CHINA: THE SEXIST REVOULTION
November 2002 1455
Operating theatre Campbell: Its mid-morning at Beijing Hospital 402 and a surgical team is making a young woman more beautiful. 00:04
After sawing her leg bones in two, they start drilling holes through her calves.
Then they hammer in long, metal pins.
Over the next hour theyll construct what looks like a medieval torture device -- a brace that can be twisted to stretch the leg as the bones grows back.
The aim is not to correct any illness or deformity. The patient is perfectly healthy. Its to make her fashionably taller, stretching each leg by as much as eight centimetres. The surgeon, Dr Xia Hetao, says its just what women need to stand out in the crowd.
Dr Xia Dr Xia: In this country we have a lot of comparatively short girls who are one meter fifty, or under one sixty. 01:10
Operating theatre They have a lot of problems finding a job, 01:21
Dr Xia so they do it to improve their own job opportunities they change their appearance by increasing their height. 01:26
Catwalk Music 01:44
Campbell: These days long legs are just the start of what women want -- or at least what Chinese men want women to have. The dull conformity of Mao suits and socialist dogma is long gone. 01:52
Street scenes and advertising In its place, a kaleidoscope of Western-style consumerism and beauty role models. It is a world where appearance is becoming all-important, and where many will go to painful extremes to become something theyre not. 02:04
Li Young women like Li, a 24 year old nursing graduate who thinks shes too short. 02:24
Li: Because I was always quite short I thought if I tried hard enough I could become a bit taller. Then I saw an article about this in the newspaper, so I came here. 02:30
Li and doctor Campbell: Li is 152 centimetres -- four foot ten on the old scale -- a fairly typical height for women in China. Shell have a total of three operations and for months shell twist her braces four times a day until shes 160 centimetres. She feels that somehow it could make her life better. 02:47
Li Li: It could be that my life will improve but things like that are difficult to say - they just go their own way. 03:09
Campbell: Her mother has reluctantly gone along with it, even though when she was a girl it would have been unthinkable. 03:18
Mother Mother: Of course todays society is very different from our times. On the one side, today real skills and learning are very important - on the other side, I believe appearance has great importance in our society. It has influence on finding a job and so on. 03:24
Street scenes Campbell: Its hard to believe just how recently it was so completely different. In just one generation China has gone from one extreme to another. 03:47
Music 03:57
Archival b/w communist China Campbell: In 1949 the Communist Party swept to power vowing to liberate women from the shackles of male domination. It shut down the brothels that had treated them as commodities. It gave women the power to divorce their husbands. The State encouraged women to do the same jobs as men -- even to wear the same clothes. 04:06
It many ways it was epic hypocrisy. Women wound up doing all the housework as well as factory and farm work. But in theory the workforce was gender free.
Archival women working in the fields By the late 60s, at the height of the Mao Zedongs Cultural Revolution, it was hard to tell women from men. 04:41
Music
Photo album Campbell: Tara Wang was three years old when the Cultural Revolution began. She and her siblings proudly posed in Mao suits with Maos little red books. Her childhood and teenage years were in a world almost devoid of sex. 04:53
Tara Tara: Imagine a generation or generations that grew up without ever seeing a single ad, 05:10
Advertising without ever seeing a sort of a sex symbol, nor having a concept of a sex symbol, 05:18
Tara to todays world in China, everything is about sex appeal. I think its a huge change. 05:26
Tara and colleagues Campbell: Today, at 39, Tara Wang edits the Chinese edition of a western fashion magazine, Madame Figaro. 05:39
Its filled with the kind of images that have redefined the Chinese view of women -- beautiful models, exotic clothes and alluring sexuality. She believes her magazine also promotes strength and independence.
