The Economist-Why Chinese feminists are doing stand-up comedy in New York City Podcasts

Tickets for “Nvzizhuyi”—a monthly stand-up comedy show in New York City— often sell out in less than a minute. The show invites Chinese citizens, mostly women, to tell jokes, perform skits and recount the absurd challenges they’ve encountered as feminist activists in China—things they could never utter in public back home.

This week, Alice Su, our senior China correspondent, reports from the dark basement of a comedy club. Together with David Rennie, The Economist’s Beijing bureau chief, they ask: Why are some of China’s exiled feminists doing stand-up comedy abroad? And can their performances have any impact back home? Runtime: 34 mins

Correction (December 6th 2023): An earlier version of this episode referred to a trans person as “he” rather than “they”. We have now corrected that error.

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