“Your policy has been one which I fully understand—I’m not second-guessing—of one child per family.”Powers quotes Chai Ling, "a two-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee and former leader of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Democracy Movement":
"The one-child policy means the child has to be killed, whether it is forced or coerced through pressure. The women don’t feel like they have a choice. In a culture that is not welcoming to women who get pregnant and keep the baby they will be persecuted, financially and politically by the government.”Powers faults NPR, the media, feminists, and liberals for failure to even minimally grapple with the human-rights implications of the one-child policy.
"When various Republican presidential candidates blasted Biden for the statement, NPR’s blog ran a story titled 'Biden’s Comment on China’s One-Child Policy Spurs Anti-Abortion Ire.' This really misses the point. The media predictably frame this issue as 'pro-choice vs. pro-life' when in fact it is a major human-rights issue. In particular, it’s a women’s-rights issue, which makes the silence from feminists and liberals about Biden’s comment particularly disturbing."Powers then cites some of the real world effects on women of "understanding" the one-child policy.
[emphasis added]
- trafficking in child brides (including toddlers); "'Today in China, 200,000 children a year, usually from poor families, are seized or sold as child brides.'”
- sex trafficking where "girls from surrounding countries are kidnapped or lured under false pretenses and forced to work in brothels"
- "sending a frightening message to other countries, like India, where sex-selective abortions are epidemic in a country that places little value on girls." [emphasis added]
A must read column by an insightful liberal. Thank you, Kirsten!
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