A long piece on the harsh, cold reality of gender selection in India – especially in wealthier areas. Chilling.
Indian women of any class rarely make decisions about their reproductive choices themselves: Husbands and in-laws are usually intimately involved.
At a south Delhi abortion clinic this week, for example, five of six patients booked for appointments had been accompanied by their mothers-in-law. The clinic director, who did not wish to be quoted by name because of the sensitive nature of the subject, noted the large sign – which must, by law, be posted – saying sex determination was illegal and not offered there. Five of the 200 patients she sees each month are well into their second trimester, when fetal gender can be confirmed, and claim to already have daughters. She turns them away, fearing sex-based termination is their primary motive.
“But others lie, and how can we check? They say they have sons already, and came because of contraceptive failure, and that entitles them to abortion … and there is nothing I can do about that,” she adds.








The irony here is that people with no regard for daughters are being judged by people with no regard for either sons or daughters. They seem conveniently unconflicted in having their own hands on other people’s ovaries… metaphorically speaking. What happened to “body-sovereignty”?
I’m sure the defense works out to being that this kind of abortion is illegal in order to counter a misogynistic attitude in a culture. Well, that’s good, but it’s not misogyny unless she is human, and if we’re going to consider her to be human to counter misogyny, then it’s hypocritical to discount humanity to defend abortion rights from the right to life.
At least we can find agreement with our abortion advocate neighbours in opposing gender filtering abortions. It’s good to know that they too can believe in a cause that is more important than the right to abortion. We can only hope that they will one day see the more general right to life as equally a worthy cause as this.
I think I mis-characterized the legalities mentioned in the article. Apparently what’s illegal is not the abortion of a girl in India, but the gender determination. It deserves pointing out that they are against both artificial implantation of boys and the abortion of girls in dealing with their society’s gender imbalance, so it’s not just about abortion, but I think my point would still stand that the abortion is not an abortion of a non-girl. A single detail about the identity of the fetus in this case affords it protection. They turn people away because they do not treat it as “just an operation”, but an act to eliminate a daughter at a socially acceptable time. I’m glad they are bothered by this, but I think the identity of being human ought to be more fundamentally important than one’s gender-identity.
I fail to see the hypocricy, Matthew. Accepting your argument that “this kind of abortion is illegal in order to counter a misogynistic attitude in a culture.”*, it doesn’t have to follow that the misogynistic attitude specified refers only to fetuses. It’s perfectly consistant for someone to have no moral objection to abortion itsself regardless of gender, but still oppose sex-selective abortion due to the effect such practices might have on the collective perception of girls and adult women.
As evidence of this, I point out that there is also a widespread objection from pro-choicers and pro-lifers alike over the use of preimplantation screening (Which barely touches on abortion) and even sperm-sorting (Which doesn’t even come close). That people object to sex-selection even by nonabortive means shows that the debate over abortion is not the primary motivation for their position.
The key difference between this view of the situation and the one you describe is that my post describes a view based upon the impact upon a culture collectively and ignoring individuals, while yours looks only at individuals (Accepting for the sake of arguement that this includes fetuses) and ignores concerns over the cultural impact.
*It’s one of two arguments I’ve seen used by pro-choicers to argue against gender selective abortions, with the other being that an approximatly fifty-fifty gender ratio is better for society as it eliminates the potential problem of millions of frustrated single men unable to find a partner.
Rather than accept for the sake of argument that a human fetus is a person too, Suricou, why don’t you accept it as a matter of fact. It’s the elephant in the room. And if you do accept it as a matter of fact, then please say so. Matthew’s main point still stands: “The irony here is that people with no regard for daughters are being judged by people with no regard for either sons or daughters”, at least not those deemed too young.
A matter of definition, I think. The concept of a person has no physical reality: It really is just a concept. If I accept a fetus as the moral equivilent of an adult human, then I can see no consistant means by which to exclude all organisms with a mental complexity between that of fetus and human. This would pose a great inconvenience to me, as I would then be obliged to put my cats on trial for the mass-murder of the local rodent population.
Suricou, your conclusion is invalid. For someone who picks an argument over a definition (an important one, I admit), you are very sloppy. You speak of a “mental complexity between that of fetus and human.” But the word FETUS refers to a stage of development common among vertebrates, and the word HUMAN refers to a species. You have confused different ways to categorize and have become illogical.
You also use a false premise. Contrary to what you say, the difference between a killing and a murder is not the mental complexity of the victim. I don’t think that morality can have a logical place in the materialist perspective, but supposing that it can–and using the lingo of the secular humanist–why do you believe in discrimination on the basis of age but not on the basis of sex?
“But the word FETUS refers to a stage of development common among vertebrates, and the word HUMAN refers to a species.”
Bickering over language. You should know the intended meanings, given the context.
“why do you believe in discrimination on the basis of age but not on the basis of sex?”
