Chinese Single Women’s Ideal Men: “Secondhand” Suitors Surprisingly Popular. By Rachel Wang. Tea Leaf Nation, May 21, 2013.
How Can a Chinese Woman Born in 1990 Already Be “Too Old” for Marriage? By Liz Carter and Rachel Wang. Tea Leaf Nation, March 4, 2013.
In an American Classroom, Awakening to the Reality of Chinese Gender Discrimination. By Jan Cao and Xueting Liu. Tea Leaf Nation, March 25, 2013.
One of the World’s Most Amazing Love Stories Happened on a Mountain in China. By Shelley Jiang. Tea Leaf Nation, November 6, 2012.
Getting Married to Get Ahead in China’s Business World. By Eveline Chao. The Daily Beast, April 9, 2013.
Wang:
A
recent survey of over 35,500 single ladies in China offers some insight into
Chinese women’s attitudes towards men and marriage. The survey, which included
questions such as “Why are you still single?” and “What kind of man do you hope
to marry?” shed light on the types of
men that single Chinese women prefer, with some surprising results.
While
51.13% of the women surveyed regarded “getting married” as their goal, they
reported that the top three male traits that made them prefer singlehood were
men’s constant involvement in “ambiguous” love affairs, their tendency to talk
a lot but accomplish little, and their stinginess. While these feelings may
resonate globally, what set the Chinese marriage market apart were respondents’
attitudes towards men, as well as their expectations and standards for their
potential future husbands.
When
asked “What kind of men are you willing to marry?” the most popular response
was “a divorced man who owns a house and car,” followed by “a successful
40-something man who has gone on a lot of blind dates but is still single.”
Interestingly – and even a bit surprisingly – the least popular kind of man,
coming in behind even “an unassuming computer programmer,” and “a handsome
freelancer,” was the so-called “phoenix man,” a high-level corporate manager
with a lot of relatives. More broadly defined, a “phoenix man” is someone who
came from humble beginnings, made his way through school, exhausted resources
of his family in the process, and was expected to change the fate of the family
when he eventually succeeded.
Instead
of being regarded as heroes who changed their own destinies, “phoenix men” have
long been unpopular in the Chinese marriage market, especially among “peacock
girls” – those from urban, relatively wealthy families. Women dislike what they
perceive to be the men’s insecurity, fear of failure, penny pinching,
inferiority complexes, and prioritization of his extended family over his own
wife and kids. These are thought to be traits irreversibly ingrained in his
psyche by the time he reaches adulthood.
Many
Chinese believe that when you marry someone, you are marrying into a lifestyle
and an entire family. In a country with conservative marriage traditions, many
men and women still think divorce is shameful and that second marriages should
be low-profile. China has some long-standing traditions when it comes to
marriage, including especially tight family ties, living with the husband’s
family after marriage, and having the wife serve his parents and potentially
his entire family. In modern days, couples who live and work in more
westernized urban areas are less likely to abide by such traditions, but they
have not completely disappeared and may remain in the back of women’s minds
like a time bomb.
Many
single Chinese women therefore find it difficult to decide whom to marry. On
the one hand, marrying a relatively rich divorced man is like taking a
“secondhand” man, and they may feel they lose face by doing so. On the other
hand, marrying an affluent “phoenix man” might embroil the woman in endless
troubles with his extended family.
Netizens
weighed in on the dilemma. One woman commented on the survey, “I personally
think that you may lose face by marrying an old man [a divorced, middle-aged
man], but at least you might have some security in life. He might also be less
flirtatious [with other women]. A more stable life would bring you a sense of
safety.” On Weibo, a Twitter-like social media platform, user @bt桃子
remarked, “One reason marrying a divorced man is better than marrying a single
man is that you can see what his attitude toward marriage is: whether he is
abusive, whether he is responsible enough, whether he likes to get involved in
love affairs. It’s hard to learn any of this about a single man unless you’ve
lived closely with him for a while.”
A
comment by Weibo user @一帘花碎影 illustrated some of the
main complaints women have about “phoenix men”:
Love
yourself! Stay away from phoenix men! They bear the entire family’s hopes while
in college, and get what they believe is a good job in a state-owned company
with a salary of two or three hundred thousand a year. If you are not from a
rich family, his entire family will think that you are not good enough for him.
Down the line, his relatives will always come visit him, borrow money for all
sorts of reasons, and make you help them get jobs. If you don’t help them, they
will think he is an ungrateful child who has no appreciation for their
sacrifices.
Women
faced these tough choices in a variety of ways. A plurality of those surveyed
reported that in their single lives they chose to devote themselves to their
work. Almost half reported they had no sex life. A sizable 13.28% said they did
not want to marry, while 23.87% said they were, “uncertain, tired, and might
never love again.”
In the
end, many Chinese women still find choosing a marriage partner very difficult.
An easier relationship might come with other trade-offs, while a harder one
might not be worth the energy spent. It is worth noting, though, that only
single women participated in this survey, so it does not reflect the views of
all Chinese women or Chinese society as a whole. Many couples are happily
married every day: the marriage registration computer system recently crashed
because of the large volume of couples who wanted to get married on May 20, a
date that is a homonym for “I love you” in Mandarin.
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A young
Chinese couple catches a private moment during their wedding. (Amaotou/Flickr)
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