Vietnam: Creating A Serious Gender Imbalance

Modern technology, medicine and growing wealth for a country can be wonderful things.   They can lead to a better way of life for all the citizens in that country.   But they can also lead to unforeseen and undesirable consequences, especially when combined with ancient social structures and values.   Vietnam is now finding that out.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is warning that the ratio of male births to female births is quickly  getting out of whack in the country.   The natural ratio in the country is 105 male births for every 100 female births.   But in just the last five years the ratio has grown to 110.6 males for every 100 females, and the problem could escalate even further.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan says this gender imbalance could lead to more than 3 million men being unable to find a wife by the year 2030.   Clearly something must be done to encourage a more stable and sustainable gender balance.   Vietnam has banned fetal sex selection, but passing a law and enforcing that law are two different things.   The practice continues.

The problem has been exacerbated by growing family wealth, which makes families want to have fewer children, and medical technology, which lets families know early in a pregnancy the gender of an unborn fetus.   This gives families the opportunity not only to have fewer children, but to determine the gender of those children (or child).

I know some on the right would just say the answer would be to ban all abortions in the country.   I disagree.   You cannot solve one social problem by creating another.   That would just take away a woman's right to control her own body and result in unwanted and unloved children.   That cannot be the answer.

Western countries also have growing family wealth and the early ability to know the sex of a fetus, and yet those countries are not developing a gender imbalance.   That means that while these may be exacerbating the Vietnamese problem, they are not the cause of it.   What then can be done to solve the problem.

First, the real cause of the problem must be understood, and that cause is not abortion, modern medicine and technology, or growing family wealth.   The root cause is gender inequality.   The simple fact is that men are considered to be more important in the society.   Social custom, law, tradition and even religion combine to give men a superior status in society than women.

Until at least a significant degree of gender equality is achieved in the society at large, prospective parents will opt to have boys over girls.   Like it or not, this is only natural.   Given a choice, wouldn't nearly any parent want their children (especially if they're having only one or two children) to have the best chance to succeed (higher status, legal benefits, societal and religious acceptance, job opportunities, higher pay and promotion opportunities, etc.)?

Other countries in that part of the world have had this problem.   China's gender imbalance was even worse (130 males to 100 females), although it happened over a longer period of time.   They are now restoring a proper gender ratio, done largely through the increase in gender equality in that country (women were given more rights and opportunities).

It is not easy to change centuries of tradition and thinking, but it is the only real solution to the problem of gender imbalance.   The modern world requires a modern way of thinking and living, regardless of where a country is or what kind of traditions they have.   Gender equality is not just the right thing to do, it is imperative for a modern society to exist.   The only alternative is a country with growing problems caused by a growing gender imbalance.

Even in Western countries there are those who whine about "feminism", but they just don't realize the truth.   Gender equality (feminism) is not a bad thing.   In this modern world, it is just common sense.