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URBAN CHAT: Fear not the label, hear the dragon ladies roar

Strong women have gotten a myriad of bad nicknames. In Asia, “dragon lady” and “tiger mom” have been thrown around. But what if it took a handful of dragon ladies to transform Asia’s largest country into modernity?

Lynda Ibrahim (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Fri, January 27, 2017

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URBAN CHAT: Fear not the label, hear the dragon ladies roar Thousands attend the Women's March on Austin, Texas, Saturday, Jan. 21, 2017, joining other movements across the country to stands up for women's rights. The masses marched from the Texas Capitol through the streets of downtown, returning to the Capitol grounds for speeches and entertainment. (Ralph Barrera/Austin American-Statesman via AP) (AP/Ralph Barrera/Austin American-Statesman)

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ast weekend, over a million women marched on the United States capital and in major cities worldwide the day after US President Donald Trump’s inauguration. They protested Trump’s repeated racist and misogynist comments, including his threat to meddle with women’s reproductive rights, which he made good on during his first day in office by reinstating the “global gag rule”, banning government-funded NGOs from providing abortion assistance.

That women still have to fight for rights in 2017 in a country as developed as the US is tragic. That the women who marched earned nicknames, like “nasty women”, is pathetic.

Strong women have gotten a myriad of bad nicknames. In Asia, “dragon lady” and “tiger mom” have been thrown around. But what if it took a handful of dragon ladies to transform Asia’s largest country into modernity?

(Read also: Women marching worldwide revive a long-sought dream: Global feminism)

Cixi was born to a medium-ranking government official father in China’s last imperial dynasty, the Qing (1644-1911). She started off in the lowest rung of Emperor Xianfeng’s harem. Meanwhile, European countries were actively pursuing entrance into China that time. However, European encroachments met strong opposition from Xianfeng, who was raised in a 5,000-yearold antiquated belief that China was the greatest country and around which the world revolved. Xianfeng then chose to engage in long wars that only ended in bitter defeats. Raised by a father who welcomed his daughters’ opinions, Cixi offered counsel on opening up on an equal footing, only to offend the xenophobic emperor. If Empress Zhen had not intervened to soothe the emperor’s ego, or Cixi had not given birth to the emperor’s first son in April 1856, which propelled her to the highest consort second only to the empress, China’s course might have run very differently.

It was right after the emperor’s death in August 1861 that Cixi made her moves. With the young prince under her care, 25-year-old Cixi strategized to earn her and 24-year-old Empress Zhen not only equal titles of dowager empress but also the official seal on behalf of the crown prince. That she, with limited education, in an era when women simply served as birth vessels, managed to pull this off by recruiting the allegiance of her forward-thinking brothersin-law to outmaneuver the board of regents, men from elite families with decades-long Confucian training, shows her inherent ability to read and lead people.

Cixi did not see foreign interest in Chinese silk and tea as a stealing of China’s treasures, but as an opportunity to trade for other things her people needed, including rice. She installed Robert Hart, a 28-year-old British literati as inspector general of Chinese maritime customs, whose diligence and honest work would multiply Chinese revenue for future decades. Cixi also built Tangweng College and hired American missionary WAP Martin to modernize the education for mandarins who had only been trained in classic Confucianism. She promoted open-minded officials like Earl Li to key positions.

(Read also: 'hUSh' unlocks silence on sexual violence)

Women cannot handle pressure? Cixi constantly battled criticism from her own court, which she chose to manage democratically. When it was time to quell an armed uprising, she enlisted the help of 30-year-old American adventurer Frederick Townsend Ward to set up a modern army, before later investing in a Chinese navy overhaul and the country’s first railroads.

Perhaps borrowing from scholar Sun Tzu’s advice to understand one’s enemy, Cixi sent out China’s first representative to the West, hiring Harvard law graduate Anson Burlingame for the job. One of his visits was chronicled by Queen Victoria, then the monarch of the world’s largest empire. One of Burlingame’s accomplishments was securing a treaty with the US that dictated better treatment of Chinese migrant workers who had started arriving in California.

I read a study somewhere that showed when you give power to a woman, she will invest in education and human well-being. You want to read how Cixi personally proved this study? Jung Chan’s critically-acclaimed 2014 biography can detail it all.

Child emperors grew up and died, Empress Dowager Cixi, backed by Empress Dowager Zhen, continued to steer China forward, indirectly making it possible to transform into a constitutional monarchy and later a republic. Interestingly, a republic led by open-minded members of the elite like Sun Yat Sen and Chiang Kai Shek who were both married to strong-willed and Western-educated Soong sisters.

For almost a century before Mao’s 1940s rise, China’s pivotal turn into modernity was orchestrated and assisted by strong women. They had to be strong, for society was not willing to give them room. They had to wield this strength with conviction, because otherwise nobody else would have passed them the baton. They had to think twice as intelligently and work twice as hard, just to receive half of the compliments reserved for their male counterparts. Cixi was portrayed inaccurately (hello, fake news) by an English biographer and her tomb was desecrated by Republican soldiers. The Soong sisters were called hapless society girls. In 2016, Taiwan’s first female President Tsai Ing Wen was mocked as “imbalanced” and a childless singleton. A century after being branded “nagging iron-jawed angels” for demanding voting rights, American women promoting equality are called “nasty” by the establishment, so they simply have to march again.

Women worldwide, despite having come a long way, still have a long way to go. If it took the dragon ladies of China to welcome modernity, maybe it will take iron-jawed dragon ladies worldwide to obtain equality. Fear not the labels, ladies, for history shows it is up to us women to get our rights. The march continues, hear the dragon ladies roar.

 

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Lynda Ibrahim is a Jakarta based writer with a penchant for purple, pussycats and pop culture.

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