to find myself agreeing with this article?

[camperdahlia]

Came across this article in yesterdays Times, saw the headline (Stop! Think! Do you really want that baby?) saw the photo of the pretty 12 year old writing the article with TWO KIDS OF HER OWN, and got myself in a total temper.

Then to my horror found myself agreeing with the article! Have I gone mad?

can kind of see her point but she is forgetting basic biology and the urge to reproduce!

YANBU to agree with her. I think she has a valid point. many people I know had two girls or two boys and had to have that third child because they wanted the opposite sex to 'complete' their family. ugh. keeping up with the jones' more like...why can people not just be happy with their lot??

Is 'so I can feel like a real MNer' a valid reason in her opinion?

Stealth none of her friends said 'I wanted children because my biology told me so'. Maybe they were too embarrassed to say it was a primal urge and that's why they seemed to have rubbish reasons along the lines of 'not getting any younger' or 'because it's what you do'.

Why should we feel the need to justify our choices?

I thought she cam across as a tad smug.

Surely this is just the same old cant served up with a slightly different hat on? You can't have children unless your vocation is to have children (ergo can't go out to work because that would deny the vocation / must go out to work due to being Islingtonite chatterati but write articles to pretend not).

Amazing how it seems only to be women who have children without any thought. Good job the men are thinking things through so carefully

My child wasn't planned out, DP and I hadn't been together long, situation was far from ideal.

However it's all worked out wonderfully and I truly believe I was fulfilling the primal urge to have kids that has been so strong in me since puberty.

Having a baby might not be a good idea for everyone, but I'm afraid biology doesn't conform to our societal ideals!!

I think this is an incredibly smug article. I doubt her reasons for having children were any more thought out than most people's to be honest. She seems to be using a couple of examples of where someone she knew made a poor decision to assume that everyone (except for her of course) is pretty stupid.

I certainly did not think about having children as a "vocation" but then I don't think of my career that way either, and actually I don't really know anyone who does. I've worked with a lot of doctors, and I've not noiced that they have planned their careers in a way that is that different to me. They have chosen to do what they are god at, and then when opportunities have arisen they have followed them up. Some with huge passions have pursued them, but they are the minority.

I also think that those who advocate that individuals chosing not to have kids are the salvation to the pressure on resources are not lookng at the whole picture. Most countries in the West have falling populations (if you exclude immigration) and that is going to bring a whole bunch of problems, as an increasing number of elderly people are dependant on a decreasing number of working people. Historically as groups of people become more educated, healthier and are able to control their lives better (principally but not eclusively throguh birth control) birth rates fall. Therefore it seems to me that that is where the emphasis should be, not on scorning those who can't explicitly say that they chose to be parents because they decided they had some sort of gift for it (not sure how that woudl affect birth rates anyway).

It made me very cross actually. Smug in the extreme. And my children were also meticulously planned.

I thought this article was ridiculous. I didn't plan to have a child - I had a child because I fell in love with a man. And the biological, primeval urge took the better of me!

That doesn't mean I am not a devoted parent, however, who parents as rationally as she can.

" saw the photo of the pretty 12 year old writing the article with TWO KIDS OF HER OWN,"
huh!

She uses the word parent, but she clearly means Mother.
Yet another pointless mother-bashing article.
Dads are allowed to have a vocation outside parenting, but not us apparently.

Fwiw, I never wanted kids as a youngster. When dh and i settled, we wanted to replicate the happy homes we came from and were lucky enough to conceive ds. Had we been unable to have a baby I really wouldn't have minded. Just because I am a woman, I do not have some desperate need to care for a baby. I do not even like babies!

I thought she was smug as well. Of course HER reasons for having children are perfectly acceptable - just everyone else who clearly doesn't think things through.

And why is it a problem to have more than two children? Is the wish to have a girl/boy really so morally reprehensible? So long as you can provide for your children (with love as well as materially) then what is wrong with wanting your family to be complete? As it is actually unusual to have more tha two children I really can't see why this is keeping up with the Jones' (unless you live in an environment where everyone has three or more children). In the UK there are plenty of people who are only having one child, or indeed none at all (we are below replacement rate at present). If we really want to reduce our population perhaps we shudl be looking at the real growth area, that is our increasing longevity...

Re: article. What a load of shit.

Clearly I have lost the plot, then! I found myself reading it ready to be angry, and then changed my mind.

Although I expected her to, I didn't think she was mother-bashing. I read it as - she wasn't condemning mothers, but the pressure put on women by society and the media to feel they HAD to be mothers, otherwise were failures. I know I've certainly felt that.

I've got one DS, really happy with him, but always have pressure put on by ILs to have another - "only child" "it's not fair on him" etc. which makes me crazy. And friends ALWAYS asking, "when are you going to have the next one?" GRRRRRRRR.

Thought this article highlighted that really well.

You're all fast readers by the way

alot of couples I know have had more than two kids because it's the 'fashion'. their friends have three or four so they have to do the same. I do also agree that there's nothing wrong with completing your family in any way you choose (if that means having more than 2!), but at the same time there are many who do it to keep up with others in their area. sad but true

nicky you got there first.

it ignores the simple fact that many men are keen to become fathers as well, and treats them all as some godawful stereotyped sperm provider to the desperate for kids woman.

What a load of shit.

Re population boom, yes, but we're not replacing ourselves in the UK at the current rate are we?

So either we open up our borders to keep the population replaced, or we keep procreating.

And i don't see the first happening any time soon...

I think on top of biology, others do start a family because it's expected of them (even more pressure put on after a couple marry). I agree with OP. Don't think its a dig at anyone, I think it's just exploring why do so many feel obliged to start a family if their heart really isn't in it.

@ nicky and bigbellas - but isn't the whole point of the article that society puts pressure on women, not on men? And that women should be able to make their choice without this pressure?

Yes BigBella, it was my dh who got broody, not me.

Nah, Camper, she is having a go.

i didn't get that from the article at all TBH camper.

It is an interesting and valid point, but not one that I believe is raised by the article.

Its opener "What is it with women and babies?" is carried on throughout the article.

She ignores both biological imperqtives and men who are keen fathers (like my DH).

nicky spot on, you are more eloquent that me

Aw, shucks, Bella.