to think that gender selection should be legalised in the uk?

[ChocolateBiscuitCake]

I have three glorious boys. I would love to have a girl as well.

I really don't understand why PGD for gender selection is illegal in the UK. I completely accept that it should not be funded through the nhs, but can not see why couples can not pay privately.

You are not choosing eye colour etc, simply the gender of your child to balance your family dynamic.

If ivf couples are allowed to pick/choose/freeze embryos, why is PGD illegal?

Aibu to think that it should be legal in this country? I would not be trying to create a 'superior race', just balance our family with a girl - a daughter for me and DH and a sister for my sons.

All the articles I've seen about girl babies being selectively aborted refer to countries other than the UK - mostly China or India - and use birth rate statistics as evidence.

i.e. this area has 150 boys being born for every 100 girls, natural statistic is approx 105 boys born for every 100 girls, therefore selective abortion / infanticide is almost certainly happening.

Given that aborting healthy babies on grounds of gender is illegal in the UK, any people who've done that would probably be reluctant to openly admit it and talk to researchers about it.

And scans aren't 100% reliable even today, if the baby's not in the right position.

Scans are not reliable. When I had my youngest the woman in the next bed was over the moon because she was having a girl. She had a boy already and went out and bought stuff for a girl. It turned out to be a boy-it is never a good idea to get all prepared in case it is wrong.

I really thought scans were like 99% reliable?

I always thought that they are usually 99.99999999% percent sure if its a boy but slightly less so if its a girl as the bits could be, ahem, hiding sts.

nope i had a friend who in the last 6mths was told girl, the baby was infact a boy, she didnt mind at all.

i think depending on the position of the baby and the skill of the sonographer they can be more or less accurate, when i had my 20wk scan with dd we weretn planning on finding out the sex, but the sonographer said 'i have a REALLY clear view of the sex do you want to know?' whihc i took to me mean boy! ie clear view = penis! so when she then said girl dp and i were quite shocked, we had just assumed it would be a boy (didnt care either way) anyway she could see we were in disbelief, and checked very thoroughly and at the end of the scan she said 'i am not allowed to say i am 100% sure, but i am 100% sure this baby is a girl' i am assuming she wouldnt have said that had she not been properly sure! as it is we didnt buy anything 'girly' anyway just reused the boys stuff and unisex stuff and then once she was born we have bought stuff and got given loads, actually i was given girls stuff before she was born, but insisted that dp put it up in the loft until right at the last minute when i washed a few bits, but then i was like that with the unisex stuff etc as well, dont like that feeling of 'tempting fate' so yes i get stuff ready but the minimal. i guess its a bit like people that dont like buying anything before the baby arrives? daft really as its not going to change the outcome!

as for gender abortions in the uk? i would be suprised if it happened tho i guess in private clinics it may? no-one can be forced to tell the true reasons they are aborting but you would still need 2 drs to sign it off etc and surely the earliest they can sex at a scan is about 16wks i thought and then it is less accurate? i dont know how it is something that they can research very well in the uk.

incidentally, the family opposite me are Indian they have one boy and 2 girls and were delighted with the births of their girls, they had a tought time with their boy (their 1st) as he was prem and she had pre-eclampsia so they were pleased all went well like any other parents and tho they have said to me how lovely to have 4 boys, they were equally enthusiastic about the arrival of our dd as they were when we had ds4 tho. i dont know them that well but when they had their babies i put a card through their letterbox to congratulate them etc and our children play out together. i feel a bit bad actually as its the language barrier that prevents me from being friends with them, the children can speak english but the mum literally only speaks a few words, she nods hello and when behind her int he queue at the local shop and her card was declined i paid for her shopping (some milk and some electricity for her meter etc) and she thanked me and dropped the money round the next day. But the language barrier does make it hard. anyway not sure what the point of that ramble is! sorry :)

The woman in the next bed thought it was 100% reliable!

No, scans aren't 100% reliable.

It depends a lot on which position the baby's in - if they're facing the ultrasound probe with legs splayed open, the sonographer can be pretty sure. If they're facing away or sideways on with legs crossed (like DS in most of my scans), it can be very hard to see.

It's commoner for them to think it's a girl when it's really a boy, if the boy bits are tucked out of sight, than it is for them to think it's a boy when it's really a girl.

Although one of my colleagues thought she was having a boy - turned out the sonographer had mistook a bit of umbilical cord for a willy, and baby was really a girl.

I don't like the idea very much tbh.

Friends of ours have a delightful little boy a few weeks younger than DS, he has haemaphilla (sp?) so I guess he might have been aborted if they could have chosen. Which can't be right, because he is their joy.

For those that selective abortion of girls is just a problem in India/China, here is an editorial from the Canadian Medical Association Journal talking about some evidence of unexpected trends in the gender of third children.

If you believe you have 'the right;' to a perfect family with each gender, then you don't deserve children IMO.

Girls are already being aborted (and killed as infants) in record numbers. Personally I don't want that to start here.

Interestingly, in China the bias towards boys is falling, largely due to economic factors.

