Understanding the Russian invasion of Ukraine through a gendered prism

Abstract

This essay offers a timely analysis of how the 2022 Russo-Ukrainian warfare is observed in China through a gendered prism. Accounting for an anti-West axis in China’s current political climate, we articulate how misogyny and nationalism converge in Chinese social media users’ discussions about the military crisis currently unfolding in East Europe. This is revealed by a vulgar interpretation of the Russo-Ukrainian relationship and the sexualisation of Ukrainian/Russian women, which are both widespread in the Chinese-language social media sphere. With the patriarchal specificities of the Party-State polity in mind, the discussion yields a feminist perspective to foreground China’s nationalist politics.