Pence: "Mulan" was a liberal conspiracy, women can't fight!

[jaichind]

Well, Pence is correct in the sense that the Mulan(木蘭) story is completely fake and has no historical basis. It was based on a short and anonymous poem in the Northern Wei dynasty of around 400AD.  Then various people added to it until it became a drama.  The part where she married her superior officer was put in much later during the Ming Dynasty and if anything is a "conservative conspiracy"to try to clarify what a women aspirations should be.  The social ethos/culture of the Ming was much more socially conservative than the liberal Sung dynasty so there was some pressure to do this. There are a bunch of these Chinese dramas with women in combat of which the most famous beyond Mulan would the stories related to the Generals of the Yang Family (楊家將) of the Sung dynasty.  While these stories are based on 3 actual generals of the Sung Dynasty from the Yang Family almost 90% of the drama are made and not based on historical fact which includes a bunch of military exploits of the women of the Yang Family. 

These drama's exist exactly because the issue of women in combat in classical China was so beyond the pale  (although not women in political and military strategy making which did take place in an informal manner and people accepted it) that these dramas were non-controversial since everyone knew that the premise was absurd so it is best to sit back, not take it seriously,  and enjoy the play, similar to watching a Superman movie.