I have 3 kids -- two sons who are 3 years apart & then my husband & I were surprised to find I could still get pregnant 10 years later with a girl.

During the time when it looked like we were a 2-boy family, many people expressed pity for my not having a daughter. Fewer people seemed to express that to my husband, although my memory of my own life is that I was much less critical of my dad than my brothers were & my sons are less critical of me than they are of my husband, so what's going on with all that? Also, those commiserating with me on my lack of a daughter relied on gender stereotypes, even though both my sons actually had some "feminine" traits (albeit different ones from each other). My older son is very polite & considerate (more so than his sister) & even though his polite & considerate self would be right before some complainer, she would be saying "Boys just have no manners."

We didn't know the sex of our first child until the 8th month & didn't tell people until he was born. During that pregnancy, one guy did whine to me about how hard it was to raise girls, but that was when I knew that I was expecting a boy, & he was telling me that crap while assuring me he "knew" I would have a girl from how I walked. That, & the fact that I was interviewing him for a job & he seemed oblivious that I had once been one of those wretched girls whose existence he was bemoaning left me sure he was a nutcase.

People were so sure we were delighted about our daughter's sex that I began to feel a little defensive about that third boy who never was -- I do love my sons & would have loved a third one, although I am very happy with my daughter, of course. You hate to think any of your kids would think s/he was intrinsically a disappointment. If I express too much joy about my daughter's sex, what will my second son think? Why not give yourself something else to contemplate -- like how much easier parenting is now that we have vaccines & antibiotics? I still remember reading an Andrew Delbanco book (The Death of Satan) & his noting that many parents in the 1600s saw their kids go to bed with a fever and never arise alive. Throw in a little contemplation of the maternal mortality rate, & life looks really, really good.

The bottom lines are: 1) you love your kids, right? Past a certain point, I wouldn't worry about what anyone else thinks or even that much about what you think -- there's a kind of primal wonderfulness about having a baby -- just enjoy it. 2) Teasing people during pregnancy (about labor, bad outcomes in the kids, having the wrong sex kid, the bills, etc.) is probably more of a universal in our culture than people preferring boys over girls or vice versa (btw, in our culture aren't more adoptees girls than boys?).

If Polanski wanted to suck up to the courts, etc. the least he could do is stand up for his victim at this late date & tell his powerful buddies (including whoever this woman's employer is) that she's not at fault. Not sure why that concept should be so hard for anyone to grasp, but when a child is raped, it's not the kid's fault.

Nutcases like Bill O'Reilly & Gore Vidal & the 30 Republicans senators who voted in favor of letting military contractors rape at will & the Catholic hierarchy still trying to blame liberal culture for their bishops tacitly approving child rape may not get that, but most ordinary, feeling people do. In the cases of Mike Tyson & Kobe Bryant, many people did try to try the victim. If women don't stand up for themselves (not the victim -- the rest of us) & put strong pressure back on those who do this, men can rape us -- any of us -- with impunity. If women & men with humanity don't stand up for not harassing this woman, then who will?

Look, Polanski has been convicted. Moreover, he has acknowledged having sex with someone he knew to be underage. So the victim's role in the trial is over & there's not much the news media can get out of her that will mitigate his guilt -- even if the worst the media says about her true, she was still 13 & he knew it & he has acknowledged having sex. So what's the point in interviewing her, other than the "fun" of it for the media? It keeps them from having to actually report on something that might matter to most of us like Afghanistan or healthcare or the recovery.

The issue is whether Polanski is sentenced for fleeing the country & what his ultimate sentence is for raping her. When Polanski was convicted, victim statements were not being used in sentencing so she hardly needs to make one now. To the best of my knowledge, no victim is required to make a statement even now. Frankly, the fact that she has been so scarred by his acts that she won't try to stand with the prosecutors says more about the lasting harm that he did her than the anything mitigating what he did. The biggest issue is do rich & powerful men get away with crimes simply because they are rich & powerful?

My favorite line is this one: "So, what does it mean? Well, I think it means this: Keep you dumb. Take away the media."

Certainly, if you define media to include any vehicle that conveys any thought or utterance or expression, then taking the media away would strike a grievous blow to education & enlightenment. But when you consider what's on TV (without even counting the Fox folks), it's a little hard to argue that knowledge is what gets transmitted -- certainty & a feeling that one is knowledgeable, perhaps, but knowledge in the sense that we're talking about descriptions of reality? Of the known universe?