# Leftover Women



## Deejo (May 20, 2008)

Don't think social dynamics and cultural expectations play into who we choose to marry?

Try being a successful woman in China and finding a husband before you are an old maid, out of your 20's.

'Leftover women' in China face tough choices in looking for love


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

Deejo said:


> Don't think social dynamics and cultural expectations play into who we choose to marry?
> 
> Try being a successful woman in China and finding a husband before you are an old maid, out of your 20's.
> 
> 'Leftover women' in China face tough choices in looking for love


In the social forum, in the "If you dare, post pictures of your travel" thread, I posted pictures from this last weekend in People's Park in Shanghai of the matchmaking, and gave an explanation of how it works, and I think enough info to see when the info you are seeing is a woman, or a man. I'd say most of the people, women and men, that were posted there were late 20s or early 30s. The one I commented on that had the picture actually had a birth year of 1956 ... So she was older than I am.

I don't know about the veracity of the article, but I think you may find the pictures interesting.

http://talkaboutmarriage.com/social-spot/107257-if-you-dare-post-pictures-your-travels.html

BTW, I'm working with a number of women in Shanghai that I'm certain are all well above median income. I know because of the profession. All of the ones in the office that I know are married. I don't know all of them, though ... It's a pretty big office.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

I'm going to ask some of the women in the office about the concept of the leftover women at the next team lunch. That should be good to get some conversation going ... Or fall dead flat if they don't know what I'm talking about. Either way, it should make for an interesting learning 
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## ntamph (Apr 23, 2013)

I thought China had a shortage of single women due to the one child policy and cultural pressure to have a boy?


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## larry.gray (Feb 21, 2011)

ntamph said:


> I thought China had a shortage of single women due to the one child policy and cultural pressure to have a boy?


There is a huge rural / urban split on that. The boy only craze was stronger in the rural areas, plus urban migration was more female than male. In the urban areas there is actually slightly more women than men.


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

Ntamph, Greenpearl and I commented on that in the Asian women thread. I can't see it where I'm located, there are a lot of women here, and a lot of successful women at that. Greenpearl tells me if I get out of the bug cities that I'll see more imbalance. 

The one child policy has been modified already in response to complaints that it put too large of a burden on a couple to care for 4 aging parents. I just read in the newspaper last week that it is going to be revised again ... I posted a pic in the funny bone thread in Social because the picture immediately below that headline made it read funny ...

*EDIT:* I'll try to post it here, too:










I'm told that in the countrysides, there was a lot of leeway or exception to the one child policy before, but it was enforced in the cities more strictly. Now, however, if both husband and wife are only children, they are allowed to have two children. I don't know what it will be after revision. FWIW, from what I hear from people, most people consider a perfect family to have a son and a daughter. People often express to me that my family is perfect because I have two daughters and one son, and that means I'll always be cared for . Pressures are a little different when a family is only allowed to have one child, though. I won't say it hasn't had an effect, just say that I can't see it, and I wonder if politics in the west has exaggerated it effects a bit ... 
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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

This problem is common in China, Taiwan, Hongkong, and Singapore. 

Chinese traditional thinking tells women to look for men whose social status is higher than theirs. So for these successful women, it's more difficult for them to find men they respect and adore. And some of the women are just picky. Sometimes these women's mothers are picky.


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

I was able to bring this up at the team lunch today. I sat at a table with 3 women and 2 men - all of whom were probably 15 - 20 years younger than I am (so probably 30 - 35 years old). These are professional women,a nd are pretty good at speaking their minds. I'll try to represent what they told me and keep my opinions out of it as much as humanly possible.

When I brought it up, it didn't really fall flat like they didn't know what I was talking about, but there wasn't a lot of agreement with the idea in the article, either. Especially, they disagreed with the part about women not being able to find a man because their level of success prevented them from marrying, and they generally thought that if a woman was a leftover woman, it was because she wasn't really giving much effort to finding a husband, and was focused on something else. 

It was funny that when I first brought the subject up, the women didn't just jump right out with an answer, and the men seemed to sit back and leave it up to the women to answer saying I had 3 good people at the table who could give opinions on it. I don't know if the subject matter was a bit uncomfortable at first, or if it was a surprise that I would use that word, or what it was, but once they began talking about it, they seemed pretty forward with their opinions on it.

They also expressed that in rural areas, women and men both typically marry earlier, but in the cities like Shanghai, Beijing, or Hong Kong, the women tend to focus on careers in their earlier years, and 30 is a pretty normal age for a woman to begin looking for a husband. They were pretty firm in thinking that younger women tend to put more emphasis on their career, and approaching 30, or in the early 30s is where women tend to get serious about finding a husband. 

At one point, I said to them, "What you're describing really doesn't sound much different from what we expect in the US." They expressed that they had limited personal exposure to the US, but agreed that in concept, it was not too different from their understanding in the US. 

I tried to get a further discussion going on the balance of men and women in rural areas, but I don't think I had much interest in that conversation, so I let it go.

So that's the summary of what I was able to get from the 3 women I sat at the table with today on the subject of leftover women, or women who were unable to get married because of their level of success. Mostly, they were skeptical about that as the reason why a woman remained single.


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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

shy_guy, 

What they said is true about some women. There are a lot of career oriented women. But there are a lot of reasons why so many women are not married when they are over 30. 

