China:
In 1979, due to the country's isolationist policy that
barred trade with other nations, the Chinese government foresaw the need to
control population growth: with only 7% of the world's arable land, it would be
unfeasible to feed everyone, should each couple bear as many children as they
could or wanted. Thus, the One Child Policy was born (pun intended). Each
married couple could legally produce only one child. Any other children born to
that couple would bring severe fines and social penalties, from job loss and
eviction from the community, to prison.
Because of this society's cultural preference for sons,
untold numbers of female offspring were disposed of, some in horrific ways.
Soon, the leaders faced another problem: who would all of these sons marry, if
no girls were being kept alive?
Enter the Spring Blossom Project (1989): financial and
social incentives for parents of girl children, which would allow for education
and health care needs. The purpose was to encourage families to see daughters
as equally valuable. Thanks in part to this project (and to a rule that forbids
doctors disclosing fetus' sex during sonogram), the gender imbalance has lessened: from 123 males / 100 females in the
early '80s to 115 males / 100 females, the most current data.
Recent reports question that statistic. Especially in the
countryside, people are having daughters and not registering them. Effectively,
those daughters do not exist. The gross effect of this tactic is that they remain out of sight: denied doctor's care and
education, doomed to a life of illiteracy and poverty. Village leaders are
complicit in this deception, going so far as to legitimize marriage
certificates between registered males and unregistered females.
Read about it here: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=11758733
Married women are permitted to deliver in hospitals:
marriage certificates must be provided upon admission. Their costs of having a
baby and the infant's care are absorbed by the state.
Unmarried women can have their baby in a hospital, however,
they must pay a hefty fine on top of their and their baby's medical care, and
will endure social penalties, including ostracization and loss of work. They
could be evicted from their home and, to avoid the shame heaped on the family
for having an illegitimate child in their midst, a single mother could be
shunned by her clan. It is possible that that child would not become
registered, thereby losing any chance at education or any other social
advantage 'wedlock-born' children might enjoy.
Legitimizing single mothers is being debated... or should we
say 'contested'?, in the upper ranks of government but, so far, they remain
illegitimate and, should single parenthood become legal, no doubt the stigma
against single mothers and their children will remain for a long time.
Due to the shrinking workforce and the growing elderly population,
in 2016, the One Child Policy was relaxed to afford each couple 2 children.
Only 38% of married couples have had a second child under this new opening up,
fearing the expense of raising 2 children. There are no social programs or
financial incentives for anyone, no matter what their level of income.
A woman's fertility is closely controlled in several ways.
After delivering a baby, women generally get a intra-uterine device (IUD)
surgically implanted and are mandated to regular checks by the Family Planning
Commission. Most women who have had their second baby undergo tubal ligation.
Abortion is legal and widely practiced, albeit with women
being counseled that repeated abortions could result in their future inability
to bear a child.
I've not found anywhere that men are forced to undergo any
type of check, restriction or blocking on their reproductive capabilities after
they've created a child or two.
America:
Women can have as many children as they want, or none at
all. Whereas in China, having a baby is seen as a family and social obligation,
in America, some women opt to not have children. There are no mandatory
'fertility checks', and contraception is optional. In fact, new legislation is
currently being drafted to bar the dispensing of contraceptive, and to prevent
religion-affiliated organizations from providing insurance that covers
contraceptives and family planning.
Some women rely on a 'morning after pill' after having sex
with no contraceptive, although studies have shown that ingesting such
emergency contraception does not necessarily prevent pregnancy, or lower the
number of abortions.
The right to life versus the right to choose – bearing a
child or aborting holds American society and politics in a bitter tug of war.
Although officially, America is not governed by religious standards - “the clause against establishment of religion by law was
intended to erect a wall of separation between church and state.” (Hugo Black,
1947, Everson v. Board of Education), in fact, religious belief drives
the abortion issue in America.
In 1973, America's Supreme Court issued a judgement in the
case of Roe v. Wade and its less well-known companion case, Doe v. Bolton,
essentially conceding a woman's right to opt for abortion. However, that governing
body's obligation to balance individual women's rights with The State's need to
protect the eventuality of life leaves grey area that gives those who would
decry women's decision to abort a potentially viable fetus a legal platform to
altogether deny anyone the right to choose.
Several states have enacted severe penalties against doctors
who perform abortions. Others have drafted laws that essentially negate the
possibility of abortion, all without infringing on the law itself. Texas
enacted a law that any clinic performing abortions must have a doctor who has
staff privileges at a local hospital. This law substantively forced closure of
all but 2 women's health clinics which also perform abortion throughout the
state. Ohio's Heartbeat Bill, which prohibits abortion once a fetal heartbeat
is detected 'by external methods', was signed into law in December 2016.
Several other states have, in the past, sought to enact similar legislation.
More are looking to try again.
Through these actions, the large majority of Family Planning
clinics across America have been forced to close. There is no government Family
Planning commission.
Once a woman, married or otherwise, has a child, she has
several financial and social options to rely on, among them: SNAP –
supplemental nutritional assistance program, AFDC – formerly called 'welfare',
a monthly allowance to support a household in need; all the way to Head Start –
an early education and all-around well-being program. These resources are
generally meant for the poorer members of society, funded by tax dollars.
Analysis
While China's family planning program might seem distateful
to some, it is straightforward, albeit biased, holding women exclusively
accountable for the production of children. Perhaps the worst aspect of it is
what unwed mothers suffer. Hopefully that will soon be alleviated. Ideally, men
would also have to undergo restrictions on producing children, namely: once
they produce their allotted quota, they too will undergo sterilization.
America needs to make up its mind: will fecundity be driven
by religion – contrary to its Constitution? If so, which religion?
If sexual congress is freely accepted as a fact of life (and
it obviously is, judging by the displays in movies and television), shouldn't
there exist the legal option to terminate unwanted pregnancies, with no shame
and no stigma?
How is it that, in America, one can legally change their
appearance through cosmetic surgery, their gender through assignment surgery;
but women are being railroaded into parenthood, when a surgical means of
avoiding it are available but denied, because some believe that having a child
is a 'gift from God'? Aren't the first 2 scenarios also 'tampering with God's
will'?
There seems to be a duality of American mores: having sex is
good; bearing children is good. One is contrary to religious morals; the other
is allied with religious morals. Nowhere, in religion, in courts of law, or in
higher government does anyone seem to address the eventuality that all of these
children will cause a population explosion, when the current global population
is already taxing our Earth's resources – the idea that drives China's family
planning policies.
Wouldn't it make more sense for America to change focus? To
legislate based on the future of humanity, and not some arbitrary standard
espoused by a few with shared belief?
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