Male prejudice skews demographics |



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لندن – The State of the World Population Report 2020 published by the United Nations Population Fund entitled “Against my will … challenging practices that harm women and girls and undermine equality”, recorded between 1979 and 2020 that 140 million women worldwide have disappeared due to partial choice of fetus sex.

Says a Jordanian woman: “I was pregnant and in one of the times when the ultrasound was examined, the doctor told me that I was not pregnant with a fetus, but with three girls. Divorce. The lady says, “I was afraid, but God inspired me to force me to refuse the abortion, so I said no,” and says, “I didn’t take care of myself after that.” It was not easy to raise and educate three daughters, but I accompanied determination and will every time I did everything for them, my daughters stood out, brought me pride and got degrees.

“We are so proud of what our mother fought for us,” say the girls.

And in a society still deeply obsessed with the preference for boys, this woman is a vivid example of pride and pride among women.

Lost

In the Arab world, Bahrain, Egypt and Jordan are seeing excessive deaths of women. Despite the paucity of data on the phenomenon of fetal sex preference in the Arab region, estimates of births of females who disappeared due to partial prenatal sex selection in Tunisia, for example, amounted to around 1,400 over five years (2013- 2017), but Tunisia, which once suffered from gender imbalances Today, the sex ratios of the fetus at birth are close to normal.

The deaths of some girls are attributed to neglect and other forms of partial sex selection of the fetus after delivery. In Egypt, in 2012 it was estimated that the death rate for girls under the age of five resulting from these practices increased by 2.4 percent for every 1000 births of the total deaths of girls under five, which amounted to at 5.6 per cent. In Jordan, the rate was 1.9% of all deaths of girls under five, or 5.0%.

The imbalance in relationships between males and females has current negative consequences and other long-term consequences within societies, according to experts

Despite all the measures taken and efforts made to address this dangerous practice, 4.1 million girls and women remain vulnerable to this practice in 2020 alone. While there are 200 million women alive today who have undergone the practice.

Excessive female deaths increased globally between the 1970s and 1990s, reaching two million deaths per year, based on research published by the United Nations, then the percentage declined in the 2000s. Perhaps the decline in deaths Excessive females could be attributed later to the expansion in the availability of ultrasound scans and other techniques that have led to greater gender selection.

Research confirms that the number of females missing due to these practices as of 2015 was greater than the number of those who lost due to selection after birth.

The common denominator here is gender discrimination, from common male preference to practical concerns that males are more likely to support their fathers in old age and give birth to grandchildren, while females should move in with their husbands, such as occurs in all countries of the world. Parental preference for male fertility is not surprising in a reality where women have no equal rights and a patriarchal society is entrenched.

Balance disorder

They need support
They need support

In the list of countries with more men than women in the world, we find that there are 6 Gulf countries that are on top of the top six. The UAE ranks first in the world in terms of increasing the percentage of males over females. This ratio is 2.19 men for every woman. This means that the number of men in the Emirates is more than double the number of women. Qatar ranks second in the world, with a ratio of two men to a woman, which means there are twice as many men in Qatar as there are women.

Kuwait ranks third in the world with a ratio of 1.54 men per woman, while Bahrain ranks fourth in the world with a ratio of 1.24 men per woman, while Oman ranks fifth in the world with a rate of 1.22 men per woman. Saudi Arabia ranks sixth in the world, with 1.18 men per woman.

According to the American website “Hair Beauty”, men in Egypt have difficulty finding a wife, due to the low number of women available to marry for social, economic and political reasons. This is due to the population density and migration of women who possess scientific qualifications and university degrees and aspire to work in the fields of science, medicine and law, and to break the stereotypes imposed by male society.

Last year the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics in Egypt stated that the number of Egyptians inside reached 98 million, of which 50.5 million are male, 51.5% and 47, 5 million are female, 48.5%.

In other words, there are 106.3 males for every 100 females in Egypt.

