Too Much Myself Not To Have Children

Last week, a friend of mine pointed me at a misbegotten blog post called "Too Smart To Have Children" which I promptly picked apart. From this article, I learned that, as an American, I don't want children, and - by way of contrast - I want as much debt as I can get.

Yeah, I know. Surprised me, too.

See, until I read that, I would have sworn that I was doing my best to avoid debt. I mean, you'd think if I wanted debt, I'd have kept my old credit card, instead of paying it off and canceling the account. Admittedly, I got another credit card about a year ago, but at the time I would have sworn that I did that simply (and only) because without it I had no credit score whatsoever. But, no - turns out that it's because I want to run up a huge pile of debt. As much of it as possible, as quickly as possible.

And, of course, I was dumbfounded to learn that I don't want children. I would have considered the number of tests, medicines, and careful planning to be some sort of evidence of actually, y'know, wanting children. But it turns out that I'm American, so I must not have. Hell of a thing to learn, especially now: the older boy is five and a half, and the younger one's nearly two.

But, well, you can't argue with mindless overgeneralizations, so I guess I'm going to have to face facts.

And the fact is, I love these boys. I love being their dad. (And I love being married to their mom!) I love showing them things, and I love it when they show me things. So, in honor of the fact that stupid rhetoric is stupid (and wrong), join me below the cut while I show off my boys!

Friday Joke Part Three: The Pope vs. The Rabbi

...And all this has reminded me of yet another joke that I remember from a long time ago. This is an old joke, and there are at least a dozen variations of it, but this is the closest I could find to the version I remember. It's kind of a visual joke, though, so you'll have to see it on video to get it.

Friday Joke Continued: In Remembrance

Another religious joke, because apparently that's where my brain is at today.
One Sunday morning, the pastor noticed little Johnny standing in the foyer of the church, looking at a large plaque that hung there. After the young man of seven had stood there for some time, the pastor walked up beside him and said quietly, "Good morning, son."

"Good morning, Pastor," replied the youngster, not taking his eyes off the plaque. "Can I ask you, Sir -- What is this for? Why are all these names listed on here?"

"Well, son, these are all the people who have died in the service," replied the pastor.

Soberly, they stood together, staring up at the large plaque. Little Johnny's voice barely broke the silence when he asked quietly, "Which one, Sir, the 8:30 or the 10:30?"

So hey, as long as I'm throwing these out here, what are your favorite religious-ish jokes?

Friday Joke: The New Priest

I remember hearing this joke in my youth - from a priest, no less - and thought I'd share it in the hope of brightening everyone's Friday. So, enjoy!

The new priest was so nervous at his first mass, he could hardly speak. Before his second appearance in the pulpit he asked the Monsignor how he could relax. The Monsignor said, "Next Sunday, it may help if you put some vodka in the water pitcher. After a few sips, everything should go smoothly." The next Sunday, the new priest put the suggestion into practice and was able to talk up a storm. He felt great. However, upon returning to the rectory, he found a note from the Monsignor. It read:

1. Next time, sip rather than gulp.
2. There are 10 commandments, not 12.
3. There are 12 Disciples, not 10.
4. We do not refer to the cross as the big "T".
5. The recommended grace before meals is not "Rub-a-dub-dub, thanks for the grub, yaaaaaaaay Lord!"
6. Do not refer to our savior, Jesus Christ and his apostles as "J.C. and The Boys".
7. David slew Goliath. He did not "kick the shit out of him."
8. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are never referred to as "Big Daddy, Junior, and The Spook".
9. It is always the Virgin Mary, never "Mary with the Cherry".
10. Last, but not least, next Wednesday there will be a taffy pulling contest at St. Peter’s. There will not be a Peter pulling contest at St. Taffy’s.

A story to illustrate plot

Firstborn: "What is plot?"

Me: "Well, let's look at a story."

Once upon a time, there were two boys. Their names were {Firstborn} and {Secondborn}. Firstborn and Secondborn were lost in the woods. They had no idea how to find their way home.

Firstborn: "Let's say we went to Target and bought a new calendar and put it on the wall. And then we went to bed, and when we woke up our bed was in the woods and we didn't know how we got there."

Me: "Okay. Creepy. We'll work it in."

So Firstborn and Secondborn got out of their bed, which was now in the middle of the woods. They looked around. Then they saw something moving in the bushes - something really, really big. They said, "Ahhhh! A monster! Run away!" And they ran and ran.

Then they came to a clearing. You know what a clearing is? It's an open space where there aren't any trees. And in that clearing was a house. Firstborn and Secondborn saw the house, and they said: "A house! Maybe somebody who lives there can help us." So they went and knocked on the door.

The door swung open, so they went in. Inside the house was a witch, in a long black dress and a pointy black hat. She looked at the boys, and said, "Oh, good, you're just in time for dinner."

Firstborn said, "Good. We are very hungry. We would love some dinner."

But the witch said, "No, you don't understand. I am very hungry, and I'm going to have you for dinner!" And she used her magic to close the door and make it so they couldn't open it.

Firstborn: "And then I went bonk! bonk! and I threw her into the wall!"

Me: "Okay, then."

So the witch was knocked out. And since she was knocked out, the spell that held the door closed didn't work anymore. So Firstborn opened the door and said, "Now we can go home."

But Secondborn picked up the witch's broom. "I bet we can use this to get home," he said.

