And....Science FIction catches up to us:

[alfreda89]

http://health.msn.com/pregnancykids/greenarticlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100171768>1=10547

Are boys becoming an endangered species? Check out this article and see for yourself.

Comments

[oliana0.livejournal.com]

I've heard that male fetus are less likely to carry to term than female and that infant mortality is higher in boy babies than girl babies.

I don't remember when, where or from whom I heard that so don't go quoting me as a source.

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

Well...you heard it from me at Odd Friday.... I'd heard that 105-106 to 100 ratio before. However, I have never traced it back to ground zero, so not sure if it's reliable. Or if people just keep misquoting something.

It's the 25% men who are sterile that's also scary....

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

Humanity's survival is not endangered by a shortage of men. Women are the population bottleneck. As the filk goes,

"If I ate your men, would your numbers decline?
Of course not -- the rest would just make better time!
But the number of children a woman can bear
Has a limit, and that's why my pruning's done there,
But an orphan's a sad sight, and so when I munch,
I'm careful to ask only virgins to lunch!"

Of course, if you include the unexpressed assumptions that (1) men and women must pair off one-on-one, (2) there is never any kind of cheating on the above, and (3) social customs will never change to fit changing circumstances, then there would be much more cause for concern.

Yes --

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

Like the panic that we forecast 25-30 years ago, when the Chinese told the population they could have only one child. Well -- most of them were rural, so they chose what could support them best in their old age -- a son. They aborted the girls.

And now, the Chinese are stealing brides from the Mongols and even more rural locations. And the Arabs and other Middleastern groups are running out of women, too, since the minute they could predict sex they aborted the girls.

Lack of men means two things -- the population will grow browner in skin tone (yes, America is growing browner, and there's little those who care can do about it, except stop terrorizing potential European immigrants at the border) and a narrowing of diversity in Western nations.

Will they go to more women to each man? Well, that's an interesting question. We'll see how desperate they are in ten years. Of course, there are people like that couple in Arkansas who have sixteen or so. Clearly, pollution and fertility doesn't concern them.