Does Hong Kong Have Mail Ordered Brides?

I am a widow who is choosing to remain single. No other man would measure up to my late husband in my eyes and I simply don’t want anybody else. I also don’t want in laws. That was the only complaint I had about being married. A year ago, I “married” 2 basset hound puppies and will leave it at that. I will be reunited with my husband after I die.

Overall, this is a developed world problem. Marriage has lost its worth to individual men and women in developed countries, and individuals benefit quite a bit by staying single. The losers in all this are everyone else (children’s parents, daycare industry, education, government, companies etc). It will take a catastrophic event for this thinking to change.

From what I understand, there is very little protection for women against abuse in Chinese society. It may be a contributor to why some women do not want to get married losing their voice to a dominating spouse. The many Asian couples I know, there is a definite give and take and often the women push the men to be more successful.

First, I am an American, I live in Thailand and my wife is Thai Chinese. What I learned was the Thai Chinese women when married then belongs to her new husbands family kind of like a new daughter to the family since her husband is responsible to his parents and he will also will inherit all of his parents wealth once they die. Second, in Thailand and I am assuming also in China that a Chinese woman that has a college education will not marry a many below her since he will not be able to make the money she does and also the man will still be responsible for his family and if they are poor farmers she will have to support his family also and that may be why there are not many educated Chinese women in the countryside. I noticed here in Thailand that there are many college educated Thai women that are single since they cannot find a college educated Thai man to marry since the man is much like any man, he is more interested in the physical attraction than the educational attraction of a Thai woman. Having many years in Asia and working for large companies, college educated and single many of the college educated women that worked for these companies were always happy to see me. I never had any problem dating them, just asked them out with a couple of the women’s friends the first couple of time and then the girl showed up alone after that. However, I was not interested in marriage and never went past the dinner date since Thailand was full of working girls that could be a lot of fun with no strings attached.

It’s the same here in the USA. Virtually ALL of the kids who are considered “good catches” for marriage – healthy, beautiful, athletic, from good families, etc., move away from small towns and rural areas IMMEDIATELY upon graduation. They go to the big colleges and get degrees. They then usually stay near the colleges in the big college towns and tech centers. Those left behind in the small towns without college degrees are often single and have very limited economic prospects. There is a serious dearth of attractive singles over age 18 in small towns and in rural America. So, those who do not go to college and find a spouse, and stay in a small town, usually end up poor and single for most, if not the rest, of their lives. It’s sad but that’s just the way it is.

i think some aspects quite different in Mongolia… for example: your parents will sit there with your CV to get you married… or never call human as leftover… never… but people often say if there is something wrong with him or her if he or she is not married well into their late 30’s. because people in the country get married very early … like in their early 20’s

The fact that the Chinese matchmaking websites are charging way to much money for every little letter to read and a letter to send . This makes it very expensive and there is no assurance that the lady will choose you as her partner. If they really cared they would charge a small fee up front to get an account instead of trying to get every cent out of you. I met a women at one of these websites and we both wanted to come together but the cost was so high that I could no longer send her messages, plus we were not allowed to exchange personal emails. It is a sad ending to what could have been a wonderful relationship.

The sad thing, most arranged marriages wind up in divorce. At least here in America. Why? The parents of the son usually are so unbelievably judgemental/critical of their new daughter in law. They use their sons and or daughters against each other. Like for example, “the first DIL gave us a grandson, do you better give us one too.” The societal pressures are abusive to say the least. It’s very sad. I speak with soooooo much experience on this. I’ve watched it so many times over. 😢😢😢😢

Here what I think is happening: Chinese women in their 20s in the beginning gets a lot of attention from guys. She gets very picky and starts to have unrealistic requirements. “The guy needs to be tall, handsome, rich, drive a Lamborghini, wear expensive name brand clothing, owns a nice house, able to be very romantic, will have our first date at a Michelin star restaurant, will buy me a LV handbag ….” 90% of guys around her are invisible to her. Since she can’t find her guy, she focuses on her career and works 996. She barely has time to time about anything besides work. She keeps putting off actively finding a guy. She keeps thinking that once she’s successful, she will be entitled to those rich and handsome guys. She finally celebrates her 30th birthday and starts to realize that her ability to attract guys attention is diminishing. That rich and handsome guy isn’t knocking on her door. She is also facing pressure from her parents to start a family. Her parents start to ask around their own network for guys. However, the parents see that their daughter is so accomplished in her career and education so they won’t settle for some average dude. So now, they post ads around parks and start to interview prospective guys. Years go by and no guy suitable for her can be found. Each year that goes by, the parents put more pressure on the daughter and ask her to lower her requirements. She finally goes out to ask guys to go on dates. However, the guys are not interested in her. They are all chasing after the girls in their 20s and don’t want a leftover “woman” since it will bring shame to him and his family.

Owl, I’ve spent a lot of time being a social demographer for some decades. The higher proportion of men is partly caused by the one-child policy, but also preference for sons as you noted, thus sex selective terminations are common – and there were plenty of them during the decades of that policy. The situation is even worse in India. It has not specific policy though India has an excess of men which outnumbers China now. The relaxation of the one child policy initially had some impact on births, but last year, births fell quite dramatically. The TFR (total fertility rate) is now 10.64, the lowest since the end of WW2. The position for men is much worse. Often, they remained in villages and rural areas whilst the younger women left for the big cities. A large part of the equation is that China got used to the one child policy and now, changing it has had minimal effect. I see no reason for it to increase AND there is now a real issue in China that it does not know how to address – high youth unemployment. That alone has had a significant effect. So has changing lifestyles, values and actual structural issues. Apartments are small, infrastructure of children in poor and the cost of children is also high. Many do not want marriage and children as they like the freedom and flexibility of single life, and their apartments are often small. Moreover, the CCP has taught the people over some decades to NOT have more than one child and then it changes policy and somehow seems to think everything will change,

