Wednesday, November 30, 2005

MORE SILENCE FROM THE SO-CALLED FEMINISTS

Feminists or hormonal bitches? Make up your mind when you try to think of any feminist who has protested at the mass murder of little girls in India. And note who IS concerned about the matter -- that horrible "patriarchal" Catholic Church

"The Indian government has publicly asked the Church for assistance in preventing abortions and reducing their number. The abortions that most concern the Indian authorities are the ones aimed at selecting the sex of the child to be born, eliminating the female children. Since 1994 there have been laws in place against that sort of selection. But they are widely circumvented. “The only way we can combat selective abortion is by changing the way the people think,” health and family minister Anbumani Ramadoss said in a speech in mid-October. “And this change in mentality can take place only with the help of those who have the public’s ear, the religious leaders. In November we will meet with all of the religious leaders in Delhi to plan a common effort that concerns all of India.”....

In its State of World Population report for this year, the UN agency that deals with demographics estimates that there are 60 million “missing girls,” the young women of Asia not reflected in the statistics, many of whom are attributed to India. Everywhere in the world, the natural average for conception is 103-107 females for every 100 males. But when you go to count the births, there are significantly fewer girls in India.

In 1981, there were 962 girls for every 1000 boys, under the age of 6. In 1991, there were 945. And in 2001, the year of the most recent census, there were 927. If you then look at where the decline has been the steepest, you find that the lowest ratio of girls is found in what are relatively the more affluent cities and states: Haryana, Gujarat, and Punjab. In these places, there is an average of 800 girls for every 1000 boys.

This unnatural imbalance is partly explained by the fact that, unlike the birth of a boy, the birth of a girl is experienced by many families as an unbearable burden, above all on account of the highly expensive dowry which, according to tradition, must accompany her marriage.

Until a few decades ago, the infanticide of girls was the most widespread means of getting rid of this burden. It is still practiced to this day. Furthermore, girls receive less care, so among them infant mortality is higher than it is among boys.

But since the 1980’s, technology has been added to this traditional rejection of girls. Tests to determine the sex of the unborn child are ever more widespread and employed, with a very high rate of selective abortion. The law permits doctors to tell the parents only about the fetus’s health condition, not its sex; but this prohibition is skirted everywhere in exchange for money..."

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AUSTRALIA: "POVERTY" MAKES YOU FAT

Which shows how absurd conventional definitions of poverty are

Residents in Sydney's [poor] south-west are among the fattest in the state, with more than half the inhabitants of the Campbelltown and Camden area overweight or obese, new figures reveal.

Meanwhile, Sydney's affluent eastern suburbs and North Shore have the lowest percentage of overweight and obese residents, with just one in five women above the healthy weight range.

Figures from the NSW Health Department, compiled for The Sun-Herald from the 2002, 2003 and 2004 adult health surveys, highlight the correlation between weight and wealth. They come as doctors grapple with the nation's obesity crisis and experts call for the regulation of food outlets and subsidising of healthy, fresh food. Compiled from interviews with 32,877 people across the state over three years, the figures also draw attention to the disparity between obesity levels in rural and city regions.....

Social researcher Neer Korn, a director of research organisation Heartbeat Trends, said the figures showed the direct correlation between socio-economic status and obesity problems. "People from a lower socio-economic background eat more junk food and they have less time to care for themselves," Mr Korn said. [Another nitwit! Has she never heard of the long houres at work that many middle-income put in?] "If you have a nanny and you're not working, you have all day to go shopping for food to get something nice to cook for dinner which is healthy, and you can afford gym membership." Mr Korn said Australia's obesity problem was more pronounced in rural areas because fresh food was more expensive [What rubbish! He hasn't got a clue! He must never have lived in a country town and found out how much informal exchange of fresh fruit and vegetables there is] and the health message was a lower priority for residents there. "Try getting fruit and vegies in Wilcannia - it's so expensive there, it's much cheaper just to go to Maccas," he said.

Ian Caterson, Boden Professor of Human Nutrition at the University of Sydney, said the availability of food was a major contributor to the increasing obesity problem. He told a WeightWatchers-hosted discussion forum on obesity last week that an American study found the abundance of food outlets accounted for 68 per cent of the increase in obesity levels. He recommended introducing legislation to police the number and type of food outlets [No disguising the Fascism there!] that could be built in any one area to ensure people could obtain, say, fresh fruit as easily as fast food....

More here

That greater self-discipline might make you both richer and slimmer is not of course mentioned

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