11:58 - This makes me sad
This is a really excellent article on why our birthrate has been falling: The Baby Boycott by Stephanie Mencimer.
Sadly, I think the article is pretty close to correct. I've been really sad to notice that women who are smart and capable (the ones I'd most like to have children with) are generally not very interested in having children.
One reason I've become interested in polyamory is that I feel it offers a partial way out of this problem by distributing some of the burden of raising children over more people. But it still is a real issue.
I'm not so much for all the government mandated stuff since I generally feel that lots of government mandated stuff is both inherently unfair and tends to backfire in unexpected ways. But I am interested in changing this situation in some way.
![[mood icon]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/pengies/sad.gif){kind=small}
sad
My ideal is a small poly household of 3-5 adults and a bunch of kids in a big giant house. :-)
I don't think that's a bad idea. But making it happen this way is.
I think a healthy birth-rate for that purpose is something like 1.9 per woman, not 1.3. 1.3 is scarily low. But that's Japan. It's not that bad here. I don't know what the exact statistics are, but I think it's like around 1.8 for US born women.
But we do have a different problem. The higher your class and the more educated you are, the less likely you are to have children and transmit the values that got you those things to them. It should be the other way around.
Almost all the intelligent people I know are simply choosing not to have children, including myself. Burdening oneself is not exactly the smartest thing to do.
The closest thing I have is a desire for my code to continue on, but that's more out of a fear of death and would probably have to involve cloning myself.
There are a lot of attempts to explain why: better nutrition, better education, kids are simply exposed to more situations... Or possibly something I'll explain in a moment.
Lots of people seem to assume that "humans are getting dumber". It's a convenient argument for lots of people on both sides of a lot of arguments, but the data just don't back it up.
Here's the theory I learned in Ed Psych - the people at the lowest end of the intelligence curve are frequently not capable of having an adult relationship and having children. Everyone at the top of end of the curve is capable of having children and some percentage of them will. Since there is a correlation (though smaller than some people assume) between a child's IQ and that of her parents, and since more people at the top half of the curve have the option to have kids, the curve will trend higher over generations.
Sorry for the lecture, this is a topic dear to my heart.
They believe that if you allow anything other than the "normal" Leave it to Beaver "traditional family"--or even suggest that such a thing exists or can work--then nobody will ever have, or even attempt to have, that "traditional family". Hence all this legislation and lack of legislation that attempts to force people into a very specific lifestyle.
It's the same thing that fuels anti-gay sentiment as well; absolutely anything that might create, allow, or even suggest a non-mainstream family model is instantly, dogmatically rejected by the right-wing.
And, alas, much of the left-wing isn't doing a whole lot to fight against this exclusivity. There's nothing wrong with living like the Cleavers if that floats your ducky, but it's the left-wing's job to say you don't have to if you don't wanna. And they're not doing it. Not really.
What that all adds up to is pigheaded determination by the right-wing to get their way even if it brings everyone to ruin, and the left-wing rolling over and taking it as usual...and in the end, everyone loses. Ain't democracy wonderful? *rolls eyes skyward*
Maybe
I don't think you sound prejuidiced
The thing most responsible for the values and future success of a child are the values of their parents. It's a cycle. People can and do rise above their backgrounds, but it isn't common. So I don't think you sound prejudiced at all, just realistic.
IMHO, one of the worst effects of closet racism in our country is that it makes reasonable discussions about the effects of class and poverty very hard because our politicians are so very fond of using those as a code for talking about race and so we feel like racists when talking about them.
However, the other points are also true. I would have had a child years ago, and probably be contemplating starting a second (I wanted two to three) if I could afford to have children. I can't. So, we delay and hope we will be able to afford children later. At this point, 3 is pretty much out of the question unless I end up with a multiple pregnancy, since I simply don't have enough time to have 3 before the risks of birth defects start climbing, especially as I want to breastfeed each child for a fair bit, which means keeping a decent interval between pregnancies. At this point I am worrying that even if we do get to have a child, having a second child may become a very difficult decision - forcing me to either have the child later than I'd like to or shorten breastfeeding more than I'd like to. And that assumes no difficulties getting pregnant should I try. Every single day increases the risk of birth defects for me already, and I am quite aware of that.
However, people often think we need a birth rate of 2 kids per couple to keep ZPG, but we don't necessarily. When you have your kids is as relevant as how many you have, and with longer life expectancies, fewer children can keep us at ZPG. Personally, I'd like to see some way of helping people in their early to mid twenties to have children, because then you have better health for the children than with older mothers and it's better on the woman's body. Physically, the late teens are actually best for women to have children, about 17-21, I think. But I think pushing it back a little to get increased maturity and experience in the parents is a good idea. But currently that's pretty much financially ridiculous for everyone I know.
I've thought about this as well. Ways for fairly young women to have children without wrecking their lives.
