More On the Childless Life: Bookworm Vs Kathy Shaidle
From the Bookworm Room, in response to recent posts here at PJ Lifestyle: Is a familial genetic legacy the right reason not to have a baby? No!:
PJ Media has had two interesting posts about whether familial genetic legacies are the right reason not to have a baby. David Swindle passes on an article about the fact that well-known “comedienne” Sarah Silverman (I use the scare quotes because I don’t think she’s funny) announced recently that she will not have children because she and her family have a history of depression. Silverman can’t bear the thought that any children she has might suffer the same fate. Conservative blogger Kathy Shaidle also thinks that her family’s genetic possibilities — in her case, shortness — makes having babies a bad deal for the babies. (Shaidle offers up a number of other reasons why she wouldn’t have a baby, all of which make it clear that she’s thought the subject through carefully and really isn’t the maternal type.)
Neither woman is concerned about a life-threatening genetic problem, the kind that mandates that the child will suffer terribly and die young. Both are concerned, though, about traits that have affected the quality of their otherwise successful lives. Within this framework, Silverman and Shaidle are both wrong. There are many reasons not to have children, but their genetic concerns aren’t the right reasons.
To begin with, there’s no guarantee that a child will inherit whatever genetic problem exists in the family. Keep in mind that babies aren’t clones. They are, instead, the end result of thousands of years of genetic mix-ups. My great-grandmother had fraternal twin girls. One was six feet tall, the other five feet tall. They represented the two genetic extremes in just one family line. I’m five feet tall. My (male) cousins on the maternal side hover around 6’7″. They married short women; I married a tall man. All of our children are clocking in at average. Nature does what nature does. We can make some educated Mendelian guesses about the probable outcome when a couple have a baby, but those are just that — guesses.
Dr. Helen also weighed in too:
I read with interest Kathy Shaidle’s post here at PJ Lifestyle called “I Kid You Not: Top Four Reasons I Don’t Have Children.”
She mentions a couple of reasons such as bad personal experiences whereby you might end up ruining your kid’s life and bad genetics and other reasons such as your temperament and pop culture. Okay, the latter two, especially the former, I understand. You don’t have the temperament for children. Okay, fair enough, but as for ruining your kid’s life, why does it have to be that way? If you had a bad childhood, doesn’t it make sense to have children so that you can give them a better life than you had? As for genetics, don’t we all know people who don’t seem that great who have kids who are fine, or at least okay? Even people who are depressed don’t necessarily have kids who are depressed. And if they are? Get them treatment, just as you would for diabetes or other ailments. Apparently, Comedian Sarah Silvermann does not want kids because they might have mental illness which runs in her family. Human beings have problems, do you have to be perfect to be born? I hope not because we would all be goners.
It’s not short stature that Kathy is on about:
“……In general, people with High Functioning Autism tend to make fairly frequent social mistakes involving because of their inability to accurately predict someone else’s thoughts, feelings or reactions to something, in the same ways as the non autistic person. They may also forget to use many of the basic social pleasantries (e.g. forgetting to knock before entering a room; or when greeted with “how are you?” they may not reciprocate by following on to ask how the other person is)……”
http://www.answers-about-autism.info/high-functioning-autism-defined.html
She wrote her blog entry in a humourous bullet list to try and illustrate this. Many people didn’t get it…….
Thanks Lzzrdgrrl — YOU got it!
And as you say, not everybody did.
Alas, that’s the joy of being a writer
People read and remember what they want to.
Along with “shortness” (“sheesh, everybody’s so serious…”) I also added “arthritic” (while they are now in remission, I have systemic lupus erythemetosis and myositis, both of which could, theoretically, come back tomorrow and leave me bedridden again) and (20 years sober) “alcoholic” (which I hope speaks for itself.) I take depression meds to help keep both of those at bay, because both can be triggered by stress.
Again, “your mileage may vary.”
I. Was. Talking. About. My. Self.
Often, other people’s hyper-defensive, hostile criticisms of another’s candid writings are an indication that the writer has… touched a nerve.
I’ll leave it at that
Thanks for the link, lzzrdgrl. I’m INTP too and it perhaps also explains my own indifference towards kids and pets.
I know some late 30-40 something women in panic mode about reproducing and I just can’t work up the sympathy. I have thought of nice ways to say “you’ve waited too long, so move on” and feel that a sigh and nod work better.
But I do get it. My arguments remain the same, whether I’m talking about autism (which may or may not be a genetic problem) or being short (which is) — in the genetic crap shoot, it’s just as likely that our children will be born normal as not; medical advances and a person’s own strengths mean that yesterday’s problem may be tomorrow’s opportunity; and disabilities may not necessarily limit a person. Add to that the unusual, and unexpected, blessings that disabled children often bring to their families, and you just don’t have a good reason to use the possibility of a non-fatal genetic inheritance as a reason not to reproduce.
I do think that someone who doesn’t want children shouldn’t have them. They’re a ton of work, and they make it impossible to love ones life on ones on terms. Once you have kids, you live it on their terms. But fear of potential, non-fatal genetic defects simply isn’t one of the better reasons to refrain from pregnancy.
Lastly, though, I think Silverman is wise not to reproduce. In her case, the handicap her hypothetical children would suffer wouldn’t be a potentially troublesome genetic legacy. It would be the real damage that comes from having an aggressively narcissistic parent.
> Apparently, Comedian Sarah Silvermann does not want kids…
For once, I agree with her.
Hmm. I’m with Dr. Helen on this. As a doc I’ve had many patients with much worse genetic diseases who decided to have kids. Think back to the day before we could screen for many of these I clearly remember that people who wanted kids just took their chances- even really crappy diseases like Huntington’s chorea which is fatal and has no cure to this day. Because the worse case scenario (autosomal dominant trait like Hungton’s) is a 50/50 chance, and in most cases it’s much less than that, especially with the multifactorial inheritance of mental illness.
The other thing to think about is from the perspective of a person with the disease. The alternative to that is NOT being healthy- the alternative is never having been born. Most people with afflictions, regardless of the severity, would choose to be alive with their problem than not existing at all.
For example, I remember about ten years ago, the first genetic tests for cystic fibrosis became available. Healthy parents could be tested for it (it’s a recessive gene meaning you need a double dose of it to be affected), and if they both had the gene there could be prenatal testing with the option for abortion if the baby ended up with both copies. The CF Foundation was initially mum on this test, but now you will find a discussion of it on the website if you look hard enough. After all, who wants to hear that the best way to solve one’s problem is to “prevent” it by killing off babies who have it?
So people who don’t want to have kids because of family health issues are sparing themselves from possible suffering, but some might wonder whether that is actually is the best interest of the hypothetical children. I would say that it probably reinforces a decision that they have already made on other grounds.