Chinese law experts recommend that men should receive equal protection as women do from rape, following the government's plan to improve the country's rape law.
Lawmakers and legal experts began asking for the recommencement of the law in 2011 when a "crime of intentional injury" was done by a 42-year-old man who was accused of raping his 18-year-old male coworker in Beijing.
The man was sentenced to just a year of imprisonment, making the legal community appeal for a new law that protects men and women to promote gender equality. This is prior to Article 236 of Chinese Criminal Law, which aims to protect women and girls from rape.
Law expert Wei Feng contradicted the law's limited scope, stating that the gap between the protection of both gender should be filled in with corresponding symmetrical regulations.
Wei discussed that the evolution and development of sexuality around the world has shown the potential victims of sexual violence, and China's definition of rape that mainly concerns women is not applicable in modern times. Rape should be defined as a type of sexual assault committed against a person without consent, not only limited to women.
Different legislator groups also ascribe gender equality orientation to all people, not just to women who have been considered as a vulnerable groups in China for the long time, in the recently held "Two Sessions" in Beijing.
Other countries have already established a law protecting men and women. United Kingdom's Act 1956 on Sexual Offenses specifically used the term "person" on sexual assault, not a particular gender alone.
The United States, and some European countries like Germany, France, and Italy, also have the same regulation on rape where both men and women receive equal features on protection from sexual assault or abuse.