This archive report was first published on 25 August 2020.
Published on August 25, 2020, a blog post by Yang Wenzhan, a Beijing-based lawyer, highlighted the challenges faced by young working women in China during dinner banquets.
Yang, who is abstinent, noted that many social crowds are formed based on drinking habits, with dinner banquets often divided into two tables: one for those who love to drink and another for those who do so moderately or not at all.
He wrote, “If you can drink and make professional connections, that will help. But if you don’t have this ability, you can still make a good lawyer.”
However, the pressure to drink can be overwhelming, especially for young working women who are often seated next to older executives and expected to laugh at their jokes while being piled with alcohol.
Some employees have dealt with the pressure by resorting to discreet tricks, like pouring one’s drink on the floor.
As novelist Yan Ge wrote in a New York Times Op-Ed article in November 2019, “When it goes wrong, it can be ugly: Fights can break out; women might be abused for sport.”
But when the drinking goes right, mistakes are forgiven, and business is done.
