September 25 marked the 34th anniversary of China’s One-Child Policy. Women’s Rights Without Frontiers (WRWF) president Reggie Littlejohn in response wrote an open letter to Chinese president Xi Jinping.
From Littlejohn’s first paragraph:
It will not work to replace it by a ‘two-child policy’ as some of your advisors may be suggesting. Rather, the One Child Policy should be eradicated from the face of the earth, because it has caused more violence toward women and girls than any other official policy on earth, and any other official policy in the history of the world. Your government has boasted that it has “prevented” more than 400 million births through this policy. These births have been prevented through forced abortions, involuntary sterilizations, confiscatory “terror fines,” gendercide and infanticide – all in violation of international human rights law.
Throughout the rest of her letter, Littlejohn highlighted stories of people who have suffered as a result of the policy, and also mentioned that China has not really eased its coercive policy after all, despite claims. Also discussed is the increase of sexual slavery, and how there has been a correlation to breast cancer, as well as low birth weight and increased chance of death in later pregnancies.
U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) also publicly denounced China’s One-Child Policy, in his Townhall column.
The Senator spent most of his article discussing a specific problem with the policy:
According to UNICEF, an estimated 290 million children under the age of 5 do not possess a birth certificate. As we know, proof of birth determines a child’s citizenship, nationality, place of birth, parentage and age, which are critical to ensuring children remain a part of society and do not fall victim to dangers such as exploitation.
Rubio explained in the next paragraph how this affects Chinese girls and women:
While China’s One-Child Policy is not the sole driver of this problem, it has contributed to it. As The Economist reported earlier this year, today there are about 13 million Chinese who lack household registration certificates because they were born in violation of the One-Child Policy. Not having this certificate means they can’t go to school, get a job, get married or do something as simple as check out library books. They have no access to China’s already flawed legal system. They can’t even escape this misery by buying plane or train tickets so they can relocate. Over time, failing to register children at birth leaves them vulnerable to human trafficking and exploitation.
Senator Rubio also discusses a solution to this problem, through his introduced legislation of Girls Count Act.
Fortunately, we have leaders like Reggie Littlejohn and Senator Rubio who get the various issues the One-Child Policy creates, and who seek to correct them with real solutions.
