Some Chinese men (and women) dislike the fact that some foreign men sleep with Chinese women. This is not a new idea, of course, but in light of the recent chinaSMACK post, let’s take a look at some of the reasons why, and attempt to assess their validity. The following are all paraphrases of ideas found in the chinaSMACK post.
- Many foreigners have come to China because they have failed in their own countries. This is, of course, very difficult to evaluate, but speaking anecdotally, I haven’t found this to be particularly true. Of the foreigners I’ve met and worked with in China, most came for adventure and new experiences, or to study (or both). Many of them are well-accomplished and left much higher paying jobs at home for the chance to experience something new. I don’t know anyone at all who it seemed clear was only working in China because he/she struck out at home, but of course, that’s just anecdotal. How about the foreigners you know?
- Foreigners come to China looking for Chinese women. Again, I don’t know anyone who professed, even behind closed doors, to have come to China for this reason alone, although I have certainly heard my fare share “yellow fever” crap from lecherous foreigners. Still, there are so many more foreign men than women in China (at least in Harbin) that perhaps there’s some truth to this one. Foreigners, why did you come to China? Was it all about the ladies?
- All foreigners do in their spare time is grumble about China. Nonsense, what we do in our spare time is drink, n’est-ce pas?
- Chinese woman/foreign man marriages will fail because divorce rates in the West are high. Certainly, many Western countries have high divorce rates, but China isn’t far behind. The nationwide average has been climbing rapidly for the past thirty years, and the speed of increase in the divorce rate has recently outpaced the rate of increase in the number of new marriages. Moreover, divorce rates in many of China’s most developed cities are already over 50%, which puts China on more or less even footing with the West. This one seems bogus to me.
- Foreign men cannot love Chinese women because they don’t respect them. Not sure I buy this one, either. Certainly, there are foreigners who don’t respect women, but most of the men I know married to Chinese women are pretty respectful, if not downright obedient towards their wives. Of course, this is purely anecdotal.
- Foreign men are better at sex. Frankly, this is probably true. I’d venture to guess that the average foreigner has significantly more sexual experience than the average Chinese male of the same age.
Though at times it’s over-generalizing and xenophobic, the chinaSMACK article’s main point is that Chinese people should respect themselves and not treat foreigners specially. If “not treating foreigners specially” means not trying to give us the 3000% price hike whenever we’re trying to buy something, I think many foreigners could get behind that.
Foreigner Poll Time!
My assessment above is pretty unscientific, so let’s do some polling. This, of course, is also deeply unscientific, but we still might learn something if people respect the rules:
- Please only answer if you are a foreigner who has lived in China at some point or who currently lives in China.
- Please only answer the questions that apply to you. For example, if you are a heterosexual male, you should not be answering questions about how attracted you are to Chinese men.
- Do some self-reflection and answer honestly.
Since this information is pretty personal, now is a good time to remind everyone that these polls are anonymous. Hooray!
Section 1: General Questions (all answer)
[polldaddy poll=3318521]
[polldaddy poll=3318510]
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[polldaddy poll=3318542]
[polldaddy poll=3318584]
[polldaddy poll=3318730]
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Section 2: Questions about Chinese women: Heterosexual foreign men and homosexual foreign women answer.
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Section 3: Questions about Chinese men: Heterosexual foreign women and homosexual foreign men answer.
[polldaddy poll=3318607]
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[polldaddy poll=3318626]
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Of course, more important than all of this are your reasons. Please feel free to elaborate on anything (or everything) in the comments!