\u201cFamily Planning\u201d in China Is Social Control, Masquerading as Population Control<\/b>\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
Author\u2019s Note:\u00a0 This is the first in a four-part series of opinion pieces on the reasons that the Chinese Communist Party will never abandon coercive population control.<\/b>\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
Xinhua News Agency reported on October 29 that China will move to a two-child policy for all couples.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This move replaces the 2014 change that enabled couples to have a second child if one member of the couple is an only child.<\/span><\/p>\n Newspaper headlines heralded the change as the \u201cend\u201d or \u201cabandonment\u201d of the One Child Policy.<\/span><\/p>\n Not so.\u00a0 Coercion is the core of the policy.\u00a0 Instituting a two-child policy will not end forced abortion or forced sterilization.\u00a0 As blind activist Chen Guangcheng succinctly tweeted:<\/span><\/p>\n This is nothing to be happy about. First the\u00a0#CCP<\/a>\u00a0would kill any baby after one. Now they will kill any baby after two.\u00a0#ChinaOneChildPolicy<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n The Chinese Communist Party will never end coercive population control, because coercive population is keeping it in place.<\/p>\n All the reasons the Chinese government has given for this adjustment are demographic.\u00a0 Even if China were to completely abandon all population control now, however, demographers worry that it might be\u00a0too little, too late<\/b>\u00a0to avert the demographic disaster it has caused.\u00a0 As one researcher stated, \u201c<\/span>Even if the family-planning policy were terminated today, it would be too late to solve our rapidly ageing population, the drastic shrinkage of the labour force and the gaping hole in social-security funds that the country has already begun struggling with.\u201d[1]<\/a><\/p>\n In addition, the most recent modification of the One Child Policy has failed to produce the expected number of births, as couples are self-limiting the size of their families.[2]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Continuing any form of coercive population control \u2013 including a two-child policy — makes no demographic sense.\u00a0 China\u2019s population problem is not that it has too many people, but too few young people, too few workers and too few women.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Why, then, does the Chinese Communist Party keep the One Child Policy?<\/span><\/p>\n In my opinion, the Chinese Communist Party will never abolish coercive population control.\u00a0 The government is exploiting so-called \u201cfamily planning\u201d as\u00a0social control, masquerading as population control.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n The One Child Policy was formally instituted on September 25, 1980 in response to the population explosion under the Mao era, when the average fertility was 5.9 children per woman.\u00a0 The Policy began as a means to control the population, however brutal and misguided. The terror of forced abortion and involuntary sterilization was a by-product of the Policy. \u00a0T<\/span>he fertility rate has fallen to approximately 1.6 children per woman, far below the replacement level of 2.1.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>These birth rates are dangerously low.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Now that keeping the Policy makes no demographic sense, I believe that\u00a0terror is the purpose of the Policy.<\/b>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Forced abortion continues in China, terrifying both women and men.[3]<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0Some of these forced abortions have been so violent that the women themselves have died along with their full term babies.[4]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Forced abortion is so terrifying that victims at times succumb to mental illness and China has the highest female suicide rate in the world.[5]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Gong Quifeng is just one woman affected by China\u2019s brutal family policies.\u00a0 Seven months pregnant with her second son, Quifeng was removed from her home and forced to undergo an abortion procedure in 2011. Her crime?\u00a0 This was her second pregnancy, in violation of the One Child Policy. Two years later, the induced abortion was still taking its emotional toll and Quifeng was diagnosed with schizophrenia. The story of Quifeng is tragic but hardly unique.<\/p>\n Men also are terrorized.\u00a0 Some have been killed or maimed for life.[6]<\/a>\u00a0 Others have lost control and murdered family planning officials.[7]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Some men have resorted to suicide in protest over the excessive fines imposed by the government.[8]<\/a><\/p>\n The spirit of the Cultural Revolution lives on in the family planning police, who function as\u00a0\u201cwomb police\u201d<\/b>\u00a0and have been able to steal, intimidate, torture and kill with relative impunity.