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Gay sex was illegal in China until 1997 and homosexuality was classed as a mental illness until 2001
Mr Gay China has been cancelled
Mr Gay China pageant shut down by police
Today's scheduled Mr Gay China pageant has been shut down by police for reportedly not following the "correct procedures".
The first ever held in the country, Beijing's event was to have included a swimwear round and a talent section for the eight contestants to showcase their singing and dancing, with the winner going to Norway for next month's finals of Worldwide Mr Gay.
The pageant had been considered a remarkable sign of how attitudes had changed and of gay people's increasing sense of security in a country where gay sex was illegal until 1997 and homosexuality was classed as a mental illness until 2001.
Rumours of its cancellation began circulating on Twitter at around noon GMT, with gay group Shanghai LGBT reporting that police had told organisers that they had not "followed the right procedures".
Official tolerance of gay activism can be unpredictable in China, where organisers have been harassed by the authorities and websites and publications shut down, but a number of recent breakthroughs had given cause for optimism.
On Wednesday, the English-language state-run newspaper China Daily gave its front page to a gay wedding in the town of Chengdu, despite same-sex marriage and civil unions not being legally recognised.
Those behind Mr Gay China had kept the event low-key by not inviting the mainstream Chinese-language media, but it had been reported in approving terms in English-language state publications.
Later today, organiser Ben Zhang confirmed to Associated Press that the authorities had said that the application for the event had not followed the "correct procedures".
