(no subject)

[gategrrl]

A woman's right to have as many babies as she wants only goes as far her right not to endanger the children that result from the desire to have a collection of children, and the ability to create the type of support she'll need to raise huge numbers of children.

Personally, I'm not so sure Ms. Suleman, the woman who now has 14 children under age 8 will have the ability to care for so many children by herself. Her mother is not going to become her de facto babysitter any longer; her father is exiting the country for work to help support her (when he should be working for his own retirement)...and she believes that she's going to have the time to earn a Masters degree along the way! There's a reality disconnect going on in her head.

Comments

[sars.livejournal.com]

It should be illegal to have that many eggs implanted.

[ladyjax.livejournal.com]

I'm wondering what her gyn/obstectrics team was thinking. Seriously, didn't any of them think this was not a good idea?

[sars.livejournal.com]

Exactly. Surely they can refuse to treat her if they feel what she's doing could possibly endanger any resultant children's lives. Surely they have a duty to refuse treatment.

[ladyjax.livejournal.com]

Surely they have a duty to refuse treatment.

Or at least suggest counseling. I'm just dumbfounded by this.

[superbadgirl]

Speaking as someone from a large family (much more reasonably spaced out, and my mom had us one at a time), it's not just a financial and physical matter. It is impossible to spread the love adequately among that many children. I never doubted my parents love, but I feel to this day I didn't get quite what I needed as an individual. Perhaps those fourteen kids will be more lucky, but I just can't see how it's possible.

This should never have been allowed to happen. There is allowing people the freedom to do what they want, and there is realizing there are some deep-seated issues at work behind these kinds of wants.

And don't get me started on the glorification of ginormous families - I'm thinking TLC's Jon and Kate Plus Eight and 17 Kids and Counting, especially the latter. Are we supposed to be amazed? I'm horrified.

[gategrrl.livejournal.com]

I don't watch the Duggar's shows...mostly because I find that sort of obsessive pumping out of babies as unhealthy, physically for the mother (your *insides* can fall out--truly) and I'm not into their brand of Christianity.

Jon and Kate...Kate is generally castigated and hated for her perfectionism, unwillingness to let the children get dirty (at all); and that's the sort of thing that pops up passively aggressively on the show, when Jon mutters about it under his breath to his kids when he takes them out.

I was shocked when I moved out here about how many large families there were--families with five or six kids. It was amazing. And I'm from a heavily Irish Catholic area (Boston). I figured it was something in the mountain air in the town where we moved.

But the shine is off of multiple births now. They're not anything unusual these days, and companies are going to be less willing to foot the bills for "accidentally on purpose" broods of children. Does this woman deserve help? No, HER CHILDREN deserve all the help they can get.

I frankly wonder if CSS is going to be called in by the hospital administration, or social services at the very least. I would hope so. And my hope has *nothing* to do with her being a single mother.

[betacandy.livejournal.com]

I just don't think a sane person could want gobs of children all at once that way.

[superbadgirl]

PS, those dolls are probably going to give me nightmares. That many dolls in one place is disturbing, I can only imagine that many babies. *shudder*

[khek.livejournal.com]

When I saw her on the Today show, she stated that the reason she wanted so many childen was because she grew up an only child in a dysfunctional family. And yet, there she is, living with (off?) her parents.

I'm guessing that with only three people in the family, they were the default dysfunctional ones? The mother who's spending her time babysitting and her father who's going off to find a job to support her?

I think her doctor should be thrown out of the medical profession. Or at least, out of any kind of fertility practice.