Parents In India Force Girls To Undergo Srs

[Guest Riana]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/sex-change-operations-turn-little-girls-into-boys-indian-parents-think-theyre-cheaper-to-keep/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/8601488/Indians-pay-surgeons-to-turn-girls-into-boys.html

I'm just... speechless. I was reading those stories and I could just feel the pain those poor girls must suffer. Forced into gender dysphoria for the benefit of their parents. Unbelievable...

[Cyndee]

Having been to India myself I can almost understand their strong cultural desire to have male babies, and not having to pay to marry a daughter off. They should somehow learn to just do away with this cultural ritual of paying dowries, IMHO. What they are doing is just wrong and appears to be motivated by financial well being in most cases. It's getting out of hand, their practices ultimately will tip the balance of fertility in their society, also happening in China, which may actually help ease world population growth (still wrong).

C -

[Guest John Chiv]

As someone who spent the first 20 years of my life there, and then have not been back in 27 years, let me provide a bit of first-hand cultural perspective if there are any more responses to this thread. If this is happening, and please note that the article said "alleged" which means not proven. There is also no indication of how many girls are being subjected to this procedure. The "hijras" who are either born intersex or are male and castrated suffer the same fate. And that is a fact well-documented and I saw the stigma and prejudice firsthand.

Both your responses are fine and very caring. I don't agree with the practice of dowry or any inhuman treatement of any person, especially women.

But it is very naive to say they should just do away with cultural practices and expect it to just happen overnight. You are talking about years and centuries of brainwashing and devaluing women. We are definitely luckier in Western cultures compared to many other places. All the international exposure has not changed the practice of female circumcision or the treatment of women in worldwide.

Even in this country, we are supposed to have "come a long way baby" yet women marry for money, for status, are forced to remain in abusive relationships, raped, molested. Women's reproductive rights and women being forced due to financial reasons hapens here as well. You get the idea.

I am not defending the practice or the culture. In fact, I speak very openly about it and had to fight for my own freedom and right to exist and was punished. I am grateful every day to live in a country where there are rights and protections.

Sexism is a worldwide scourge practiced regardless of culture, class, religion, sexual orientation, income and we need to lead by example by addressing our own inequities and sexism.

Most of all, articles like this illustrate that at least in this country we have freedoms, especially for women and should not take them for granted.

John

[Guest Risu]

Because of the fact that people pay dowries there, and from what I have read trans people aren't exactly treated the best there (or maybe that is more reserved for MtFs) and the heavy value placed on male children to boot this really doesn't make sense to me.

Who would want to pay a dowry to marry their daughter to an infertile husband? And then top it off, who will want to marry a their daughter to a male born female? Not that I have issues with it personally but, besides the fact that there are people whoo NEED these surgeries and they aren't getting them, and these babies are being forced into a lifetime of GID and probably ultimately suicide, I can't wrap my brain around how it would be better to force your daughter into this than just have a daughter? If these girls ever find out when they're older, how would they feel, about themselves and towards their parents? And since marriages are still arranged there in some cases all their friends will know, 5 years ago that family gave birth to a daughter, not a son...

It really makes me wonder about the capacity of medical technology and understanding there. Don't they know anything about GID and what genuinely transgender people suffer from? Then why force children into it? Surely they can put 2 and 2 together and figure out that in the long term this will not work out and ultimately they will be met with a HUGE lawsuit following the rash of suicides and or murders this leads to in 10 to 20 years...

*Sighs*

And please don't get me wrong, I love India, the language and culture, food, films, music, etc, but this just confounds and infuriates me to no end. When I think about this I am literally dumbfounded... but I am biased as I place value on women and femininity.

[Guest Isabella_Anne]

That has to be one of the sickest things I have even read. These people are crazy. The parents should be taken outside and put down like a rabbid dogs. This is disgusting. I don't care how screwed up there culture is there is zero justification for this. If there worried about having a girl then don't have children. All these children should be taken away from these pervert parents with nothing but money in there eyes. There not fit to have children. Those poor girls mutilated by butchers. There not fit to be called doctors. That is outrageous. It make me sick to my stomach.

Isabella

[Carolyn Marie]

Before we all get apoplectic over this article, please consider that these charges are unproven, and the British tabloids are well known for either making stuff up or wildly exaggerating facts. Even if true, we don't know the extent of this practice and it is unfair to condemn all of Indian society and culture. One can find lots of shocking things going on in America without indicting all of American society.

Lets wait for some facts, and not just a bunch of speculation published in known tabloid newspapers. BTW. you'll notice that one article simply cites the other tabloid for its story and didn't even attempt to determine the "truthiness" of it.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest John Chiv]

Thank you Carloyn.

[Guest Ashrynn]

I would mostly be with Carolyn on this one. It seems very far fetched to me.

The motivation behind having male children is entirely financial. India is also very cultural so I just can't see them forcing girls to undergo SRS as it would ostracize the family from the rest of the community.

That said, most families just have female children aborted.

Very wrong either way.

[Guest EvenClose]

Even if only a few people on the whole globe are doing this, to me, imho, its complete insanity. Its just so disturbing. I just can't believe the human mind could justify doing something like that.

I even seen a video of a 18 month old chain smoking baby. Chain smokin...Burning 1stick right after another. The poor thing couldn't even talk, but can have the parents go buy a pack of reds and blow through them in an evening while sipping on a baby bottle?

wow!

I believe in to each his own, but there is just a limit. If the story is false then the paper should be sued for slander. They are making an entire society look bad if that is the case.

Amazing, truly amazing.Its a wild world we do live in these days.

Miranda

[Guest Julie T]

To all

This is wrong on so many levels? If it is true, then that is a horrible thing. If it is not true, then the publishing of such is if not criminal, then totally unethical and immoral. If there is some truth, which may be most likely, some of his may have happened in the huge populated country India is, then again, it is so wrong to force something like this on a child.

But like John said, it could be a case of intersex or ambivalence, just like what happens everywhere, where for whatever circumstances, a baby is surgically forced into becoming a male, because of prejudice against female children.

Is the world a horrible place sometimes, or am I just suddenly aware of so much evil?

Julie

[Guest rynae]

Why would they do such a thing. Don't these people know what they are doing. It is so sad to see that these innocent children are suffering in the hands of their own parents who are suppose to be protecting them. What a monstrous act, forcing children to live a life of agony and misery for the parents own well eing. Am hoping that those articles are just lies because that would be heart breaking if they were telling the truth.