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Xi Jinping's order: Clothes 'hurting feelings' of nation may be banned in China
The law does not specify which which types of clothing stand to be banned by the new rules.
Clothes which "hurt the feelings" of the nation could soon be banned in China, according to recent draft revisions to legislation, news agency AFP reported. The proposed law states that both speech and clothing deemed "harmful to the spirit of the Chinese people" or that "hurts the feelings" of the nation will result in fines. Use of the same could also lead to jail time. Although, the law does not specify which which types of clothing stand to be banned by the new rules.
"Determining who has the authority to decide and how to make judgements may require more time, and we need the establishment of mature judgement criteria before advancing such proposals," a 23-year-old Beijing resident told AFP, adding that the offences that the law targets are “not as clear as crimes like robbery, where right and wrong are definitive."
“Dressing is everyone's own choice and freedom, but there are also special (circumstances). If someone makes an insulting move in front of a certain statue on a specific day and wears a special costume, such behaviour is 100 percent on purpose and should be punished,” she was quoted by the news agency as saying.
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Many legal scholars in China objected on similar grounds to the revisions in the law as the consultation period will last till September 30. The proposals would lead to "too vague a standard of punishment, which will easily lead to an arbitrary expansion of the scope of administrative punishment", Tsinghua University's Lao Dongyan said on social media platform Weibo.
Earlier this month, social media videos showed a man in the city of Shenzhen being questioned by police for livestreaming himself wearing a skirt.
In 2021, the state-backed Global Times said that a woman was "severely criticised and educated" after she wore a kimono in public on December 13, the national remembrance day for victims of Japanese war crimes in 1937.
Last year, a woman said she was detained during a photoshoot while wearing a kimono in the city of Suzhou by police.
