One child policy

[website]

Boy, am I mad. I walked around Shenzhen today and I counted 21 little boys and 3 girls. That's a 7:1 sex ratio! I heard that some places in China and India have 3 boys for every 2 girls, but this is really outrageous.

Who are all these boys going to marry in 20 years? Why are there so much sex selective abortions and families with more than one child here if it's illegal?

[PollyWaffle]

Who are all these boys going to marry in 20 years?

each other... i've heard they can do wonders with modern medicine...

[skylee]

or HK girls.

[Ian_Lee]

Import spouse like what Japan and Taiwan are doing now.

Choices of origins of girls:

(1) Vietnam -- will be highly demanded due to cultural similarity;

(2) North Korea -- also highly demanded provided Kim Jr. nods his head;

(3) Laos and Kampuchea -- lower priority owing to darker skin color;

(4) Philippines -- in the middle market segment but may be preferred since Chinese-Filipino kid may easily speak more fluent English;

(5) South Asia -- Potential big market especially Pakistan and Nepal if the girls there want to avoid political turbulence at home;

(6) Cuba -- spouses will be easier to communicate based on socialist brotherhood;

(7) Russia/Ukraine/Belorussia -- I expect those websites which advertise Russian girls for spouses to target Chinese men;

( Sudan/Ethiopia -- Hmmm........

[Ian_Lee]

Website:

By the way, I think you have miscalculated the demography of Shenzhen.

Shenzhen is one of the few cities in China that has an overabundance of marriage-age girls. Due to the concentration of light industrial and service industries, Shenzhen has attracted a lot of female workers from other provinces.

In fact, Shenzhen newspaper has published articles about the dilemma of the lonely female hearts in the city owing to a lopsided female-male ratio.

Maybe at the moment you visit Shenzhen, the girls are all working indoor or have gone home during Mid-Autumn Festival.

[website]

Shenzhen does have slightly more women than men due to the offices, factories, and brothels here, but little girls are hard to find. One teacher said she had 12 boys and one girl in her classroom. The sad thing is that both men and women prefer having little boys. There is a story going around about a couple who was walking down a dark alley here when they heard a sound from trash cart and the girl ran away. When the guy asked why, the girl she said it might have a baby inside and refused to go back to check it out. Luckily many of the baby girls that live are adopted by foreigners. Anyone who thinks killing baby girls is acceptable is a sicko.

Anyone in China can walk around and count the baby girls to confirm the girl shortage. Some estimates say that China will have a shortage of 60 million women. That's equal to half the population of Nigeria.

http://www.peopleandplanet.net/doc.php?id=2328

[bhchao]

In this Powerpoint presentation conducted by a demographer working in China, there is a map showing the sex ratios (Ages 0-14) in each of China's provinces in 2000.

The sex ratio problem is most prevalent in the southern provinces and east-central China, while the problem is less severe in the northern provinces.

http://www.prb.org/Template.cfm?Section=PRB&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=8650

If China had a version of the US television show The Bachelor, it will be a sensational phenomenon in China as the sex ratio trend continues.

[J.B. Frog]

... heard a sound from trash cart and she ran away. I asked why and she said it might have a baby inside and refused to let me go back to check it out.

Your 'GF refused to let you go back to check it out'??? What is the matter with you? Do you know how that sounds to a Western ear?

Roddy I know you're going to consider canning this account but for heaven's sake that's close to murder!

----

Took out the swear words

[roddy]

He said she heard a noise, not a baby's rattle - if you checked out every odd noise from bins, alleys and bushes you'd wind up either mugged or collecting a hell of a lot of rats, in any country.

If your girlfriend runs away from a bin claiming it might have a baby in it, I'd suggest you don't bother going back and checking it out, but instead consider getting a slightly less hysterical girlfriend. I know I would.

Incidentally, website has two Western ears.

If anybody seriously thinks website ignores babies in bins, please contact the Guangdong Public Security Bureau . . .

[bhchao]

The traditional bias towards male heirs goes back a long way. The great Su Dongpo was shocked when he saw peasant families kill their newborn daughters during the Northern Song dynasty. He started a charity that helped peasant parents bond with newly born girls as a way to deter infanticide. This he believed would allow parents time to think how closely connected they were with their daughters, and it worked.

Men or women of such talent and 人心 are rare nowadays.

[beirne]

Who are all these boys going to marry in 20 years?

People have noticed the problem but it is of course a hard problem to deal with. One concern is that there will be a permanent bachelor class that will cause trouble because they can't find mates. They will tend to be poor because the women will pick men with more money. Prostitution will increase as will all sorts of other problems.

Why are there so much sex selective abortions and families with more than one child here if it's illegal?

One reason is that the son is expected to take care of his parents for life, and the daughter is expected to take care of her husband's parents. This makes a son a lot more "valuable".

