२५ जून, २०१८

"At Caffe Bene, a trendy Korean coffee chain in central Ulaanbaatar, almost all the tables are occupied by young women on their own."

"One sits with her shopping bags on a chair, typing on her phone. Another reads a comic, while the woman across from her peers at a laptop. Single women in Mongolia face a certain stigma, which makes dating even harder....  For Anna Battulga, 25, a recent graduate working in human resources, dating seems different from how it was for her parents, who met in the 1980s in Ulaanbaatar when Mongolia was still under a communist system. Her mother was a shop assistant and her father a police officer who, after meeting Battulga’s mother, came to inspect the shop every week, scaring the owner. Eventually they started going to the cinema where her father would translate the films, available only in Russian, into Mongolian for her mother. After a few months he nervously asked if his parents could come to her house to ask for her hand in marriage, a Mongolian tradition. Battulga is more likely to meet someone on Facebook, Instagram or Tinder...."

From "Too smart, too successful: Mongolia’s superwomen struggle to find husbands/Highly educated women far outnumber men in the capital – making it difficult for them to find a partner" (The Guardian).

In the old days, a scary Communist policeman could snag a shopgirl. These days, women are educated and self-sufficient enough to reject marriage if the men aren't their equal:
Bulganchimeg Gantulga, 19, a university student studying political science... is considering never marrying at all. “When men don’t respect women, it’s obvious what kind of husband they will be,” Bulganchimeg says.
Meanwhile, the men reject the women who are above their level:
A survey released in March by the World Bank found Mongolian men in their 20s often described women as more ambitious than men, a trait they found unattractive. Some wondered why women invested so much in their education, given that it increased their risk of not being able to find a husband. 
It's interesting that women don't choose to underachieve.

३७ टिप्पण्या:

rhhardin म्हणाले...

Women get a nominal victory on points, as they used to caution about computer controlled warfare.

rhhardin म्हणाले...

If they wait too long to have a baby, I suppose mongolism is a risk.

YoungHegelian म्हणाले...

Well, ladies, do what your Mongol ancestors would have done in times of yore: decamp to greener pastures. Then, they'd climb on a horse & grab their bow. Now, learn English & then hop on a plane with your diploma.

If you're acceptably pretty, a modern American, Canadian, or European male will snap you up in heartbeat, your exoticism icing on the erotic cake. In your heimat, you're pretentious & snooty. Over here, you're Little Miss Susie Homemaker by comparison. Take the example of the female half of your former Russian overlords to heart. Us Western dudes iz where it's at!**

** Myself not included. Old-ish & married is considered out of the game.

Jupiter म्हणाले...

"It's interesting that women don't choose to underachieve."

You mean like all the men, who marry some woman and work a shit job they hate to support her brats, when they could be seducing virgins instead?

Gahrie म्हणाले...

If you're acceptably pretty, a modern American, Canadian, or European male will snap you up in heartbeat,

India and China are much closer and both in need of wives.

n.n म्हणाले...

Perhaps the women can stay home while pregnant and shortly thereafter, and the less productive -- there is a correlation between intelligence and taxable return -- men can look after the household and raise the children. Equal in rights and complementary in Nature. They could also send their husbands to school in order to improve their knowledge and skill, as their husband would do for them if the circumstances were reversed.

William म्हणाले...

This is an opportune time to plug the movie Child 44. It stars Tom Hardy as a Stalin era secret policeman. There's a subplot about his courtship of Noomi Rapace. He thinks that he has won her affection and the friendship of her family. Later on, when he loses his secret police job, there's a big reveal. Noomi tells him that it wasn't his courtship and charm that won her over but the fact that he was a secret policeman, that there was no way she could ever have possibly said no to his advances, and that she doesn't consider him that attractive or amiable.........It's not a great movie, but it's better than Red Sparrow. Jennifer Lawrence's nude scene in Red Sparrow was relatively fleeting, although she does wear lingerie for a longer period of time.

Michael K म्हणाले...

Mongolian population crash in 5, 4, 3, 2.....

Sprezzatura म्हणाले...

"It's interesting that women don't choose to underachieve."

It takes a lot of effort to make them underachieve.

Dudes been workin' hard fer a long time.

mockturtle म्हणाले...

No problem. Just import a bunch of Chinese men.

Oso Negro म्हणाले...

I suspected immediately that there was active cultural interference going on. My suspicion went to 99% likelihood when "LBTGQ" was mentioned, and was entirely confirmed when NGOs focusing on women were introduced. FUCK those people who go and screw up someone else's culture. I hate NGO workers. I can spy them right off. The 50s something woman with a bad haircut drinking vodka on ice in first class on the flight to a third world country. Ruining their own lives wasn't enough. They have to shit on someone else.

Christy म्हणाले...

Can we draw a comparison to us when Buddhism is their main religion? What about the educators? We're they imported westerners? Would that impact the culture perversely?

mockturtle म्हणाले...

Oh, I guess Gahrie had the same idea.

Jupiter म्हणाले...

When other people made women's life choices for them, it didn't matter what they wanted, and Evolution didn't care what they wanted. Because it doesn't matter, evolutionarily, what you might happen to want, if you can't get it. But that's all changed, and Evolution is now paying close attention to what women want. Or rather, to the fact that an awful lot of women want some damn silly things, evolutionarily speaking. I'm not sure how long it will take for the new models to start coming out, but the designer is definitely at work. Pretty sure I'll never get to drive one.

