Topic: news All the Single Ladies! Why Does China’s “Leftover Women” Phenomenon Exist?

> narrow social circle, less active lifestyle, emotional issues, and inability to interact with the opposite sex Much of which is caused by the fact that as teenagers all they (can) do is study, study and study some more for the all important gaokao. And after university graduaction many focus fully on work. A lot of Chinese people have a very small social circle and few close friends. It's also the reason why mid-twenty Chinese young people still appear like teenagers to westerners. > "Perhaps this type of woman is acting out of perceived necessity because she doesn’t have ‘the look’ that will score her a successful husband with large sums of money in the bank." Perhaps not ... beauty is an important success factor for a career in China. If you're not pretty enough you can get your face knocked into shape. Why did you think the cosmetic surgery clinics are doing such good business. > "They’ve held on to the notion that the woman’s role is to manage the household so that the man can attend to public affairs." This is also not necessarily true anymore, since a lot of kids are left with their grandparents while the parents both work to make ends meet. In the worst cases they both work in another province, only seeing their kids during Spring Festival. Katie, this is a nice article but not much more than a summary of other articles that have recently been published. Most of it simply echoes what was written in this article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21320560 For a more in-depth analysis I recommend the book "Behind the Red Door". Which reminds me, there's another reason why 'leftover women' are not very popular. The fact that they are unmarried does not mean they do not have sex. And a lot of Chinese men still prefer to marry a virgin. There's lots of interesting stuff about this in the mentioned book ... > "Foreign men seem find these women very alluring and are lining up to date China’s “leftovers”." Well, I got married to what Chinese would consider a leftover woman last year. Thanks for not wanting her ! :-)