Supriya Panjiyar Essays (1464 words) - Demography, Gender Studies

Supriya Panjiyar Essays (1464 words) - Demography, Gender Studies Supriya Panjiyar Dr. Cherry English 1302-71016 13 November 2017 The Gender of a Child Should Not be Pre selected The practice of determining the gender of a child before its birth via different techniques is preselection of gender of a child. With the advancement of new technologies and equipment in science the determination of the gender of a child has become easier and convenient. The various methods to include the gender of a child include fertility method like manipulating the sex chromosomes a child, post-birth method like adoption, infanticide. There are also new technologies like ultra-sound screening, in-vitro fertilization and sex selective abortion. Sex selection methods have raised a lot of ethical and moral arguments. The advancement in the technology has raised the number of gendercides and giving up baby for adoption just because the gender of a child is not what the parents had preferred. Gendercide is a very critical issue since a child is basically being murdered just because of its gender. People perform gendercides through abortion for different reasons. One of the main reaso ns for abortions is preference of sons over daughter. Several parents in various parts of the world abort their unborn child just because of its gender that is why the gender of a child should not be preselected. Especially in countries like India, China, South Korea, Iran, etc. the gender of a child is preselected just for the preference of son. "Case 1. A couple with four healthy daughters desire a son. They request prenatal diagnosis solely to learn the fetus's sex, in the absence of any medical indications. They tell the doctor that if the fetus is a female they will abort it. Further, they say that if the doctor will not grant their request for prenatal diagnosis they will have an abortion rather than risk having a fifth girl.Case Case 3. An immigrant woman from an Asian nation where sons are strongly preferred requests prenatal diagnosis for fetal sexing. She already has three daughters and says her husband will divorce her, send her home, and "throw her on the dung heap" if she has another."(Wertz et al. 1) Both of the cases above clearly indicates that most of the parents perform preselection of their child for the sake of preference of a son. This practice has been prevalent in countries like India, China and other regions of the world since several decades. Desai claims that "By 'disappearing', I mean British Indian communities in this country are failing to produce the number of girl babies that science tells us to expect, which, broadly speaking, is 950 girls for every 1,000 boys." Sons are preferred over daughter just because they think that sons will keep the family name running while the daughters will be sent to others home after marriage. Another reason for abortion of daughters is the dowry system which still exists in the rural regions of these country. The sex selection method of a child maybe costly but it is not more costly than raising a daughter and sending her off to someone else's home after marriage with dowry. This mentality has led several parents to commit genderc ide. Talking about another country China the one-child policy has given rise to preselection of gender. Since, the parents can have only one child, they prefer to have a son rather than a girl. Many families in China prefer male children for better family income. The female children are seen as less valuable in labor and unable to provide more family income. Especially in rural areas where farm, harvest and work fields are the main sources of income. Other aspects like family name inheritance and preserving of family tradition by male child are also the reasons of preselection of gender. Many arguments have been raised whether selection of sex of a child has been beneficial or has it led the human desire to a darker side. There can be parents who choose to know the gender of a child just for the sake of balancing their family. For example a couple who already has a son may prefer to have a daughter as a second child. There are arguments that preselection of the sex of the child can improve the quality of life