Unless I see hard statistics drawn from a much broader spectrum that support your belief, I am unwilling to draw the same conclusions as you do from such a small sampling.
Kathy's right here you've only presented cases that you feel fit your theory and that isn't enough substantial evidence to prove your theory is correct. Here in Australia a toddler boy's body was found down a mine shaft and the father has been arrested charged with his murder. In fact I can tell you now that here the high profile child homicide cases have been predominately male. However, I will not jump to such a bias theory why? Because a few isolated cases aren't enough for me to draw any significant conclusions.
You also mentioned that it took you only 2 cases before you noticed a pattern that isn't enough to draw such a conclusion. To establish a definite pattern you'd have to pull out all child homicide cases and actually look at them first.
In Sweden during the last circa ten years, all abandoned newborn babies have been found dead, and all but one of them have been girls.
This doesn't prove that the baby was murdered it could have died from exposure or lack of food from not being found in time. There was a similar case in Western Australia where an abandoned baby was found dead at garbage dump and if memory serves correct it had been alive when it was left there.
Would God just have accepted that Jephthah killed his son just so that he could fulfill his vow to God? Frankly, I don't believe it. There are many passages in the Bible that most strenuously forbid the sacrificing of sons. Yes, there are also passages that forbid the sacrificing of sons and daughters, but there are no passages that single out the sacrificing of daughters as forbidden in itself. To me, there is no doubt that the Bible speaks with more vehemence when it forbids the sacrificing of sons than when it forbids the sacrificing of daughters.
As a Christian I refuse to believe that God is bias towards a certain gender. I don't understand where you can draw such a conclusion. Please remember that the Old Testament contains traditions that are thousands of years old. Traditions which today are generally not practiced especially in Christianity. Also you mention that you were raised on the Bible and that it seemed to you that the birth of a daughter was not desired. In those times perhaps it was true, but the Bible also has two books that are specifically about women Ruth and Esther. Esther would eventually be crowned queen. As for your theory that God would have stopped Jephthah from killing his son had it been his son that was the first to greet him as like Stephanie said he made that vow on his OWN. As for Abraham and why God stopped him it was meant to be a test of his devotion to God that he'd be willing to sacrifice the one thing that meant the world to him because God asked him to.