Tara: If you read in detail our magazines 06:02
Tara still promote a lot of successful women, but this concept of success is much broader than being beautiful and famous and rich. Most of them are intelligent women, independent women. So I dont really feel Im just promoting plastic beauty, I think were also promoting inner beauty as well. 06:04
Street scenes and advertising Music 06:34
Campbell: But in the market at large, its plastic beauty thats a growth industry. Since China reopened for business, its been flooded with fashion chains, beauty parlours, cosmetic counters, bridal shops and gymnasiums. Economic reform has certainly brought more choice and, for some, opportunity. But it hasnt necessarily brought liberation. 06:41
This is and probably always has been an extremely sexist society -- even during the Cultural Revolution. Chairman Mao, for example, had his retainers bring him young girls each night in the belief it would stop him growing old. It didnt. But his Communist Party is still running the country -- albeit with a modern image -- and its still trying to determine how women should behave. 07:05
Music
Shanghai Normal University Campbell: And todays communists have a very different role for women in mind. 07:33
Shanghai Normal University has opened the first State-run finishing school for girls. Its aim is to teach young ladies to be refined and demure. Its dean, Sun Xun, says it represents a new phase in socialist education.
Sun Xun Sun Xun: Most importantly, we felt that while women are equal to men and all opportunities for education are about the same, 07:55
Shanghai Normal University they have their unique qualities - qualities that differ from the ones that men have. Some courses might be suited for women but not for men.
Campbell: The courses it believes women are best suited to include handicrafts and etiquette. 08:16
In side class room Lecturer: All right, the order of protocol is when we deal with people, which seat we have to reserve for the person of honour . which seat we have to give to the elder.
Campbell: In this class, girls are learning where to sit, stand and walk when escorting prominent officials, such as a Communist dignitaries. 08:34
Lecturer: The right one is the honoured one, isnt it? This is number one .this is number two, right?
Campbell: Its studied with the determined concentration of an advanced physics class. The students see these officially feminine skills as their tickets to better lives. 08:48
Huang Wen-Xian is typical of the girls who come here -- smart, stylish and beautiful. 09:02
Wen-Xian Wen-Xian: It doesn't matter if it's in the past, or today - I believe we women are valuable in society and we should know how to manifest that value. So, we should also present ourselves better. Therefore, I can learn a lot about these things here. 09:08
Campbell: Today Wen-Xian is learning how to be the MC at a ribbon cutting ceremony. 09:32
Lecturer 2 Lecturer 2: We usually stand on one side on this side is the audience. 09:36
Campbell: The scenario is the launch of a trade exhibition by Chinese and British sponsors. 09:42
Wen-Xian: On behalf of the exhibition committee I now announce the opening of the seventh China International Educational Technology Exhibition. 09:48
Sun Xun: Its the sort of event thats now very common in China as even state bodies open for business. The college believes the new China needs young women like Wen-Xian to perform these supporting roles. 09:59
Sun Xun Sun Xun: Nowadays our government's needs in people are completely different from the ones during the Cultural Revolution. The all-round and free development of people is still in line with Marxist views. 10:15
Tara Tara: My honest opinion, I think its pretty ridiculous. 10:32
Campbell: Tara Wang has no problem with women making themselves more attractive. She is, after all, a fashion editor. But she does believe women should take responsibility for their lives. Shes shocked by how many girls these days just want to catch a man. 10:40
Super fades up Tara Wang Editor, Madame Figaro China Tara: You have a lot of young women, I think they would rather find a sugar daddy, an easy way out than working hard, and make it by themselves. Then in the meantime you also find a lot of women really driven, and independent, modern. I think you find both, but when we were growing up, that was not a concept even to find a man to support your lifestyle. It was never a choice in our minds. But today it is and there are many who does make that choice. 10:54
Shanghai Normal University Campbell: The girls in finishing school say theyre here to improve their minds. Twenty-one-year Liu Jin says its giving her a rounded education. 11:37
Liu Jin Liu Jin: They have many subjects here that are particularly suited for girls - for example etiquette is one of them. Then there is .. yes, etiquette and flower arrangement - lots of other fun subjects like, such as cinematography. It produces multi-talented people - not just bookworms. So I believe it suits much more the complex needs of the new century. that's why I chose this course. 11:46
Campbell: But she thinks it could also help her as housewife. 12:24
Liu Jin: It doesn't matter if it's from the perspective of either a university student or just of a modern woman - it's very good for the overall development. You could say it produces women who are "presentable in the hall and adept in the kitchen". 12:27
