Shanghai has decided it has too much pride to put up with all this prejudice.
After decades of putting up with criticism and ridicule from other parts of the mainland, the largest city has spoken out against its detractors. A survey sponsored by the local government and conducted by one of its affiliated think-tanks lashes out at the stereotyping of Shanghainese as stingy, arrogant and henpecked.
'I am proud that the survey might help dispel some long-held myths about Shanghainese,' said the study's main author, Zhang Jiehai, a native of Anhui who has worked in Shanghai for years.
If the city is to become an international financial centre, it must first clear up its image at home. But the results of the survey, published last Monday by the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, have not quite had the desired effect. A sarcastic nationwide backlash simply means the debate refuses to go away.
Perhaps the most eye-catching conclusion Professor Zhang and his colleagues reached was that Shanghai husbands were not more obedient to their wives than those from other parts of the mainland.
The study cited anecdotal evidence provided by two surveys in 2003 and last year that found husbands from other parts of China were more willing to wash their wives' underwear.