Gender Imbalance

Women are dominating education on every level and China has too many men. The conflict is between why women are perceived as valuable. Kenneth Anderson’s analysis over at Volokh Conspiracy:

My view today is that – drawing on conversations with Eberstadt in which he noted that he, too, had read Heinlein – it was far more historically common, and almost certainly the more common direction of things today, that in a world with scarcity of women – especially in a world of scarcity of females and yet a cultural preference for male births – the result would be increased treatment of women as property. More valuable property, yes, but increasingly as property precisely as the perception of its value increased.

So, too many men = increases the treatment of women as property. I agree with Anderson’s (depressing) analysis here, but would like to note that I doubt the same conclusion would be drawn if the ratio were reversed. The reason Kenneth’s logic holds is because China is largely conservative regarding gender roles, which are exacerbated by the imbalance.

There are two complications, however. The first is that women are getting far more degrees than men:

degrees

A women in any society shouldn’t property (duh), but in a conservative one such as China, a degree (particularly graduate) gives that point gravity. What happens in a society where there are ten men for every women and for every educated man, there are three educated women? It sounds like a recipe for polyandry if you ask me.

The second implication is in a globalized society, what are the chances that the imbalance will lead to an explosion of Chinese men marrying non-Chinese? Furthermore, what might this do for the queer movement in China? I have no idea what the answers are, but the consequences of these two imbalances are going to be massive. My (cautious) hope is that the West will continue its agonizingly slow movement towards liberalism and influence China enough to prevent a backslide in women’s rights. My (ambitious) hope is that having more educated women than men (particularly when many are from developing countries) will begin to have societal impacts that are tangible and progressive.

Pop Transhumanism