College committee Campbell: And its hotly contested. Thousands of girls apply for the few places available. The college only chooses girls who have high marks and long legs. The minimum height requirement is 162 centimetres. 12:45
Sun Xun Sun Xun: It is out of consideration for employment, because the aim of our two courses is to produce PR and secretarial personnel whose jobs mainly involve human relations. A very small physique might have a negative impact on their employability. So we set this height requirement, without any other requirements - this is not a beauty contest. 13:00
Dr Xia Campbell: And thats where men like Dr Xia come in. Hes done his leg-stretching operations about 700 times, on girls as young as 16. He says the job market -- and fashion -- ensure a steady supply of patients. 13:32
Dr Xia: Most short women have relatively short legs. They want to be pretty as a whole. They feel when they wear clothes - when they buy clothes -they can't find anything suitable. That's also a worry. 13:47
Tara: I think its scary, its really scary that -- 14:04
Tara it astonishes me that how could people feel so insecure about their height that they have to inflict such pain on themselves. 14:08
Music 14:18
B/w Photos foot binding Campbell: And its hard not to hear a faint echo of something Imperial China practised --foot binding. For centuries, highborn women bound their daughters feet, crippling them to satisfy a male taste in beauty.
Operating theatre So is leg-stretching the new Communist equivalent? 14:44
Dr Xia: They are two completely different things. The function of that act was to force people into submission. It was a confinement for women. If her feet were bound how could she run away. This here now is not the same. This operation is only to improve - to make them more perfect - to improve someones physical appearance .their beauty. 14:48
Street advertising Its a time of breathtaking change in the worlds most populous country. But it seems womens lives will continue to be shaped by men. Beauty, the new Utopia in a sexual revolution. 15:30
Credits: CHINA WOMENReporter: Eric CampbellCamera: Terry McDonaldEditor: Garth Thomas 15:49
November 2002 1455
Operating theatre Campbell: Its mid-morning at Beijing Hospital 402 and a surgical team is making a young woman more beautiful. 00:04
After sawing her leg bones in two, they start drilling holes through her calves.
Then they hammer in long, metal pins.
Over the next hour theyll construct what looks like a medieval torture device -- a brace that can be twisted to stretch the leg as the bones grows back.
The aim is not to correct any illness or deformity. The patient is perfectly healthy. Its to make her fashionably taller, stretching each leg by as much as eight centimetres. The surgeon, Dr Xia Hetao, says its just what women need to stand out in the crowd.
Dr Xia Dr Xia: In this country we have a lot of comparatively short girls who are one meter fifty, or under one sixty. 01:10
Operating theatre They have a lot of problems finding a job, 01:21
Dr Xia so they do it to improve their own job opportunities they change their appearance by increasing their height. 01:26
Catwalk Music 01:44
Campbell: These days long legs are just the start of what women want -- or at least what Chinese men want women to have. The dull conformity of Mao suits and socialist dogma is long gone. 01:52
Street scenes and advertising In its place, a kaleidoscope of Western-style consumerism and beauty role models. It is a world where appearance is becoming all-important, and where many will go to painful extremes to become something theyre not. 02:04
Li Young women like Li, a 24 year old nursing graduate who thinks shes too short. 02:24
Li: Because I was always quite short I thought if I tried hard enough I could become a bit taller. Then I saw an article about this in the newspaper, so I came here. 02:30
Li and doctor Campbell: Li is 152 centimetres -- four foot ten on the old scale -- a fairly typical height for women in China. Shell have a total of three operations and for months shell twist her braces four times a day until shes 160 centimetres. She feels that somehow it could make her life better. 02:47
Li Li: It could be that my life will improve but things like that are difficult to say - they just go their own way. 03:09
Campbell: Her mother has reluctantly gone along with it, even though when she was a girl it would have been unthinkable. 03:18
Mother Mother: Of course todays society is very different from our times. On the one side, today real skills and learning are very important - on the other side, I believe appearance has great importance in our society. It has influence on finding a job and so on. 03:24
Street scenes Campbell: Its hard to believe just how recently it was so completely different. In just one generation China has gone from one extreme to another. 03:47
Music 03:57
Archival b/w communist China Campbell: In 1949 the Communist Party swept to power vowing to liberate women from the shackles of male domination. It shut down the brothels that had treated them as commodities. It gave women the power to divorce their husbands. The State encouraged women to do the same jobs as men -- even to wear the same clothes. 04:06
It many ways it was epic hypocrisy. Women wound up doing all the housework as well as factory and farm work. But in theory the workforce was gender free.
