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The War Against Girls
Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2011-06-21 22:08
Review here. Excerpt:
'Mara Hvistendahl is worried about girls. Not in any political, moral or cultural sense but as an existential matter. She is right to be. In China, India and numerous other countries (both developing and developed), there are many more men than women, the result of systematic campaigns against baby girls. In "Unnatural Selection," Ms. Hvistendahl reports on this gender imbalance: what it is, how it came to be and what it means for the future.
In nature, 105 boys are born for every 100 girls. This ratio is biologically ironclad. Between 104 and 106 is the normal range, and that's as far as the natural window goes. Any other number is the result of unnatural events.
Yet today in India there are 112 boys born for every 100 girls. In China, the number is 121—though plenty of Chinese towns are over the 150 mark. China's and India's populations are mammoth enough that their outlying sex ratios have skewed the global average to a biologically impossible 107. But the imbalance is not only in Asia. Azerbaijan stands at 115, Georgia at 118 and Armenia at 120.'
I commented as follows:
'The author makes a mistake in saying that the gender ratio is fixed and anything other than that ratio is due to unnatural causes. A lot of 'natural' things can influence any given current sex ratio. Examples include pre-conception influence by endocrine-disrupting chemicals on the gamete production in men (ie, sperm-production), tending to favor production of either X or Y-bearing sperm (near the Great Lakes there is a relative abundance of female births specifically for this reason). Also, diseases could come along and for whatever reason only men or women as a class are being largely exposed to them (eg: men gone off to a foreign land to war could be exposed to and die from diseases they got in camp or found in that land for which they have no antibodies). This is not to detract from the point he is making about selective abortions based on sex. Indeed, he is right. That is going on in India and China to this day and there is a word for it when people of either sex are targeted for their sex. It is known as 'gendercide'. The right to have an abortion without restriction based on arbitrarily-set values is a double-edged sword. It's fine when the society that allows it agrees with the values of the aborting mother, but not so fine when it doesn't. But we cannot have our cake and eat it too. What, outlaw the abortion of girls but not boys? The author also fails to mention that here in the US and the west in general, the typical aborted fetus is male. Does this also constitute gendercide and should there not also be a book on this topic? Finally, the tone of his article seems to be hostile to the idea of men being in a substantial majority in any given community and says it is because we are inherently more violent. Nothing could be further from the truth. Situations of scarcity, not gender dominance, beget violence-- otherwise by his logic, monasteries would be very violent places indeed! Men, due to social norms, are more likely to go to, explore, or be sent to places of scarcity much more frequently than women. It's that scarcity factor that is the primary factor in violence among otherwise well-adjusted people, not gender.'
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Comments
Interesting topic.I agree
Interesting topic.
I agree that society should never disrupt the natural ratio of male to female births, not only is it immoral to do so, but there are also unintended side effects later on.
However, Matt, I am not sure about a few things in your comment. Particularly this:
"The author also fails to mention that here in the US and the west in general, the typical aborted fetus is male"
Could you please list a source, and clarify if you are saying a SIGNIFICANT number of aborted fetuses are male (you say "typical" as if it is way above 50%) or is it the extra 5% or so, that is a result of nature (nature conceives about 5% more boys than girls. So I would expect that aborted fetuses would also be 5% more males).
As far as I know, here in the USA most abortions are performed before gender is detected, and I am not aware that "gendercide" is significant here in the USA (I am guessing gender selection is the reason for less than 1% of abortions). If I am wrong, I would like to know. Thanks
Here ya go, Kris
http://www.in-gender.com/XYU/Gender-Preference/:
"The Birth Ratio of Girls Has Increased Since the Legalization of Abortion
A 1998 report published in the respected Journal of the Americal Medical Association (JAMA) showed that, between 1970 and 1990, the birth ratio of boys to girls in the U.S. declined by .0001 from the normal birth ratio of 106 boys per 100 girls. This sounds like a tiny number, but is considered statistically significant for such a large population. While no one is suggesting that this trend is the result of aborting boys, it certainly seems to rule out any significant sex selective abortion of girls in the U.S.
...
Actual parents seeking to use currently available sex selection techniques are mostly trying to have a girl.
80% of American families who use MicroSort sperm separation want a girl.
The fact that MicroSort is 91% effective for conceiving a girl, compared to only 76% accurate for a boy, is probably a factor in more requests for a girl.
...
The findings in this study show miniscule margins that dwindle over time, and are very often based on results that are just barely statistically significant. Media coverage of the study blew the findings out of proportion, and missed the real story altogether: that son bias has steadily and dramatically decreased until the present day. Personally, I find it irresponsible and offensive for parents of daughters to be told that they are more likely to divorce, when in fact this is not the case. And Dahl and Moretti, shame on you for distorting the data for the sake of 15 minutes of celebrity."
http://encyclopedia.adoption.com/entry/gender-preference/150/1.html:
"International and domestic adoption agencies report a very strong preference of adopting parents in the United States to adopt girls, whether they are childless couples or individuals or whether they already have children. This sex preference is seen in adopting parents of all races, socioeconomic statuses and ages.
