Killing Baby Girls
© Moira Richards
How young does a woman need to be, to escape the gender-based abuse that is directed against females? Sadly, the answer is that she is never too young.
It is common knowledge that baby girls are often subjected to rape and incest, but according to a Gendercide Watch report, baby girls are also killed - just because they are not boys. This report states that female infanticide has been practiced for many hundreds of years, that it still happens in countries all over the world, and that it is a matter of critical concern in India and China.
Hindu families in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu are said to murder their unwanted baby daughters (especially the second daughter) at birth. Sometimes they smother or strangle them, sometimes they give them poison to drink, sometimes they just don't feed these infant girls and let them starve to death.
But Indian and Chinese parents also have other means at their disposal to rid themselves of their unwanted baby daughters. A pregnant mother can take a test to find out if her unborn baby is a girl or a boy. In those countries where families prefer to have sons than daughters, many thousands of female foetuses are aborted. Why? The basic reason is that these families would rather have had a little boy.
In India a son can grow up and work and help to support his parents in their old age. But a daughter taken into her husband's family to live and to care for his parents, and her parents must also give an expensive amount of dowry to her in-laws to pay for her keep. So if you're poor, it is economically much more viable to raise sons.
The Chinese government introduced its one-child policy in 1979. Couples that have more than one child are fined, and parents would prefer that one child to be a boy. So various things happen to you if you have the misfortune to be an unwanted baby girl.
Maybe you are aborted before you are born, or maybe you are murdered at birth so your parents can try again for a boy. Maybe your parents will abandon you to the dubious care of a state orphanage, or maybe they will keep you but not register your birth. That means that legally you don't exist - difficult then, if not impossible, to get medical care at clinics, to go to school, and to get access to other state services.
It is common knowledge that baby girls are often subjected to rape and incest, but according to a Gendercide Watch report, baby girls are also killed - just because they are not boys. This report states that female infanticide has been practiced for many hundreds of years, that it still happens in countries all over the world, and that it is a matter of critical concern in India and China.
Hindu families in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu are said to murder their unwanted baby daughters (especially the second daughter) at birth. Sometimes they smother or strangle them, sometimes they give them poison to drink, sometimes they just don't feed these infant girls and let them starve to death.
But Indian and Chinese parents also have other means at their disposal to rid themselves of their unwanted baby daughters. A pregnant mother can take a test to find out if her unborn baby is a girl or a boy. In those countries where families prefer to have sons than daughters, many thousands of female foetuses are aborted. Why? The basic reason is that these families would rather have had a little boy.
In India a son can grow up and work and help to support his parents in their old age. But a daughter taken into her husband's family to live and to care for his parents, and her parents must also give an expensive amount of dowry to her in-laws to pay for her keep. So if you're poor, it is economically much more viable to raise sons.
The Chinese government introduced its one-child policy in 1979. Couples that have more than one child are fined, and parents would prefer that one child to be a boy. So various things happen to you if you have the misfortune to be an unwanted baby girl.
Maybe you are aborted before you are born, or maybe you are murdered at birth so your parents can try again for a boy. Maybe your parents will abandon you to the dubious care of a state orphanage, or maybe they will keep you but not register your birth. That means that legally you don't exist - difficult then, if not impossible, to get medical care at clinics, to go to school, and to get access to other state services.
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