Another aspect that I haven’t noticed anyone mention yet in the comments is that a huge percentage of these 30+ year old single Chinese women are virgins (who never learned about sex education in school either). While that might pique the interest of some guys, it shouldn’t. This is the problem with a culture that is overprotective and won’t let young people date–sometimes even all the way through college. So these women get out into the world at 22 or even 25 without ever having had a boyfriend before. So yeah, when it comes to dating for these women, they are incredibly unrealistic about what a relationship is like, and they act super weird. I know because I work in China and have many 30+ year old single female colleagues. One colleague, who is actually fairly attractive, has gone on like dozens of first dates and has never gotten past that point… So there is no shortage of interest from men–it’s mostly that these women still think that getting married is going to be like a fairy tale, and it’s really pretty pathetic to watch. Moral of the story: if you’re a parent, you need to let your kid grow up to become an adult, and they need to learn how the world actually works. There are far more important things than just getting good grades on math exams…

Honestly, getting married in China for women is a bad deal. You have to give up your youthful identity in order to become a mother, you become in charge of a whole bunch of traditional stuff while your in-laws hover over you (hopefully the husband has a good family so they aren’t annoying though), and top of that you’re expected to be the main caretaker for your husband’s parents once they become frail. Anyone who’s taken care of frail family members 24/7 knows it’s very difficult. Let’s also not forget that it’s common for married women to work too. Working class moms can’t just stay home all day because they need money to pay for lessons and schooling for their child.

I don’t believe for a second that the odds are stacked against the women just because there is a “preference for younger women”. There is a preference for younger women everywhere, it doesn’t stop them holding the power in the dating market. Men outnumber the women by a fair margin in China. You cannot discount the “numbers game” completely. I won’t say that the situation is not fucked up for both men and women in China, but this nonsense that men have all the power and it is easy for them and impossible for women is something I am not naive enough to believe.

I am a Chinese male in the early forty and I actually didn’t plan on finding a girl worth of my heart nor my account really allow me to do so as for the same time which I might say that I’m lucky that my parent wasn’t the type which rushes to have their children getting married and having grandchildren for them where I prefer to die free than getting married. I rather get a secretary that can help me go through my daily schedule and arrange it for me while taking confidential business notes which are non-disclosed to anyone that’s not related even if they are my family whereas I can say that I got nothing to hid from her. But totally agreed if the women attempt on taking over China of their leadership and economy with the higher possible chance of re-establishing the well-being of the country. So, go girl power…..

It seems dating is horrible no matter where you go. In Europe my impression is that there are a few major behavior groups of women: those who find a guy and settle really early in their twenties, those are the best most reliable women. Those who never intend to settle ever because they can get men whenever they want or need one and can replace him whenever. And those who focus on career and studies who once they finally graduate focus on traveling around and working in other countries and then one day when they aren’t fertile anymore they begin thinking about if they should have settled down and gotten kids. Many men try to get the first type of girl when they are young and not married and not taken yet, al lot the old and young men so you compete with all of them.

It’s the government and system as a whole to blame for the situation we are in. Getting married and having kids feels more like a luxury nowadays. Maybe it’s all by design who knows. The greed of the people in charge is also a big problem. People are working so much that they have not much time for anything else

It is not just the one-child policy. In 2023, people have reached a high standard of living that enables them to live alone. Our society no longer requires people to get married immediately. However, in the long term, this poses a problem because the family serves as the foundation of a moral society.

I saw a PSA from the CCP directed to the women in this article. It said for these women to stop talking about their degrees / education. Men don’t care about those things. It was stressed to these women to look good, smell nice, learn to cook, and keep a clean home. These PSA should also be directed at western women as well

It’s exactly the same here in America, exactly. Leftover is a little bit nicer I suppose then here in America, where is referred to as hitting the wall. In America, the problem is feminism.. but the end result is what’s occurring, women having to work, and not marrying because they are so “independent”

I’m a guy in America. I’m 30, i have given up on finding someone. The women i have interacted with don’t really care for me and I don’t think they really feel like they need men. At this point id rather focus on my career and money than settling down with some wildebeest or risk getting my heart broken which is an inevitability given the abundance of options in the dating market. Being alone is better than having you peace, time, or money stolen by someone using you as a pit stop.

30 something, well educated at university level, with a career, besides Chinese most probably fluent in a foreign language? This women are an asset. Any foreign willing to have part of his career related to China would seriously consider such option. If I were the Chinese government, I would support the idea, to get foreigners within chinese… sphere of influence…

Sons are not preferred in Millennials city dwellers nowadays. Daughters are preferred, as the saying goes. If its a son, you are like “Construction bank” meaning you have to build his foundation while daughters you are like “Merchant bank” means you can choose the best deal offered by those construction banks.

Dear reader of these comments (looking for the main point of this article, but too impatient to watch the full 8 minute length), I’ll save you some time: It turns out there IS no “deadly single women crisis”. The meme of “the leftover women of China” is something made up by the lucrative matchmaking industry of China to prod desperate parents of single women to spend more on their services. Yep, that what the producer concluded. After all, we were told for decades that because of the One Child policy combined with the preference for boys (and the large scale adoption of abandoned Chinese girls by rich foreigners in the 1990s, etc.), that there was a surplus of men in China — which should mean that the marriage market favors the ladies: there are more than enough men (even if many of them are poor, leftover rural farmers who don’t have any more impressive car than an old two-wheel rice tractor).