...
This sexist preference, when it exists, presents a particular problem to international adoption agencies and children abroad, because many people in other lands have an even more pronounced protective and positive preference for females than for male children.
Females are to be protected, while males are expected to fend for themselves. Females are economically more valuable: They can ultimately serve as maids and perform other menial tasks, whereas boys are often seen as a burden on their societies. As a result, at many international agencies male infants and older children are more readily available for adoption, and prospective adoptive parents who want to adopt females face a longer waiting period."
I wouldn't characterize the statistical difference between male v. female fetus abortion here in the US as 'gendercide'. In my comment I was merely letting the reviewer know (assuming he reads the comments) there was a name for it whenever a gender is selectively picked for existential persecution, as with numerous examples of this in military history when boys and men are rounded up and executed en masse for the crime of being male. In the case of what is happening still in China and India, it's the crime of being female happening to unborn girls. And who remains strangely silent on the matter? Feminists.
OK, Matt, perhaps I missed
OK, Matt, perhaps I missed something as I quickly looked over the sites, but these sites you provided seem to repeat what I am claiming. Here are some quotes from the sites you just listed....
"there's plenty of good evidence that U.S. parents want daughters just as much as sons."
"In the U.S., the gender of an unborn baby is rarely a factor in the decision to have an abortion, because most abortions happen too early in pregnancy to detect the baby's gender."
"Only 5% of abortions in this country are even potentially gender related, because only 5% occur when it is likely the mother knows the baby's gender."
"Although you may see a statistic that 42% of female fetuses are aborted compared to 25% of male fetuses, this figure is worldwide, and reflects the widespread practice in some East and South Asian countries of aborting many female babies. In the U.S., only a small percentage of abortions happen when it is even likely that the mother knows her unborn baby's gender, and there is no evidence that either gender is aborted more often. "
"The Gallup organization first quizzed Americans on whether they preferred a son or a daughter in 1941. The response has remained the same over 50 years: sons are preferred."
****
From your second link (this refers to parents in the US, if they could choose the gender of their biological children)......
* For an only child, 90% of men and 67% of women would choose a boy.
* 80% of both parents prefer to have a boy as their first born child.
* For a three-child family, most prefer two boys and one girl.
I did not see anything that supports your claim that more male fetuses are aborted in the USA compared to female fetuses. The only consistent biased theme that I read at both sites, was that ADOPTING parents seem to request girls (I am not supportive or claiming this is morally acceptable) but one reason that was given is because American parents are aware that internationally there are more girls in orphanages due to the desire to have a son in some Asian countries (and many Americans are adopting from Asian countries). Other reasons were speculated as well.
OK, Your comment was edited
OK, Your comment was edited while I was typing my response. At first you just had the links. I will read your new edited post and see if it clarifies anything for me.
Gendercide...
Thanks for clarifying Matt.
Now I have a few more comments on the article.....
I am against any type of gender selection especially when it comes to abortion or artificial type methods of conception. Messing with natural gender ratios is bad for everyone. Both genders suffer equally but in different ways no matter which gender is being preferred.
Gender selection or "gendercide" should be outlawed and criminally enforced.
Interesting how the subject of the article, Mara Hvistendahl, does not question the morality of abortion. OK to kill for the convenience of the mother, but not OK if one gender is more "convenient" than another. Also she is not concerned about the impact on males (even though they are the one's being preferred at birth, they suffer consequences later in life due to the gender imbalance)
From the article: "Ms. Hvistendahl is particularly worried that the "right wing" or the "Christian right"—as she labels those whose politics differ from her own—will use sex-selective abortion as part of a wider war on abortion itself. She believes that something must be done about the purposeful aborting of female babies or it could lead to "feminists' worst nightmare: a ban on all abortions."
[end]
This is karma at it's best. Feminist support abortion, and now they are upset that abortion is taking the lives of more females compared to males.
More from the article.....
In 1976, for instance, the medical director of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, Malcom Potts, wrote that, when it came to developing nations, abortion was even better than birth control: "Early abortion is safe, effective, cheap and potentially the easiest method to administer."
The following year another Planned Parenthood official celebrated China's coercive methods of family planning, noting that "persuasion and motivation [are] very effective in a society in which social sanctions can be applied against those who fail to cooperate in the construction of the socialist state." As early as 1969, the Population Council's Sheldon Segal was publicly proclaiming the benefits of sex-selective abortion as a means of combating the "population bomb" in the East.
[end]
Does anyone believe for a moment that Planned Parenthood is concerned about women's health? Margaret Sanger was all about selective abortions. She hoped people of color and the poor would select abortion so only the rich white people would prevail. Ironically the rich are choosing abortion, and in Asia, they are apparently aborting mostly females.
Damn you're quick!
Must have been right there when I was typing it...
There's also concerns that
There's also concerns that chemicals in drinking water, including (but not only) wasted passed through urine from the hormones in the birth control pill, could be affecting birth rates of male vs female. I believe it's been shown in lower animals, there's no evidence yet to show it affecting humans, but who knows what we'll find out 5 or 10 years from now.