How many kids? Part 1

I've been watching with interest (and dipping my toes in) the debate over Sarah Palin's childbearing and childrearing choices and to what degree they reflect on her as a person, a mother, and a candidate. I don't want to rehash those arguments here, but the subject did get me thinking about choosing to have large families in today's world.

Is it OK to look down on a person's judgment for bringing five kids into this world? Is it relevant if they have trouble affording five kids? Is this changed if both parents have demanding jobs that take them outside the home frequently?

Does it matter if all five of the kids were planned? Does it matter if all five of the kids were unplanned? Furthermore, what do we think about the women or men who have five children, but from multiple partners?

Are any of these scenarios fairly subject to ridicule?

First, let's look at the problem with being too judgmental of people's childbearing choices. The affordability question is a big slippery slope. Where do you draw the line? If people waited until they could "afford" kids, we'd have a huge population of first-time parents waiting until they reach 40. (Oh, wait a minute...) While there is nothing ethically wrong with waiting until 40 to have kids, on the societal scale it means high numbers of infertility issues, maternal health issues, and greater risks (like Downs) for the resulting children. So, perhaps the affordability issue can be overemphasized.

We all have different standards on what is affordable. Are we really going to tell working class people struggling to make ends meet that they are ineligible to have families? The other side of the coin is that wealthy families get "permission" to have large families that are morally barred to less well off families. Hey, this isn't China. Rich people get more cars and homes and flashy entertainment systems than the rest of us, but should they get to have more children?

Connected to the wealth issue, is it better to have multiple kids if a parent can be at home as opposed to daycare? Again, a messy standard. The decision whether to go the childcare route versus at-home parenting relies on many factors. We know that for families and children both options have their positive and negative aspects. Why should that matter in the decision to have kids? Or are we telling career women that they are not allowed to have kids or at least not very many of them?

The planned versus unplanned distinction is a whole can of worms. I think we can all agree that due to inadequate sexuality education and irresponsible personal choices, a great many men and women unintentionally find themselves on the cusp of parenthood. But to paint all unintended pregnancies as evidence of moral failure is unhelpful and unfair. Approximately 50% of pregnancies in the United States are not planned. That would be a big number of "irresponsible" couples. Of women seeking abortions, over half had been using a method of birth control the month they got pregnant. Sometimes people are inconsistent with birth control and sometimes birth control methods fail.

I'm proudly pro-choice. But I would never judge someone harshly for making the personal choice to continue an unexpected pregnancy to term. Afterall, it's all about choice. If you negatively judge a woman who has had more than one child unplanned, you are putting a woman who has had multiple abortions on higher moral ground. I would assert they are of equal moral standing.

And as for the multiple partner angle, both fathers and mothers are judged for this, but women are judged much more harshly for having multiple partners than men. And women are usually the ones actually taking the responsibility for the resulting children! I'm not going to say that perhaps a person who has had five kids by three partners may be making some ill-advised and selfish decisions. But I would also urge people to pause before judging and assuming too much. None of us know where life may unexpectedly take us. Some of us are simply more lucky in love.

Too many kids?

NEXT UP:
Now that I've argued that it is unfair to judge someone for having large numbers of children in these kinds of circumstances, I'm going to get a little judgmental myself. I'm going to say that no one in North America today has the moral standing to birth large numbers of children regardless of circumstance. I'm not advocating a China one child policy, but in the world in which I'm in charge, no one bears five kids. Stay tuned.