Wow, I never thought I'd see the day I'd agree with anything Ellen Goodman wrote, but she was was pretty much right on with this column...
Jobless mom who decided to have octuplets is 'nuts'
...
It turned out that Nadya Suleman already had six kids at home. The Suleman Fourteen don't have a father, they have a sperm donor. They were apparently all conceived by in vitro fertilization with the last eight presumably implanted en masse. For good measure, their mother doesn't have a job. And her family recently filed for bankruptcy.
...
If Suleman's brand new publicist succeeds in selling her as a "smart," "joyful" mother with a "wonderful sense of humor" who is grateful "for the miracle of life," maybe this mother will be able to roll her degree in child development into a reality program that supports them all.
But right now, a reproductive business that generates so much controversy has produced a remarkable consensus. Infertility treatment for an unemployed, single mother of six? Eight embryos in one womb? There must be a proper word in the medical literature to describe this achievement. I think the word is "nuts."
Yeah, that's more or less the long and short of it. It might well have been Nadya Suleman's dream to have children, but one would think she'd have had the foresight to get to the point that she could support all of them before she had them. Talk about putting the cart before the horse. She doesn't even have a job? The kids don't have a dad to speak of? Family filed for bankruptcy? If that's not the grand trifecta of personal irresponsibility then it's pretty damn close. I know there are those out there who would accuse people like me of being selfish for not wanting to surrender my guns (or, for that matter, license and register them), but I'd say the real selfishness lies in people like Nadya Suleman, as apparently she was only thinking of herself and her short-term desires. "I want kids! NOW NOW NOW! I'll figure out how to support them later!" At least folks like me retain some sense of responsibility and at least some sense of awareness of the fact that every action has consequences. I think that personal responsibility is arguably the foundation for liberty and a return to the ideals of the Founders, and to the extent the effort fails to get back to those ideals, it's going to be precisely because of people like Nadya Suleman. That may be harsh, but I think it's the truth and the truth is sometimes that way. Comments?
|