• Urbanisation means that women are often more employable than men now - the types of job that typical rural-urban migrants do are are as easily done by women as by men
• Urbanisation means that the traditional expectations that a boy child and his wife would live with his parents and support them (i.e. not with the wife's parents) have broken down. The extended family set up is far less common because increasing numbers of adult children go to the cities and dont come back to the rural areas (just send money home to both sets of parents).

In HK, amongst the educated Chinese population, I'd almost say there's a bias towards girls now- "girls are less trouble", "girls work harder at at school" etc.

The thing about China is that whilst in no way do I agree with gender selective terminations, there are tangible reasons why it happens. When you're only allowed one child and you're a poor rural peasant, if that child is a girl you are totally screwed because your daughter will leave you to live with her husband's family. China has no pension system and minimal welfare provision. These people are often dirt poor. It can be life or death.

By contrast, in the UK, our reasons for preferring one gender over another are, at best, self-indulgent and whimsical.

I think it is all due to the fact they are going to be Mother's soul mate and best friend for life, Sargesaweyes! They are going to think the same, be very involved with their grandchildren in future years and have lots of shopping trips!
This is despite the fact that they are individuals and might not get on well. I have rather pityingly been told that I am missing the mother/daughter relationship - from a friend who has a pretty ropey relationship with her own DD.

It is all a bit strange, because if I mention that it is because boys are noisy, messy and need lots of exercise have boring clothes and don't like shopping I would be shouted down and told it was social conditioning and there is no difference! If that was really so then it wouldn't matter which you had.

I agree with LurkingandLearningforNow.

Another one astounded by people thinking a child is something to be chosen in a particular colour. Either is a blessing. If I closed my eyes and imagine a baby, it's a girl - I assume that's because i'm a girl and I have a sister and that's what I identify with/as. But when I love a man, the idea of having a son with him or seeing how some boys are with their mums and mums are with their boys makes me like the idea of that too.

I also don't get this 'family dynamic' thing and 'pigeon pair' malarkey works. I'm sure one of each is lovely but so are all of one sex too. So my parents weren't 'lucky' to get one of each - a world without my little sister? No thanks! That said, if I'd had a brother instead, I wouldn't have known any different and that might have been nice too.

gender selection is available in the uk ( I think) but it is used for genetic conditions not so you can chose your children to order, I know gender dissapointment must be difficult for parents, but once you start choosing girls over boys you will be looking for hair colour height etc, I dont think children should be designed ,

yes Mrsjay they do gender selection if a specific sex is going to have a genetic condition as there are some conditions that only affect boys or vice versa and for medical reasons like that then fine but as you say purely for the sake of a boy over a girl, where will it stop? and it really is not an easy or simple process to go through either, it has many risks, its invasive and draining emotionally and it may not even work! you only have to go and look at the infertility threads to see the stress that some posters are under trying iui and ivf etc, why you would put yourself through that just to get a particular sex child i have no idea, to get A BABY, any baby as its the only way you can then hell yes, but to do it to 'balance' your family you are having a bloody laugh!

That's an interesting article from Canada and wonder what effect a 30 week wait until finding out the babes sex woud have.

If you want 100% accuracy then I think an amino gives you ths and it an be one earlier but it's not without it's own risks.

I still can't believe that there are people who would consider intrusive medical treatment over the good old fashioned way of making a baby just to get a girl or boy.

Sargesaweyes, I've said this before, but I'm not convinced that people in the west do side towards girls.

Yes, a lot of western women want girls - I think exoticfruits explanation about that is pretty accurate.

However, I work in engineering, mostly with men, and when their wives or girlfriends get pregnant, most of them say that they hope the baby will be a boy. Some of them say that they don't mind as long as it's healthy, but I can't recall any colleagues who don't already have a son saying they hope it's a girl. I've even heard men at work saying to male colleagues who've just had daughters things like 'Bad luck it's a girl, are you disappointed?'

I'd be interested to hear whether all the people convinced that the west is biased towards girl babies are hearing 'I want a girl' comments from both men and women. Based on my experience, I'd be surprised if men truly are biased in favour of girl babies.

I just don't understand why a certain sex is so important that a couple would go through all that just to get a boy/girl I have same sex children and i didnt think oh i wish she was a boy , this I want a girl so we can bond be best friends really irks me, my girls have a great relationship with their dad he didnt want boys and was happy that we had healthy children,

picnicbasketcase

''I have a DS and a DD. I would only want another child if it was another girl. So we will not be having a third child because you don't get to choose and I would hate to have a child if I ended up having any sense of disappointment or resentment about it.''

Gosh, your post has really upset and saddened me .
You already are disappointed in a child and resent it . If you truly appreciated and loved your children equally, why would you feel so strongly about only wanting a girl next time ? What has this boy done that made you feel you would definitely not want another one of his sex, you would resent it ?
It's shocking to be honest.

mmmvanilla, I second you.

Thirded. How cruel. :(

5madthings Tue 26-Jun-12 21:22:33

There's something really fucking patronising about your post. I just can't put my finger on it..

I have a child with a disability. It affects boys so if I had known that I could select have a girl then my son would not be an only child.

Gender selection was at an early stage when he was born. My only option for subsequent children would have been to have early cvs testing to find the sex and then terminate if it was a boy.