Choose your 3rd child's sex by SMS
This story has me reeling. The cabinet - oh wise ones - have decided to ask the Hungarian people if parents should be allowed to select the sex of their third child. Now that in itself is a wild jump of optimism, but the best is yet to come. This campaign is to be conducted by SMS. My brain just freezes thinking about this. Is this a clever way to reach the text happy populace or a crass insensitive way of appearing to be with it, while not really having a clue what you're doing? You can probably tell by the structure of that last sentence that I've largely decided it veers towards the latter option. The campaign is to be run for 6 weeks according to the cabinet spokesperson, Laszló Boglár: Népszabadság Online: Sms-kampányt indít a kormány. And as the health minister, Rácz Jenö?, helpfully points out this question has ethical implications - he's kidding, right? This is why they have decided to ask the people - so they do know you're there. The options might be: 1. Text 101 if you want to: Make sure you can give birth to your very own barbie-doll, get to dress her in pink and share tips when she's older on how to deal with boys. 2. Alternatively text 666 if you believe: You're all going to burn, and the first option was just proof. Look, some things are great for texting, such as deciding on who gets voted out on Big Brother or which ringtone to have on your mobile. Messing about with DNA and X- or Y-chromosomes isn't one of them. Well it's nice to be asked, even if it is a deeply disturbing question. p.s. Since I wrote this yesterday the original article has fleshed out a bit. This now claims that 30 countries already allow the selection of a child's gender (mostly only in cases where there are other genetic justifications for doing so). I've scoured the internet for a source that indicates how many countries allow gender selection and haven't been able to find much. The best so far is an article on msnbc. The market price tag for a designer baby is about $15,000 by the way - I'll take 2 to go:
Lizette Frielingsdorf [has]... one MicroSort girl, Jessica, who just turned 2. "I call her my $15,000 baby. We felt like we won the lottery,"So, if you feel lucky and want to win your own lottery the official number set up by the cabinet is 06-30-444-444. Phone this and your vote will be automatically recorded. A good neutral source of information is always wikipedia, so you should try their content on sex selection.
