Free Republic

Since the late 1970s, 163 million female babies have been aborted by parents seeking sons. BY JONATHAN V. LAST Mara Hvistendahl is worried about girls. Not in any political, moral or cultural sense but as an existential matter. She is right to be. In China, India and numerous other countries (both developing and developed), there are many more men than women, the result of systematic campaigns against baby girls. In "Unnatural Selection," Ms. Hvistendahl reports on this gender imbalance... (snip) In nature, 105 boys are born for every 100 girls. This ratio is biologically ironclad. (snip) Yet today in India...

Feminists may insist that life for women has gotten better since the days when raucous female activists marched in the streets for equality and questioned traditional social mores... Pollsters say otherwise. Things are out of kilter. And pretty dismal, according to a Harris Poll released Monday. Eight out of 10 Americans, in fact, say, "Women today are treated with less chivalry than in the past."