lemurgoddess ([info]lemurgoddess) wrote,
@ 2006-09-26 18:11:00
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Entry tags:culture and politics, in the news

Why I want to adopt a little Indian girl...
I've had it in my mind that when the times comes for me (/us) to have a child, I would want to adopt a girl from India. Female babies are not seen as valuable and therefore they are literally thrown away. That is, if they are not aborted first...

India's female freefall

Makes me rather ill, on a number of levels. I'm not a huge fan of abortion, but will concede the right to people to have one, on those rare occasions it may be necessary or rightly justified (the same position I take on all life/death issues: war, death penality). A child not being profitable, however, is not one of them.

(I could easily go on, but I'm trying to reign in my ranting these days...)


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[info]irishkitsune
2006-09-26 10:36 pm UTC (link)
Yeah, it's heartbreaking... a lot of Southeast Asia has this problem. I remember watching a special on TV about abandoned girls in China, and it's horrible to see what some people who just don't care will do to a helpless child.

I think more people should adopt... there's tons of kids out there who need good parents.. but too many otherwise good people are hung up on "must have my own kid"...

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-26 11:45 pm UTC (link)
Exactly. I never really understood that, genetic lineage stuff. In the human world, the nuture has far greater influence than the nature.

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[info]artsygirlstace
2006-09-27 01:04 am UTC (link)
That's really cool of you. =) I hope you get her!

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Nice... really nice
[info]dieterderblau
2006-09-27 06:15 am UTC (link)
I find the number of young bride deaths indicated in the article to be far more offensive than the pre-screening and decision to abort... ...just cuz their third-world poor ass family couldn't afford their dowry, and paid too little (or so the article leads one to believe).

Too bad there's nothing you can do to fix the problem without wiping their CULTURE from the face of the earth (a humane gesture? a Humanitarian act?). Who are we to challenge their way of life anyway?

On the other hand, saving one is a good start tho.

Kudos!

Dieter

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Re: Nice... really nice
[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-27 02:20 pm UTC (link)
And that's the ongoing philosophical question: If some sort of injustice is ingrained in a culture, do we have a right to fight that injustice and interfere with the culture?

This has come up a lot in discussion with our conflicts in the Middle East. There are some drastically oppressive regimes that has very negative consequences on members of that society (women is the most obvious).

I don't think we should ever gather up a military and tear a part a culture just to right some things that we see as (and what very well be) social injustices. Ultimately, people need to fight and die for their own cause. Instead, I think we as a country should be supporting the grassroots campaigns that are going against the oppression. That's the thougths behind an earlier entry of mine about the best way to fight terrorism is to support feminists in the Middle East. That's an overly simplistic approach and is meant to be a representative example of a larger pursuit of social revolution in those nations.

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[info]kitty771
2006-09-27 12:32 pm UTC (link)
THat's really really sad. I never knew that it was that much of an issue over there. The whole dowery thing making it an issue is horrible. It's so sad to think that things like that are still a h uge part of society in other parts of the world. That things like that can actually make you kill your fetus.

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-27 02:23 pm UTC (link)
It is terribly horrific. More anti-abortion groups in this country need to spend a little less time picketting Planned Parenthood and hurling pictures of dead babies at teenagers and get there asses over to India and do something truly worthwhile.

(DISCLAIMER: I do realize that many anti-abortionists are fighting such causes as well. I was being somewhat hyperbolic to point out how lazy and short-sighted some of those individuals can be)

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[info]chaoticset
2006-09-27 01:38 pm UTC (link)
Yeah, but the backlash is a total bitch.* I was reading about the lack of females of marrying age in some nations, and how the arrangement is now a bride for a brother -- if you don't have a female sibling to marry the brother of your betrothed, then you don't have a shot at getting married.

Shortsightedness screws people a lot faster than they might think. :)

* Forgive the appropriate but terrible metaphor.

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-27 02:23 pm UTC (link)
Wow, that would suck! O.O

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[info]chaoticset
2006-09-28 02:26 pm UTC (link)
Yeah, it's a little bizarre. There's people who are in the position of feeling stupid because they made sure they had a boy, and now their boy can't get married!

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[info]chaoticset
2006-09-27 01:39 pm UTC (link)
If I ever came to the conclusion I wanted to have a kid, I would adopt.

I'm never coming to that conclusion, so it's not an issue -- but if I did, I'd much rather adopt. :)

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-27 02:26 pm UTC (link)
Well I'm not a 100% sure I will ever have a kid. I'd much PREFER I be in a place of financial stability before caring for a life other than my wife's and my own. Of course, if by some miracle of biology I actually produced a kid, I'd be thrilled no matter what my financial situation.

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[info]chaoticset
2006-09-28 02:25 pm UTC (link)
I'm apprehensive about using the word miracle to describe birth. It's constant, endless, has a truckload of psychobiological undertones, is attached to a thousand different social conditions, etc.

But, then again -- if birth is a miracle, it is as much a miracle as drinking tea. And tea? Tea is quite a miracle.

Of course, my niece just had a baby, so I'm a little biased.

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-28 02:30 pm UTC (link)
I have two dialated arteries that hinder sperm development and take drugs that slowly destroy my testicular tissue on top of THAT. So yes, if I produced a child it would be a fucking miracle.

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[info]chaoticset
2006-09-28 02:36 pm UTC (link)
I understand you would call it that. I wouldn't, and I'm not trying to be cold about it; I just feel bad if I don't explain myself about these things.

I know plenty of people who are very, very, very happy about Having Kids, and I'm not one of them. Whenever I attempt to explain it to them, they tend to get very angry at me, as if somehow I'm decrying their attempt to Do Something Great. I'm not. I'm merely responding with my viewpoint, which I feel compelled to express, which is People Tend To Act Like Kids Are More Important Or More Significant Than Adults, Which I Find Absurd, Partly Because There's An Obvious Biological Effect Where Kids Automatically Gain Adult Attention More Than Other Adults, Partly Because The Line Between Adulthood And Childhood Is Arbitrary And Ill-Defined, And Partly Because Children Become Adults, And Then Appear To Be Completely Worthless To Some People.

So.

I just wanted to make the point that children are always seen as a miracle -- what about the people they become? Why are people no longer miraculous when they become 18 years old? Who adopts lonely people when they get past the age of consent? Why isn't anybody trying to help the screwed-up adults with the same fervor they're trying to help these kids?

Uh, the upshot here is: If I said something offensive, please understand I wasn't trying to do that. I was trying to express myself, and sometimes when I do that I offend people. :\

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-28 02:56 pm UTC (link)
It's not a matter of offense. You seem to be trying desperately to make a counter-point to a point I never made -- all for the sake of making a point. Which I find confusing and irritating.

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[info]chaoticset
2006-09-28 02:59 pm UTC (link)
Mea culpa; it's a point I try to make sometimes that is more about my feelings than the conversation.

No irritation intended. :)

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[info]lemurgoddess
2006-09-28 03:09 pm UTC (link)
S'all good. :)

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[info]aseariel
2006-09-27 09:33 pm UTC (link)
the decision of certain groups (i'll pick on my own, here: christians) to get all fussy about the da vinci code really grates on me when i see stuff like this. why are we trying to win the media? i thought we were supposed to look after orphans and widows, and the like. yar.

[/mini-rant]

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