Chapter 31: Won’t You Come In? [Slightly Modified]

Wang Zhao couldn’t understand Li Zhenguan’s worries, even though she had spent the first half of her life in a world that was the inverse of this one in terms of yin and yang.

That world also had traditional gender opposition consciousness, but her living environment should have been affluent, or rather, her elders didn’t treat her differently because of her gender. For her, the biggest difference between men and women should have been reflected in physiological differences.

However, in this world, this physiological gap has been reduced. Women’s strength has increased greatly, but men are not so delicate either. Most of them can effortlessly lift a 5-liter mineral water bucket.

Perhaps Li Zhenguan could do it too, but they don’t like to reveal such strength in front of women. Instead, would they pretend to be weak?

This behavior is roughly equivalent to a peacock displaying its feathers. It seems to be a one-sided mating action, but this weakness needs to exist within certain limits, otherwise it would be passed over. Excessively weak men are likely to have poor genes, unsuitable for reproducing offspring.

It has a bit of a natural selection, survival of the fittest vibe.

Wang Zhao had read many books in the library before, and there were many in-depth research papers on male studies on CNKI and VIP, most of which were quite profound, based on experiments.

On the other hand, this world also pursued the beauty of tallness, so a physique like Li Zhenguan’s was considered excellent in this world. This gave a sense of gene selection, which Wang Zhao found interesting when she first saw it.

However, now she had to face this gender difference, and it felt very strange. All she could do was try her best to comfort and alleviate Li Zhenguan’s pressure.

People undergo many changes after becoming pregnant. For example, some pregnant men become sentimental, finding everything sad, often shedding tears at falling flowers. Some become more dependent on their partners.

So in this world, not only do men have maternity leave, but women also have it, though not as long as men’s. It just allows women to take paid leave to accompany their partners at home during the rest period each week.

Just this one policy is much better than some policies in the previous world. However, looking at the development of this world, despite many policies beneficial to men, men still face discrimination in the workplace.

But apart from those who are discriminated against, others find it hard to feel this unfair treatment. They think men can work too, and there’s nothing unequal about it.

But most people haven’t considered that if there’s a man and a woman with the same education level and similar work experience, under the same personal conditions, if you ask the hiring company, they would mostly choose the woman.

Isn’t this a kind of inequality?

In Wang Zhao’s view, it is inequality.

This inequality is hidden under layers of cover. Even if that man didn’t pass the employment interview, he most likely wouldn’t know that he lost the job because of his gender. He might have some guesses, but there’s nothing he can do about it.

Because the overall environment is like this, he can only train himself more rigorously, learn more knowledge to enrich himself. What they seek is not to be the same as their competitors, but to be better than them, to have greater competitiveness. At least they need to work harder than women to achieve the same status.

However, even after such struggles, most people would add the word “male” to their titles. They are called male achievers, not just achievers. But in this world, do you see capable and accomplished women being called female achievers?

They are usually called elite professionals, new nobility, or big shots.

At worst, they might be called some kind of executive, but once a man achieves some success, people would remark in conversation: “Mr. So-and-so is quite a male achiever, even so-and-so isn’t as capable as Mr. So-and-so…”

Once something is given a gendered title, it becomes strange. But most people don’t think so, only those who can feel the injustice would vaguely feel a bit uncomfortable.

Perhaps because of her past life experiences, when Wang Zhao sees men in this world, she always feels like she’s looking at women from the previous world. While having reproductive rights, they’ve lost a lot and gained very little. Moreover, in history, the “right to reproduce” actually largely didn’t belong to men who had the ability to get pregnant and give birth, but to women.

At that time, although the pregnancy sac was in men’s bodies, it was controlled by women.

However, now she had become a beneficiary of this unequal treatment.

Li Zhenguan was lying there, unknowingly tugging at the pillow, his cat-like eyes looking at Wang Zhao on the other end of the video. After her words, his mood had improved a lot, but in his heart, he still wanted to have a daughter.

He was just that kind of person, stubborn to the extreme. Otherwise, ordinary young people at his age would have been scared to death if they got pregnant. He was different. After learning about the pregnancy, he didn’t tell anyone, just quietly took care of the fetus every day, waiting until three months to speak out.

In this world, children are basically secure in the womb at three months, and abortion is extremely harmful to the body, possibly causing infertility, with very high risks.

Generally, people who discover an unexpected pregnancy after three months and want to go to the hospital for an abortion would need to provide certification documents from a notary agency, and even leave records in the system. This is a kind of protection for the pregnant man’s identity.

For unmarried men with unexpected pregnancies, the state generally provides some subsidies, and after the child is born, the genetic information is entered into the system, which can be matched with the information of women in it. Once a match is successful, the matched biological mother needs to pay a certain amount of child support to the man’s side every month, which is mandatory.

However, these are things that Wang Zhao is not very clear about now, and no one has told her about it. Wang’s parents wouldn’t bring up such things voluntarily either. This is a kind of social common sense, rules that boys and girls would generally learn about through some methods in high school.

She glanced at the time, took out a textbook and opened it on the table, while pulling out a gel pen from the pen holder, and asked Li Zhenguan, “Aren’t you going to take a shower? It’s almost nine o’clock.”

Li Zhenguan looked at Wang Zhao, not wanting to move.

He still wanted to do some exercise later, a little practice, so he would sleep more soundly at night. Moreover, he had gained a lot of weight during this period, and the rapidly increasing weight made him a bit uneasy, his emotions noticeably more agitated.