text: Women's liberation was an important political agenda of the party. Particularly, the party emphasized women's participation in production in achieving gender equality. The state depicted divergent, even conflicting images of women, with some emphasizing the productive skills while some the domestic role of women, to meet various economic and labor situations. In urban areas, women and men nominally were remunerated equally, but in reality, men often secured jobs with better payment and more social prestige. In rural areas, more women were mobilized to participate in agricultural production. Historians show that in China's collective farm, women were, on the one hand, mobilized to cultivate grain and cotton under the notion of gender equality and, on the other hand, constrained by gendered division of labor, were burdened with domestic labor. Some women had to bear physical suffering as a result of having to continue working hard shortly after they gave birth. In big water constructions, rural women had to do heavy manual labor and, at the same time, took housework responsibilities. The party forcefully transformed rural women into productive roles while overlooking their reproductive responsibilities and health. Even when the state sought to monopolize the cotton industry under the unified purchase and sale system, rural women continuously engaged in handicraft, weaving and spanning to make cloths for household usage as they had been historically doing. Apart from working for the collective farms and other construction work, they crouched the shoulders and worked overtime late in the night after their husbands and children went to sleep.
  The Maoist state generally did not outlaw third genders, but officially it also ignored LGBTQ. However, homosexuality in practice was usually demoralized and could face severe political consequences. In some struggle sessions during the Cultural Revolution or self-reflections, homosexuality was often referred to as a crime or serious problem. For example, a young cadre in a factory accused of homosexuality faced fierce political criticism.