Pictures of a male bridesmaid at a wedding have triggered debate.

In the pictures, the man is dressed as a bridesmaid, with a small bow in his short hair and wearing heavy makeup. He accompanies the bride and groom in walking out of a house. One post described the man, whose identity is not known, as "the best bridesmaid in Tianjin".

The pictures were first posted by Weibo user "Eail-skar" on Sunday, but were later deleted.

The Weibo user, who works for an event management company in Tianjian, and who only disclosed his surname of Liu, said the pictures he uploaded were sent to him by an acquaintance.

"I only wanted to share the pictures with my friends. It's a surprise that they aroused so much attention. They were even reposted by many big official media," Liu said.

The huge number of reposts put Liu under pressure. "I didn't get permission from the acquaintance," he said in explaining why he deleted the pictures.

However, some Web users downloaded the pictures before uploading them again.

Zhou Jing, a graduate student at Beijing Foreign Studies University, said she welcomed the idea of making her male friends bridesmaids for her wedding.

But Yang Mingming, Zhou's roommate, said, "I want a traditional wedding. It's outrageous to have a male bridesmaid. My parents certainly would not approve of that."