Why does India produce the most odd pregnancy and baby stories I see in the news.  Aside from the occasional mother taking go forth and multiply to the point of going forth and doing fertility clinic calculus here in the states we seldom see stories of the two faced baby outside of the tabloids.  I am deeply troubled with this.

Why am I troubled?  First off it may be nothing and this kind of thing is happening just as frequently around the world, but just doesn’t make the news.  That actually might be more troubling than if it was only happening in India.  I am bothered by these kinds of stories for a couple of reasons.

First, I dislike anything that furthers religious ends as some of these kids seem to be used for.  How hard will it be to have any kind of normal life when you not only have two faces but are treated like the the reincarnation of a goddess and have your every breath witnessed.  From what I understand this is not caused by a genetic condition so I don’t have a problem with her condition on that level.  It is up to her parents and later her as to whether surgery should be used to correct this, which at this moment doesn’t look like it is going to happen.

If this had been a genetic condition I would have advocated an abortion early on, or at the very least sterilization to keep her from passing on genetic disorders.  I know that sounds horrible, but face it we do more to improve the dogs, mice, and horses as a species than we do human beings.  We breed like there is not an impact to the world socially, economically, or environmentally.  Not only are we producing genetically mediocre children as a whole, we allow the inferior ones to keep passing on their traits.  Sorry to be the barer of bad news, but this is a bad idea, ask any breeder of any organism and they will tell you that.  The more we breed, the more genetic anomalies we produce, some of them good but most of them bad, we need to learn the to tell the difference or one day we will be nothing more than second rate chimps…  Please also give a moment of thought to Charlton Heston for that last remark.

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Update - Just to prove a point I am going to keep a running tab for a while of all the countries where I see birth anomaly news.  if anyone sees ones I miss please let me know, for the win and the link.

4-9-08 23" tall teenager weighs all of 11 pounds - India
4-10-08 29" 18YO woman gives birth against advice - India