Russia enacts new rules for birth clinics

[MeMyselfAndI]

Russian Ministry for the Defense of Health has put forth new rules for birth clinics.
http://medportal.ru/mednovosti/news/2010/09/06/labor/

Number 1 most important change: it is now law that a father has a right to witness his child's birth and to do so without paying for it!

As it is now, the whole birth process is largely distanced from the father. To witness your child's birth through a far away window, you have to pay high prices (about $800 dollars, that is a lot of money for many people here).

If one often walks by the natal wing of a Russian hospital, this is a familiar picture
http://s16.radikal.ru/i191/0912/32/d6d456030b4b.jpgHusbands, waiting under the windows to shout greetings and encouragements to their expectant women inside. They, the men, are not allowed inside. The Russian birth clinic is, and has always been the world of women.

Mothers, nurses, almost entirely female doctors
http://savok.name/uploads/ussr1/69.jpg
http://img153.imageshack.us/img153/3886/61360326.jpg
http://photopolygon.com/photo/fit/3749/11622/64465.jpg.700
http://s46.radikal.ru/i113/1010/78/ae81c5a56c00.jpg
http://www.fond-sdd.org.ua/uploads/posts/2010-03/1267544507_vld_3851_thumb.jpg
http://bgmy.ru/uploads/posts/2009-06/1245077173_28.jpg
http://www.roddom1-lipetsk.ru/pics/ill/rod2.jpg
http://www.kotlin.ru/photo/kotlin/R16461.JPGIt is often believed that the extremely few males who do work there are probably homosexuals or transvestites or otherwise not entirely male as such.

It is believed men would be useless in there: what do they know about giving birth? Nothing. They don't do it, do they. Let them instead go to work, earn money for the new family. Women will take care of the babies, it is, after all, what they are born to do.

Well, not anymore :D Men can now legally enter the birth clinics, can visit their wives actually inside their rooms, rather than by standing and shouting under their windows.

I think this is good, very good. Equality of the genders, we are finally achieving it :D

[NickKIELCEPoland]

My God, there are some boring topics in this world, aren't there. :lol:;)

[MeMyselfAndI]

My God, there are some boring topics in this world, aren't there. :lol:;)

If you had to stand foran hour in the rain or snow, under the windows of a birth clinic, waiting to 'talk' (yell) with your wife, you would not find this 'boring'. We've been waiting for this a long time :lol:

[NickKIELCEPoland]

If you had to stand foran hour in the rain or snow, under the windows of a birth clinic, waiting to 'talk' (yell) with your wife, you would not find this 'boring'. We've been waiting for this a long time :lol:
Haha :) ;)

[MeMyselfAndI]

Haha :) ;)

A friend and colleague of my whose wife is expecting their 3d child is celebrating now. Lots of men are. It is a great change indeed. A cultural revolution, of sorts.

We contributed to the creation of those babies too, we have a right to observe them come into this world! :lol:

[Donkey]

What a bizarre little old rule. It's good that it's lifted. There's a lot of men who don't want to be in the room (and I imagine women who don't want them there), but that should be a decision made between the couple, not by the government.

[MeMyselfAndI]

What a bizarre little old rule. It's good that it's lifted. There's a lot of men who don't want to be in the room (and I imagine women who don't want them there), but that should be a decision made between the couple, not by the government.

According to a survey, 78% of women would want their husband with them in the operating room.

The philosophy used to be, the expectant mothers would feel better in an all-female environment. Their own gender would offer them solidarity and true understanding men cannot. That is not always true though. Sometimes, the girls just drive each other mad. :lol:

[NickKIELCEPoland]

Doesn't this prove, MeMyselfandI, that some traditions are stupid?

Of course, some modernisms are stupid as well.

It's not how traditional something is, or how modern something is which is important; what is important is how sensible something is.

[Michael]

Doesn't this prove, MeMyselfandI, that some traditions are stupid?

Of course, some modernisms are stupid as well.

It's not how traditional something is, or how modern something is which is important; what is important is how sensible something is.

In case you are curious, the origin of this custom comes from the idea that menstrating women were 'evil' and needed to be separated from men when they were menstrating and birthing in order to protect the men from evil/devil.

Most of these religious taboos disappeared in the west several hundred years ago - that old superstition apparently continued in Russia much longer (old superstitions or customs often get maintained by habit or inertia).

[NickKIELCEPoland]

Yes, the Russians seem to be much more traditional then we are.
And that is why men have had to wait outside, while their children were being born.

[Michael]

Yes, the Russians seem to be much more traditional then we are.
And that is why men have had to wait outside, while their children were being born.

My point is that you will find old customs where men are separated from women during menstruation/childbirth to be almost universal around the world. Nothing unusual about it at all - only that this taboo lasted so long in Russia.

[NickKIELCEPoland]

Yes, and I was putting forward a suggestion as to why it lasted longer in Russia than in other places;)