Over 180 LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) people from around the globe called for the construction of a gay-friendly environment for students at a South China university in a letter sent to the school's president on Wednesday, following controversy over the university's punishment of a gay couple.
"We empathize with the lesbian couple at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies [GDUFS] who were denied their bachelor's degrees," one of the two petition organizers, nicknamed Sister Shan, told the Global Times on Wednesday.
In June, GDUFS refused to give a lesbian couple their diplomas, saying their public marriage proposal "violated certain regulations." The university has since granted the women their degrees, though it has not apologized for the delay.
Meanwhile, GDUFS President Zhong Weihe awarded 50 legally married alumni couples certificates of honor in 2015, Shan said.
"We were upset by the university's different attitudes and standards toward gay and legally married couples," Shan said. "We hoped to write a letter with [over] 100 signatures to help build a gay-friendly campus."
On Sunday, Shan and her friend Xiao Qi collected the signatures of some 187 supporters from China and abroad on jinshuju.net, a data management website.
In the letter to GDUFS, they advised the college to seek to understand and protect the gay community. They also called on the college to bring courses on gay recognition to new students.
"Even today, LGBT [students] go through bullying, suicide and school expulsion because of their sexual orientation and their natural differences," Liang Wenhui, founder of the Chinese Gay-Straight Alliance, told the Global Times.
Liang also noted that teachers at GDUFS who tried to promote courses on sexual identity and homosexuality on campus last term received punishment from the school.
"In the diploma rejection case, the lesbian couple's parents were informed by the university of their sexual orientation. Their private matters should not be exposed against their will," Liang said.
On July 28, LGBT group All Out sent the signatures of over 75,000 people to the university, requesting that the university apologize to the two students.