\u00a0 The result is a strengthened police state with an intimidated populace unable to offer effective resistance.<\/p>\n The Chinese Communist Party is a brutal, totalitarian regime, responsible for multifarious human rights abuses.\u00a0 Coercive population control, however, is unique in that it touches each individual and community.<\/span>\u00a0CCP maintains its grip on power by extending its arm from Beijing and inserting its hand into every womb to declare life or death over the beating heart inside.<\/span><\/p>\n [1]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cCritic of One Child Policy in from Cold.\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.scmp.com\/news\/china\/article\/1224885\/critic-one-child-policy-cold<\/a><\/p>\n 4\/28\/13;\u00a0\u201cEasing One Child Policy May Be Too Late.\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/yaleglobal.yale.edu\/content\/easing-one-child-policy-may-be-too-late<\/a>.\u00a0 1\/7\/14.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [2]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cWomen in China Can Now Have Two Children, But Don\u2019t Celebrate Too Soon.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/women\/womens-life\/11963915\/China-one-child-policy-Its-changed-but-dont-celebrate-too-soon.html<\/a>\u00a010\/30\/15.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n [3]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cChina Couple Speak of \u2018Forced Abortion.\u2019\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/news.sky.com\/story\/1150016\/china-couple-speak-of-forced-abortion<\/a>\u00a010\/4\/13;\u00a0 \u201cFour Uyghur Women Forced to Abort Their Babies in Zinjiang.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/uyghur\/abortion-12302013050902.html<\/a>; \u201cXinjiang authorities try to force six women to abort for violating one-child policy.\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.asianews.it\/news-en\/Xinjiang-authorities-try-to-force-six-women-to-abort-for-violating-one-child-policy-29925.html<\/a>. 12\/30\/13<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [4]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cChina Couple Speak of \u2018Forced Abortion.\u2019\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/news.sky.com\/story\/1150016\/china-couple-speak-of-forced-abortion<\/a>\u00a010\/4\/13;\u00a0 \u201cFour Uyghur Women Forced to Abort Their Babies in Zinjiang.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/uyghur\/abortion-12302013050902.html<\/a>; \u201cXinjiang authorities try to force six women to abort for violating one-child policy.\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.asianews.it\/news-en\/Xinjiang-authorities-try-to-force-six-women-to-abort-for-violating-one-child-policy-29925.html<\/a>. 12\/30\/13.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [5]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cForced abortion at 7 Months \u2013 The Horror of China\u2019s One Child Policy Sparks Further Outrage.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.christianpost.com\/news\/forced-abortion-at-7-months-the-horror-of-chinas-one-child-policy-sparks-further-outrage-101764\/<\/a>\u00a08\/7\/13; \u201cChinese couple seeks damages for forced abortion.\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.worldmag.com\/2014\/01\/chinese_couple_seeks_damages_for_forced_abortion<\/a>\u00a01\/10\/14.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [6]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cChina:\u00a0 Family Planning Official Stabs Man to Death,\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.womensrightswithoutfrontiers.org\/blog\/?p=147<\/a>.\u00a0 4\/5\/11.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n [7]<\/a>\u00a0\u201cCrazed Chinese father-of-four stabs two government officials to death over one child policy.\u201d .\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/news\/article-2376771\/Chinese-father-kills-1-child-policy-officials-registering-4th-child.html<\/a>\u00a0 7\/24\/13.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [8]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u201cChinese father of four commits suicide over one-child policy fines so his children can go to school.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.lifesitenews.com\/news\/chinese-father-of-four-commits-suicide-over-one-child-policy-fines-so-his-c<\/a>.\u00a0 5\/26\/14; \u201cFarmer drinks poison after being fined for violations of family planning policy.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.globaltimes.cn\/content\/830847.shtml<\/a>\u00a012\/8\/13<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cFamily Planning\u201d in China Is Social Control, Masquerading as Population Control\u00a0 Author\u2019s Note:\u00a0 This is the first in a four-part series of opinion pieces on the reasons that the Chinese Communist Party will never abandon coercive population control.\u00a0 Xinhua News … Continue reading
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