Leftover Women 剩女 Can’t Freeze Their Eggs
I attended Shanghai International Literary Festival yesterday to hear Leta Hong Fincher talk about her latest book titled Leftover Women: The Resurgence of Gender Inequality in China:
A century ago, Chinese feminists fighting for the emancipation of women helped spark the Republican Revolution, which overthrew the Qing empire.
After China's Communist revolution of 1949, Chairman Mao famously proclaimed that "women hold up half the sky."
In the early years of the People's Republic, the Communist Party sought to transform gender relations with expansive initiatives such as assigning urban women jobs in the planned economy. Yet those gains are now being eroded in China's post-socialist era.
Contrary to many claims made in the mainstream media, women in China have experienced a dramatic rollback of many rights and gains relative to men. Leftover Women debunks the popular myth that women have fared well as a result of post-socialist China's economic reforms and breakneck growth.
Laying out the structural discrimination against women in China will speak to broader problems with China's economy, politics, and development.
The following excerpt from Wikipedia explains what a “Leftover Woman” is:
Sheng nu (剩女; shèngnǚ means "leftover women" or "leftover ladies") is a derogatory term made popular by the All-China Women's Federation that classifies women who remain unmarried after 27 years old.
Xu Xiaomin of The China Daily described the sheng nus as "a social force to be reckoned with" while others have argued the term should be taken as a positive to mean "successful women". The slang term, 3S or 3S Women, meaning "single, seventies (1970s), and stuck" has also been used in place of sheng nu. The equivalent term for men, guang gun (光棍) meaning bare branches, is used to refer to men who do not marry and thus do not add 'branches' to the family tree.
In March 2011, the All-China Women's Federation posted a controversial article titled 'Leftover Women Do Not Deserve Our Sympathy' shortly after International Women's Day.
An excerpt states, "Pretty girls do not need a lot of education to marry into a rich and powerful family. But girls with an average or ugly appearance will find it difficult" and "These girls hope to further their education in order to increase their competitiveness. The tragedy is, they don't realise that as women age, they are worth less and less. So by the time they get their MA or PhD, they are already old — like yellowed pearls."
Leftover women is a scaremonger campaign focused on urban educated women over 27 who are unmarried. The state has been using this nasty title to insult single women in order to push them to get married young for fear of never being able to find a husband.
The state thinks the Chinese population “quality” (suzhi) is low and want to upgrade the population with the children of these urban educated women.
Now have two kids, not just one to upgrade population quality - that is both based on eugenics and class. The problem for the state, is the women are not buying it.
I’ve always been interested in this topic, so it was great to have someone who had studied it in detail explain the background.
In terms of the women’s rights in China, the communists created the highest women’s labor force in the world up until then, but this decreased since reform.
When the one child policy was brought in, the draconian measures that were taken to enforce the policy went directly against the rights of women and the relative freedoms the communists had provided to women.
Fast-forward a few decades later and now in the mid-2000 real estate boom, most property is owned by men. And by recent social standards, a man must own a home to attract a bride, which is, as Leta explained, a new phenomenon linked with the real estate market.
When it comes to purchasing a home, the husband’s name is usually the only name on the deed, even though in most cases the wife contributes heavily to the purchase.
All well and good, except that in 2011 the judicial court reinterpreted the marriage law - essentially clarifying property ownership within marriage. Before 2011, property was joint owned between married couples, but after 2011, the one whose name is on the deed gets the property.
This means that women have no rights to the home if the marriage dissolves, unless she can produce documentation showing she contributed financially to the purchase of the home.
Property rights in the Song Dynasty (1000 years ago) were better for women in China then now, says Lena.
So where is this Leftover Women thing coming from?
I’ve noticed among my Chinese girlfriends after the age of 25 they are fully aware that their moms and dads are going to start laying on the pressure and fear mongering of that title on them.
In the past couple of years, more women are becoming aware of this discrimination and standing up against the unfairness.
It turns out guys and girls in their twenties are pretty progressive and if left to their own devises would like to marry in their 30s or not at all and have children later - like the rest of the world. Except, the state and their parents and grandparents are coming down hard on them.
And that’s why this whole Leftover Women campaign comes in which is basic government propaganda aimed at trying to control the success of women - particularly the urban educated ones.
On average in T1 cities, more women have Bachelor and Masters degrees and in many cases they are making more money than their husbands.
In some sense, the One Child Policy led to families investing very heavily in their one daughter - in her education and financially towards her future success. Those daughters did not need to compete with a brother for parental investment.
But the downside of this, from the state’s perspective, is a rise in Chinese feminism - women who would like to delay marriage, possibly reject it and many don’t want to have children. Basically - leftover and PROUD OF IT.
Keep in mind, that although China has opened up to the two child policy now, single women ARE NOT allowed to have children. If they do they will be hit with a serious fine (half to 6 times their annual salary), and their kid won’t get hukou (which is basically a birth certificate or state household registration that allows you to go to school), unless they pay heavily.
Women in China are also NOT allowed to freeze their eggs. When an unmarried famous 41 year old Chinese actress, 徐静蕾 Xu Jinglei, went to the United States and had her eggs frozen, there was a social media uproar. Even Han Han who had been fairly silent recently on Weibo jumped in to support her asking the question: “Why does a women need to be married to have a child?”
So with more women now then men in China, the state NEEDS theses girls to get married - even marry down as necessary.
Will the two-child policy benefit women in China? This is the big question. Leta is pessimistic. She feels that now girls will have to compete with a brother and lose out when it comes to parental and financial support, while before with only one child, their families went all in for them.
And will the pressure to have two children now just make it worse for the urban educated career women? I guess time will tell.
Certainly, modern China has a ways to go when in comes to laws to protect women’s property rights, protection against domestic violence, protecting working girls and ultimately her choices in love, lifestyle and reproduction.
That being said, women’s rights worldwide have a long way to go and China certainly is more progressive than many other countries.
And the whole idea of scaring women about being a single old hag or “old maid” or “cougar” when she is over 30 is as old in Western culture as Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.
I’m proud of all my Chinese girlfriends who are brave enough to break the mould and create their own path.
It’s certainly not easy with all the pressures from the state and propaganda campaigns that also influence your own parent’s perception of you.
Go girls, you are amazing. Freeze your eggs. Be single. Enjoy your life on your own terms. Marry if you want to. Have a kid or two if you WANT to. But don’t cave to other’s view of how your life should be.