Before our first baby was born, many of our relatives and close people have done an excellent prediction that I will get a baby boy. People in my place used to tell me my son would carry my family name. Not really sure, what this means even till date. Anyway, my first kid is a baby girl. I am absolutely fine with any one. But most people around me are not fully fine with it. But anyway, they decided to give a chance to me. So they said “You are very lucky you got a girl who is equal to goddess Lakshmi”.
In between first and second kid most number of predictions, deals with all kinds of gods (not by me) and discussions took place. Fast forward.. My second daughter was born. Now I could see black and white pictures, low pitch wishes and sorry faces. This is called “Gender Bias”. I was wondering what happened to goddess Lakshmi and luck. If the logic is true then every thing should be double. We say some thing but we actually mean some thing else most often.
Even after so many years ,I still get to to see and feel sorry expressions. In this whole episode we as parents, never had any problem. But rest of them seem to have more problem as if they are going to take care of my kids. This is not a story about my kids. It is the story that most parents with two daughters would have gone through this, especially in India.
If you reflect back – 1) You would have lost most precious time in “managing” other people sympathy instead of happily spending time your kids 2) In reality no one has any clue which gender will be more beneficial (we are already into some business model.!!) . 3) At the end you will realize “it does not matter”.
In this whole social hypnosis process some parents also get sucked in. After all episodes, self supporting statements comes out. ” All the famous people like Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Kamal Hassan, Rajinikanth, some Sr executive in your company and some ”xyz” has two daughters” or ” Daughters are better nowadays” or ” I have two beautiful daughters (why to mention beautiful??)
All of you who have two kids – You don’t need to give any justifications. Next time raise your pitch and head and happily say you have TWO DAUGHTERS !!.
And most importantly don’t say goddess Lakshmi or luck to any one who got a daughter. And don’t show your sorry face and sympathy to any one who has two daughters.
Please forward this to any one who has daughters. Most importantly please share this with some one who is waiting for boy after a first daughter. They may need help. So please share !!
2 Comments
Do we as society view kids as long term personal investment? Son is better investment or vice versa? Can we view kids not as long term investment but as your contribution to the larger society, a communal/societal investment ? Will this bias go away if it’s viewed as societal investment/ contribution Vs personal investment? Did communal societies of past have similar bias or did this originate only after materialization of the society ?
Looking to kishore for more answers ☺️
I would n’t say all but many view kids as some kind of investment (some times this is unconscious). If you have son then you will have better insurance coverage. That why the demand. And all your fears and insecurities can be passed on to son. This is an assumption under which people have been working. It may be true for prev gen. Not sure about future gen.
Bias will go away with freedom and economic advancements. This is what you see in most advanced countries. I think capitalistic societies would give better environment for reducing the bias. Bias is there since beginning. It just based on strongest dominate weak theory. But the whole point is about how most educated people are also under the influence of social conditioning and make you believe that you have missed some thing. So try to get out of the trap is the message.