UK Report Suggests Designer Offspring

chromakey writes "Several news agencies are reporting that the UK is considering allowing parents undergoing fertility treatment to select the sex of their unborn babies." Also covered in Q&A format by the BBC. From the article: "At the moment in the UK, sex selection is only permitted if there are strict medical reasons. This could be because there is a serious sex-linked disorder in the family, such as Duchenne's Muscular Dystrophy."

Comments

fp

[Anonymous Coward]

yo

Re:fp

[Anonymous Coward]

What about me? Will this allow me to have this "sex", too?

Import from Russia

[Chemisor]

They should import women from Russia. Since half of Russian women are single, they are in dire need of men. Sounds like a win-win situation for both countries. Women have been one of Russia's main exports lately.

Re:Import from Russia

[Jameth]

Actually, the Chinese are still fairly racist about marriage. Foreign wives are somewhat frowned upon there, so that wouldn't really help.

(My source on this is a friend who is studying Chinese language and culture in her minor and who has spent a few summers there. She looked into how dangerous is was for a woman before going there, because she was a bit worries, and this is one thing she found.)

Re:Import from Russia

[gjhut]

The facts (according to the CIA World Factbook):
China data: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ ch.html#People

at birth: 1.12 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.13 male(s)/female
15-64 years: 1.06 male(s)/female
65 years and over: 0.91 male(s)/female
total population: 1.06 male(s)/female (2004 es

Russia data: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ rs.html#People

at birth: 1.06 male(s)/female
under 15 years: 1.05 male(s)/female
15-64 years: 0.94 male(s)/female
65 years and over: 0.46 male(s)/female
total population: 0.87 male(s)/female (2004 est.)

The linked article in this post mentions:

He also said that according to the latest poll, there are 15 percent more women in Russia than men. For every thousand men we have 1147 women, and because of lower levels of males being born as well as high mortality rates among men we should not expect the gender ratio to level out, the researcher said.

The comment about lower levels of males being born in the snippet above is clearly wrong. A normal ratio between the birthrate of man and woman is about 1.05 in favour of men, and russia is no different.
Additionally, the data in the CIA world factbook states that the the ratio of men/woman in russia is 0.94, and this corresponds to (only) 1070 women for each 1000 men.

B.T.W. Normal (western) figures are equal ratio's to a slight excess of men in the ages 15-65. The 1.12 ratio in birthrate for China is very high.

Re:Import from Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

This is true.

If there is anything that can get you in serious trouble in my family (very traditional Shanghainese living in N. California), it's going out with or marrying a white girl.

Lots of us in the younger generation have gotten into a lot of heat over this one in the past few years alone. I have cousins that my parents, uncles, and aunts simply won't ever speak to again, just because they married white women. They don't even want to see their grandchildren, etc. But somehow if one of us marries a Vietnamese or Japanese or Korean girl, or whatever E. Asian nationality, somehow that's a lot better, and there's no big problems over it. Obviously, those of us who were born in the U.S. think it's bullshit, but that's the way it is with the older generation.

Re:Import from Russia

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're talking about S. Chinese, maybe.

If you're talking about Han, good luck with that fantasy world of yours, where every "Chinaman" isn't as tall as you are. Seriously, the Han and their descendents (the Koreans, the Mongolians, etc.) grow some big people. Why? Because the Han eat dairy into adulthood, that's why.

Dairy does some bad shit to you. That's why animals in the wild stop taking it after infanthood. But when it comes to humans, who in some cultures have a tradition of eating it all throughout the development stages of childhood, it also results in extended body growth, particularly over generations, if that's what your culture does. That's why you'll see 6'3" Koreans walking around L.A.: Their Han ancestors took dairy by the bucketfull on the plains of Mongolia, and now that they're living like Americans, they are growing again. S. Chinese, Southeast Asians, and Japanese (who themselves grew from a hybrid of Chinese, Koreans, and Southeast Asian Malayans) just don't have the cultural history of taking dairy past infanthood. So they tend not to be as tall.

Anyway, I hope it doesn't surprise you that Han-descended Siberians have been intermarrying with causcasians for a long time. It's why you'll see Russians with mixed skin complexion, or with squinty eyes, all the time if you ever visit Russia or a Russia-town. There are no height discrepancies to make things difficult for anybody.

Re:Risky Business

[Anonymous Coward]

Who said anything about Jameth's country not being full of immoral assholes too? I'm sure wherever he's from has its equal share of the depraved as everywhere else.

Aw crap, I've been trolled.

Re:Stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

And the jury's still out on "sense of humor".

Re:Risky Business

[dr_dank]

Due to their one-child policy, many families had sex-based abortions.

Isn't every abortion sex based? Sex is why they needed the abortion in the first place!