China's New Divorce Law Triggers Wave Of Protests

Ilustrasi (Christine Fuller/Pixabay)

JAKARTA - The high divorce rate in China has made policy owners start scheming to draft new laws. As a result, any spouse who filed for divorce was required to go through the cooling phase for a month.

Although it has been discussed since a year ago, the new law was passed on Thursday, May 28. Passing the law will replace the old rules governing marriage, adoption and property rights.

Then, Chinese citizens are busy rejecting the new law. Launching Channel News Asia, right after it was passed, the issue became one of the popular topics reviewed by social media like Twitter in China, Weibo.

This can be seen from about 25 million posts using the hashtag "against the divorce cooling period." To this day the objections are still being voiced via Weibo.

Someone commented, "We can't even divorce freely?" Another comment also voiced: Surely there are still a lot of people who get married spontaneously, they should set a period of rest for marriage too?

"They are still discussing the divorce policy in the midst of opposition from everyone online. That means that respect for the owner of the policy for public opinion is limited to mere discourse."

Unlike the public, officials in China have revealed that the new law protects people from careless divorce. Moreover, nowadays the phenomenon of divorce has become increasingly prevalent in the Bamboo Curtain Country.

In the past year alone, more than four million people got divorced. In contrast to 2003, which only had more than one million cases.

Not only that, the cooling phase will not take effect if one partner is found to have committed domestic violence. Although it has been passed, the law will only come into effect on January 1.

In addition, another new law is being prepared. Some of these include broadening the definition of sexual harassment, new protections against land grabbing, and measures that allow people to donate organs to their deceased relatives.