This blog was written by Advocates for Youth board member Mark Hiew.  Residing in China, he is unable to create an Amplify account because Amplify and www.advocatesforyouth.org are both blocked by the government there.

One of the less-covered stories within Western media’s ever-growing coverage of China, that rising giant looked upon with equal measures of suspicion and fear, is its continuing sexual revolution. Over my past two years here, I have consistently had any lingering preconceptions of conservative Confucian mores shaken by numerous sites: the multitude of sex toy stores, the open affection of young lesbian couples walking along the street, by high-school lovers making out in a club…in front of the guy’s parents, no less! This is a country modernizing as much in the bedroom as it is on the work floor.

 

In conversation with a local friend about she and her friends’ sexuality, I found it fascinating comparing their own experiences with those of friends back home in the States. As a high school student in Shanghai, she lost her virginity at 17 while living in her own apartment (her parents lived in another city). Like many young people, she had received no formal sex ed from either school or family. However, when her mother later found out, instead of responding with anger or threats, she gave my friend “the talk:” how to have safe sex, to always keep a condom in her purse, and so on. She tells me that her mom’s response is rare amongst her friends, but still, I was surprisingly impressed by such pragmatic, empowering parenting.

 

Sadly, not all relationships are so. Another 20-something woman, who began having sex some time ago, is scared to death of her parents finding out that she’s not a virgin. She locks the door every time she showers, claiming that if her mother was to come in, she’d “just be able to tell.”

 

Online, of course! Apparently, a number of Chinese language sites and message boards exist dedicated to sexuality topics, and now even radio agony aunts (and uncles!) are openly answering anxious youngster’s pleas for advice—think Dr. Drew, but speaking Mandarin.

 

Beyond sex ed, there are a number of curious differences between young Chinese sexual mores and that of the West. Whereas we have unequal notions of the “player” or “playboy,” a sexually promiscuous man looked up to by others (often men) compared to similarly promiscuous women, locals tell me that both men and women are widely and equally scorned by their peers for such “loose behavior.” And if that strikes some as reminiscent of the puritanical views of Confucianism and more recently, the Cultural Revolution (which only ended in 1976), than consider the way that young women are apparently free to dress as “tomboys” in men’s clothing and short hairstyles without ruffling many feathers, whereas any men considered too effeminate or homosexual in styling are largely condemned as “sissies.”

 

It may have been Mao who first proclaimed that “women hold up half the sky,” but I wonder when will the time come for gay men (or “comrades,” as they have come to ironically refer to one another) to find their own place in the People’s Republic?

 

One thing is certain: the One Child Policy, in shifting the focus of intercourse away from being merely a means of reproduction, has unwittingly opened up a whole new world of sexual freedom and opportunity for the average Chinese, of which they’re increasingly eager to take advantage.