‘No affair means he has no charm’: outdated sexist advice from China marriage counsellor sparks online backlash
- Stay for benefit of kids, focus on them, counsellor advises wives
- Plenty of online temptation, common for men to cheat, women told
A marriage counsellor in China has been accused of being sexist for persuading women whose husbands had affairs not to leave for the sake of their children.
The comments came from a government-assigned divorce mediator, whose brief is to convince couples not to separate.
The city of Suqian in the eastern province of Jiangsu, launched a divorce mediation scheme in 2021, assigning counsellors to couples after the government introduced its one-month “cooling off” policy.
As a result, at least 1,000 couples have retracted divorce applications in the area.
A 57-year-old woman, surnamed Liang, was hired as a counsellor after retiring from a kindergarten where she had worked for more than 30 years.
She said half the cases she handled involved husbands committing adultery and wives making the divorce application. She admitted she would often try to dissuade the women from continuing with their application.