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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by mtw on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @03:24PM (#325958)
if this is true, then we will see soon Chineese men behaving like conquering Vikings

:)

(ratio of men vs women is one of the highest in the world due to single child policy)

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by wmf on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @03:58PM (#325996)
No smiley needed; I've read serious predictions that China will invade neighboring countries for water and women within a few decades.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by rgrieselhuber on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @08:12AM (#326488)
May be one reason why Japan is working so hard to develop robot women. :-)
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by rms on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @03:52AM (#326409)
It seems a lot more likely that they will import water and women.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by netcan on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @09:05PM (#326258)
Or for women & wine
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by omouse on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @11:57PM (#326322)
Well if you're a Christian/Catholic, water = wine.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by j2d2 on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @03:37PM (#325975)
(due to abandoning woman since they prefer men and get one child)
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by gruseom on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @03:38PM (#325976)
(ratio of men vs women is one of the highest in the world due to single child policy)

Single child policy can hardly be the reason for that.

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by arockwell on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:03PM (#326004)
Not by itself, but there's strong economic incentive for your one child to be a boy rather than a girl.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by eru on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:07PM (#326006)
To say it bluntly: Sometimes girls are neglected until they die or killed outright.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by netcan on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @09:12PM (#326265)
I think selective abortion is more common then selective infanticide.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by LogicHoleFlaw on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @09:53PM (#326278)
Abandonment is common too. My sister worked part-time in an orphanage in Xian for a year and saw a lot of sad things.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by gruseom on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:46PM (#326051)
Right. And to call this "single child policy" is a nasty euphemism.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by emmett on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @06:36PM (#326141)
Actually, that's incorrect. There's a strong social prestige incentive for your one child to be a boy rather than a girl. There's a strong economic incentive for you to have a girl: there's a tradition of reversed dowries in China, and girls are rare, so the benefits are high.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by arockwell on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @06:43PM (#326147)
I thought the reason they wanted boys was that they were the ones who had the means to support their parents in old age?
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by emmett on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @12:28PM (#326682)
Perhaps that was the historical reason boys are high prestige, but modern China has huge opportunities for women (who "Hold up half the sky", as Mao put it).

China was a society of prima genitor, like Europe; boys are high prestige because they carry on your family name. All praise to the eldest son!

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by gruseom on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:48PM (#326055)
People who kill their own daughters for "economic" reasons stretch my ability to be non-judgmental.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by asdflkj on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @05:20AM (#326438)
Infanticide for "economic" reasons is an evolutionary adaptation common in many mammals, including humans, including in rich societies. In the US, it usually gets classified as SIDS.

I'm yet to see a convincing argument for why it's unethical.

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by pmorici on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @08:39AM (#326500)
Isn't SIDS when a baby suffocates because they are sleeping on their stomach or in a room with poor ventilation? Or are you saying it isn't as sudden and accidental as we are led to believe?
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by asdflkj on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @01:14PM (#326746)
Not always accidental, apparently. Wikipedia has references.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by DabAsteroid on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @10:55PM (#327412)
Also, in the Netherlands, child euthanasia is openly practiced.

http://www.google.com/search?q=netherlands+euthanasia+child

280,000 hits.

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by DabAsteroid on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @05:39AM (#326448)
Do you judge sexual abstainers?

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22abstinence+is+murder%22

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by pmorici on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @08:46PM (#326243)
I've heard people cite this as a reason from Islamic terrorism as well. Since it's common to take multiple wives in religion.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by dimitar on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @03:26AM (#326401)
The marriage ceremony is expensive - especially in the Middle East. And in countries like Egypt have low economic growth and huge inflation in marriage prices, so males have to work long and hard into their 30es to get married. And they can't just get a girlfriend and marry her in a inexpensive ceremony with only a civil unions - the religious leaders made sure its illegal (they have a interest in preserving the expensive traditions, you see).

Most men in the Middle East can hardly afford a single wife. Only really, really rich men have harems.

Of course the reasons are way more complex.

I'll recommend this excellent article from Fareed Zakaria: The Politics of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us? http://fareedzakaria.com/articles/newsweek/101501_why.html

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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by netcan on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @09:06PM (#326260)
It's not very common in practice though. Not enough to create demographic problems.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by randomwalker on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:40PM (#326045)
This is discussed in Jared Diamond's book "Collapse." (A good book, although winding.) A skewed sex-ratio was definitely one of the factors, but it would be foolish to say it was the only one. In fact, one of the theses of "Collapse" is that it is almost always a combination of multiple factors that leads to major changes in a society.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by vaksel on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:20PM (#326019)
women are usually the motivation for almost all the accomplishments a man has ever achieved
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by helveticaman on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @09:55PM (#326280)
I've heard this about scientists and criminals...both desist when they get married. Not far-fetched.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by stupiduser on Wednesday October 08, 2008 @02:16AM (#326374)
Anecdotally, it wasn't true of Einstein.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by brandnewlow on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @03:31PM (#325969)
Well, that more or less explains a good bit of my startup motivation.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by attack on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @05:41PM (#326106)
No kidding.
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Re:Viking Age triggered by shortage of wives? by eru on Tuesday October 07, 2008 @04:15PM (#326013)
Viking women:

http://deafjoke.tv/wp/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/women-2007-...

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