According to a census conducted by the World Bank in 2016, the percentage of women in Tunisia is 50.6%. The population of men and women has undergone a number of fluctuations throughout history.

“Some countries are witnessing a gap in this sense,” said Hair Beauty, referring to this “demographic imbalance” for several reasons, including the violent treatment of women, the wars that led to mass migration and the gender inequality that they pushed women to leave their countries of origin for better opportunities.

The site claims that Libya suffers from this problem, mainly due to the long-term civil war that has led to the emigration of a large percentage of vulnerable women, as well as social controls that restrict the freedom of women in Libyan society, which it caused a lack of tendency for Libyan citizens to marry Libyan men.

Distorted demographics

Double challenges
Double challenges

The Jordanian Women’s Solidarity Institute Association, “Solidarity,” notes in a report that male ideology seeks to feed the idea of ​​boys carrying the future of the family and teaching girls that their future ultimately depends on their own. husbands. A girl’s transition state from dependence on her family to dependence on her husband and family degrades the girl’s social worth and her contribution to the family she was born with. Social behaviors are also determined by these norms and traditions and encourage male procreation in order to ensure the continuation of the family’s offspring.

Solidarity added that this harmful practice has led to 140 million females being considered missing due to partial sex selection of the fetus, and has skewed demographics in many countries around the world, as can be seen from the rising birth rate imbalance. for both sexes.

According to the Department of Statistics, Jordan’s estimated population at the end of 2019 was 10,554 million, of which 7,455 million were under the age of 35.

It should be noted that the number of males under the age of 35 is 3.933 million males against 3.521 million females, with a difference in favor of males, estimated at 412 thousand males, equal to 11.7 per cent. This is an indication of the onset of the effect of prenatal sex determination on the high percentage of males, as well as a decrease in the number of females, which heralds future demographic problems that disturb the natural balance between the sexes.

Technological advances in the medical field have made it possible to determine the sex of the newborn before birth, in addition to the low cost and availability of this technology in most countries of the world, and the orientation towards small families whose members do not exceed three or four people for various and different reasons, in addition to the traditions and customs that root discrimination against females, through the preference for male births, are all interconnected factors that lead to an increase in the number of females victims of the determination of the sex of the child , and lead in the long run to an imbalance in the demographics of societies, which can have irreversible effects if the world does not realize the danger of this.

The Jordanian Fatwa Council, in its Resolution no. (120) (5/2008), issued on 10/7/2008, prohibited this type of operation that determines the sex of the fetus.

While there is no strong opposition between families because there are no females if there are males, this opposition extends to the point of determining gender in the absence of males or the first births are females, while families do not care about the issue. determination of the sex of the newborn. Being a girl if there are males in the same family and there are no females.

Solidarity states that all of this is a violation of women’s rights which have been approved by international conventions and rooted in discrimination and inequality between the sexes. Furthermore, it contradicts what was adopted by 184 countries, including Jordan, during the International Conference on Population and Development in 1994, which defined reproductive rights and gave the right to individuals, men and women, to freely determine their reproductive choices, but without discrimination.

Solidarity indicates that fetal sex determination before birth and abandonment and denial after birth of females constitute a new and serious obstacle to efforts to achieve gender equality and a core for destabilizing the demographic balance of long-term company.

United Nations Population Fund Regional Director for Arab Countries, Louay Shabana, says: “The time has come to address the unfair favors enjoyed by males at the expense of females. This privilege has reached a point that drives many families to take all necessary steps to avoid having a girl, even if they give birth, Their care and health are neglected for the benefit of the male … This preference is publicly expressed and families celebrate the birth of males while they are burdened by the dissatisfaction and disapproval of those close to relatives and society in the event that the newborn is female.

The irony is that women are losers in both cases: whether they are more or less than men. In reality, however, we are all losers. We know that the imbalance in relationships between males and females has current negative consequences and other long-term consequences within societies.

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