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Yuanyue Dang

A 38-year-old man is taken for a check-up at a psychiatric hospital in China by his mother every Lunar New Year because he is single.
A video of the man – from the central Chinese province of Henan – which was reported on by Sohu News and The Beijing News, has gone viral and provoked a lively debate about the pressure to marry on the mainland.
In the clip – which has been viewed more than 4 million times – the man, surnamed Wang, says that he has never brought a girlfriend home at Lunar New Year.
This has resulted in his mother believing he “has something wrong in the head”.

The bizarre “diagnosis” has meant that since 2020, his family has developed a strange tradition, following each Lunar New Year holiday, his mother takes him to see a psychiatrist.
On February 4, Wang was once again taken by his mother to the Henan Provincial Psychiatric Hospital.
This time, however, the doctor told the mother that her son was not ill but that it was her who had had a problem as she had developed the mental disorder of “forcing her son to marry”.
In an interview with The Beijing News, Wang said he has worked in Beijing for more than a decade, formerly as an actor and now as a tennis coach.

“I should not be identified as an unmarried person. I am just very busy and haven’t met the right person. My mum can’t sleep because I don’t get married, so I feel quite upset.” Wang said, adding that he went along with his mother’s strange hospital fascination to reassure her.
Wang also said that in his rural hometown he is known as the “super old single man”.
In addition, he said he has not saved enough money for a down payment on a home in Beijing and as such, “who would want to marry me?”
The video posted by Sohu News has garnered more than 2,000 comments, most of which tell how their elders push them to get married.
During the Lunar New Year, when young people living in the big cities return to their hometowns, generational conflicts over getting married intensify.
While the older generation in China wants their children to marry and have kids earlier, the younger generation tends to marry later or is sceptical about marriage for many reasons.
These include daily living pressures and a lack of social support.
In addition, in many less developed areas, the practice of “bride price” in which the groom’s family is required to pay a sum of money to the bride’s family to obtain their permission to marry, still persists.
One online observer said: “Those who marry casually are the ones with mental problems.”
Another said: “Why are we acting like sinners in society if we don’t get married?”


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‘Force-to-marry disorder’: Chinese mother who takes single son, 38, to psychiatric hospital for annual check-up gets dose of own medicine

A Chinese man who remains single aged 38, says his mother takes him to a psychiatrist for “treatment” every Lunar New Year” because he is not married. Photo: SCMP composite

A Chinese mother who takes her 38-year-old son for a psychiatric check-up every Lunar New Year because he has not married is given a taste of her own medicine by doctors. Photo: SCMP composite

The dutiful single son says he goes along with his mother’s insistence on annual psychiatric check-ups to keep her “reassured”. Photo: Weibo 

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People & Culture

Millions watch video of man, 38, who says he goes along with annual psychiatric check-up just to please his mother
Pressure to get married is ever-present in China, but at Lunar New Year the demands intensify


More than four million people have watched an online video of a Chinese man, 38, explaining that his mother takes him for a psychiatric check-up every Lunar New Year because he is single.


China society

‘Force-to-marry disorder’: Chinese mother who takes single son, 38, to psychiatric hospital for annual check-up gets dose of own medicine

Millions watch video of man, 38, who says he goes along with annual psychiatric check-up just to please his mother Pressure to get married is ever-present in China, but at Lunar New Year the demands intensify

Millions watch video of man, 38, who says he goes along with annual psychiatric check-up just to please his mother

Pressure to get married is ever-present in China, but at Lunar New Year the demands intensify