Women in China finally making a great leap forward

excerpt:

"Qu Man and Yang Jie marry in a hotel courtyard with 85 people and a type of ceremony that is becoming common: Western. Statues of Roman gods and scads of purple balloons are part of an event complete with the throwing of rice and confetti. At one point, the parents of both bride Qu and groom Yang are called up front to speak at the ceremony. It seems like no big deal.

Yet like many family matters in China, this wedding ritual represents an enormous change - mainly for the bride. Not long ago, less than 20 years, the bride's family did not attend her wedding, let alone speak at the ceremony. Brides were sent out the door by parents to the groom's family, where they were obliged to serve with duty and alacrity."

[...]

"Qu Man, the bride with the Western-style wedding, is an example of greater status among urban women. Both she and Yang Jie work in a state accounting office. Yang says he chose Qu. But Qu chose just about everything else: She chose the wedding site. She also brought her parents to the wedding.

And that was not for show. It signals she will not be an old-style daughter-in-law, subservient, powerless, dependent. She will negotiate when to leave her career and have a child. If she is like many brides today, she will have told her husband already that if he expects her to live with his family, he must find a different wife."

[...]

"Families with one child, a girl, now place great hope in her. In urban areas, men now say they don't care if their baby is a girl or boy. (A lively debate exists over whether they mean it.) Also, the virtues of having a girl are more explicitly stated in the city: "My parents and many parents I know feel that when the son moves out, his counsel will not be as reliable," she says. "He will look out for his interests first. But the daughter, even when she is married, can be trusted to think for the whole family."

"The daughter is easier to raise, cares more, and is less trouble," says Beijing University family sociologist Xia Xueluan. "That's the feeling.""