Brief Thought

Some Republicans apparently despise Al Gore for educating himself and then sharing what he has learned.

Since I come from a long line of teachers and scientists, I consider educating ourselves to be the first basic act that makes us human.  And sharing what we know as the second basic act that makes us human.

And people who despise those basic acts--well, how can you reason with people like that?

Gendercide--an article in The Economist

A recent issue of the Economist came out with a cover article somewhat breathlessly titled "Gendercide: What happened to 100 million baby girls?" There is an online version of it here.  One of my friends has been asking what I think about it.

The gist of it is that sex ratios in several countries--China, India and a handful of other asian countries--are heavily skewed towards boys.  There are naturally slightly more baby boys born than girls, which normally evens out because boy babies are more fragile and die at slightly higher rates in infancy.  Normally it's about 104 boys born to 100 girls.  In some provinces in China 130 boys are born for every 100 girls.  This is because of a combination of infanticide, the giving up of baby girls for informal "adoptions" when a woman becomes pregnant a second time and ultrasounds combined with abortion.

I get the feeling my friend is expecting me to be shocked and angry.  But to be shocked--I'd first have to be surprised, wouldn't I? 

And I have known for decades that there are a lot of cultures--including in the US--that devalue women.  I'd basically have to be deaf dumb and blind not to know that.  Insisting on boy babies is just a symptom--the actual problem is cultures not recognizing women as being really people.

What do I think? Given that these cultures devalue women and want sons more than daughters, it stands to reason they're going to take steps to make that happen.  Better abortions than infanticides, frankly.  Plus, a woman always has the right to decline the use of her body.  She doesn't have to have a reason not to have sex--much less a "good enough" reason.  She doesn't have to have a reason to discontinue a pregnancy likewise.  So if she wants to abort because the fetus is female, that is totally her right.  I'm just saddened that she was raised in an abusive environment, taught she wasn't as good as a boy would have been, and internalized the values of her abusers. 

Furthermore this could be the best thing that ever happened to women in these cultures in the long run.  When a girl--any girl--can choose between several suitors, how long do you think dowries are going to last?  She'll hold her head up knowing she is rare and precious as she stands in her sneakers and if suitor X doesn't think so, would he please step aside?--there is someone behind him who would like to court her.  The same for education and working outside the home and having only a limited number of children and being immune from physical abuse.  According to the Economist article, dowries are already dropping and bride prices rising, so that's a start.

However I can well imagine that the In Sorrow Shalt Thou Bring Forth Children crowd is sitting around salivating over the prospect of the reaction to this story.  Some of these people know perfectly well what they're doing and the delicious irony of harnessing decent people's indignation over the mistreatment of baby girls (and let us not overlook the fact that these aren't just abortions--some girls are being killed at birth or neglected to death in their first five years or so) to vastly increase the suffering of women by banning abortion is assuredly not lost on them. 

But the solution is not to ban abortion.  The solution is to destroy--or at least change--those cultures that devalue women.  And frankly, the more we do that, the more secure women's rights--including our right not to be enslaved to produce unwanted babies--will be.

Who the heck IS this and how did zie get catsittingstill's password?

Yes, I know I've been posting a completely non-typical amount lately.  Sorry about that; it will probably go away presently.

But I noticed something today.  Something I've been thinking about myself for a while, but that was really driven home this afternoon.

My husband and I watched a DVD of "The Prestige" this afternoon.  I had to stop the movie shortly in and ask Kip for help.  Without spoilers, it's about two rival stage magicians who end up trying to destroy each other--it's a fairly complicated movie, with a lot of plot twists and surprises.  But my problem was much simpler than that.

The two main characters are both young, handsome, Caucasian, with dark hair, about the same height and build, and neither of them wore glasses.  I could not tell them apart.

It mattered to the plot who was doing what, and I couldn't tell.  Their faces were different enough that I could tell them apart when they were both on screen together--but I couldn't remember from one scene to the next which character had which face.  For about the first hour I had to keep asking Kip--this is the American guy, right ? (one of the characters was supposedly British but the actor had an American accent) This is the Cockney guy, right?  Which guy just did that?  Once I realized which one limped--which happened about the time I learned why--that helped.  And by the end I did actually know their faces; I can remember them now.  Tomorrow I bet they'll be gone unless I watch the movie again.

And this is why I don't care for movies all that much.  They confuse the hell out of me because the directors or whoever think that seeing a character's face is enough.   Give me something relatively mindless, like Avatar, or with really distinctive faces like The Little Mermaid, and I'm good--I can tell a crab from a merman--but something with a complicated, involuted plot where I'm supposed to realize with a gasp that the disguised woman slipping out of the Victorian house is not the wife but the mistress and I haven't a hope.