Letters to the Editor
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Yep!
Rich people are often pompous, oblivious idiots. Don't worry, their kids will "rebel" by killing themselves with drugs, becoming whores, or both.
So what's the news here?
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OK, this is my last post .
You are breaking my heart. Shame on you all. Shame shame shame. The women's movement is not being set back by women who make the choice to quit work, or become CEOs, or have 10 babies, or get married, or go lesbian, or cure cancer, or wear blond ponytails. It's being set back by those of you who insist of judging those choices with only the slightest knowledge of others' real lives, desires, and motivations. Right-wing American thanks you for your help in turning back the clock.
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Pretty judgmental, Rebecca
Just another attack on "breeders," who can't win no matter what they do. Kids are a contribution to society. I'm glad we're past the point at which they are the only contribution a woman is allowed, but let's not devalue motherhood as a choice.
As for these mothers not bothering to get a job, there's quite a lot to be said for having "enough" money. Leave the jobs for those of us who need them to pay the mortgage, please.
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Perhaps
it's merely about women wanting to keep their boobs big for a longer time without surgery.
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Children a fashion trend?
Rebecca and others, please get a grip.
Some people like children. Some people want children. Some people want several children.
I was raised in a family of six children. Despite lots of normal kid bickering with my siblings, I always enjoyed being part of a big family. As far as I was concerned, it was great! And I always felt sorry for kids who had just one or two siblings, or none at all. Now that we're all grown up, I am still close to my siblings; they are my best friends.
Certain economic and biological and luck-of-the-draw factors have limited my own family to two children. But if conditions were different -- if, say, we were not so strapped financially -- I would love to have a couple more kids, perhaps adopted kids. For me, four would have been the perfect number, though it's not a number I can afford.
I liked growing up in a big family. I wish I could have a big, or bigger, family myself. So sue me.
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Channeling that Ivy League energy
Whether you judge these women or not, I think the article makes excellent points about women focusing on their children to fulfill their career ambitions. Those of us who were raised in the 70's and 80's were taught that we could do anything - we didn't have to choose just from teacher, nurse or mom. So we went to college and planned and started careers. Somewhere along the way, and for a myriad of reasons, some decided to stay home and take care of the kids. All that ambition and prompting to "be anything!" will make you feel a little guilty if you decide to stay home and raise kids and largely ignore them like our parents' generation did. So people had to become uber-moms. Quality time all the time! Flashcards! Super-duper classroom mother! Micromanage the kids's lives! Because otherwise, what are you? An overeducated babysitter? Unambitious? Certainly not fulfilling all that potential everyone told you you had. But if you're great at your job as a mom, then it's ok.
This is not a matter of money, although the women in this article have the financial means to take this to another level by having more kids. Many middle class women don't work and fall victim to making their children's lives their sole focus in life. I know I've seen it, and I'm sure I'm not alone. Overparenting crosses socio-economic lines. I have no problem with women who decide to stay home with their kids, I just don't know why that means that so many have very little else in their lives. Having a hobby does not make you a bad parent.
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I agree. Please, all educated, wealthy people stop having kids
Let's leave the kid-having to our ever growing non educated populice that gets by on welfare and minimum wage. Our country in 25 years will be even more wonderful than it is now. Can't wait!!!
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oh the horror
The rich and the affluent are having a lot of kids. Let me rephrase it: the people able to support and educate their own children, in--gasp--two-parent families are having a lot of kids. How horrible this is. It's much better then the multi-child families are the ones of the urban poor--babies born, by different dads, to single mothers unable to feed them, babies destined to spend their childhoods being supported by the rest of us.
Now, that's a lot more normal, right?
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feminism should be more than not judging people for bad decisions
Two comments:
- I'm tired of this whole feminism-as-never-judging thing. What a waste of time. If we can't judge each other, we can't better ourselves, and we can't solve the real problems that face all of us. We judge people every day (creationists? republicans? etc), and nobody gets off just for being female. These people are making a bad decision that effects all of us - squandering a privileged opportunity to produce children in a world that has too many already - and very much NEED to be judged.
- After reading so many articles about Ivy League graduates doing moronic things, I've lost all respect for these institutions. If they're producing people who have no sense of ethical responsibility to the rest of us, then they're failing their mission.
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Rich white people are afraid of being outnumbered by the darker hordes
Sounds like that is the real reason people here are supporting the rich white women having lots of rich white kids. Birth control for the coloreds, breeding like rabbits for the rich white folk. How lovely for you... heil Hitler!
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Missing the point
I think many of you are missing Traister's point, which is that these women are having more kids than they ever wanted, strictly because all the cool moms are doing it. Here's some quotes to ponder:
"mom of two kids who didn't know she needed more until she moved to posh Darien, Conn...
To stay cool, Madden-Kline had a third little bundle of social status. But then a biking buddy told her she was pregnant with her fourth. Madden-Kline tells NPR, "I was like, 'I'm so jealous of you.' And sure enough, within the month, we're biking again, and I'm like, 'Guess what? I'm pregnant with No. 4 too!'"
"according to the women interviewed by NPR, part of the point of having multiple offspring is to secure approval for their choices from their peers without actually punching a clock."
THIS is why this story is so vomit-inducing. Not that some people want many kids. I myself grew up in a large-ish family and we all enjoy having a big extended network of family. If you WANT 'em, go ahead and have 'em. But if you're just having them because everyone else is doing it and you feel that therefore you have to, too, or because you're bored and no one appreciates how accomplished you are, so you are now creating children you don't really want just so you can use them as "projects" to display your particular skills and talents and that you ARE worthwhile as a human being, well, that's just pathetic. I agree with Traister - if that's the reason you're having these kids, get a job!