Archival women working in the fields By the late 60s, at the height of the Mao Zedongs Cultural Revolution, it was hard to tell women from men. 04:41
Music
Photo album Campbell: Tara Wang was three years old when the Cultural Revolution began. She and her siblings proudly posed in Mao suits with Maos little red books. Her childhood and teenage years were in a world almost devoid of sex. 04:53
Tara Tara: Imagine a generation or generations that grew up without ever seeing a single ad, 05:10
Advertising without ever seeing a sort of a sex symbol, nor having a concept of a sex symbol, 05:18
Tara to todays world in China, everything is about sex appeal. I think its a huge change. 05:26
Tara and colleagues Campbell: Today, at 39, Tara Wang edits the Chinese edition of a western fashion magazine, Madame Figaro. 05:39
Its filled with the kind of images that have redefined the Chinese view of women -- beautiful models, exotic clothes and alluring sexuality. She believes her magazine also promotes strength and independence.
Tara: If you read in detail our magazines 06:02
Tara still promote a lot of successful women, but this concept of success is much broader than being beautiful and famous and rich. Most of them are intelligent women, independent women. So I dont really feel Im just promoting plastic beauty, I think were also promoting inner beauty as well. 06:04
Street scenes and advertising Music 06:34
Campbell: But in the market at large, its plastic beauty thats a growth industry. Since China reopened for business, its been flooded with fashion chains, beauty parlours, cosmetic counters, bridal shops and gymnasiums. Economic reform has certainly brought more choice and, for some, opportunity. But it hasnt necessarily brought liberation. 06:41
This is and probably always has been an extremely sexist society -- even during the Cultural Revolution. Chairman Mao, for example, had his retainers bring him young girls each night in the belief it would stop him growing old. It didnt. But his Communist Party is still running the country -- albeit with a modern image -- and its still trying to determine how women should behave. 07:05
Music
Shanghai Normal University Campbell: And todays communists have a very different role for women in mind. 07:33
Shanghai Normal University has opened the first State-run finishing school for girls. Its aim is to teach young ladies to be refined and demure. Its dean, Sun Xun, says it represents a new phase in socialist education.
Sun Xun Sun Xun: Most importantly, we felt that while women are equal to men and all opportunities for education are about the same, 07:55
Shanghai Normal University they have their unique qualities - qualities that differ from the ones that men have. Some courses might be suited for women but not for men.
Campbell: The courses it believes women are best suited to include handicrafts and etiquette. 08:16
In side class room Lecturer: All right, the order of protocol is when we deal with people, which seat we have to reserve for the person of honour . which seat we have to give to the elder.
Campbell: In this class, girls are learning where to sit, stand and walk when escorting prominent officials, such as a Communist dignitaries. 08:34
Lecturer: The right one is the honoured one, isnt it? This is number one .this is number two, right?
