Gendercide: Elimination of One Sex Essay

In this short video and article on the topic of gendercide, reporter Elizabeth Vargas travels to India to found out from the people of India personally why there is such a shortage of females. She discovered that although aborting a fetus of a female child is illegal because of the shortage of females, families still continue to abort them because they don't want the burden that the baby girls brings. Vargas also discovered that illegal sex determination clinics can be found just about on every street. Men and their families also the wives to have sex determination tests and abort the baby if it’s female.

"Raising a daughter is like watering your neighbors’ garden.” That quote from a Hindu proverb.is referring to is how in some cultures when a daughter is old enough to be married, she leaves that family and joins her husbands'. So, raising a daughter in those cultures is seen as helping another family. Unlike females when a son is born he will stay and take care of the parents as they age. This son preference can lead to some countries committing gendercide. The act of gendercide is the mass killing of people because of their sex. Gendercide is a horrid trend that is due to the son preferences of many countries. Parents in Countries such as china and India have been killing there daughters. In India 25 percent of girls die before they can reach puberty. Also, 200 million women are missing because of being killed at a young age. There are many cultural causes of gendercide. The first is that boy babies are valued far more then female babies. Male children can carry on the family name, take care the parents when they get old and are less "expensive" to raise. In India there is a dowry system where in order for a woman to be married, the bride’s family must give gifts of money, land, livestock or other expensive items. This can put I strain on poorer families who cannot afford to pay a dowry or richer families who do not want to spend that type of money. So , when they have a girl child they either get an abortion or kill the child to save money. There was a Indian mother that

All over the globe, violence and discrimination against women and girls violates their human rights and severely compromised their perception of equality. Culture, false beliefs and ancient traditions, such as early marriage, the nuclear family, gender-based discrimination, which lead to violence against women and femicide, destroyed young girls ' mental and physical wellbeing and self-esteem by supporting the ideas that gender-based discrimination and inequality is acceptable in our societies.

Woman have a lot to consider in their everyday lives. Although bringing a child into the world can be a beautiful thing, women should have the right to choose if they are ready for that commitment and if they want to bare any children at all. In some countries these are freedoms that women do not have. When reading about genders, it was sad to read about “honor killings”. Honor killings typically involve male family members killing a female family member who caused shame or disgrace to the family. The female could be a victim of rape and

Violence and cruelty directed at women starts from a very young age and it happens because certain cultures and governments allow it to exist and thrive within their population. Within the text, Steinem reveals that, “...child marriage contributes to the fact that the biggest cause of death among teenage girls worldwide is pregnancy and childbirth” (Steinem). Child marriage is still remarkably prominent in many cultures still to this day. These young adolescent bodies are being forced to carry a child the second they get their period and so many of these young girls die from this cultural normalcy. This illustrates why radical feminism is still essential to completely eradicate this kind of subtle brutality against developing girls. Often the cruelty can start even earlier than that with the second thier parents find out they are having a baby girl. Thanks to the ever growing baby boy preference, female fetuses are getting aborted more and more often. If the baby girl is already born they are often neglected, left to

The WHO states that there are three core motivations for engaging in sex determination and sex selection which include “medical reasons such as preventing the birth of children affected or at risk of X-linked disorders; family balancing reasons where couples choose to have a child of one sex because they already have one or more children of the other sex; and gender preference reason often in favor of male offspring stemming from cultural, social, and economic bias in favor of male children and as a result of policies requiring couples to limit reproduction to one child, as in China.” In countries such as India and China, it is apparent that women can be harmed by sex selection

People in India show a strong preference to not spend time raising girls. The sex birth ratio in India is one of the worst having 112 boys for every 100 girls born. Gill and Mitra-Kahn believe the reason for this lack of girls is due to

Genocides refer to specific calculated arrangements by an ethnic or religious group, leader or government to intentionally eliminate an entire group of people for political, religious, or cultural reasons. They typically consist of mass murders that is abnormal for warfare. Although most people are aware of the Holocaust, that event was not the first. Genocides have occurred as early as the 15th century. Gendercides, or genocides in which only a specific gender is targeted, have occurred as early as the medieval period. Recently in India, the amount of females being born has drastically dropped over the years. The female gender in India is decreasing because men encourage women to abort their children if they are not men. More importantly,

India’s statistics are similar. According to the BBC “In 1961, for every 1,000 boys under the age of seven, there were 976 girls. Today, the figure has dropped to a dismal 914 girls. Although the number of women overall is improving (due to factors such as life expectancy), India's ratio of young girls to boys is one of the worst in the world after China. Many factors come into play to explain this: infanticide, abuse and neglect of girl children. But campaigners say the decline is largely due to the increased availability of antenatal sex screening, and they talk of a genocide”.

Female infanticide has been accepted for centuries in many countries, and is more prominent in India and China than in any other countries around the world. It is illegal in India, however it is reported by Unicef that up to 50 million girls and women are “missing” in India as a result of systemic sex discrimination.

In many nations, particularly India and China the three most dangerous words to hear at birth are “it’s a girl”. Which proposes the biggest moral question, are girls better off dead or alive in today’s society? Females still make Women are the creators of life yet they still make only 77 cents on the dollar, still are supposed to be less than and submissive to a man, and still get denied certain jobs or even positions just based on gender. Women cannot be trusted to make decisions because we are ruled by our hormones or don’t know enough to make those well informed decisions. Women are still being blamed for rape that was committed towards them because it was their fault that they were alone or

     For many years society has embraced the idea that the difference between men and women were biologically determined. Thou through traditions, media, and peers we act accordingly to how others view us. Each individual has pressure placed upon them based on their gender. Our sex is determined by genetics while our gender is programmed by social customs. Some theories interpret that a women is tender and a loving mother while on the other hand men are aggressive hunters and are the dominant one of the family. People who support this theory seems to believe that men and women are happier when fulfilling the roles nature determined for them. Women are to be nurturing and men are to be providers by

It is regrettable that female infanticide and foeticide are rapidly decreasing the female population throughout India. The main factors that is responsible for the increase in the incidence of female infanticide and foeticide is the low status of women, son preference, and the practice of dowry across all casts groups.

In India, there are several ways of how the culture attributes to gendercide. Gendercide is happening in India mostly because of dowry and greed. Why have a daughter when you have to pay such a large sum to marry her off? It seems more logical to have sons to keep your wealth and then gain more wealth when your sons marry. Women must also worry about gendercide even into adulthood. Women are killed for not

In order to answer the question above this essay will discuss in depth what exactly sex is and what gender is and the differences between the two terms. The research carried out will display that we live in a patriarchal society without a doubt as we look at how gender links to inequality in society. A patriarchal society can be clearly seen from the gender inequality in the labour force which is paid labour and also in unpaid labour which occurs in the household. Another area the answer will reflect on is how gender inequality links to education which overall links to society. Finally the answer below will show how the media also portrays gender inequality and how it affects the people in society.