China’s macro environment and LGBTQ+ rights: The benefits of an online support community to promote marriage equality

Zhiyu Chen; Jingguo Chen

doi:10.1080/00981389.2025.2535290

China’s macro environment and LGBTQ+ rights: The benefits of an online support community to promote marriage equality

Zhiyu Chen
, Jingguo Chen

Education and Society

Research output: Contribution to journal › Review article › peer-review

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Abstract

Many LGBTQ+ communities have been actively campaigning to influence their countries to promote equality and protect human rights, including the right to same-sex marriage. However, the macro environment in China, including public policy and social attitudes, heavily influences such activism, which is progressing almost silently. The social environment shaped by traditional values still discriminates against and marginalizes sexual minorities, making it challenging to establish marriage equality. With literature review, this paper argues that grassroots LGBTQ+ communities should strengthen communication through non-confrontational online networks.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	193-207
Journal	Social Work in Health Care
Volume	64
Issue number	6-8
Early online date	20 Jul 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1080/00981389.2025.2535290
Publication status	E-pub ahead of print - 20 Jul 2025

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 3 Good Health and Well-being

Keywords

LGBTQ+ activism
online support community
policy
same-sex marriage (SSM)

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Community and Home Care
Psychiatry and Mental health

Access to Document

10.1080/00981389.2025.2535290Licence: CC BY-NC-ND

Final published version
© 2025 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & France Group, LLC. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
Final published version, 1.37 MBLicence: CC BY-NC-ND

Cite this

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ER -

China’s macro environment and LGBTQ+ rights: The benefits of an online support community to promote marriage equality

Abstract

UN SDGs

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

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