On Not Doing It for the Kids

I read an interesting article in Maclean's (thanks, Twanna!) on the merits of not having children and the stigma that couples who decide not to have kids face. Personally, I'm happy for my friends who wanted to be and are parents--and am equally proud of my friends who've decided not to. There is absolutely no good reason to cave to the insane pressures of others to have a kid if you don't want to. The last thing this planet needs are more kids whose parents resent having had them. (For the record: My parents decided to wait a year before starting a family--and received a barrage of guilt tripping for it from both sides, the most ludicrous of which being, "Don't you want to give your husband a baby?") Personally, I think people who opt not to have children should get a tax credit for population control.

And what about the nation of children needing homes and proper parents? I dig the idea of adopting kids from other countries, but yo--we've got kids here needing help as well! "The system" can be blamed into eternity, but unless people demand real change, it's going to remain as difficult to adopt as it already is. I believe a woman's right to choose (whether to have a child or not) falls under "inalienable," so when I hear about these right-to-life people staging protests, my question is, "How many kids have you adopted?" It's all fine and well to tout the value of life, but it seems to me the movement should be more comprehensive. Okay, so you've made sure another child is born, but what are you doing to ensure the quality of that life?

I'm also disgusted with the way the culture treats its children. It's lovely to talk a good game about education and child care, but I see so little action on both fronts. Every official running for election touts the need for education--which this country needs to get up to snuff lest it fall behind the rest of the world. How can we realistically expect to sustain a country full of poorly educated people? I understand that the solutions aren't simple, but I also understand that that isn't a good enough reason not to get in there and fix it. What kind of world are we creating for today's and tomorrow's children?

Having children was a dream of mine. Somewhere along the way I realized that, for me, it made more sense to adopt one, given the plethora we have. Then I worried about the difficulty that being gay might place on said dream. My hopes were restored during a trip to New York's annual gay expo, where the Department of Social Services had a booth. When I hit 30, though, I reexamined the desire--which pitted the type of parent I wanted to be against the demands of my creative life and aspirations. I'm not one of those people who can do both, so I surrendered the former. And while the decision has come with its share of rueful days, I take solace in the surrogate nieces and nephews my friends and cousins have seen fit to bless me with and am pleased to be contributing to the quality of their lives. And no, I don't think it gives me any higher moral ground than the right-to-lifers; it just makes me a happier, less-harried human being who will defend the right not to have children until the day he...dies.