The August question:
Enough about the myth that the childfree are selfish because they don’t have kids.
How can parents be selfish? What are signs of a selfish parent?
September question: Look to your right in the On-the-Ground section and tell us your story~
The site, Life in a Shoe, recently did a list of reasons to have kids, in response to lists of reasons they have seen out there on why not to have them. It is run by a Christian family that has 12 kids. They make it clear that they think the reasons not to have children are ”based in immaturity, materialism, myths, and misconceptions.”
Well we can obviously contest this, but given this month’s On the Ground question re how parents can be selfish (see the On the Ground section to the right), I thought we’d take a look at their list and see how many on it are based in selfishness–a reason that boils down to what having the kid will do for the parent. How many do you count? Here’s the list: (more…)
Seeing the recent article in Time on debunking the myths of only children, I thought of Bill McKibben who told us all about this and more over ten years ago in his book Maybe One. He talks about how single kid families can work and are necessary to help ensure we not exceed “planet capacity,” or the population that the earth can support.
This idea takes me to the issue of overpopulation. Some experts believe it’s driving many environmental issues and global warming. But other experts don’t agree. There’s a range of expert positions. Let’s start with a most interesting one. Check out this video of Ted Rosling, Professor of International Health at Karolinska Institute in Sweden. Definitely worth the watch–
