40 Reasons not to have children - book

[Judy1234]

Description of a book in the Sunday Times from France which is interesting - 40 reasons not to have children.
www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2042068.ece

Sure, there is much more pressure on women to have children here - if you get to thirty without children (as I did) you get harsh words from your gynaecologist, anyone interviewing you for a job etc. Women who reach 30 without children are considered very strange, and by 35 you are just extraterrestrial and ought to be on the psychoanalyst's couch.

So, yes, that much is true.

Author of book in question isn't much cop however

Well, it's certainly possible to make a better moral and ethical case for not having children than it is for having them.

from the link:
Just imagine. There?d be fewer of us around so rents would be cheaper, it would be easier to get a job and there?d be fewer traffic jams.

?And if people didn?t have to think about their kids all the time, they?d think about what they really want and just go out and do it.?

weird outlook on life

madamemez - really?

I can't think of any moral/ethical arguments for not having children, personally

Which doesn't mean I like the pressure on women to have children here in France - I think it leads to women having children out of a sense of duty, and then they don't enjoy them much

She sounds a bundle of laughs, doesn't she? I bet she loves going to see impenetrable arty black-and-white films and and discussing their philosophical ramifications with her lover in poncy cafes.

Where exactly is this "baby-mania" she speaks of? FFS, if you want to have children, have them, and if you don't, then don't.

Tricky to get an advance for a book saying 'Oh, I dunno, have them if you want them and don't if you don't' though, UD?

Well, quite... she even admits the book is 50% deliberate polemic!

Corinne Maier

eeek! scary!!!!

Why scary? Because she wears glasses and not very much make up?

I was thinking more of the penetrating stare.

And the glasses are odd...

UnquietDad - "babymania" - in France you get medals and reductions on trains, in museums etc if you are a "famille nombreuse" (mother with three or more children).

Sounds a good idea!
Do you still get them if you are a father?

No.

The medals are for mothers.

So, my partner who has 3 children but with two different mothers gets nothing.

Personally, I think that's the right idea in France given the average level of paternal involvement in childrearing .

Anna - or it could be that cause and effect are reversed....

So, let me get it right, if Pierre and Sabine have trois gosses, entitling sabine to a "famille nombreuse" reduction at the musee, and, say, Sabine has a lie-in one day while Pierre takes them out, he doesn't get the reduction on the door because they are avec Papa and not avec Maman?

Yes, it's famille nombreuse.

But Pierre doesn't get a medal .

If they introduced medals for fathers it might work quite well! So that if a dad changes a nappy and proudly goes on about it, when DW says "What do you want, a medal?", he can say, "Actually, yes!"

I think in France quite a lot of fathers already have a few children they don't own up to so I'm not sure that the country is in the business of encouraging fathers too much .

Love UQD's Pierre and Sabine.

Anna8888: in an overpopulated world, with many unwanted, homeless children starving, it would be more ethical to sterilise yourself and adopt, if you want to parent.

(THat's the ethical argument, BTW, not my personal case history)

madamez - I don't buy that argument

Anna8888 fair enough. But what's the ethical argument for having one's own children?

Dear God, Corinne!

This doesn't happen often, but I agree w/UD, she's truly chilling.

To propagate your own brilliant genes