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Technology and gender inequalityIndraswari, Bandung | Opinion | Sat, April 06 2013, 11:44 AM

When I was a child, I remember being with my father when he talked to his friend. It was only the three of

us and I

found myself listening to them chatting. The conversation turned to family issues.

My fathers friend asked how many children my father had. My father had three children. Are they girls or

boys? the man said. My father replied they were all girls.

My fathers friend was quick to say he had four children and that meant he was luckier than my father as

all of them were boys. My father said the sex of the children did not dictate ones luck, as boys and girls

were the same.

I was only a little girl then, but I could grasp the attitude that lay behind my fathers friends statement: A

girl was worth less than a boy.

Today 1.5 million girls go missing at birth every year as a result of prenatal sex selection (Kate Gilles and

Charlotte Feldman-Jacobs, When technology and tradition collide: From gender bias to sex selection,

2012).

The writers note that based on the sex ratio at birth the balance of male to female births is generally

expressed as the number of male babies born for every 100 female babies born under normal

circumstances, about 102-107 boys are born for every 100 girls. Nonetheless, in some countries more

boys and fewer girls are born, which goes against the normal ratio.

Gilles and Feldman-Jacobs indicate that the reason behind the imbalanced sex ratio at birth is a

combination of three factors: preferences for sons, decreasing family sizes and the rapid spread of pre-

natal sex determination technology.

The preferences for sons is nothing new. In a patriarchal culture, a son is preferred for economic, social

and religious reasons.

A friend of mine said that a married daughter should be more dutiful to her husband than to her parents,

while a son should be dutiful to his parents regardless of his marital status. Thus, having a son is an

investment for old age, socially and economically.

Ironically, in some countries, decreasing family sizes due to family planning programs combined with a

strong preferences for sons, lead many families to not just prefer a son over a daughter but to view atleast one son as a must have in a family, at all costs.

The development of medical technologies such as ultrasound machines is mainly aimed at improving

prenatal care for women, but is often misused as a tool to enable parents to identify the sex of their

unborn child. Problems occur when parents discover the sex does not meet their expectations.

Some of them decide to abort the pregnancy as a result. Others continue the pregnancy only to abandon,

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discriminate and hide their child, in particular if its a girl, not registering herso that they still have a

chance to have a boy.

This particularly applies in some countries that apply strict policies on limiting the number of children in

families and on strong son preferences.

Sadly, the words its a girl are no longer followed with gasps of joy. Instead, they can prove deadly to the

baby, even before she enters the world.

Indonesia also applies a policy on limiting childrens number in a family which is part of an effort to control

the population number. Its family planning program promotes two children as an ideal familys size.

While son preference also occurs in Indonesia, sex ratio at birth is within the normal range that is 105

male babies born for every 100 female babies (UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, World

Population Prospects: The 2010, Vol. II: Demographic Profiles). This could partially relate to Indonesias

family planning programs motto two children is enough, girls or boys are the same.

In a book titled Sex Imbalances at Birth: Trends, Consequences, and Policy Implications (2012),Christophe Guilmoto says the top three countries with imbalanced sex ratios at birth are mainland China,

with 118.1 boys born for every 100 girls (2009); Azerbaijan, with 117.6 (2009); and Armenia, with 115.8

(2008). (Indraswari, 2013)

The writer is a lecturer at Parahyangan CatholicUniversitys school of social and political sciences,

Bandung