Chinese Marriage Style

Shelly Lou

Ms. Kennedy

English 11

May 15th, 2016

Chinese Marriage Style

Recently, a Shanghai girl who broke up with her Jiangxi boyfriend became a controversial topic during Spring Festival. The girl is a 26-year-old pure Shanghainese with decent living standard, and she has been dating for a year with “a migrant worker” form Jiangxi where surrounded by mountains and undeveloped transportation. She quite likes the boy since he is good-looking and hard- working, whereas her parents dislikes this poor boy from another place. “After all, parents only want the best for their own daughter.” The girl’s mom stated. However, after being invited to boy’s hometown to meet his parents in Chinese lunar New Year, she immediately decided to break up and posted a dinner photo in social media, because the food and transportation condition are unacceptable for her. The post became popular at once, and great number of comments showed below. Not like freedom love style in western countries, this event could mainly reflect the China’s special marriage situation which caused by class difference, old values, and family influence.

From the basic point of view, Urban-rural gap and regional disparities are widened in China which largely affect the marriage situation. Use the above event as an example, Shanghai is a metropolitan city with advanced economy, great geographic location and suitable weather condition. However, Shanxi province which located near the western part of China is relatively less developed area. Surrounding mountains make lots of inconveniences for local people, although they have paid many efforts and labor forces. We can see that boy’s parents are working painstakingly for children’s education and trying their best to serve a good dinner for the girl. In addition, the Jiangxi boy is trying to prove and change himself through hard work, but his hometown is still different and undeveloped. It is common that the girl feel unbelievable and unacceptable comparing to their noble lifestyle in Shanghai. Even worse, some people will discriminate some special regions. When two people are together, they need to have some shared habits or values to make their life happier. Unfortunately, there are huge gaps among the different regions in China that could only make rich family becomes wealthier.

So, is that saying two people who are disturbed of regional gap cannot be together? In western countries, people might say no, because they believe the freedom of true love and there are lots of spaces for them to prove by hard work. However, old Chinese values about marriage are still in people’s mind. The major one is spouses should be well- matched. Well matched represents that they both have a similar social or family background, education level, social class, same beliefs or economic status. Since ancient times, a marriage needed to between two equal social rank families for their next generations. When people think this kind of outmoded opinion does no longer exist in society, but they still put this factor as an important standard in today’s marriage. If they have children but unhappy marriage, most of Chinese people will be limited to keep living in this family without love, since old saying goes “together till white hair”. Moreover, traditional marriage required substantial dowry, as more as better. For Chinese family, this is an imperative thing; otherwise, they will feel “lose face”. Therefore, a lavish wedding, housing and car estate become common marriage standards in Chinese society. Sometimes, it is even considered more important than their emotional relationships, which called “the commercialization and marketization of love and marriage”.

Last but not least,

Moreover, Nan regards the remarks from those that scold the girl for despising the poor, currying favor with the rich, and discriminating against peasants as moral mugging. "Consuming an individual's behavior through labeling or even stigmatization is a kind of discrimination itself."

It is true that one's choice of husband or wife should be respected because it is his or her individual freedom. Therefore, her decision to call off the relationship should be above reproach. However, the girl's immediate departure was brusque and inconsiderate. At least, she is supposed to behave more gracefully.

物质上的差距经过奋斗是可以缩小的， 但精神上的贫穷才是最可怕的， 希望在改变命运的过程中，同时也能提升自己

Compared to the West, people in China mostly marry for money rather than feelings. Most of the time it's only because of their parents' influence.

"From my understanding, many times the choice in China is based on financial and education criteria before true love. But I believe everybody should be humble and respectful toward each other. Class differences should not be a deal breaker if the couple really loves each other," said Saidah.

"Relationships and marriages with big gaps in their backgrounds are common in Western countries. It's not usually a problem for couples, but some rich parents wouldn't want the husband of their precious daughter to earn less than them," said Portnova.