Campbell: Its studied with the determined concentration of an advanced physics class. The students see these officially feminine skills as their tickets to better lives. 08:48
Huang Wen-Xian is typical of the girls who come here -- smart, stylish and beautiful. 09:02
Wen-Xian Wen-Xian: It doesn't matter if it's in the past, or today - I believe we women are valuable in society and we should know how to manifest that value. So, we should also present ourselves better. Therefore, I can learn a lot about these things here. 09:08
Campbell: Today Wen-Xian is learning how to be the MC at a ribbon cutting ceremony. 09:32
Lecturer 2 Lecturer 2: We usually stand on one side on this side is the audience. 09:36
Campbell: The scenario is the launch of a trade exhibition by Chinese and British sponsors. 09:42
Wen-Xian: On behalf of the exhibition committee I now announce the opening of the seventh China International Educational Technology Exhibition. 09:48
Sun Xun: Its the sort of event thats now very common in China as even state bodies open for business. The college believes the new China needs young women like Wen-Xian to perform these supporting roles. 09:59
Sun Xun Sun Xun: Nowadays our government's needs in people are completely different from the ones during the Cultural Revolution. The all-round and free development of people is still in line with Marxist views. 10:15
Tara Tara: My honest opinion, I think its pretty ridiculous. 10:32
Campbell: Tara Wang has no problem with women making themselves more attractive. She is, after all, a fashion editor. But she does believe women should take responsibility for their lives. Shes shocked by how many girls these days just want to catch a man. 10:40
Super fades up Tara Wang Editor, Madame Figaro China Tara: You have a lot of young women, I think they would rather find a sugar daddy, an easy way out than working hard, and make it by themselves. Then in the meantime you also find a lot of women really driven, and independent, modern. I think you find both, but when we were growing up, that was not a concept even to find a man to support your lifestyle. It was never a choice in our minds. But today it is and there are many who does make that choice. 10:54
Shanghai Normal University Campbell: The girls in finishing school say theyre here to improve their minds. Twenty-one-year Liu Jin says its giving her a rounded education. 11:37
Liu Jin Liu Jin: They have many subjects here that are particularly suited for girls - for example etiquette is one of them. Then there is .. yes, etiquette and flower arrangement - lots of other fun subjects like, such as cinematography. It produces multi-talented people - not just bookworms. So I believe it suits much more the complex needs of the new century. that's why I chose this course. 11:46
Campbell: But she thinks it could also help her as housewife. 12:24
Liu Jin: It doesn't matter if it's from the perspective of either a university student or just of a modern woman - it's very good for the overall development. You could say it produces women who are "presentable in the hall and adept in the kitchen". 12:27
College committee Campbell: And its hotly contested. Thousands of girls apply for the few places available. The college only chooses girls who have high marks and long legs. The minimum height requirement is 162 centimetres. 12:45
Sun Xun Sun Xun: It is out of consideration for employment, because the aim of our two courses is to produce PR and secretarial personnel whose jobs mainly involve human relations. A very small physique might have a negative impact on their employability. So we set this height requirement, without any other requirements - this is not a beauty contest. 13:00
Dr Xia Campbell: And thats where men like Dr Xia come in. Hes done his leg-stretching operations about 700 times, on girls as young as 16. He says the job market -- and fashion -- ensure a steady supply of patients. 13:32
Dr Xia: Most short women have relatively short legs. They want to be pretty as a whole. They feel when they wear clothes - when they buy clothes -they can't find anything suitable. That's also a worry. 13:47
Tara: I think its scary, its really scary that -- 14:04
Tara it astonishes me that how could people feel so insecure about their height that they have to inflict such pain on themselves. 14:08
Music 14:18
B/w Photos foot binding Campbell: And its hard not to hear a faint echo of something Imperial China practised --foot binding. For centuries, highborn women bound their daughters feet, crippling them to satisfy a male taste in beauty.
Operating theatre So is leg-stretching the new Communist equivalent? 14:44
Dr Xia: They are two completely different things. The function of that act was to force people into submission. It was a confinement for women. If her feet were bound how could she run away. This here now is not the same. This operation is only to improve - to make them more perfect - to improve someones physical appearance .their beauty. 14:48
Street advertising Its a time of breathtaking change in the worlds most populous country. But it seems womens lives will continue to be shaped by men. Beauty, the new Utopia in a sexual revolution. 15:30
Credits: CHINA WOMENReporter: Eric CampbellCamera: Terry McDonaldEditor: Garth Thomas 15:49