A legal expert proposed Monday that China should expand the definition of "rape victims" in its Criminal Law to cover men who have been assaulted and therefore better promote gender equality.
Jia Jian, a lecturer at the Chongqing-based Southwest University of Political Science & Law, told the Global Times that his proposal aims to protect men's rights to sexual autonomy as he has seen many cases in which sexual offences were committed against men and the victims were not helped by the police or safeguarded by the law.
Jia put forward several suggested changes to the Criminal Law. Under one suggestion, the definition of "rape victim" in the law - which specifies that only women or underage girls can be rape victims - should be modified to use gender-neutral terms, meaning that the crime of rape not only refers to man-on-woman assaults, but also covers man-on-man, woman-on-woman and woman-on-man crimes.
"This mode has been widely adopted by countries such as Germany, France and Italy, which define the victim of rape as 'others' and equally protect both women and men's sexual rights," said Jia. "Traditional conceptions of rape only saw rape victims as women when men can also be the victims."
Jia added the law could also clearly point out that women are also capable of being rapists.
Jia's proposal was published in the Procuratorial Daily, a newspaper under the Supreme People's Procuratorate on Monday. Many netizens showed their support for the proposal and his suggestions were especially welcomed by LGBT activists.
"This suggestion is one we have promoted for a long time," said Xiao Tie, executive director of the Beijing LGBT Center.
"This may be a way to eliminate the long-standing legislative discrimination against both genders," said Liu Junhai, a law professor at the Renmin University of China.
China's Criminal Law, in which rape is defined solely as men having sexual intercourse with women without consent, only protects women's rights to sexual autonomy. It should be changed to keep up with the times and equally safeguard public sexual rights, said Liu.
