Condom Craze in Conservative China

China, with a population of 1.3 billion, the largest in the world, embraces condoms in its fight against AIDS and HIV. Models wear extravagant dresses, wedding gowns, bikinis, and hats made from condoms and sashay through a stage filled with soap bubbles. The Beijing Fashion show sends out the message that condoms of all shapes and sizes are in.

In conservative and repressive China, the problem of AIDS was once ignored as a foreign disease blamed on Western decadence. As China awakens to the enormity and spread of AIDS amongst its general population, it changes its tune. This type of fashion show is usually seen in Paris or New York but Beijing has embraced it with glamour and style. Guili Latex Factory, the largest condom maker in China, organized the show.

As China opens up its economic policies, it undergoes a social and sexual revolution which it had chosen to hide in closets until recently. The condom show represents the confrontation of the Chinese government with this social issue and its present situation. Sex, sexual diseases, and even sexual orientation issues loom large in every country but larger in this largest of countries. Contraception is China’s hope of controlling its population and containing the spread of AIDS.