Gender Imbalance in Vietnam
11/08/2007
A+
|
a-
Print Friendly and PDF
As I pointed out in my recent article, Mentioning The Unmentionable About The Chinese Model Minority, anti-female prejudice is deeply embedded within the culture of the world's most populous nation. Unsurprisingly, similar negative attitudes prevail in Vietnam as well.

The country's gender ratio has changed from a normal 105 boys to 100 girls at birth, to 110 boys versus 100 girls, essentially where China was a decade ago.

Vietnam's preference for boys over girls is further tipping the balance between the sexes in Asia, already skewed by a strong bias for boys among Chinese and Indians. The trend could lead to increased trafficking of women and social unrest, a U.N. report says. [...]

"The consequences are already happening in neighboring countries like China, South Korea and Taiwan. They have to import brides," said Tran Thi Van, assistant country representative of the Population Fund in Hanoi, adding that many brides are coming from Vietnam.

"I don't know where Vietnam could import brides from if that situation happened here in the next 10 or 15 years." [...]

It estimated Asia was short 163 million females in 2005 when compared to overall population balances of men and women elsewhere in the world. It said sex ratios at birth in other countries, such as Nepal, Pakistan and Bangladesh, should be monitored to avoid uneven trends there. [Vietnam prefers baby boys to girls, Detroit News 11/2/07]

"Import brides" — like human beings were some sort of commodity. This is the language of slavery.

Furthermore, concerns about social instability are not unfounded. Tens of millions of young Asian males adrift could get into a lot of trouble: many could be organized into activities ranging from criminal gangs to foreign military adventures.

Print Friendly and PDF