Stacking the odds of a baby's sex

By Marissa Leung

No more neutral colors for the nursery walls. No more surprises. You can now choose pink or blue (if you want to stick with the traditional baby colors) before you and your partner even conceive your child.

Scientists at the Genetics & In Vitro Fertilization Institute in Fairfax, Va. have developed a new method that can "substantially stack the odds" in favor of conceiving a boy or a girl, the New York Times recently reported.

What does this mean for our society? While there has been a history of sex selection throughout the world, it has never been clearly determinable or scientifically accurate. From ancient remedies to superstitions, we've all heard stories about what we can to do to improve our chances of getting one or the other. People throughout the world have both clinical and self-induced abortions if they don't approve of the gender of their baby. In China, the restrictions of the one-child policy have led some families to kill or abandon their daughters so that they can try again for a boy.

The current ethical debate in genetic engineering focuses on the issue of cloning. People fear the worst about human cloning; they picture a society where future parents can "manufacture" their children by picking and choosing their traits. How different is this new development in genetic engineering? Scientifically, sex selection sorts sperm by the amount of DNA it contains, since Y-chromosomes (carried by sperm) contain 2.8 percent less genetic material than X-chromosomes (carried by both eggs and sperm). Ethically, however, the old and new methods are very similar: both involve the manipulation of genetic material in the hope of fulfilling parents' desires or preferences. If the government allows parents to choose the sex of their child, it would not be long before parents could duplicate that perfect older sibling.

But is it so wrong to want a baby girl after giving birth to four sons? One woman on whom the new method was tested stated, "Having a daughter for me was like having a baby for some people; that's how important it was." Does this mean that this woman would not love a son as much as her daughter, since she already had two sons? I find this reasoning a little superficial. I was taught that all people are equal--men and women, boys and girls. Sex selection would begin to break down our society based on gender lines. Studies would undoubtedly follow to see which sex was more popular when parents choose their babies' genders.

There are some parents, however, for whom the choice is a matter of life or death for their baby. One woman in the study had X-linked hydrocephalus, a genetic disease that strikes only boys. After four male members of her immediate family died from the disease, she wanted to insure that she would have a daughter. While some parents might make a gender choice out of preference, this woman clearly made it out of necessity.

Aside from special circumstances like this one, having the option to choose the sex of a baby goes against nature's original intention. There are infertile couples who would be overjoyed at the prospect of giving birth to any child, regardless of gender. It seems that the ability to have a baby is being taken for granted, and people are forgetting how important it really is. Parents always say that all that they want is a healthy child, but is this really true? Only time will tell.

Marissa Leung is a freshman in Berkeley. Graphic by Sara Edward-Corbett.

Back to Opinion...