I was actually discriminating on the basis of mental capability – it’s the only consistant means I can find to grant moral value to humans, but not to most animals. Or, for some animals, a much lower but non-zero value fits better.
I’m not one of those people who likes to divide the world into ‘humans’ and ‘other,’ then just declare that all humans are of equal value and non-humans of none. I find this view simplistic, and not reflecting of reality. Animals have worth. Humans have a lot more worth. Some humans are worth more than others, even to the extent that the lowest levels (those without a functioning brain, such as a fetus or those with extremally severe mental disability) are worth so little to me as to become expendable.
I value mind. Not meat. No mind, no value. Just a bag of organs wrapped in skin.
“I don’t think that morality can have a logical place in the materialist perspective.”
It’s like money. It doesn’t exist at all – you can break a coin down and find lots of atoms of various metals composing it, but not a trace of money. It’s a complete fiction, there just is no such thing as money. That doesn’t stop the fiction from raising and destroying empires and determining the course of civilisation. If enough people believe in money or morality then, in a sense, they do exist.
Suricou, I have a few more questions:
(1) May I kill someone while he sleeps?
(2) True or false: Mr. Hitler’s eugenics were flawed, but their goals were commendable.
(3) Does the mind exist? Shouldn’t a materialist use the word BRAIN? But a brain is just “meat,” in your opinion.
God did not divide the world into into ‘humans’ and ‘other,’ then just declare that all humans are of equal value and non-humans of none. Animals have worth. Humans have a lot more worth. Some humans are worth more than others (though not intrinsically), even to the extent that a majority (those whom God chose to leave in their depraved conception of reality) are worth so little to Him (but obviously something) as to be damned forever to suffer His anger. Humans can’t make this distinction, however, not on a practical, individual level.
As God’s minister, the civil government already rewards both virtue and vice in this life. It does so very often based on a distorted version of morality, one not in agreement with God’s thoughts as manifested, for example, in the Ten Commandments. I have prayed that Canadians will again learn God’s will so that their government will only kill evil-doers in the exercise of justice–not mentally retarded people in the exercise of eugenics.
“Some humans are worth more than others, even to the extent that the lowest levels (those without a functioning brain, such as a fetus or those with extremally severe mental disability) are worth so little to me as to become expendable.”
A fetus does in fact have a functioning brain. Brain waves are present about 6 weeks after conception, when it is still technically an embryo. The brain continues to develop throughout pregnancy and of course after the baby is born. There is evidence that as it grows, the fetus learns to distinguish sounds (such as that of its mother’s voice), feels, smells, hears, and eventually sees. A baby doesn’t just suddenly start thinking after it’s born.
http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/tul/psychtoday9809.html
“Some humans are worth more than others…”
This position is untenable. You are denying that human beings are valuable because of the kind of entity that they are, and you are instead claiming that the moral value of human beings is derived from some acquired characteristic (“mental capability”), that some human beings have and others do not, and which varies in degree from one human being to the next. You have tossed away entirely the notion of equality, and instead replaced it with some kind of horrible utilitarian hierarchy of rights, in which the rights of the superiors always trump the rights of the inferiors.
The untenability of your position persists regardless of which acquired characteristic you choose as the basis for discrimination.
“Some humans are worth more than others, even to the extent that the lowest levels (those without a functioning brain, such as a fetus or those with extremely severe mental disability) are worth so little to me as to become expendable.”
I have to hand it to you, Suricou. You have the courage to openly acknowledge the logical conclusion of materialistic philosophy: that human value is determined entirely by some utilitarian metric. Your personal preference is evidently on the basis of mental capacity. The obvious question then is at what IQ level, or other preferred metric, above which someone may be considered a human being in your reckoning? Are you okay with more intelligent people taking advantage of you, since rights apparently increase in that direction?
Most people don’t admit to the logical conclusions of materialism, because as a life philosophy it is plainly unlivable, yet they will use the reasoning as a basis for framing the lives of others. At least you don’t deny it, but it unfortunately renders you incapable of objecting to any form of oppression, since someone else can reserve the right to hold a different scaling-metric for human worth than yours.
“Brain waves are present about 6 weeks after conception”
Not true. What is detectable at 6 weeks is the weak electrical activity found in the brain stem of brain dead patients. Brain waves, as such, do not show up until week 26, and are not sustained until week 28. The “6 weeks” myth originated in a study that is 60 years out of date. For something more recent, I would suggest “Fetal Pain
A Systematic Multidisciplinary Review of the Evidence”, published in 2005 and available at the website of the Journal of the American Medical Association. The cerebral cortex does not begin to develop until the 26th week and is not physically hooked up to the nerves prior to the 28th week. It should be noted that fewer than .8% of abortions are performed that late in the pregnancy.
In an article, The First Ache, published in the NYTimes in February of 2008, shows that the foetal brain is bathed in chemicals that keep it sedated, and unconscious until the moment of birth.
There is a good summary of the available evidence at the Wikipedia page on Neonatal Perception.