It’s a well-known fact that there are significantly fewer men than women in Russia (86 males to 100 females). The women who have a partner are obviously not looking to meet someone from overseas.
From the remaining 14% of female population who are definitely single, only some Russian women consider the option of demographic migration, i.e. finding a partner from abroad. With all the unappealing habits of Russian men, including their philandering and affection for alcohol, single ladies would still rather date locally, but poor gender ratios are against them.
“Immigration Is Worse Than Death”
For the majority of Russian women “immigration is worse than death”, our female members report. They say that their single girlfriends refuse to even look at the option of dating internationally, because they absolutely do not see themselves living anywhere except Russia. The current wave of neo-patriotism in Russia supports this view.
To give you a perspective, my estimation is that there are not more than 50 thousands of Slavic women seeking partners abroad at any given time, which is only 0.5% of the total female population of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus (or about 3.5% of unattached females). The vast majority of these women also date locally, and are not set on finding a partner abroad as their sole relationship goal.
Maybe only 10 thousand of Slavic women (at any time) are concentrating solely on finding a partner from a foreign country (0.7% of the total number of single women).
Desperately Seeking a Partner
However, if their searches do not result in a relationship within 12-18 months, they are likely to abandon their pursuits, and again shift their priorities to exploring local options.
The majority of women who are only seeking a partner internationally are over the age of 30, and often have a child from a previous relationship, or have never been married.
On the Russian dating scene, this means:
- A never married woman over 30 is considered deficient because “no one wanted her”, which means there “should be” something wrong with her.
- A woman with a child from a previous relationship is considered as inherently deficient and only seeking someone to provide for her child, according to the prevalent views openly expressed by single men on the Russian Internet.
A joke on a Russian site states: “You couldn’t get married by the age of 23? Well, OK, now try self-expression, what else is left for you.”
This is why you may see scores of girls in their late 20’s joining international dating sites. It doesn’t mean that they are seeking to immigrate. It just means that they feel their “shelf life” as a “marriage material” comes to an end, and they try to expand their options.
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Completely agreed! Looking for a quality man in Russia is like looking for a job during economic recession. Men have high standards, but what you finally get is not always what you want. I think it’s reasonable that a Russian woman would want to search for a foreigner, especially if she’s beautiful and educated.
I don’t know what your talking about, there plenty of good Russian men, you must not go out a lot.
Such problems arise from lack of culture and education. And low standards of living of course. So why not date someone from a more prosperous country? Marry a foreigner and automatically get a residence permit. Moreover, people in Europe are generally more polite, wealthy and less aggressive than in exUSSR.
From the western perspective, this paints a pretty grim picture of international dating, at least when it comes to Russian women. First, the vast majority of Russian women feel that immigration is worse than death. Only 3-4 percent would even consider it, and these are doing so reluctantly. A vast majority are dating locally and still hoping to marry a local and stay in their countries. So, the takeaway for a western man is: most Russian women would rather die than move away to be with you. There’s only a tiny percentage who would even consider this, and even those… Read more »
Steve, Do you have plenty of other options? 🙂 Then use them. Yes, international dating is the last resort for people who cannot find what they are looking for, in their home countries. I was the one. I wanted a local man – no, I didn’t want an alcoholic, philandering Russian man – I wanted someone “normal”. Which is hard to find, when you are 29, and all good guys are already married (they usually marry before the age of 25, see the statistics), and the ones that are not married are players. So, yes, international dating was my last… Read more »