China's "leftovers" are rejects in a man's world

From University of Cambridge:

In China, hysteria is growing about a rising number of so-called “leftover women”, who are highly successful but remain unmarried. A new study suggests that the country’s traditional, patriarchal society may be to blame.

Successful Chinese women who have been publically shamed as “leftovers” because of their failure to marry, often remain single because men are uncomfortable with their careers and achievements, a study has found.

As the derogatory term implies, the “leftovers”, all in their late 20s or early 30s, are typically scorned for having only themselves to blame. In 2007, the Chinese Ministry of Education attributed their failure to find a husband to their “overly high expectations for marriage partners”, in an official explanation of what sheng nu means.

Now a rare investigation into the experiences of the women themselves has reached a rather different conclusion. The study, by sociologist Dr Sandy To, found that these women struggle to find a lasting relationship because of the constraints of the conservative, patriarchal society in which they live. Far from spurning suitors, they badly want to be married, but find that men reject them.

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