People sometimes ask me why I don't have children and I usually give them some smart-ass answer such as "because I can't have kittens," or something equally evasive. Why I do this is because we live in a world where I've received more hate mail over a section of my shop that is devoted to childfree people than I have over designs such as "Fuck You Mr. President." People are threatened in a weird way by those of us who choose not to breed.
And yes, it is a choice, one I made when half my graduating class was missing because they signed up for the military at 17, got sent to Vietnam, and were dead by graduation day 1969. We read their names in tribute and handed their empty diploma cases to their grieving families. At that time the military was mostly male and we young women looked around that room empty of most of the boys we grew up with and left the room as Pacifists. I swore right then, with many of my friends, that I would never provide children to be used as cannon fodder.
My other reason was over-population. I saw a world filling up too fast with too limited resources. It is far worse now. If we keep reproducing at the rate we are now, our future and those of children born in the next few years, will be a future of wars fought for limited resources such as water, food, and unpolluted land. We are already dying for oil. That should be a clue and wake-up call for those who still don't get it.
Later in life I was told a third reason to never have children: I carry the gene for Hemophilia. Any male child would have more than likely been born with this disease. And while I've heard all the arguments why someone who has this can live a long and happy life, I didn't feel I should inflict it on a child if I had the choice not to. I chose not to.
At the same time, I realize there are amazing people in the world who need to have children. They need to raise the next generation to be the amazing and enlightened beings they themselves are. The answer to this is very simple. Adopt. There are so many children all over the world who would be grateful for a safe and permanent place to sleep with parents who loved them. There are children in this country, in our own neighborhoods who have grown up in foster homes because they are not cute enough, white enough, perfect enough to be adopted. This is so wrong.
One of the worst arguments I've had with someone on myspace was with a couple people who tried to convince me there was a shortage of babies to adopt and that's why abortion was wrong. There is NO shortage of babies to adopt if you aren't looking just for cabbage patch dolls. If you really care about humanity and the planet and saving lives, then adopt a special needs child. Adopt a child who is not a baby. Adopt a foster child who longs for a real home they won't have to eventually leave. Then tell me there are no children to adopt. Before then, you are not being compassionate and caring about human life. You are being a fucking racist who only wants a dolly with blond hair and blue eyes.
After the latest round of hate mail I decided to expand the section of my child-free shop and will be adding more designs to it just because I don't like racists, I don't like people who think it's alright to tell me what to do with MY body, and who judge others for choices they make that are different. If I was like them I wouldn't have any friends with children. I wouldn't be around children. I would just live in my biased reality and call it good.
But I'm not them and I have both child-filled and child-free friends. I have friends who adopted children from other countries. I have friends who adopted crack babies. I have friends who foster children no one wants. To me these are the true heroes of the world, those who give a home to the less than perfect. That makes them perfect humans in my book.
Changing minds one t-shirt at a time. Visit Ursine Logic for more designs.
1 comment:
Amen!
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