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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
"This article only reinforces the increasingly empirically proven fact that the child-free are able to outrun, outwork and outscrew the breeders around us. For the sake of yourselves and your children, please keep the hell out of our way."
Wow, what an ugly sentiment.
First of all, nobody forced you to read this article. Secondly, I question your assertion that the child-free can "outrun" those with children. Many world-class runners, especially marathoners, are faster after children than before. There's medical evidence that having children improves a woman's cardiovascular system. (I personally am posting PRs, now that I've had my second.) There's even evidence that childbirth improves a woman's brain function and raises her IQ a few points.
As for the assertion that the child-free "outwork" parents, are you calling your own parents lazy? Remember them? You wouldn't exist without them.
So you don't want to have children. That's OK. But that doesn't give you any grounds to be so filled with hate. I feel sorry for you.
Maybe I'm just lucky. Maybe by internist and my physician friends are zealously dedicated to following protocols, respecting patients and anticipating patients' questions and needs. Maybe I'm lucky, but I don't know why anyone would settle for anything less.
Sexual function and dysfunction are such matter-of-course concerns for OB-GYN care that it's bizarre and absurd to have to state and re-state this.
Let me put it another way: if an OB-GYN isn't supposed to discuss pre- and post-partum sexual function and dysfunction with a pregnant woman, then *who* is? A pulmonologist?
Also, a "capable but indifferent" physician is, as good studies have clearly demonstrated, just a polite way of describing a physician who's going to have defend against any number of malpractice complaints.
Once again, if your physician is as "capable but indifferent" as Ms. Williams' physician, you need to find yourself another doctor.
Strange diversion these letters to the editors take. And yet these letters take on the same theme over and over again...
Women complaining about their hubsands desire for sex after children, and men complaining they don't get enough sex.
One wonders whether monogamy is pretty pointless. Pretty clear that the male biological imperative is to spread as much seed around as possible. The female biological imperative is to have and nuture children.
Sure some of us manage to take ourselves out of the equation and exercise self-control over our animal instincts and choose not to breed. But most give into the selfish animal instincts and have to replicate ourselves endlessly.
No amount of feminism or male chauvinism seems to be able to alter that fact.
One wonders what the point of monogamy is? Seems to me we'd all be a lot happier just giving into the fact that we are creatures of lust and wants. Little more.
One reader posted:
"We also tend to think of women as objects of physical beauty whose primary purpose is to provide sexual gratification. This is fundamentally warped. We are not window dressing for our vaginas. Men who marry for beauty tend to be less content in their marriages, as Neil Chethik discovered. Something to keep firmly in mind when choosing a wife.
We also have a distorted notion of marriage itself. It's as if we assume that we are entitled to a person who will gratify our every need for the rest of our lives. I can't imagine anything less realistic. The notion of a happy marriage as one in which nothing has ever gone wrong is even more warped."
This was in response to my assertion that men are ill-prepared for the radical changes in personality, dress and sexual habits that occur is some women after child birth.
Notice how the female readers first tried to dismiss these radical changes in personality and sexual habits as "no big deal" or as "minor changes" that men should feel embarrassed to even complain about. The point being these changes some women (not all) undergo can be dramatic. (A huge drop in sexual activity that lasts for YEARS is not a minor change by anyones definition)
Again, if a man were to lose almost all interest in sex and refuse to engage in sexual activity with his wife for years -- would women be so quick to say there is no problem? Would they argue that it's just evolution? Would they try to shame the wives if they asked for a divorce because they hadn't had sex in years?
Of course not.
If a man suddenly stopped dressing as he once did prior to a child -- threw out all his suits and ties and wore only sweat pants every single day, would that be a problem for a women?
If a man suddenly refused to have sex with his wife after she gave birth for the next five or six years (or did it only after the wife begged) would women consider that a problem or just a "minor adjustment" and "perfectly natural"?
If a man suddenly shaved his head (much like how women almost ritulaistically chop off all their hair once they become mothers) and ignored all onjections by their wives would that be an issue for a woman?
If a man suddenly gained, say, 100 pounds after his wife gave birth and refused to go to the gym and dismissed all objections by his wife that he lose weight -- would women consider that an issue?
The answer to every one of the questions is yes. Yes the wife would have a huge problem with a husabnd that suddenly gained 100-200 pounds, dressed very poorly and took no pride in his apperance and refused to have sex with his wife.
Yet when women do this exact same thing after child birth -- notice how the double standard come up.
Notice how men are now pigs for being dismayed that their spouses have these same issues that-- an yet if they occured in a man would be grounds for divorce.
Wouldn't we all laugh at a man who refused to lose weight if his arguement was that society should stop viewing him only as a sexual object?
And if HE refused to have sex with his wife -- should we shame wives for being sexual greedy? Should we tell that that they are wrong and selfish?
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