I think many of them have high standards and they haven't met the right men. I have three nieces. Right now they are 22, 23, and 24. My 22-year-old niece told me that her parents don't allow her to look for a boy friend. They want her to focus on her studies. My 23-year-old niece is a very pretty girl. She often tells me that she still doesn't have a boyfriend. She wants a boyfriend, but her classmates from her university are too sissy for her. My 24-year-old niece is a very pretty girl too, and she just graduated in July. She has always wanted to have a boyfriend. But she hasn't found one. The boys she likes aren't interested in her; and she is not interested in the boys who like her. I don't know if my nieces will be forced to focus more on their career, or they will find the right men and marry soon. I don't know.


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

No argument from me, Greenpearl. I just thought the reaction from the ladies was interesting, especially since I got the chance to talk to them specifically about the subject matter of the article . I do think we're talking now about the same kinds of things that women in general deal with when they begin to want to date, though.


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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

shy_guy said:


> No argument from me, Greenpearl. I just thought the reaction from the ladies was interesting, especially since I got the chance to talk to them specifically about the subject matter of the article . I do think we're talking now about the same kinds of things that women in general deal with when they begin to want to date, though.


shy_guy,

Don't know if you already know this or not. Some Chinese rent boyfriends or girlfriends to go home during spring festival or other big holidays. They do this just so they can stop people from asking them annoying questions. These people face a lot of pressure from their families and the society to get married. In western countries, it's not a big deal to stay single. In China, if you are still single when you are over 30, people think something is wrong with you and they gossip about you.

In Taiwan, they don't use the term "leftover women", they use the term "ripe women". A lot of women in Taiwan don't want to get married because of heavy responsibilities of being a mother and a daughter-in-law. They are happier being single.


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## Cosmos (May 4, 2012)

This puts me in mind of an article I read some time ago about a Chinese woman being (successfully) sued by her husband for having deceived him about her looks:- Plastic Surgery Nation: Chinese Man Sues Wife For Being Ugly, Wins - All News Is Global |


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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

Cosmos said:


> This puts me in mind of an article I read some time ago about a Chinese woman being (successfully) sued by her husband for having deceived him about her looks:- Plastic Surgery Nation: Chinese Man Sues Wife For Being Ugly, Wins - All News Is Global |


A lot of Chinese men still want to marry virgins. A lot of women fake their virginity, they would go to a doctor and have some kind of surgery. It's easy. But sometimes the husbands will still find out the truth, and they will divorce their wives even though the wives have been very loyal to them since they got married.

The more I talk about Chinese men, the more I dislike them. They themselves **** around like crazy, but they require their women to be all virtuous.


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## Cosmos (May 4, 2012)

greenpearl said:


> A lot of Chinese men still want to marry virgins. A lot of women fake their virginity, they would go to a doctor and have some kind of surgery. It's easy. But sometimes the husbands will still find out the truth, and they will divorce their wives even though the wives have been very loyal to them since they got married.
> 
> The more I talk about Chinese men, the more I dislike them. They themselves **** around like crazy, but they require their women to be all virtuous.


It's very sad that such double standards still exist in such an ancient culture.


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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

Trenton said:


> I think this can translate to the U.S. It's a struggle women face because now that it is clear women can compete for and get jobs that require a high level of education, and women are graduating college more than men in the states, they are going to be left struggling with their relationships with men and the idea of motherhood and how that role is now defined.
> 
> The questions are:
> 
> ...


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

Trenton said:


> Funny thing is, the answers to these questions will be guesses even if we spend the next fifty pages digging up and comparing sources to try and prove our perceptions based upon our own choices.


I agree completely here. I have a tendency to be skeptical of articles, especially feature articles whose main purpose is to be entertaining while touching on a topic that will likely interest us because it is different from what we normally see around us. That's why I wanted to discuss the topic with colleagues. I'm not arguing with GreenPearl on her perspective. I do say that the perceptions of the ladies I talked to were a bit different from hers, but that in no way invalidates her points. I'm not arguing with her.


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## greenpearl (Sep 3, 2010)

shy_guy said:


> I agree completely here. I have a tendency to be skeptical of articles, especially feature articles whose main purpose is to be entertaining while touching on a topic that will likely interest us because it is different from what we normally see around us. That's why I wanted to discuss the topic with colleagues. I'm not arguing with GreenPearl on her perspective. I do say that the perceptions of the ladies I talked to were a bit different from hers, but that in no way invalidates her points. I'm not arguing with her.


He he he, I am not arguing with you either. 

I am just telling you something from a different angle. 

It only says that different people have different ideas. And we get the whole picture from talking to many different people! 

There was a woman who is from a small city. She works at a university there. Her university paid for her to study to get her PhD. The university expected her to come back and work for the university for more years. But after she got her PhD, she didn't want to come back to the small city. The reason she gave was that she couldn't find a man there. She needed to be in a bigger city where there are more highly educated men. Anyway, that's the excuse she gave, and she got away with it.


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## shy_guy (Jan 25, 2012)

The English Language "Shanghai Daily" has become my breakfast reading material these last few months. This morning, I found this article in it, and then came back to find it on the online version so I could post it here.

Shanghai Daily | ???? -- English Window to China News

The only comments I'll make on the article are that:

1. It seems to be written in response to the article posted in the original post on this thread, rather than being yet another person writing about the same phenomenon observed independently. As such, counting articles can lead to someone thinking it is a larger phenomenon that it is. I'm not saying it is or is not, but I think it is important to pick up on whether or not she is writing in response, getting on a bandwagon, or coming to the same conclusion with independent observation.

2. The article doesn't really seem to say anything about the concept. It talks in generalities about the value of women, but doesn't really address or not address any concept that may exist or not. 

3. The author's identity was something that caught my attention, too. Unfortunately, it leaves me unable to really make much comment beyond just noting her identity and wondering about her contact with the concept.

I'm just adding it for the discussion, and not arguing with anyone, though.


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