[bhchao]

Here is an article from The Epoch Times posted on Nov 6. The Chinese government is rethinking the one-child policy and moving towards a two-child policy. The one-child policy combined with China's low fertility rate does not serve China's long-term economic interests. This will certainly not supply its future workforce with an abundance of able, young, talented workers.

Based on United Nations data, China's median age will jump from 32 to 44 by the year 2040, due to the one-child policy and increasingly low fertility rates. Sooner or later, young pretty girls will be a rarity in China.

The two-child policy may not be an outstanding solution, but it would give couples more options to choose from when having children. Don't want to be too optimistic, but looks like Hu Jintao's pragmatic governing approach is starting to look like a good sign.

https://english.epochtimes.com/news/4-11-6/24206.html

" -- China’s stringent one-child policy is being re-evaluated after 20 years of enforcement. Eventually, couples in China may be allowed to have two children.

Earlier this year, the Chinese government appointed a special task force of more than 250 experts from various areas, led by three senior officials. The group specifically investigated the trend of population development and its potential impact on the economy.

According to the Xingdao Daily, the task force recommended that China gradually abolish the strict one-child policy and apply a more flexible two children policy. This recommendation is in line with a proposal presented to China’s National Population and Family Planning Committee by Chinese socialists in early 2004. The recommended policy allows women over 35 to have two children, starting in 2010. Every year, the age of eligible women will decrease by one year. Eventually all women will be allowed to have two children.

Yu Xuejun, director of Policy and Regulation Bureau for China’s National Population and Family Planning Committee told China Business that, although the government has not yet come up with a detailed two children policy, she thinks the two children policy is more suitable for China.

One of the main reasons for relaxing the one-child policy is that China is experiencing severe aging problems which have caused a growing burden for the government. In addition, the one-child policy forced more savings for retirement, which is causing less spending and fewer investments."

[skylee]

兩個就夠哂數

兩個就夠哂數

生女也好

生仔也好

兩個已經夠哂數

無謂追

無謂追

追得到也未必好

追唔到就生壞肚

兩個就夠哂數

兩個就夠哂數

Take a look at this classic ad (1972) -> http://www.famplan.org.hk/fpahk/common/videos/tv-1975-2enough.wmv

[Kevin]

I come from Shenzhen,the sex ratio was 7:1;7 men,1 woman.As Ian_Lee said since the light industies and service industries in Shenzhe,Shenzhen has many many female workers come from other part of China.

A friend kided me I can have 7 wifes when I go back to Shenzhen.haha

[wiz_oz]

I wonder how long before the law of supply and demand kicks in? Can anyone imagine what the scenario will be like when girls fetch a million or two in dowry?

[Ian_Lee]

The recommended policy allows women over 35 to have two children, starting in 2010.

But did the Health Officials realize there is a much greater probability that the baby may be retarded if the mother is over the age of 35 when the baby is born?

For pregnancy in the cities, that may not be a big problem since prenatal checkup may be available.

But for pregnancy in rural area, the problem will only be known after the baby is born.

[Ian_Lee]

I guess this kind of mail order bride advertisements from the marriage agency will soon prop up at the street corner around Guangzhou and Shanghai:

http://bbs.people.com.cn/bbs/ReadFile?whichfile=10105711&typeid=14

Read the warranties:

(1) Guaranteed a virgin;

(2) Guaranteed to be married within 3 months;

(3) Never raise price;

(4) If the bride flees within one year, a new bride will be replaced.

Looks like Taiwanese business people are really shrewd!

[HashiriKata]

Looks like Taiwanese business people are really shrewd!

I was visiting Vietnam during the summer and was saddened to hear many similar stories. Many girls (mostly uneducated and poor) in Vietnam have been deceived & kidnaped to be the objects for buying & selling by Taiwanese. I couldn't help wondering what would happen to these girls if they don't meet the expectation of the buyers after the "marriage" ???

Here are 2 headlines in the paper I happened to read this morning (in the UK):

"KILLED FOR NOT BEING PERFECT"

which is court case about a childless couple who adopted three children and killed the "less perfect" one as a method of selection.

"KILLING FOR KICKS?"

with a sub-title "One writer spent months with a U.S. platoon in Iraq. He saw the slaughter of children by men with an almost erotic delight in killing. But most of all he met raw, ignorant, yet basically decent youths, brainwashed into believing Iraqi lives were worthless."

It's depressing that these acts are committed mostly in the more "civilised" places and by the more "civilised" people, and not much we can do about !!!

[Quest]

Cambodia:

from this page: http://kylereed.com/Pictures/pictures.html

[skylee]

Yeah, I remember seeing that in the Tuol Sleng Museum of Genocidal Crime in Cambodia. A most upsetting place.

http://www2.seasite.niu.edu/ztest/images/cambodia/tuolslengrules.jpg