So. Looking specifically at the negative consequence of bearing a female into rural China and why it is such a bad thing.
So. With just the one consequence of the want of a boy to pass on the family name; it leads to three (female infanticide/sex selection pregnancies, male/female population imbalance and not enough females for Chinese men to marry and maybe more but not mentioned) repercussions. And, it just does not seem to be humane or make sense.
Take for example, farmers in rural China are allowed to have more than one child to help with the farm etc. Understandable.
But. What is a little questioning is the fact that they see a girl as a bad thing and not able to help out in farms. I know, for one that my mum's family was living under this policy and well, my grandmother did like pretty much, I hear, got forced to have a procedure that prevented her from ever producing children, but that's not my main point.
My main point is that although my mum was girl, she was, in a word, pretty manly and helped around the household with 'farm-like' chores such as fetching chicken's eggs and looking after the many animals that the family used to have on their not-so-much-farm.. but depsite the fact that she was not a guy, she was able to in a sentence, 'become a man' and do 'male-related' activities.
So, to say that only a guy can do 'farm-work' and such is a.... generalization? A... stereotype? Yup. Exactly. Even though, for some people and stereotypes, maybe like myself I am told that I am such a 'girl' and then I reply, "coz I am?" is pretty obvious but for some like that 'males are favoured on a farm' coz maybe of their work ethic and ability.
It really, really actually depends. It showed for my mum that she was able to perform farm work. But I guess not her female siblings.... but still, I guess if they had to and if they were maybe told to and possibly even bought up to, they could most probably perform the farm work duties as well as a male-born child can?
So. In conclusion, I think it may be society dictating what males and females can and cannot do.. once again...
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7 comments:
whoa, thats something i can not even get my head around. i can understad their reasoning but i think childeren should be brought into this world for love. i am interested to see whre your blog is going to take us!
- ash
Lol.
What is that you can't get your head around? The one-child policy in China or that children should be made out of love and not to tend to farms etc?
Hmmm.... I didn't actually mean it in that sense but... thinking about it... hmmm.
you have chosen a very good topic,
i really not agree of China, some of the China people want to have more children, so they will immigrated to other country or have a child without letting the govenment know.
but it is still not a good ideas for those people.
ash was right, children should ve be brought into this world for love.
how can they have any love if they living without telling anyone?
most of them even not allow their own child to call them "mum" or "dad", in this case, they will asked their own children to call them "uncle" and "aunty".
but what's the point to have a child if u gonna tell them "oh, i am not your mother."?
tht's so sad right?
if China don't want anymore female born, then china's future may have much more male than female.
so what now? 1 wife and 3 husband? will it work something out?
well, personally i really don't understand what china government are thinking.
but i think this policy better change now.
Omg! Woah! I didn't know some parts of what you mentioned (that the children are not able to fully acknowledge that they are your parents etc). That's really not something a child should be bought up into.
Re: Uneven population balance. I think they do that in Inida or something... have 1 husbad and three wives... that is also like polygamy.. hmmm =\
Soo yeah... I might actually mention that in an upcoming blog entry....
This is a really broad topic.
But yeah, I agree with your points. Obviously, the Govt. didn't really think this policy thorugh to begin with fully knowing that the Chinese prefer males. Or they want males to pass on the family name..
Hmm...
Yes this policy introduced-what some 30 years ago have and will continue to be highly controversial. Another criticism of this 'one child family policy' is that it has and is producing some "little emperors" among these males- they are so thoroughly spoiled and protected and expect to be served than to be able to work. I don't think they can be any where close to matching women's ability who have had the experience of "hard knocks" through life to survive. I agree with your conclusion that it's society's 'perception' of what are males 'can do' roles and females 'can't do' roles. I think women are as much at fault to allow that perception.
Hmm.. yes. I agree with the point that the point that the males are being brought up like little emprerors but I think like all one child family children are being bought up like that - spolit and given all the attention coz its their only child but I do know that it is worse with males.
I know this because my two cousins in China (one male and one female) are the products of one child family and the male is definitely given more attention and spoilt more than the female. Which is quite sad and just not what life is about.
I personally, after this thought and factor not sure how China can change this policy coz I think it has more to do with perceptions rather than the policy. China hasn't introduced a policy but they have introduced a way of thinking. Which I think will be very hard to change.
Maggie , I think you've picked a really deep and controversial topic to work on and I like the way it genuinely riles me ( gets me feeling annoyed ) just reading about it.
Audrey made a comment about it possibly being as much womens fault to allow the perception of their own sex to be considered the weaker and less able bodied.
Clearly women have been toiling the land as well as the domestic frontier alongside their men since the beginning of time. Where they may in some instances lack the brute strength of a man they make up for in ingenuity and flexibility.
Yet culturally they are deemed less important. My feeling is this will not change until substantial numbers of women are appointed to government roles or those that encourage public campaigns for the rights of their own sex.
I'd be interested to hear about the political make-up of the country in relation to women.
As far as controlling population goes I believe in overpopulated countries birth controli.e contraception, is essential,even though only having one child is heartbreaking to many people. However , controlling the sex of the child , especially in the inhumane instances of infanticide, is a very dangerous thing. As a highly controversial subject recently in this country, I believe controlling the sex of a child is a very dangerous thing.
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