A forbidden book passed down by her grandmother, a mother's last words of blood and tears, and a "Daughter's Record" written by herself, allowed Sheng Mingwei to see clearly: the battle between concubines and concubines is a strategy for dividing men, marriage is a trade in women's goods, and "chastity" and "virtue" are nothing but gold-plated patterns on shackles. She refused the marriage arranged by her father and read "Women Are Not Goods" in public; she secretly established a women's mutual aid association to teach low-class women to read, hide, and escape; she wrote to the court demanding the abolition of the "Women's Commandments" and confronted the famous Neo-Confucian officials.
This is not a story of "adapting to the rules and succeeding in counterattack". Mingwei refused to be the wife of the Hou Mansion, refused to be ordered to be rewarded, and refused to be the most honorable canary in the cage. She chose to travel to Southeast Asia and work with a group of women who were unwilling to accept their fate to open up the cracks in the new world.
Orchids grow in deep valleys, and they are not fragrant just because there are no people there. Why can't there be another way to live outside of the cage?
