“How far would you go for love?” asks Cartier’s new commercial in China. The spot features people who are clearly romantically involved – including two men and two women. The nature of the persons’ relationship with each other in the clip is deliberately left vague  – but in the meantime the homosexual couples were called “girlfriends” or “father and son” in the advertisements. Activists are appalled.

Two men riding bicycles and looking into each other’s eyes – a woman who lays her head on the shoulder of another woman while the latter dreamily closes her eyes… The 60-second clip by jeweler Cartier was released just in time for the Qixi festival, a kind of Chinese Valentine’s Day in a few weeks. The commercial features a ring – known to be one of the greatest symbols of eternal love.

In this context, it seems very progressive that Cartier not only depicts heterosexual couples, but also same-sex couples. In the spot itself, the relationship between the couples is not dissolved, but the intention is clear – at least that’s what one might think. In the meantime, Cartier has backed off: In ads and banners on his Tmall site, Cartier has  given the couples other labels by mean. Tmall is one of the world’s largest e-commerce sites and reaches around 500 million users per month.

The ad of the two women reads:

“Mutual understanding beyond words. Witness our everlasting friendship”.

The text on the picture of the two men reads:

“Father and son are like brothers”

In a statement on Thursday the company stuck to its presentation. The Trinity Collection would tell four stories of love, friendship and family ties. They said:

“One of the stories shows the unique bond between a father and his son who enjoy a joyful and playful bicycle ride together, symbolising the path of life where there will be moments of separation.”

You can watch the video here.

Clear criticism on social media

Criticism hailed on social media. On the Weibo platform, the Chinese response to Twitter, many users resented the company’s alleged “touch-up” of the campaign. They believed that the two men were obviously destined to be a couple – due to the almost non-existent age difference and the fact that father and son rarely wear rings as a symbol of their bond.

One wrote, for example:

“They are not more than three years apart in age. Furthermore, I have never heard of fathers and sons wearing matching rings.”

Another pointed out the signal Cartier was sending with the retroactive attribute assignment:

“The campaign was much better when it stayed in the ambiguity zone. Now I feel that being gay is something to be ashamed of.”

Was Cartier trying to circumvent media censorship?

Did Cartier get scared of their own courage – or did they try to outwit the Chinese system? Although many queer activists* were disappointed, they also showed resignation. On social networks, too, many blamed the tightened regulatory requirements for companies and the media censorship prevailing in China – which in the end erases nothing less than the value of all cultures, a critic said on Weibo.

Homosexuality is still considered taboo in China. Although homosexuality has no longer been officially listed as a psychological disorder since 2001, the reality is unfortunately different. Recently a courageous lesbian student sued a Chinese publishing house in whose publications homosexuality was still called a “psychosexual disorder” (we reported). Since 2016 there is a nationwide ban on the depiction of “abnormal sexual behaviour” in online video and audio content. This includes homosexuality.

Yanzi Peng, the director of the China Rainbow Media Awards, told CNN that companies need to be bolder. However, she also argued that Cartier’s advertising and the obvious “circumvention” of the taboo has increased the visibility of queer life forms.

“Some people may think that [Cartier] is just trying to make a few ‘pink dollars’, but I tend to think more positively that they support gay rights in a way that’s not so different from the way we do – by increasing our visibility through these kinds of ads.”

The China Rainbow Media Awards is a prize-giving ceremony that, since 2011, has been honouring publishing houses and media companies that are committed to the queer community in a variety of ways and increase the visibility of non-heteronormative lifestyles in China.

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