TR and I were having an informal chat about the brouhaha surrounding the societal-induced need for generation of posterity when he mentioned that his longterm girlfriend and he had unanimously decided not to have children. Reasons ranged from cost-cutting and preservation of sanity to in-depth research on how 90% of childless elderly stand by their decision to let resting wombs be.
Adoption was still on the cards though, if ever they felt the need.
“But only girls, mind you”, said he, “there is no way I’d want a boy.”
I was surprised. Daddy’s little girl and all that aside, has our nation really turned its back on the overwhelming need for a male child?
“Don’t you read the newspapers?”, he continued. “There is a rape happening every day. There is no way I’d want to father a potential rapist!!”
I laughed and laughed, caught off-guard by his deranged line of thought. This has got to be a first, when someone decided the preferred gender of their offspring based on crime rates in the community.
Or was it?
I realised what was deranged about him was not so much the line of thought as how it culminated. In a society that feared having its daughters raped, he feared raising his son wrong.
Isn’t this the very paradigm shift that we need today? As I read somewhere once, why not let the girls roam free after midnight and lock in all the boys instead? Why not spare the women lectures on modesty and safety, and teach men how to behave instead? Why not stop fearing for your daughter’s morals and save your son’s instead?
Is that really too much to ask for?