Procreation vs recreation

HONG KONG: In Guangdong province in southern China, just across the border from Hong Kong, the ernai cun (or ‘mistress villas’) come alive on weekends. Walking down the town streets lined with karaoke bars, saunas and massage parlours, you can almost hear the gush of male hormones, and hear the hum of an underground economy at work. These towns are the “caverns of pleasure” to which armies of testosterone-driven Hong Kong men turn when they want a bit of carnal action on the side. They are also the epicentres of an epidemic of extramarital relations that has overrun Hong Kong in recent years.

Adultery and concubinage have traditionally enjoyed social sanction in Chinese cultural history, and although in more modern times, the law has taken a dim view of these practices, it is widely prevalent in civil society. Ng Man-Lun, professor of psychiatry at the University of Hong Kong, who has conducted extensive surveys on sexuality in Hong Kong and mainland China, estimates that 50 per cent of married men in Greater China have had extramarital relations. Citing ancient Taoist-Confucian premises that governed sexuality, Ng says that the underlying value system held that sex within a marriage must serve the purpose of procreation, and sex outside marriage should cater to erotic satisfaction.

In the annual global sex surveys, Hong Kong’s citizens typically rank low against the global average for frequency of sex. But these survey statistics are hard to reconcile with the reality of the streets: “love hotels,” which rent out rooms by the hour, abound in Hong Kong’s pubbing and entertainment districts, and do roaring business. And, according to social workers and family counsellors, there has been a sharp rise in the number of divorces linked to adultery in recent years.

To the embarrassment of the Chinese Communist Party, there have in recent months been a string of scandals involving mainland provincial leaders, their corrupt ways and, all too frequently, their harem of mistresses. After one particularly bruising case, in which the Shanghai mistress of a disgraced party official gave notice of her intention to auction his gifts to her (which included a villa, several apartments and a Lexus!), the authorities even contemplated measures that would have required leaders to officially “register” their mistresses!

Ng says that although sexual liberalism is frequently associated with the West, such an association may be “too simplistic, given that Chinese culture has a long history of tolerance of varied sexual practices.” In fact, he argues, “modern liberal sexual ideas must be seen partly as a revival of the traditional Chinese sexual attitude.”

This weekend, trainloads of Hong Kong men will be validating Ng's statement when they slip across the border for a bit of good, old-fashioned nookie…