I would rather see a decline in the population. Maybe it will rattle some cages. Get a few things changed. Plus as someone said earlier. Better it be now, and voluntary, than later and tragic.
Yes, I still say that though my son is the light of my life and I consider myself redeemed by his birth. I know on a practical level I’m not a genius with something spectacular to offer the world, I consider that my contribution through him will likely be my greatest. Intelligent people might not necessarily make the best most nurturing caregivers because hanging out with children is not exactly intellectually stimulating. Believe me ;-)
In an ideal world I would choose to raise another child, preferably adopt, but rationally I know I’ve only so much attention, energy and money. At any rate, the high culture that you seem to esteem, ie that created by ‘intelligent’ people engaged in intellectual work is a culture that has always been directed largely by those with idle hands, ie, people who had the leisure of not being busy wiping down their children’s backsides (males) and elites.
I do not understand people’s unceasing desire to biologically recreate themselves and then claim it is about the nurturing and the raising of the child. There are SO many unwanted already born children and children of other families that need resources, encouragement, attention, etc. The ‘culture of poverty’ that you fear will be perpetuated by only the lower classes having large families can be countered with programs of hope and activism on the part of individuals such as yourself who are not actively parenting. You could make a difference(perhaps you do I don’t know) to hundreds with your life if you choose to rather than to just 'that one' biological child of your own.
Speaking of poly, wanting a biological child so desperately reminds me of people wanting ‘the one’ in the mono sense. It seems a limited way of looking at life on earth and the capacities of love. Children are not the property of their parents and the responsibility for uplifting the younger generation should not fall solely on them if we want society to improve. We can ALL make a phenomenal difference in other people's lives and the lives of their children.
Just my thoughts, hope I didn’t offend, and the 'you' here that I'm speaking of is more of a generalized than personal one :-)
As a counter-example I give you![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
memegarden. :-) And you yourself seem fairly bright as well. Your long introspective posts betray a lot of careful thought on your part.
I think our personal accomplishments are often more important to the world than the ones everybody esteems. I enjoy putting my work out there and seeing people use it or get excited about it, but what I really want is a family and children of my own.
I have a friend who's a foster mom and is thinking of adopting the child she's fostering. I don't think I'd be able to deal very rationally with the child she has. She has sometimes feared for her life because that child has so many problems and knows well how to manipulate the system against my friend.
I strongly suspect there are very few babies available for adoption.
Here's an article from this year about the current "Baby Boomlet" that is occurring. 2006 was the highest birthrate year in the US since 1945.
http://www.citizenlink.org/content/A000
Interesting. :-) I was thinking that various forces may change this. For example, the working from home thing and helping out with chores I think is big. Also, I think employers are starting to get more flexible with their schedules and not insist that employees be full-time.
Several women on my friends-list are having kids. Most of them are poly though, which is something I think also helps.
If that's the case, over the next few years, I think there's going to be a huge shift in how corporate America views motherhood.
Just an observation
I'm going to assume you mean women receiving assistance with housework from the partners in their life, and say this...
It's not helping, it's being a part of something. I also hate when women say their husbands are "babysitting" the kids. They're not babysitting, they're PARENTING.
I think a lot will change when people realize it takes 100% from everyone to make a household work, with or without children, and that until they give it all they have, people will continue to look for the easy way out. It's much easier to be a woman, maintain a home, and not have kids than to have kids, take care of a house, work, and have a partner who thinks putting away 2 loads of laundry or starting the dishwasher really makes it any easier.
Sorry, I get soap-boxy on this. I live with my extended family (by love, not blood) and mom runs a business, is home with the kids, keeps up on the house and finances, while dad is gone 5 days a week, and puts in MAYBE 2 hours effort a day when he's home. The rest of us in the house make up for his lack of effort. I'm not ok with it, but it's also not my relationship to change.
/end rant
Re: Just an observation
Point taken. Though I didn't really mean 'helping out' in the sense of 'doing a favor'. I meant 'helping out' in the sense that when you take on a job you are helping the company succeed and could be said to be helping out the company.
I love it!
Wishing you all the best,
Jenny Block
Author of "Open: Love, Sex, and Life in an Open Marriage"
www.jennyonthepage.com
Re: I love it!
Not to be too combative, but one thing that I do find distressing is the "nanny I get to have sex with" phenomena that seems to be popular in polyamorous couples. I see a lot of couples advertising for a girl to join them with this idea in mind, and I think that it's a problem of a class I call 'environmental problems' in which any one instance is fine but the behavior in aggregate leads to serious problems. In this case the problems being both having polyamory just degenerate into being another name for polygyny and the possibility of a lot of single men with no prospects for finding a partner.
It's not just women who can contribute to childcare. Most of the poly families I see in which this works out well have multiple male members as well as possibly multiple female members.
Re: I love it!