How a Netflix show sparked a #Me Too movement in Taiwan

Taiwan is facing its own reckoning with the #Me Too movement – all thanks to a Netflix show. The series the Wave Makers – a political drama about a team of campaign managers ahead of a Taiwanese presidential election – has caught the public imagination and resulted in dozens of #Me Too accusations being made against rich and powerful in Taipei. Let’s take a closer look: What happened? It was a sexual harassment plotline on the show that resulted in the outpouring of allegations. According to the China Project, the plotline sees a young worker Zhang Yajing harassed by her colleague. Her senior Weng Wenfang vows to get justice despite a higher-up blithely dismissing her concerns. “We can’t just let this go,” Weng tells Zhang. “Many things can’t be dealt with like this. If they are, people will slowly die. We will die.” [caption id=“attachment_12728702” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] A plotline on the show Wave Makers kicked off the #Me Too storm in Taiwan. Image courtesy: Netflix[/caption] It was those very words that kicked off the #Me Too storm in Taiwan on 31 May. A former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) worker on Facebook wrote about how she was sexually assaulted in September 2022 in a car after a campaign film shoot. When the worker approached the director of the party’s women department, she was asked why she didn’t leave the car. According to Focus Taiwan, the woman was pressured not to file a complaint against her assailant. “I also thought I could let this go,” she wrote, “but recently when I watched the show, I was overwhelmed and cried until I almost died… the person upholding women’s rights failed to become my Weng Wenfang, so I will become my own Weng Wenfang,” the worker wrote. According to CNN, the Facebook post found much support online. DPP chairman William Lai, who is also a candidate for president, apologised. The party official in question was quickly suspended – and later resigned. A torrent of allegations According to CNN, dozens including a writer of Wave Makers have spoken up about their own experiences with sexual harassment. Among those named are exiled Tiananmen protest leader Wang Dan, Chinese dissident poet Bèi Lǐng, United Daily News chairman Wang Chien-jung, professor and writer Chen Fang-ming, according to The News Lens International. Two people have made accusations agaist Wang, according to The China Project. One man has accused him of attempted rape, as per CNN. One of the accusers took to Facebook to say he came forward after being inspired by other victims. “Wang Dan’s position and political friends are members of the independence movement and the DPP. I call on everyone to choose their allies carefully. If you ignore someone’s hurtful actions just because you have similar positions, is that not collusion?” the man wrote on Facebook last week. As per Global Voices.org, Wang has claimed the accusations are politically motivated. The man has filed a legal complaint against Wang. Meanwhile, Chien Li-ying, who co-wrote the Wave Makers script, on 3 June wrote a social media post accusing Bèi of sexually harassing her, as per The China Project. Though Bei denied the story, Chien says five others have reached out to her and spoken of similar experiences. “Cases have been popping up in all walks of life recently, and you can see why it resonates,”  Chien told CNN. “There had been so many incidents like this, but they couldn’t be discussed or told.” Chien told CNN victims are urged to ’let it go’ in view of the so-called bigger picture. “The victims are prone to self-censor, because they are afraid what they say would spoil the bigger cause,” she said. “It seems like the issue of sexual harassment and assault has been suppressed all along – as if we’ve been swallowing it for a bigger political cause and sacrificing ourselves for the sake of the bigger picture,” she said.

Politicians haven’t been spared either.

According to The International, Presidential Office Adviser Yao Chih-fa and former Chief of Staff to the Mayor of Kaohsiung Hong Chih-kun of the DPP have also been named as well as several Opposition Kuomintang (KMT) politicians including legislator Fu Kun-chi. President Tsai Ing-wen on 2 June June apologised for the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) mishandling of sexual misconduct complaints, following a recent spate of allegations by former party staffers. [caption id=“attachment_12375032” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen. apologised twice in two weeks AP[/caption] “As a former party chairperson, I should bear full responsibility,” Tsai said via social media. “I would like to sincerely apologize to the victims [of sexual harassment] and the public.” Tsai on 8 June yet again apologised after claims of sexual harassment were made against senior staff in her party. This came just hours after her national policy adviser Yan Chih-fa was accused of sexually harassing an employee of a Tsai support group in 2018. Yan withdrew a defamation lawsuit he had filed against the complainant and resigned from his position, as per The Guardian. “Our society as a whole must educate ourselves again. People in sexual harassment incidents are victims,” Tsai wrote in a Facebook post. Kang Ting-yu, an associate professor specializing in gender and media studies at Taiwan’s National Chengchi University, told CNN the victims were inspired by the show. “I know of multiple cases where they explicitly said they were inspired by the show,” she said. But experts say Taiwan has never really reckoned with #Me Too. The Guardian quoted Chen Chao-ju, a law professor at National Taiwan University, as saying that in Taiwan “#MeToo has become a symbol of anti-sexual violence activism, but it has yet to produce a crystallising effect and recharge the anti-sexual violence movement … stories are told in private, with victims in the dark and perpetrators enjoying impunity”. Professor Chen Mei-hua of the sociology department at National Sun Yat-sen University told The Guardian the accusers were unlikely to win in legal proceedings. “Most cases happened many years ago, and most women do not have any evidence or witnesses,” she said. “It is almost impossible for victims to win the lawsuit.” With inputs from agencies Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News , India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.