moved from Main List: on not having children

[dradamsapple]

Anna responds;

Oh, my! I think you've opened up a case of dung bombs!(or, should I 
say, stinky diaper pails instead?) Can't let this one go by! Must 
come out of lurkdom and give my two knuts!


--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "Catlady (Rita Prince 
Winston)" <catlady at w...> wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Laura Ingalls Huntley" wrote 
in 
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/78224 :
> 
> << P.S. If I ever have three daughters (which I won't, because I'm 
> not ever having kids), I'm going to name them James, Tomas, and 
> Mordecai.  In that order. >>
> 
> >snip<<
> 
> And *I* am most certainly not going to tell you that not wanting to 
> ever have kids is 'just a phase' you're going through. That's what 
> people told me when I was your age ... and for years thereafter ... 
> and now I am 45 (46 in November) and I never had children, never 
> wanted to have children, never particularly liked children, still 
> hate babies, and do not regret lack of children.


Good for you, Catlady, for recognizing this about yourself early in 
life.  The world certainly does not need children born of parents who 
do not want them. (Er, I see a "Pro Life" sign waving in the shadows: 
my intention is NOT to dispute abortion issues with this statement, 
but merely a 'pat on the back' to Catlady for being so honest.)  
Raising a child, I feel, is probably the most un-selfish thing you 
can do, and probably the most rewarding. 


> However, I do feel concerned about the gene pool: if all the most 
> intelligent and talented women (such as you) refrain from 
> childbearing, that works out the same as if some superhuman 
hobbyist 
> human-fancier was breeding FOR stupidity.
> 
> (*I* feel noble rather than guilty for not inflicting MY genes for 
> obesity, ugliness, social ineptness, depression, and generally 
being 
> a loser on the gene pool.)


Aw, now, Catlady, you can't possibly be that bad! Besides, I am also 
overweight, rather unattractive, clinically depressed, have irritable 
bowel syndrome, am extrememly nearsighted, and a klutz, but my 
children are absolutely BEAUTIFUL!!! (uh, no, I'm not biased.) No, 
really, they are! (lol)

So, basically, am I understanding that you don't think that people 
with faults should procreate??  (AAAAAHHHHH!!! visions of little 
cloned children all wearing the same thing dancing through my 
head!!!!!) I am hoping that you were only joking about your reasons 
for not contributing to the 'gene pool', as you say.  And, as I feel 
that you ARE one of those intelligent women, I say you are being 
rather hypocritical in your thinking, especially since I know a lot 
of people who are very intelligent but also pretty stupid to boot! 
(Uh, I don't mean you; I don't even know you).


> Drifting even further from my topic, I believe in *both* genetics 
> *and* environment, causing me to have opinions which will offend 
> EVERYONE. On such opinion: Women who hand their children over to be 
> raised by a nanny are putting their child in the environment of the 
> intelligence, education, mode of speech, table manners, religious 
> beliefs, political beliefs, of a person who chose that line of work 
> either because she obsessively adores being with children, or 
because 
> she CAN'T get anything that pays better.

 

YES! And thank goodness for that!

First of all, have you ever thought that maybe some of these children 
are in such an awful family situation that they may be BETTER OFF 
with a caring, nurturing, well mannered person who is there to take 
care of them?? I can swear to you, from personal experience, that 
this is true; where the parents were just too busy with their 
professions to really give enough attention to the childrens' basic 
needs. (As I found my four year old daughter one day walking down our 
BUSY street with her friend; father oblivious to the fact that they 
had left the house!)  The children were actually better off with 
their babysitter/nanny while their parents were off discovering new 
solar systems.

  Now, should have these parents have been sterilized? Should they 
have not had children? I would not assume to make that decision for 
them, as there is no telling how you will be as a parent/caregiver 
until you are in that situation. But it is not fair of you to assume 
that all children in a daycare situation are worse off than being at 
home, and we, as parents, are somehow 'bad parents' (my description, 
not Catlady's) because we put our children in daycare. I have had the 
fortune of having my kids in daycare, and 
watched by babysitters (er, adult women, that is), and I ENVY the 
patience and understanding that they have with these children, day in 
and day out.  [And, if anything, they are certainly UNDERPAID!!] They 
are kind, considerate, teach manners, respect for others, social 
skills, art, music, literature, AND wipe bums, and come back and do 
it again the next day. As much as I HATED leaving my children, and I 
still do, I know that in many ways it has made them better persons.  


Yes, it is true.  There are "people" out there who only have children 
for status, or trophies, or whatever reasons, and do ship them off to 
daycare, and boarding school, and what have you, because they can't 
be bothered, or don't have the time, or whatever ridiculus reason.  
But then there's the rest of us, who, for other reasons, HAVE to work 
and have no choice but put our children in daycare, or with a 
babysitter/nanny, etc.  Do we like it? NO!! Do we feel guilty about 
it?? YES!!  But this is not Ozzie and Harriet's world anymore, and 
most people I know, have no choice but to work while raising 
children. And if it were a perfect world, there would always be a 
loving, caring, nurturing "family" member there to watch the child 
while the parent/parents work.  \ 
But guess what:  the world aint perfect, and no one in it is.

(The same for men who turn 
> their children over to be raised by wives, but at least the men are 
> positioned to have some knowledge or their wives' behavior and 
> opinions.)

Oh, You think so??  Don't you watch Dr. Phil??


 Result: double-bind. Women with good genes either withhold 
> their good genes from the gene pool or submit themselves to a yucky 
> life of childrearing.

Gene pool.  That phrase again.  I didn't know that this was one, 
giant genetics class.  Drosophila melanogaster, anyone?

Anna  . . .(who hopes she can go to bed without having visions of 
different colored fruitflies in her head)