If You Can't Feed'em Don't Effin Breed 'Em -- 17 Kids is just TOO DAMN MANY

An article that I just read "Family Welcomes Baby No. 17", has with just cause placed me high upon my soapbox today. This article was a lifestyles piece on the Largest Family in America. Basically two imigrants, since moving to America seven years ago with their eleven children, still do not speak English [the parents nor the kids]. Since they have been here, they have had six more kids. This, for those of you who aren't too quick with the math, means that they have SEVENTEEN biological kids. Now as disgusted as it makes me to imagine spending over 136 months or 11.33 years of my life pregnant, some women may find it to be a wonderful gift from God. Yes, it is amazing that one woman could carry 17 kids through 17 different pregnancies-- I'd never do it, but I shall not discredit it's wonderous nature. So all of these kids could be a beautiful thing.

Those of you who know me, know exactly what I am about to say next. There are TWO MAJOR problems with this story.

1. No one in this family speaks English.
2. The dad is a maintance worker and a security guard [not taking anything away from those professions], and the mother is a domestic engineer [a housewife]. This means...they are recieveing public assistance [the nice way of referring to Welfare] to take care of this larger-than-a-football-team hoard that they have chosen to breed-- this is not an assumtion; the article clearly states that they recieve public assistance.

There is no quicker way to become someone for me to despise than to have either of these traits agianst you, but to have BOTH is beyond blasphemous!

Let me explain something; some of us in America work for a living. Granted we may have good jobs that allow us to live well above the poverty level, but we don't do it so that we can support other families who do not and irresponsibly choose to breed more offspring that they cannot support. Having kids, to some, is a beautiful thing. It is a beautiful thing to carry on your lineage. However, there is a level of responibilty that should come along with having offspring.

Here is a hint: If you are already on welfare, or "public assistance" then you ought not have anymore kids. It really is as simple as that. The very state of being on public assistance, is acknowledging that you cannot finacially support your offspring, and that you need help.

For the life of me I cannot understand why people do not understand that their kids should be their own responsibilty. Now, I understand that sometimes people hit hard times, and need help while they kick the dust off and try to regain stability. That is understandable, but to continue to produce offspring when you know your finacial situation has never afforded you the ability to care for what is yours is just irresponsible. It is irresponsible and unfair to those of us who take care of what is ours.

Yes, while writing this, I understand that "welfare recipients receive less than blah blah blah percent of the tax payers dollars." That is not an argument that means anything to me because it is all negated by the fact that "welfare recipients recieve..." I don't care how much. I don't care if it is a penny of every dollar; I do not work to sustain people who do not think enough of themself to get off their lazy asses and sustain themselves. Again, I am not talking about the people on welfare because they have had a rough spot in their life, but always being in a rough spot for lack of looking and actively trying for better, or due to over reproduction when one already knows financially providing for current offspring is beyond a burden... therein lies my issue.

Aside from the finacial aspects of having a family that is so large, there are other consequences of having a family that large that are just irresponsible. There is no way, that as a parent, you can emotionally give each child the time and nurturing that s/he needs. Yes they have lots of brothers and sisters, but there is nurturing time and a parent child bond that needs to be created for children to be healthy that these kids just really can't have.

The articls states that the older kids substitute for the mom sometimes and take care of the younger kids. Howfair is this that your older kids have to be consistent baby-sitters because the parents don't know when to say enough. I say, once you cannot be a fully funtional parent to each child individually, then it's time to stop having kids. Just stop.