The Muslim Daughter

We can pretend all that we want that women are accorded a high status in Muslim cultures but how does one make sense of the following when a Muslim women upon hearing about at the birth of a male child says, “God has saved them from the calamity of a girl.” How is one supposed to interpret this statement? Is it happiness on the birth of the male child or does it show that the woman in question knows how much a woman has to go through just to survive or is it both? Thus the dichotomy contiues in Islam (or is it with Muslims?) between theory and practice. Bernard Shaw may be been right, Islam may be the best religion but Muslims are not the best of followers.