Women, girls struggle beyond tsunami

[Amelia]

Women, girls struggle beyond tsunami

By ELIZABETH EVANS - The York Dispatch

Monday, January 24, 2005 - Over and over yesterday, her fellow Living Word Community Church parishioners asked Marsha Bornt to retell the story about the orphans.

Bornt, a York gynecologist, was one of the missionaries who made the annual trip to Bethel Agricultural Fellowship, a small, Christian-run community in the Indian village of Danishpet. They returned Saturday night.

Besides a hospital and small farm, the Bethel fellowship runs a 600-child orphanage, primarily for girls.

"The orphanage kids basically have two outfits: a dress for Christmas each year" and an everyday outfit, Bornt said.

But after learning that other children were left with nothing in the wake of the Dec. 26 tsunami, the orphans each donated one of their two outfits, she said.

"They have nothing, and out of the love in their hearts they gave away half," she said. "It's humbling as an American to look at the resilience of the human spirit there."

The people who live in small fishing villages along India's southeast coast have long known about poverty and hunger.

Bornt has seen that suffering

every year since 1993, when she began going to the state of Tamil Nadu with Living Word Community Church annually to do humanitarian and religious work.

But always, she said, it's the daughters and mothers who suffer most.

In these small villages, where fishermen and their families live hand-to-mouth and illiteracy is rampant, women are nothing more than property, as they have been for thousands of years.

It's still socially acceptable to kill all female offspring except the first-born, and women have no say in anything -- not even their own bodies.

Physical abuse against women is common, and victims would never consider going to authorities because if they are being beaten, it surely must be their fault.

Women 'not a priority': As part of her missionary work, Bornt performs surgeries for women in need. But only if their husbands allow it.

"It's not unusual that they don't get what they need," she said. "And if the woman is a widow, a son makes that decision."

In a society that tolerates killing female babies, women's health care "obviously is not a priority," she said.

"The cows and the goats usually get medical attention before the women."

Tamil Nadu has the highest infanticide rate in India, according to Bornt, who was quick to point out that things are different in other parts of the country.

"There are under 800 girls for every thousand boys," she said; the ratio should be about 106 girls for every 100 boys.

"Girls are a liability -- a financial expenditure," Bornt said.

A woman who is divorced is ostracized by her family and village, and often must turn to prostitution to survive. Many of these women die of AIDS-related problems, Bornt said.

So for Hindus who believe in reincarnation, infanticide can be justified.

"There is a saying in the area: The girls that are killed at birth are the happy babies," because they have the chance to come back as boys in a subsequent life, she said.

[Guest]

Oh, but we must accept this culture and be civil and tolerant. We should not be judgemental and critical because we look at life differently. This is just the way they do things there... c'est la vie...

we should just adhere to that gospel principle...

MYOB

[Dr. Shane]

How can anyone believe all cultures are equal or that we all worship the same God? This is one of the results of false religion - lack of value for human life.

Now if they had ultra-sound machines available and could tell it was a girl while it was still a fetus, would anyone object to abortions? I mean, other than me.

[Amelia]

I believe they do sex selective abortions in China due to the one child law. Everyone wants a boy there too. I think this is horrendous.

[cricket]

I guess that would be all right...I mean, the quality of life for these girls would be horrible. And then, there's always the shame the poor parents would have to go through because they didn't have the coveted boy. Absolutely, go ahead with the abortions, this would be the only civil thing to do.

[Dr. Shane]

Must make finding a wife hard. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />