Women hold up more than half the sky.

On September 25, 2018, CUSWF joined the discussion at the China Institute with Leta Hong Fincher, journalist and author of Betraying Big Brother, and Lu Pin, founding editor of Feminist Voices, a Beijing NGO that promotes gender equality. Moderated by Dinda Elliott, the panel discussed the changing perception of gender equality issues in China. 

With the internet and social media giving women a greater ability to communicate their concerns about the inequality of career and education opportunities, their stories began to go viral, and a movement was born.

Leta explained that for safety advocates for women's rights often couched their protests as performance art, such as when performance artists gathered outside a government building wearing large underpants with an X to protest gynecological exams that women applying for government jobs had to undergo. 

The detention of the "Feminist Five" in 2015 announced a government crackdown. But as the #metoo movement swept the world, students in China began to share stories of sexual harassment by professors and the Chinese #metoo movement called "ricebunny" blossomed in China.

Lu Pin emphasized that addressing women's concerns for greater equality in opportunity and working conditions is essential for a thriving society, and she optimistic that the gender equality movement will not be stopped.