RTXWNM4.jpg (Photo : Reuters)
With cross-cultural dating and marriages becoming prevalent in China in recent years, scholars share some enlightening thoughts on how Chinese women perceive Western men.
Richard Burger, formerly an editor of a government-owned newspaper, said that a sexual revolution has occurred in China. Nowadays, couples hold hands in the streets, people dress differently and the youth are more open-minded regarding sex.
According to Burger, one contributing factor is that the Chinese youth are given more freedom by their parents when it comes to choosing their partner.
There are several qualities of Western men that appeal to Chinese women, from being sporty, romantic, considerate and confident, through to giving more value to life, having more hobbies and being respectful of others' privacy and choices.
A Korean-American man shared his opinion: "You see Chinese men every day, so Western men are new and exciting. The other case is that Chinese women might like the way Western men think, as opposed to how Chinese culture is."
Back in China's founding year in 1949, there was no inter-racial marriage in the mainland. The first Chinese woman who tied the knot with a Western man was Li Shuang, who married a French diplomat to China in 1983.
Since then, the so-called "opening up" of China's cultural perception about cross-cultural marriages, the number of Chinese people marrying someone from the west continually rose. In 2012, the Chinese government recorded 53,000 of these marriages.
Chinese women are likely to date or marry someone from the west than the other way around, said Li Yinhe, a known sex scholar in China, because "Chinese men lack confidence."
Actress and dating guru Yue Xu added that Chinese women have become more aggressive when it comes to dating, because they do not want to be left behind or labelled "left-over woman" at 27.
Media have also contributed to this mindset, said Yue, and today's Chinese women think that they need to find love themselves.
"No one else can do it for me," is what goes on in the minds of Chinese women these days.
