“Where do babies come from?”

I wonder how Marina herself acquired her own children?

So is it for yummies who want to be mummies, or yummies who have accidentally introduced a sperm to an egg at a drinks do and are now having to factor in the cost of a nanny, set up an account at Boden and drop the best part of £700 on further misinformation from Marina?

Incidentally, Ben’s dad is/was a vet, she could have checked the biology stuff out with him , so no excuse.

All the chicken keeping families children will have fun explaining that one and the easter bunny

The Bump Class appears to be for yummy mummies (if that term is not now old hat).

Oh, right. Published in 2021, so probably written at absolutely peak batshit.

By now, I expect anyone involved is feeling a bit daft and probably hoping that it will be quietly forgotten.

And the thing is that it seems like a small thing, but all of these 'small things' chip away at and undermine knowledge, so children end up confused, and unclear, and puzzled.

Children need to know the facts about reproduction, in clear, age appropriate terms.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Everything-Under-Sun-curious-question/dp/0241433460

https://www.everand.com/podcast/590734503/10-Where-do-babies-come-from-How-deep-is-the-river-Thames-Why-do-ladybirds-have-spots-With-Marina-Fogle

'Alessandra would like to know the answer to a question we all ask at some point in our lives, which is, "Where do Babies Come from?" Parental Warning! In case you don't want your children to listen to this answer. As this can be quite a tricky one to know how to answer well for children I asked Marina Fogle, host of the top parenting podcast The Parent Hood and creator of The Bump Class, an antenatal class she runs with her sister Chiara Hunt, who is a top doctor who knows all about children. Marina knows everything about babies and is the perfect person to explain the answer to this question all children ask. If you feel your child isn't ready to listen to this one, do skip over and carry on from question two, but if they're asking you about babies or you have already had a conversation about it then this could be perfect! '

I started to wish it was illegal to publish dishonest shit like this book, deliberately misleading children about things they need to know. Lying to children about serious matters is shameful.

Then I thought no, I don’t want censorship either. What this book needs is to be pilloried, held up to ridicule and contempt. Make sure the contents are widely known. How could that be done?

Ah — Mumsnet!

Thanks for posting, OP. Please add the name of the book. I’ve looked up Marina Fogle and found Everything Under the Sun, which seems to be on general knowledge. Is “Where do babies come from” a chapter in this?
There’s a podcast too. I dread to think what nonsense she pushes in that.

It looks as if she's now rebranded herself as an expert in parenting because she and her sister run eye-watering expensive antenatal classes at the Portland Hospital - £620! Interestingly, the blurb for those classes is pretty clear who they're for, mentioning "pregnant women" and "mothers-to-be"...

(I'm not actually sure I like that, personally, as it frames pregnancy and parenthood as being entirely a woman's business. But that's another discussion.)

Can you share the book title, OP? For avoidance.

Return the book as not fit for purpose

Also saying that the egg is "from" another adult's body sounds like the egg was just dropped in the street or something.

Whole thing raises far more questions than it answers and I'd be worried what any kid would conclude from this weird non-information.

Infuriating.

Adults? Apart from the loony reluctance not to say man or woman, does this mean a 12 year old can't get pregnant in this strange sexless Fogle world.

Marriage might require consummation, but procreation doesn't require marriage.

Exactly.

I wasn't clear - it was a young children's sex education book. I found it among the shelves at home while being nosey - either my parents were intending to have The Talk at some point, or they figured that by the time I was old enough to find and read the book, I would be able to deal with it myself :)

What it described was a man and woman laying very close together and the man putting his penis inside her vagina

But on top of that, I forget exactly how it was phrased, but it was clear that a necessary precursor to this was for them to be married, which I struggled with. Given the biological description, it seemed like there must be a biological reason, which didn't make much sense to me.

I wasn't yet old enough to figure out that a biological text might include religious lies or omissions, trying to assuage sensibilities, so struggled with trying to make sense of the simpler explanation that marriage was a official ceremony for some biological procedure people didn't talk about. (Like some sort of circumcision type thing to make one of the parties able to procreate?)

If my kiddies had read that book they wouldn’t want eggs for breakfast…

So sperms and eggs come from any bodies?
Was this written by a 6 year old boy?

Marriage might require consummation, but procreation doesn't require marriage.

Yuck! I went to a talk recently where one of the women repeated a phrase she'd heard.
"Women are people that people come out of"
This book is on a par with that.

For clarity, she was repeating the phrase in disgust at how awful it was. Not agreeing with it.

You were right about marriage requiring a physical aspect @NecessaryScene. The physical bit is consummation. Without it the marriage is not valid - not even if the wife is pregnant at the wedding - and can be annulled. Annulment is why Henry VIII only had four wives: his marriages to Catherine of Aragon and Anne of Cleves were annulled and therefore never existed - which made the succession of Mary I a bit problematic.
As to the book and 'adults' making a baby, it's outrageous and such misinformation can have bad repercussions down the line, especially when later contradicted. Bloody stupid.

Never forget, a baby grows inside an adult's body

Indoctrination, straight into the bin

ETA: Today, my DD pointed out a shop display made from a stack of books with holes drilled through them held together with a metal pole.

She noted that the books were destroyed and asked which book I would add to the pile.

Both of us had a good think but could not come up with one at the time

Now I have a strong candidate

Nonsense book. Burn it.

Ouch that's horrible. And unhelpful too. I thought the point of this kind of book was to help children understand the world around them, the world of which they and rheir bodies are part. This just obfuscates.

God, what an embarrassment.

That is dreadful. Duff info from start to finish.