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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

Heartbreaking - how many female babies have never made it to womanhood

37 replies

beenandgoneandbackagain · 07/06/2019 11:13

This article managed to both break my heart and make me really, really fucking angry.

too many men

The fact that it focuses on the men who are here rather than the millions and millions of female babies murdered or aborted because of their sex makes me angry too.

It's all a bit "poor men" rather than focusing on the fact that the patriarchy killing females is the root cause of their misery.

It also fucks me off when I read shit about pink / blue brains and think that these babies didn't even get a chance to identify as anything.

I don't even know if I'm looking to start a conversation about this or just find an outlet for my anger and sadness.

OP posts:
RickAstleyGaveMeUp · 07/06/2019 11:23

God. I couldn't read it to the end. It made me furious. The men are only upset because they haven't got anyone to fuck, clean up after their old people, and tell them when to take a fucking bath. And who is suffering? Poor women. Poor trafficked Cambodian women. It's disgusting.

Original poster
beenandgoneandbackagain · 07/06/2019 11:25

That makes me angry too. I would have hoped that the current situation would show that treating women as second class/disposable citizens is harmful to society as a whole, yet it seems to be leading to a doubling-down of ill-treatment of women.

OP posts:
RickAstleyGaveMeUp · 07/06/2019 11:35

I guess they are seeing women as a commodity, so rarity has increased the financial value of one but hasn't encouraged anyone to appreciate that they are actually people. And as with any commodity that is scarce, people are smuggling cheap alternatives through the black market. Forgetting that these are human beings, not bags of sugar.

RuffleCrow · 07/06/2019 11:39

Men are so fucked up.

sar302 · 07/06/2019 11:42

All those "poor" men who can't get married now, and are having their masculinity damaged by having to step into "traditionally female roles".

My heart fucking bleeds for them.

Oh no, wait - the other thing 😡

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 07/06/2019 11:44

I can’t read it because I will have a stroke. Which country though?

RickAstleyGaveMeUp · 07/06/2019 11:46

China and India.

Original poster
beenandgoneandbackagain · 07/06/2019 11:58

The story focuses on China and India but does mention that other countries have a similar problem. Women are being trafficked from Cambodia as slave brides, and some women from Russia are also being sold as brides though the desirability of their western features makes them seem to be treated a little better.

RickAstley I think women are seen as even less value than a bag of sugar Sad

OP posts:
Bezalelle · 07/06/2019 12:54

It puts identity politics into sharp perspective. These millions of females couldn't identify out of their sexed bodies.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 13:04

It's all a bit "poor men" rather than focusing on the fact that the patriarchy killing females is the root cause of their misery.

The article is rubbish and the 'poor men' point even worse. But this is not about 'killing females' unless you equalise 'selective abortion' or gender selection before implantation.

If you are a woman in India you cannot find out the sex of your child while pregnant by law. This raises all kind of issues. If you are rich you can always find out, travel abroad, use selection of sex, whatever. If you are a poor woman who cannot afford a girl/dowry, you cannot have an abortion.

If you are anti-abortion, it makes sense. If you are pro-choice, the reason why a woman decides to terminate should not be anybody's business. Or shall they have the child to remedy the gender imbalance? And get them to be called 'killers'/'feminiciders'?

There are countries such as Liechestein or Qatar with worse imbalances for different reasons.

The problem is cultural and, as usual, they are trying to control women's bodies to remedy a problem they have not caused.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 13:05

It puts identity politics into sharp perspective. These millions of females couldn't identify out of their sexed bodies.

How can you make a link between this and trans people? Have you read anything about the situation of trans in India? What are you comparing here? Where is the link?

Original poster
beenandgoneandbackagain · 07/06/2019 13:12

I disagree with your point Cameleon The article is about killing females. Sex-selection may be banned, both here and in India, but it still happens.

Personally I don't think it matters when the females are killed - either through embryo selection, selective abortion, or infanticide. The fact that they are killed simply because they are female is the horrific undercurrent. The women "choosing" to have sex-selective abortions are not making that decision in a vacuum.

And the way the men in the story still see women as nothing more than slaves, chattels or replacement mothers (feeding/cooking/cleaning).

I guess it's the patriarchy unfettered.

Sorry - I'm probably too angry at re-reading the article to make much sense!

OP posts:
Original poster
beenandgoneandbackagain · 07/06/2019 13:15

I think the trans point is because trans ideology says that gender is a feeling rather than chromosomes and something that can be identified into (or out of).

But females being killed can't identify out of their killing, and the women being treated as commodities can't suddenly identify as a man to escape their suffering. It just shows what a crock of shit the idea of "identifying as a sex" is.

