{"id":258351,"date":"2020-06-17T08:20:37","date_gmt":"2020-06-17T12:20:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=258351"},"modified":"2020-06-17T08:20:37","modified_gmt":"2020-06-17T12:20:37","slug":"malaysian-economist-under-fire-for-proposing-two-husband-strategy-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/06\/17\/malaysian-economist-under-fire-for-proposing-two-husband-strategy-in-china\/","title":{"rendered":"Malaysian economist under fire for proposing \u201ctwo-husband\u201d strategy in China"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Entitled \u201cIs polyandry really a ridiculous idea?\u201d, Ng suggested two ways to address the problems he posed: legalizing prostitution and allowing women to marry two or more men \u2013 both of which are currently illegal in China. (File Photo:
chuttersnap\/Unsplash)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

To address the surplus of bachelors and imbalance of men and women in China, an economist proposed a solution, which is to legalize polyandry \u2013 or allow women to have multiple husbands. However, this did not sit well with the Chinese, as he got himself in hot waters with side-to-side criticisms.<\/p>\n

Yew-Kwang Ng, a Malaysian economist, professor at Fudan University in Shanghai, and a columnist in NetEase Finance earned criticisms in Chinese social media after publishing a controversial opinion piece on June 2 in his weekly column \u201cHow to be Happier.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ng first cited reports showing the gender imbalance in the country with a ratio of 117 boys to 100 girls. This \u201cbachelor crisis\u201d stems from China\u2019s decades-long one-child policy sandwiched with the tradition to prefer sons over daughters, thus illegally aborting female fetuses to carry on the family name<\/p>\n

He said that at this rate, men who want to settle down and get married will only face difficulties in finding a wife, which will affect their happiness.<\/p>\n

\u201c[If a man\u2019s] natural biological and psychological needs cannot be met appropriately, it will certainly bring substantial negative impact on his happiness,\u201d he wrote in his column where he discusses \u201call matters related to happiness\u201d like \u201cfactors that contribute to happiness\u201d and \u201cthe relationship between money and joy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Entitled \u201cIs polyandry really a ridiculous idea?\u201d, Ng suggested two ways to address the problems he posed: legalizing prostitution and allowing women to marry two or more men \u2013 both of which are currently illegal in China.<\/p>\n

Ng wrote that \u201cbuilding brothels for men to visit\u201d would work for men with \u201curgent needs.\u201d However, this is just a short-term solution as not everyone would have a budget to pay for sex. He also added that wives \u201cserve other purposes such as being life partners, producing offspring, and raising children.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is where polyandry comes in as he cited Tibet as an example. The professor said that this is a long-term fix because women are more capable of addressing multiple men\u2019s sexual needs instead of vise versa; explaining that prostitutes serve more than 10 clients a day. Ng added that women doing chores in several households is not as difficult as in just one.<\/p>\n

He also wrote that he is not denying the advantages of monogamy such as long-term relationships benefitting kids\u2019 growth and education. But he still emphasized that China\u2019s current sex ratio calls for another solution which is polyandry.<\/p>\n

While a lot called him out for these ideas defying traditions and moral views, a lot were more enraged by his “misogynistic” views, reducing women to being roles of reproduction and just instruments to fulfill men’s’ desires.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To address the surplus of bachelors and imbalance of men and women in China, an economist proposed a solution, which …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":258352,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-258351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-w","mauthors-bea-kirstein-t-manalaysay","mauthors-philippine-canadian-inquirer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=258351"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258351\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":258353,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258351\/revisions\/258353"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}