Drum Tower: Stand-up feminists

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 have some of China’s exiled feminists taken to doing stand-up abroad? And can their comedy have any impact back home?

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