YoungHegelian म्हणाले...

Gahrie/mockturtle,

India and China are much closer and both in need of wives.

Yeah, but those guys aren't any less obnoxious to their women than the Mongolian guys.

Let me tell you, if I was a Chinese or Indian woman, & if I had a family that wouldn't disown me if I did it, I'd marry a Western guy in a heartbeat.

Those men are often nasty to their women. I've worked in IT for 38 years now, & I've seen it up-close.

n.n म्हणाले...

Evolution (i.e. chaos) persists with Posterity. Lots and lots of babies. Everything else is an article of faith, including: individual dignity, intrinsic value, reconciliation, stability, monotonic functions.

She can achieve. He can overachieve. They can still find common ground on another plane. People are so one and even two-dimensional, and find comfort, or dread, in the relentless progress of time.

mezzrow म्हणाले...

The universality of hypergamy. Sad, but very human.

Left Bank of the Charles म्हणाले...

Althouse needs a “like a fish needs a bicycle” tag for posts lsuch as this.

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM म्हणाले...

At the Caffe Bene, you can talk about whatever you want.

Providing you are equal to or above my status

cronus titan म्हणाले...

We have successfully exported whining and missing the issue. See, the fact that men are undereducated and struggling is irrelevant; the real issue is that women can't find husbands at what they consider their station. THAT is the tragedy and the only issue worth considering.

Can we quantify whining in our export numbers? 'Cause it looks like we have exported that attitude.

LordSomber म्हणाले...

Women almost universally tend to "marry up" across cultures worldwide.
The more they themselves rise in socio-economic status, the more their window of potentially acceptable mates narrows.

This was obvious to me as far back as the '90's, even before I knew there was a term for this -- hypergamy.

I don't know why people of both sexes still find this puzzling, even today.

tcrosse म्हणाले...

Steel Mongolias

buwaya म्हणाले...

This is a common situation in big cities all over, an excess of young women.
They flock to big cities, and then can't find husbands.
You could probably write essentially the same article about San Francisco today.
Its been done, IIRC, several times since the 80's.

Lee Moore म्हणाले...

As LordSomber says, this isn't even Evolutionary Psychology 101, it's pre-school.



cronus titan म्हणाले...

@LordSomber

It was true long before the 1990s but your point is well taken. Progressive women are the most hierarchical people you will come across. The first time I saw self-identified progressive women in a clique shun another woman for dating "beneath her" I was stunned. They were actually angry (more likely anxious) that it would damage their clique's reputation. Experience informed me it is very common.

n.n म्हणाले...

Irreconcilable differences... for lack of trying.

rehajm म्हणाले...

I notice this in Boston, too. Mon-Wed at any moderately fancy eatery is tables of young career women mostly in groupd but some alone at the bar.

Well good luck with that...

mockturtle म्हणाले...

Young Hegelian notes: Yeah, but those guys aren't any less obnoxious to their women than the Mongolian guys.

Let me tell you, if I was a Chinese or Indian woman, & if I had a family that wouldn't disown me if I did it, I'd marry a Western guy in a heartbeat.

Those men are often nasty to their women. I've worked in IT for 38 years now, & I've seen it up-close.


I wasn't aware they were after 'nice'. I thought they were after successful, rich.

Henry म्हणाले...

Makes me think of Bill Forsythe's classic "Gregory's Girl"

You know where we should be?
South America.
There's a town there--
and this is
a well-known fact--
but do you know the ratio
of women to men?
Eight to one!
Eight women per one guy!
That's the sort of place
for us, eh?
It's called Caracas.


Poor sods had the wrong city. And the wrong century.

buwaya म्हणाले...

If you are looking, and hard up, you probably could get all the women you want in Caracas, its hard times over there.

mockturtle म्हणाले...

You could probably write essentially the same article about San Francisco today.

I should think that a significant portion of eligible males in SF are gay, so...

Jaq म्हणाले...

Whatever you might think, though, women are NOT, I repeat, NOT hypergamous. That's just right-wing claptrap!

Mr Wibble म्हणाले...

I've always wanted to visit Mongolia.

YoungHegelian म्हणाले...

@mockturtle,

I wasn't aware they were after 'nice'. I thought they were after successful, rich.

Western men come (no pun intended) in those flavors, too, & they just cut their women an awful lot more slack.

PM म्हणाले...

My wife would be the first to say she underachieved.
Suckerrrr!

Gospace म्हणाले...

buwaya said...
This is a common situation in big cities all over, an excess of young women.
They flock to big cities, and then can't find husbands.
You could probably write essentially the same article about San Francisco today.
Its been done, IIRC, several times since the 80's.


Even moreso in San Francisco. Exiting a subway back in the late '80s I let out an involuntary whistle as I witnessed a great set of legs pass by. The woman turned around and said "Thank you. That's the first time anyone has ever whistled at me in this neighborhood." If you're a woman interested in catching a man- San Francisco is the wrong place to go hunting.

LA_Bob म्हणाले...

mockturtle said, "I wasn't aware they were after 'nice'. I thought they were after successful, rich."

Evidently both, at least from what a Philippine woman once told me. She was married to a white LA dentist. Thinking of the ads I'd remembered in Popular Mechanics when I was a kid, I asked her what was up with Philippine women seeking American men.

"We think they are hen-pecked," she replied.