Text: Xiao Yu
On January 17, the National Bureau of Statistics released the changes in the Chinese in 2021. In terms of gender composition, by the end of 2021, China's male population will be 723.11 million and female population will be 689.49 million. There are 33.62 million more men than women, accounting for 104.88 per sex ratio of the total population (female = 100).
Rural areas, in particular, are more serious than in towns. According to the data released by the China Statistical Yearbook 2021, the sex ratio of the rural population in the country is 107.91, and the sex ratio of rural men and women in the 31 provinces of the mainland is greater than 100, that is, all men than women in the rural areas of 31 provinces are more than women.
The main reason why there is an imbalance in the proportion of men and women on the mainland is that it has long been caused by the backward concept of "son preference over daughter". Especially in the 1970s and 1980s, rural people generally had the idea of preferring sons to daughters, and at that time, the state implemented a family planning policy, and each family could only have one child.
This has also led many rural families to go to great lengths for their sons. And even today, in some rural areas or areas with serious traditional thinking, there is still a phenomenon of "son preference". This has directly led to the increasing number of single sticks in rural areas. Obviously, in the case of more men and fewer women, this has also become a problem for some men to get married.
The data shows that in 2020, the number of marriages registered in the mainland was 8.131 million. This is the second fall below the 9 million mark after falling below the 10 million pair mark in 2019, and it is also a new low since 2003. Of course, this is also related to the decline in willingness to marry. However, it should be known that young people who are not active in marriage are mainly distributed in cities, and for those young people living in rural areas, they are still looking forward to marriage, and when they reach the age of marriage, they basically begin to prepare for marriage.
But for them, getting married is not easy. You know, nowadays, more and more people have received higher education, of which many go out from the countryside, and women account for a considerable part, but the vast majority of women will not want to go back after they go to the city, after all, the rural living environment and the city, the difference is still very large. And women are even more reluctant to marry early after receiving higher education.
The loss of a large number of female populations has directly exacerbated the difficulty of marriage in rural areas, so that more and more rural men of school age cannot find suitable marriage partners. At the same time, a new phenomenon has emerged in the countryside, that is, the "second marriage women" are becoming more and more popular.
Influenced by traditional concepts such as "no filial piety has three, no queen is greater", rural people still attach great importance to marriage. When they reach the age of marriage, they usually marry and have children. As we all know, in the countryside, the cost of marriage is relatively low, but if the women are married for the first time, the requirements are still not low, at least to have a house in the county. But now the mainland housing prices are not low, some counties are several thousand, breaking tens of thousands. For some people who are not very well off financially, it is true that they may not be able to afford to get married.
Compared with people who are newly married, "second-married women" have certain unique advantages. For example, the bride price standard will be correspondingly lower relative to the first time people, and they generally will not ask for too much bride price. In this way, the cost of marriage will be much lower for rural men. Therefore, in order to save the cost of marriage, many men are even more willing to marry "second-married women".
In addition, after experiencing the first marriage, the second-married woman will become more mature. At the same time, because the "second-married woman" has a marriage experience, the experience of marriage and life is also increasing, and she will also take care of the family in life and can bear some family responsibilities. In addition, it will also cherish this marriage very much, take the initiative to maintain a family's marriage relationship, and often make this marriage more long-term and stable.
Of course, the reason why people are willing to accept second-marriage women is also largely because rural people are now more and more open-minded. Especially on the issue of the concept of marriage, although the problem of rural singles is more prominent. It is difficult for rural men to marry, but divorce rates are generally getting higher. It is reported that in 2009, there were 2.468 million couples in the mainland who went through divorce procedures, but this number rose to 4.701 million pairs by 2019.
This also proves that more and more rural couples have also joined the "divorce army". It wasn't until 2020 that the number of divorces declined for the first time in recent years, at 4.339 million pairs, and the main factor was also the rapid decline in the number of marriages. In addition, the first half of 2020 was affected by the epidemic factors. In fact, rural divorce is no longer a strange thing today.
In the past, rural divorce was a very faceless thing, and divorced second-marriage women were often discussed in rural areas, and even poked in the spine. But with the development of society, this situation has also changed. As divorce became more and more common, second-married women were slowly accepted by rural people. For rural women, they no longer regard divorce as a very shameful thing, and they will never be wronged when they can't live, and they should be divorced.
Nowadays, society is becoming more and more open, and people's concepts are also changing. Marriage does not have to depend on whether the other party is the first marriage, as long as the other party is suitable for themselves is the best choice. This is true for both men and women. Marriage is free and should not be viewed in terms of some old ideas.