I don't believe in outlawing children.

Every so often, I go through a rash of postings on Facebook to share articles I have found that day while perusing the news websites. Recently, I posted the following link with all sorts of semi-scathing comments and my friend thought I reacted with defensiveness. The article reports the recommendations of the UK's green adviser that we all get serious about insisting that families limit their childbearing to no more than two children.

It might seem that I am defensive about this issue because I have five children. I have personally procreated more than most people I know will in their lifetime, and hopefully I’ll have at least a dozen grandchildren alternately bouncing on my knee, one at a time, someday. My knees will be completely shot by the end of my life.

No, I am not defensive because I have five children myself, although I do think that people with no children, or possibly just a couple children, may not “get” why anyone would want to have more than that. Here in Alaska, I have been blessed to know many families with many more children than we have. In California, I felt distinctly out of place for having more than two (and for being in my twenties at the time, at that).

The reason I get defensive about this issue is because:

THE WAY TO MAKE A BETTER WORLD FOR OUR GRANDCHILDREN IS NOT BY ELIMINATING THE GRANDCHILDREN!!

When I think about a pregnant woman, I think about that little person inside her as a living person who will probably come out of his or her mother and proceed to have a long life, ultimately being loved (it is the hope) by his or her parents and someday having a family of his or her own.

Or maybe that won’t happen. Maybe that person’s life will have pain, abandonment, and stress. I certainly know many people who have had far harder lives than mine, as most of my own struggles have been largely created by my own desire to “take the hard way,” as my mother would put it, and not by circumstances imposed upon me. There are many admirable people I know who have had a terrible upbringing with abuse and pain who have triumphed and established what seems like a very enjoyable and rewarding life for themselves.

Either way, the vast majority of people would not rather be dead. I am of the opinion that we should be fighting like hell to ensure that people can live and have the opportunity to experience this crazy ride. Are you a third, fourth, or fifth child? Was your mother or father a third, fourth, or fifth child? How terrible if that person was made or coerced to stop at two and you didn’t exist. I guess you can argue with me that this is illogical because we are already here and those future little 3s, 4s, and 5s aren’t.

One reason I am defensive is because establishing an ad campaign or “national conversation” about family planning and abortion results in coercion toward abortion as a choice when it is something that should not happen under coercion at all.

Example: A woman gets unexpectedly pregnant with child #3. She wants the baby. But that’s something you just don’t do. Government mandate or not, a campaign can do the job just as well. How about a national campaign to adopt babies? Or a grant program to fund adoptions? Adoptions cost a small fortune. Most people I know who would love to adopt babies have made a comment at some point about the debilitating costs of adoption.

I am so thankful to be living in a place where having lots of kids does not get us lots of strange looks. I remember all the looks we’d get in Los Angeles where, demographically, it was very weird to have more than two kids and to be in our twenties at the time. "A young white woman should not have four kids!” (Yep, I heard that one.) That was something that the Hispanics did, for example, and humorously, the only time I have ever overheard people criticizing my brood was by a Hispanic family here in Alaska when I was big and pregnant with #5. I am not, of course, trying to make some big point about Hispanics. I’m just pointing out that often these issues are charged with racial stereotypes and become a very racially pointed topic inadvertently. Our country has a long history of racism which is terrible, shameful, and even involves eugenics. God help us.

Why is it that we can come up with a cap-and-trade idea for manufacturing plants but the most creative we can get in this area of fertility is abortion? How about a cap-and-trade idea for family sizes? People who don’t want kids can get sterilized and “trade” their two-child-allotment to another family who want more. In a way, I’m joking, because this is an area the government should not be dictating, in my opinion, nor is our government dictating, so I don’t need to devise these schemes. But for all the talk about contraception, I’m very surprised that women have tolerated the dearth of healthy and effective options. There is a sexism in our culture which always looks to the woman to “deal” with these issues. The above article, for instance, appeared under the “Woman” heading of the Times. When I clicked on the “Man” tab, hoping against all hope that this article would also appear under it as though it might be of interest to them too, the heading shining out at me was “Does more sex cure a low libido?” Today, it's about "Men and Botox."

Before making sweeping statements about family size, it may behoove us to have a fresh conversation about how to be more green, regardless of family size. Last I checked, many large families I know don’t drive around as much. It’s too dang hard to get all the kids out and about, and we certainly don’t schlep kids around every night in a gas guzzler to after-school activities every single night of the week (big families, forgive me for generalizing…I’m just speaking from experience!). Clothing is seldom purchased new because hand-me-downs are cherished as the money-savers they are. Frugality is often a true need, not just a fun pastime. I myself, having used cloth diapers all these years, have probably used fewer disposables than a mother of just one baby has in the course of her child’s diapered years. We have a neighbor up the street who routinely drops a fresh toy or pair of shoes on our porch which her children have either tired of or outgrown and they’re usually brand new. Rock on. You go ahead and buy it all new if you want to! Not me.

Sadly, China provides us with an example of government-imposed fertility rates which, accompanied by what seems to be the inherent sexism of mankind, has resulted in entire generations of women being wiped out through selective abortion. What is cherished so much in western countries as a right has become a virtual annihilator of females in places like China and India. We are lying to ourselves if we think we here in America would do it differently. I like to think we would, but we’re not inherently better than them.

Holding the personal opinion that humans should only have two babies is your right. But to actually promote that can have terrible consequences and can also stifle our creativity in dealing with the issues at hand. Let’s not punish future generations of human beings, taking away their lives simply because our own choices over the past century have been so shortsighted.