“Childhood is disappearing”. These are the concerned words uttered by Mary Ann Glendon, president of the Papal Social Science Academy, who presented this morning the conclusions of the XII plenary meeting of the academy. The plenary meeting brought together, from April 28th to May 2nd, the world’s “best academic brains in the field of social science” to reflect on the subject: “Disappearing youth? Solidarity with children and teenagers in a wild age”. The disappearance of childhood all over the world explained Glendon is due to many different factors. In developing countries, many children “live in the dark shade of oppression and exploitation. Many of them cannot even be born or are left to die in the very first days of their lives. This particularly applies to little girls, since in the world’ most peopled areas, the disproportion between boys and girls is wide now”. The plenary meeting particularly denounced the situation in China, where the disproportion is 150 boys to 100 females. This means one fourth of men will not find, a wife and in the near future this will cause serious “social imbalance”. (to be continued)
