Female Foeticide

PRESENTED BY: NEHA GUPTA

What is Female Foeticide?

o Female feticide is the selective abortion/elimination of the girl child in the womb itself, done deliberately by the mother, after the detection of the child’s gender through medical means.

o This is usually done under familial pressure from the husband or the in-laws or even the woman’s parents.

o Unplanned pregnancy is generally the reason behind abortion.

o However, female feticide is a far more heinous sin than the age old practice of killing an unwanted child, even before it’s born.

Why Female Foeticide?o Every unethical act, like this one, has some age-old lame

reasoning behind it, which is used as genuine justification by its staunch supporters.

o The root cause for female feticide lies within the cultural norms as well as the socio-economic policies of the country where this practice prevails.

o The most infected are the South Asian countries like China, India, Vietnam, Korea etc. from where this social evil has mushroomed today to the western nations like the USA and Canada.

o This is the end result of immigration that has brought along female feticide across the pond. What is the rationale, one may wonder.

o Surprisingly, the reasons aren’t quite as diverse for these nations as one may perceive.

Origin• Female foeticide has been linked to the arrival, in the early

1990s, of affordable ultrasound technology and its widespread adoption in India.

• Obstetric ultrasonography, either transvaginally or transabdominally, checks for various markers of fetal sex. It can be performed at or after week 12 of pregnancy.

• At this point, 3⁄4 of fetal sexes can be correctly determined, according to a 2001 study. Accuracy for males is approximately 50% and for females almost 100%.

• When performed after week 13 of pregnancy, ultrasonography gives an accurate result in almost 100% of cases.

• Ultrasound sex discernment technologies were first introduced in major cities of India in 1980s, its use expanded in India's urban regions in 1990s, and became widespread in 2000s.

Magnitude estimates for female foeticide

• Estimates for female foeticide vary by scholar.

• One group estimates more than 10 million female foetuses may have been illegally aborted in India since 1990s, and 500,000 girls were being lost annually due to female foeticide.

• Macpherson estimates that 100,000 abortions every year continue to be performed in India solely because the fetus is female.

Reasons behind it…

o Preference for the male childo Deteriorated Status of Womeno Foul Medical Ethicso Industrial Growth

Preference for the male child

o In India, the age old custom of dowry system puts a damper on the parents’ spirits who are ‘blessed’ with a girl child.

o Right then and there, begin the calculations associated with marriage expenses, which may happen after a couple of decades, following the child’s first breath.

o A lump sum paid to the daughter in twenty years when the currency value may depreciate and inflation may skyrocket is seen as a tragedy waiting to happen.

o It would be so much better to get rid of them with just a fraction of the amount.

Deteriorated Status of Women

• I’m not a rabid feminist who would shout herself hoarse about the domination of men in any society.

• Sure, males are the stronger sex when it comes to the pecking order in a country, but that does not entail a curbing of rights for women.

• Rather than whining about the denied opportunities, women should stand up and try to grasp the chances they want for themselves.

Foul Medical Ethics

• The opening conversation to this hub satisfactorily covers this point. With the legalization of abortion in India, illegal sex determination and termination of pregnancies has become an everyday reality.

• The professionals in the medical field are only too glad to help parents realize their dream of a healthy baby boy.

• Female feticide is openly discussed amongst many in the healing fraternity and even pin boards outside certain clinics read, ‘Pay Rs.500 ($ 10) today to save the expense of Rs. 500 000 ($ 10 000) in the future’.

• The initial meager sum is the cost of a pregnancy termination, while the bigger amount specified in comparison, is the expense that the family will be burdened with in the form of dowry for the girl.

Industrial Growth

• Industrialization of the health sector has further strengthened the selective sex abortion quarter.

• With the advent of CVS, amniocentesis and Ultrasound, sex determination of the fetus has become much easier than it was earlier.

• This goes on to show how the manufacturers of high-tech equipments and gadgets, used to run these tests, benefit from the woes of future parents and their unborn child.

• Many hospitals are known to sign long term contracts with the firms involved in the production of these types of medical machinery.

• Often, a healthy percentage of the profit is shared with the hospital and both parties enjoy the fruits of rewarding a death sentence.

Traditional Practices of India

o The life of a woman in India is often marked by such disrespect that some feel it is better for the family, and even for the baby girl, that she not be born.

o Perhaps the greatest factor in this is the practice of dowries.

o Defenders of this system point out that a dowry takes the place of inheritance, which some women in India do not receive.

o However, in many cases the groom's parents take possession of the dowry and do not set any of it aside for the bride's future use.

o Furthermore, the bride's family's responsibilities extend to further supporting the new family in substantial ways, beyond the initial dowry.

Effects of Female Feticide in India

• Female feticide has adversely affected Indian society. 36% of men between the ages of 15 and 45 in the wealthy state of Haryana are unmarried.

• This prevalence of unmarried men has a destabilizing effect that counteracts the stabilizing and enriching effects of families in a society.

• The poorer of these unmarried men seek brides from India's economically challenged eastern states, and wives obtained in this way tend to be exploited and in some cases passed on from one husband to the next.

• The sex imbalance in India will have an increasingly destabilizing effect on a consumer of U.S. nuclear and other military technology.

• India's economy promises to continue growing rapidly in the future, as currently thriving industries such as information technology grow and expand throughout India. It remains to be seen whether India's moral character will keep pace with its economic growth.

Who is Responsible?

• This ethical problem goes along with economic growth in many cases. It is the wealthy families that can afford ultrasounds and abortions.

• If unchecked, the problem will grow in proportion to the Indian economy.

• The parties responsible in this genocide include parents, Indian society, Indian government and religious leaders, worldwide consumers, trade partners and allies of India, and corporations such as GE who supply many ultrasound machines that are used primarily for purposes of feticide.

Global Effects of Female Foeticide

• All countries where female feticide is practiced are at risk for being caught in a vicious circle. Female feticide leads to low female-to-male ratios, which in turn perpetuates low status of women.

• Conversely, low status of women leads to more female feticide.• If an increase in ratio of women to men brings higher status to

women, a decrease in this ratio risks the opposite effect.• Thus, the decrease in the boy-to-girl birth ratio, itself the result of

the low status of women in Indian society, risks a sharp further decrease in the status of women from bad to worse.

• The danger is a vicious circle bringing continually greater female feticide and lowering of the status of women in Indian society.

• All countries where female feticide is practiced are at risk for falling into this vicious circle. Therefore, it is especially urgent for Orthodox Christians to respond to female feticide.

Response to Female Foeticide

o There are a number of possible responses to the worldwide problem of female feticide.

o The most fundamental response is to decry the practice of abortion and the circumstances that lead women to resort to it as their best option.

o The hypocrisy of abortion rights advocates is revealed by their denouncing of the female feticide. It is as if a woman's "rights" to an abortion depend on her motives.

o If she chooses an abortion for financial, social, or personal reasons, she is supported.

o However, if her choice is gender-based, it is condemned. The very naming of gender-based abortion as female feticide reveals a double standard.

o Abortion is supported as a fundamental right, but that right is revoked when it coincides with gender discrimination.

o In India, a proposed nationwide network of orphanages would take in unwanted girl babies.

o This is a merciful response to the symptom of the problem, but it does not seek to treat the problem itself.

o Some radiologists and obstetricians in India oppose female feticide vocally, while others oppose it silently.

o As women's status increases, female feticide will decrease, and increasing the status of women will likewise decrease the practice of female feticide.