Preference For Sons - Girls Gone Missing

Preference for sons has long been part of Asian’s culture and tradition based on believing in male-superiority in society. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) alerts us that one of the most alarming change in Asia’s population dynamics in recent decades has been a dramatic increases in the proportion of males within its local populations. There is now an average of 120-130 male born for every 100 female born per year in India and China and similar trend in other countries. At the Fourth Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights, held in Hyderabad, India, two months ago, UNFPA presented the study “Sex-ratio Imbalance in Asia: Trends, Consequences, and Policy Responses”. After analyses of the consequences of the growing gender imbalances in the population of four studies conducted in India, China, Viet Nam and Nepal, the participants came to a conclusion that gender discrimination, son preference and the resultant unequal status of women and girls have contributed to an increasing demand for sex selection services. As a way forward, they recommended that governments and civil-society organizations should take priority action to eliminate sex selection. I agree that sex selection, with assistance from new ultrasound and amniocentesis technology, can lead to the problem of “Girls Gone Missing” through the abortion of female fetus. But I disagree with their way forward recommendation to elimination sex selection altogether. Stopping the abortion of female fetus, as practiced by a small group of women in the population, is not the same as stopping all the people from sex selection/services and access to information and technology. It is wrong for the participants to encourage governments and civil society organizations to take action against the right of parents to have the freedom to choose the size of their own family, the sex of their child, and the use of modern technology to improve the quality of their own lives. I have been working for years in population information, education and communication field in programs and projects where sex selection information was provided freely to parents along with information on family planning methods. We should keep the free flow of information to the people, especially, when we see success such as the Thailand Family Planning Program, which is based on the provision of unrestrictive information makibg use of available modern technologies. Authoritarian force must not be used by anyone to solve the problem of missing girls in the population. Instead we should use persuasive methods and give advice on appropriate technology for sex selection, while at the same time, provide gender equality and human rights education for all people from childhood to adulthood. Parents will then be able to make their own free choice about the number and sex of their children based on knowledge and understanding of the equal value of the male and female child. Without change in respecting women’s integrity and their right to be in charge and control of their own body, authoritarian government and religious authority will not succeed in stopping the women to abort female fetus from their own body.

Filed under Gender Issues, Thailand, United Nations |