OP posts:
RickAstleyGaveMeUp · 07/06/2019 13:16

Given cultural pressures, the choice to abort a female foetus can hardly be considered a free choice in huge numbers of circumstances. And poor women are likely to use old wives tales to guess at the sex of their baby and have back street abortions at great physical risk. If a female baby gets through, how many of these are 'stillborn'? Or abandoned? To say that the widespread aborting of female foetuses is wrong is not an anti-choice argument.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 13:19

I really cannot find the link with trans issues. There are many interesting points involved in the gender imbalance in many countries (sometimes exacerbated by polygamy).

This is not 'females being killed' kind of problem. It dehumanises others as savages who go around killing baby girls by the millions. Infanticide, in many countries where data exist is mainly perpetrated by women. Must actually be the only violent crime where this is true. But this is not the point under discussion (or I don't think so; if anybody has other data I am happy to be better educated)

camaleon · 07/06/2019 13:23

To me is an anti-choice argument. The reason should not matter at all if you are pro-choice. The prevalent discourse in India is of incredible pressure not to have an abortion. It leads to doctor not performing abortions because they may act against the law if this is perceived as 'sex-selection'. This is well-documented. The pressures to have an unwanted child increase immensely.

You cannot argue that it is OK to have an abortion in case of disability or because you cannot afford a child and make an exception based on foetus of the sex.
I totally understand people who are against abortion completely. Not this choose and pick depending on ability/sex/age/income/etc.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 13:23

sex of the foetus among other typos.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 13:26

And I would not speculate about numbers of 'stillborn' or 'abandoned'. As far as I know, there are no reasons/evidence to affirm that right now, there is a high proportion of female infanticide in India or anywhere else. Show me the data otherwise. Conflating selective abortion or selecting sex before implantation with killing babies is really bad form.

FirstTimeDogParent · 07/06/2019 14:10

I see what cameleon means, re abortion and pro-choice. It’s a complex ethical area. I’m a pro-choice feminist, supportive of women’s right to choose for any reason. So, in theory, I should be supportive of the right to choose to end a pregnancy on the basis of foetal sex. However, the fact that pregnancy isn’t wanted because the foetus is female is a very uncomfortable thought indeed which obviously doesn’t sit well with my feminist principles and beenandgone, you are right, the pregnant woman is not making her decision in a vacuum.

I agree re that article being very ‘poor men’ though. Toxic masculinity ruins it for everyone, again.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 14:21

RickAstleyGaveMeUp, I have had a look into the links (have not watched the documentary). Again, the figures conflate selective abortion, better treatment of boys and other issues as trafficking with infanticide/particularly female infanticide. There is only one set of relevant data from 1995.

The only reliable data relates to imbalance in gender numbers: the 'missing girls'. How many disable adults are missing in the UK because a pregnancy was terminated? These figures are misleading and I don't think you should conflate infanticide with termination of pregnancy. It portrays other cultures as uncivilised in the worst possible way. It portrays other women as monsters actually (majority of infanticides are perpetrated by women according to the data we know).

I am VERY uncomfortable with terminating a pregnancy based on sex. It is however possible to do so in the UK. If a woman decides to terminate a pregnancy because she wants to make that decision about her body, the reason does not matter (unless you are against the decision itself in every circumstance). If you believe you are killing a baby, I totally get why someone is anti-abortion. The reason, again, does not matter.

And women are under real pressure in India (I know much less about China) not to terminate a pregnancy precisely because of the ban on sex-selection.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 14:23

Of course the decision is not made in a vacuum: the societal and cultural structure puts a massive burden on women without resources if they have girls. This is not resolved by controlling their bodies and forcing them to continue the pregnancy.

QuentinWinters · 07/06/2019 15:16

I'm a bit confused. If these countries aren't killing female babies, or practicing sex selection of embryos or aborting female feotuses, how is it that they have such a gender imbalance?

I do feel bad for the men in this case, it must be awful to know you have little chance of a family. But it is a consequence of the patriarchy and the fact females aren't valued as people.

camaleon · 07/06/2019 15:26

Nobody is denying sex-selection is happening QuentinWinters. It is very plausible in the given circumstances. Like it is very plausible that the massive sex imbalance in Qatar is due to male migrant workers.

I am saying that 1) sex selection is not infanticide; 2) you cannot resolve patriarchy controlling women's bodies.

A world map about the differences is here: statisticstimes.com/demographics/countries-by-sex-ratio.php

camaleon · 07/06/2019 15:40

If you look into the data it is really interesting. The countries in Europe with less women than men are (order from those who have more women to less):

Malta
Icelnad
Luxembourg
Norway
Albania

I don't think sex selection is happening in Norway, although it looks like more boys than girls are born www.ssb.no/en/befolkning/artikler-og-publikasjoner/_attachment/347081?_ts=1632b8bcba0