Philippine E-Journals

Sex Selection: Any Taker?

Florentino T. Timbreza

Discipline: Cultural and Ethnic Studies, Sexuality

 

Abstract:

Modem biological technology has greatly affected human values and moral issues. Biological science, for instance, provides man with a scientific understanding of sex selection-otherwise known as sex control, sex determination, sex predetermination, and sex preselection. This refers to the means whereby the sex of an offspring can be chosen. The effort to select the sex of offspring can be traced back to the Egyptian culture (1350 B.C.). The Hebrew Talmud, for example, suggested that placing the marriage bed in a northsouth direction favored the conception of boys. In many of the Slavic countries, if a couple preferred a boy, the wife was advised to pinch her husband's right testicle during the conjugal act. German folkways held that if the father wanted a boy, he was to take an ax to bed with him. Among some Filipinos, the husband should wear a hat during the conjugal act, if the preferred offspring is a boy.