South Sea Crossing. Stunning pictures are overlaid with quadrilingual messages sent between family in Mandarin, Hokkien, English, and Bahasa Indonesian comprising conversations of recollection and loss.
Atomic Light by David Blandy depicts a reconciliation between the artist’s understanding of weighted historical events and a family member’s interpretation of said events.
In her documentary Day by Day, Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai tells the story of ethnically Vietnamese people on the edge between Vietnam and Cambodia, unaccounted for by either country’s bureaucracy and ostracized sociopolitically by more dominant local communities; through intimate moments both captured on camera and illustrated in interviews, this work candidly depicts reality faced by these people.
At the end of the event, The Kitchen Collective provided extra context to the works, and invited everyone to their closing event for this series on the 18th of August on Sunday at Hong-Gah Museum; there will be an artist talk with Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai and live music afterwards!
Alright, that’s all for the first half of August! I sent this Newsletter out a day early because the second half of August has a lot going on in terms of Taiwan’s transgender rights movement, and this Newsletter was already running long.
Coming up
2024/08/15: Taipei High Adminsitrative Court ruling on TAPCPR plaintiff Vivi’s non-medical evidence case against compulsory surgery for changing one’s legal gender — analysis and reporting forthcoming by yours truly.
2024/08/16: FORUM ASIA event with Southeast and Northeast Asian activists Alric Lee (Lady Liberty Hong Kong) and Naw Sai (Athan Myanmar), moderated by Rosalind Ratana. See event info here.
2024/08/22: Feminist Labor Struggles: US and Taiwan Perspectives — an evening with Seattle-based organizer JM Wong.
2024/08/26: Taipei High Adminsitrative Court ruling on TAPCPR plaintiff Lisbeth Wu’s case against compulsory surgery for changing one’s legal gender — analysis and reporting forthcoming by yours truly.
2024/08/30: Taiwan Aromantic Group’s inaugural meeting—please see their newly launched Facebook page for more information.