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Social mores make China a nation of adulterers: Duowei
Staff Reporter 2015-09-02 09:09
Xu Qiyao, a disgraced official from Jiangsu province who is said to have had more than 140 mistresses. (Internet photo)
A significant number of Chinese people were among the 30 million subscribers whose personal details were published after a hack of Canada-based website Ashley Madison, which markets itself as a service for people seeking discreet extramarital affairs, according to Duowei News, a media outlet run by overseas Chinese.
The personal information disclosed included their names, email addresses and details of their sexual preferences.
The number of Chinese account holders ranked in the tens of thousands, with over 1,000 users in each of the country's major cities, with Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Beijing and Chengdu behind Shanghai, with 8,953 users.
Despite the general impression of conservatism in the country when it comes to issues of sex marriage, the cheaters revealed by the Ashley Madison link are likely just the tip of the iceberg, according to Duowei, though this is in line with the general rule that secret pornography consumption and use of online sexual services are higher where the prevailing social mores are more restrictive.
The website said China is undergoing a period of sexual liberation, which started in the 1990s, similar to the sexual revolution in the West during the 1960s.
A research report from 2012 cited by the website stated that Chinese women rank highly in terms of the rates of infidelity after marriage–with 4.2% of them cheating after marriage, 0.8% higher than the average cheating rate for women in other countries. The rate of cheating by Chinese men after marriage was 13.6%, above the average of 13.2% for cheating men in other countries.
Chinese news reports on affairs by corrupt officials in the country lend credence to this report. A whopping ninety-five percent of corruption probes into officials reportedly said that they had extramarital affairs. Ashley Madison, however, is still relatively unknown in the country compared to more popular hook-up apps and websites, one of which trails only popular social messaging app WeChat in popularity, according to the website.
The website also stated that China's relatively strict stance on prostitution and pornography means that men who are unsatisfied with their married sex lives have little other legal resort than masturbation or having affairs. Affairs are conventionally believed to be safer than visiting sex workers and while affairs are looked down upon in China, they are not illegal, whereas contracting a prostitute is.
The impact of the Cultural Revolution on the upbringing of those born in the 1960s and 1970s in China has also made for a lot of poor marriages among middle-aged people in China, according to the website. People born in the chaotic era had little moral guidance from their parents on family values and were taught not to trust or share things with others, even with the people closest to them, the report analyzed. Added to this was the strict prohibition of sex before marriage in the era, not to mention the greater availability of sexual partner in the modern internet era, according to the website.
The article also gave the view that China's lack of a predominant religious faith in contrast to other parts of the world means that there is a lack of framework for morality beyond the law and traditional customs in China. For Christians, violating the terms of a marriage is a moral transgression, which adds to the psychological pressure on them not to cheat, whereas for Chinese, the majority of whom are said to be atheists, do not have this added dimension of spiritual anguish.
Traditional customs, indeed, likely contribute more to cheating than they prevent it. Practices like arranged marriages and the filial obligation to have a child forces many young people into unhappy marriages, including homosexual people who feel pressure to marry in order to appease their parents, resulting in unfulfilling sex lives for themselves and for their partners.
The paper cited research by sexual sociologist Zhang Beichuan stating that there are tens of millions of women married to gay men in China and the number of men married to lesbian women should also not be underestimated.
Even among couples in which both partners are straight, traditional customs leave little room for discussion of sexual gratification, as sex is considered mainly to be for reproduction.
