Recently, a new article by US-based author Qing Di tackles the same topic. Same as before, Qing discredits Western customs as a way to allow for an examination of Chinese society.
Once again, Qing states that Americans (who stand-in for “Westerners”) “do not place an emphasis upon a person’s external appearance”, instead finding traits such as “a healthy open-mindedness” and “a vigorous self-confidence” to be “beautiful”.
Qing then cuts to the heart of the matter by stating something Westerners may take for granted: that “beauty” and “sexiness” are not the same thing:
To be considered sexy by Americans, one doesn’t need to have a beautiful face, but most definitely requires ample breasts and a huge set of buttocks.
Bai Ling (shown above) is an American-Chinese actress who has found fame working in the USA, but is not considered “beautiful” by Chinese standards. Qing explains Bai’s success as a product of her willingness to cater to the second standard:
Bai has broken the mold of the traditional Asian beauty that had been entrenched in the mind’s eye of Americans. Even though many feel that Bai has discredited the dignity of the Chinese with her vulgar displays, she has been able to break into the white world of Hollywood and establish her own niche.
As much as this depicts US society as being superficial, Qing uses this point as a way to criticize Chinese society. Although the standard of beauty is rigid in China, Qing points out that the demand for fair skin in China does not have scientific merit:
The highest objective of any animal organism is to pass on their DNA: if the mate is healthy, then their offspring will also naturally be healthy. If a person’s skin is healthy, this will reflect their state of health. And yet, having fair skin won’t necessarily prove the worth of one’s internal qualities.
Qing suggests the Chinese aesthetic for fair skin is “a remnant of the country’s feudal past” when women were forced to stay at home, and has since ruined the way Chinese people make important choices:
When some rich Chinese look for a marriage partner, the first thing they look for is someone with a “fair-skinned complexion”: they are turning the important decision of finding a life-long spouse into a farce.
As before, finding the answer to “Why do laowai marry ugly Chinese girls?” for Chinese people has less to do with understanding foreign cultures as it has to do with coming to understand the true nature of love.
An ancient Chinese proverbs describes the perfect couple as being “a beautiful woman and a capable man”: but if a man doesn’t love his wife for her beauty, what does he love her for?