So Firstborn and Secondborn went outside, and they sat on the broom. Just then a big monster came out of the woods. The monster said, "You bonked my witch! I will eat you up!"

But Firstborn and Secondborn said, "Too late! We are going to fly away on this broom!" And they flew up into the air, and the monster couldn't get them.

Then they flew the broom all the way home, and lived happily ever after. The End.

Me: "So, who were the characters in the story?"

Firstborn: "Me, and {Secondborn}. And the witch... and the big guy."

Me: (surprised) "Very good. So the characters are Who Is In The Story. Now, the plot is What Happens In The Story."

Firstborn: (looks thoughtful)

Me: (ticking off points on my fingers) "You woke up in the woods. You ran away from the monster. You found a house. You went inside. The witch tried to eat you. You bonked the witch. You took the broom. You escaped the monster. You flew home. That's the plot."

Me: "Now, what's the setting?"

Firstborn: "The forest."

Me: (surprised, again) "Very good. You've been working on this in school?"

Firstborn: "Yes."

Me: "Well, now when you get to plot, you'll know what the plot is, right? It's what happens in the story."

Firstborn: "Right."

* * *
Notes:
It occurs to me on reading this that Firstborn also has a natural understanding of roleplay. In fact, this might count as the first GMing I've done in years.

Firstborn will be six in June - so he's just over five and a half years old right now. Secondborn will be two in mid-April, so he's about one and three quarters right now. So while Secondborn talks in the story, he mostly sort of burbles in real life - his current vocabulary is about two dozen words. ("Mommy, Daddy, Elmo, Apple, Water, Please, Choo-Choo (train), Beep-Beep (car), Meow (Cat), Pizza," and like that.)

Music Recommendation: Heartless Bastards

Heard this band on the radio this morning and thought I'd share. The Heartless Bastards are an Austin band, and worth a listen:

Rebuttal - Too Smart To Have Children

Trigger warning: rape, death penalty, and adultery are all mentioned in passing.

One of my iFriends just pointed out an article titled Too Smart To Have Children on a blog called "Set Your Heart." To be fair, I should point out that I don't ordinarily read that blog, and I am unfamiliar with the belief tradition that its author is working from. (In fact, I wasn't initially sure that he was even a Christian; there's an awful lot of Jewish terminology in his writing. But the Statement of Faith for the place where he's an Elder explicitly includes both the Old and New Testaments as the inspired, infallible, and authoritative Word Of God. So, y'know, pretty clearly Christian.) Also, this particular piece is from all the way back in July of 2011, so this is not what you might call a timely response.

Having said that... well...

Okay, first of all, it opens by quoting from Psalm 127. Understand, I don't think there's anything wrong with that particular Psalm in itself; it's just that people seem to read it... oddly. In particular, that's precisely the same Psalm that a father in the Quiverful movement recently told me that he "prayed over" before coming to embrace that particular lifestyle. (This was the same man who insisted that the "Godly Model" of marriage was obvious to anyone who prayed over it, and that anyone whose marriage was set up differently didn't have the faith to follow God's Plan For Everyone. I'm paraphrasing, but only slightly.) So seeing this particular passage again throws up a huge red flag for me.

Then I started reading the post itself, and the red flag was suddenly joined by all sorts of flashing lights and blaring sirens.

The recent census has reported that children are now making up less of America's population than ever before. According to the passage of Scripture above, children are a heritage (an inheritance, a gift) and a reward from Adonai. What can we deduce from these two facts?

Okay, I can actually answer this. What can we deduce from these two facts? Not much. From a Biblical perspective, the U.S.A. now has less of the blessing of children per capita than it had before. That's about all you can deduce here.

Unfortunately, deduction isn't actually what our author has in mind.

Adonai has given us a choice; we choose if we want to be blessed or cursed. The Bible says that children are a blessing but Americans don't want children. In fact they consider them 'inferior goods.' The Bible says that debt is a curse but Americans will take take as much of it as they can get.

See? This isn't a deduction. It's a mess of assertions and rampant over-generalizations. Frankly, I'm a bit irritated to be told that Americans don't want children: I'm an American, and I wanted children - and now I have two boys, and guess what? I still want them. I just don't want any more children.

Look, I'm down with the idea that children are a blessing. Thing is, they're also a responsibility. They take work, and use up resources: time, money, energy. They require attention. Saying that they're a blessing doesn't change that. I generally consider beer a blessing, too, but that doesn't mean I should be drinking as much of it as possible as often as possible.

That said, it's a nice rhetorical setup, isn't it? There's a choice between Good and Evil. Children are good. Debt is evil. Everybody wants debt, nobody wants children. Who has time to deal with nuance or complexity when the world is clearly going to Hell in a handbasket?

As our nation moves further and further away from God and His Torah (instructions), it becomes more and more profane. In the US it is now the norm to choose curses over blessings because the curses make more sense in this secular society and the ways of God are seen as archaic, antiquated and flat out foolish.

Okay, first of all, these sorts of blanket statements about the rise of evil in the world? People have been saying that since at least 2800 B.C. So at this point in history, I'm having a hard time taking the assertion seriously.

Second, the ways of God are seen as archaic, antiquated, and flat-out foolish? Nonsense! The only reason I don't stone disobedient children is that I don't have a gate to drag them out to. Here in Texas, we're all in favor of imposing the death penalty for adultery. And, of course, the country has really never been the same since we gave up on the idea that anyone convicted of rape should have to marry his victim and pay her father fifty shekels of silver.

Last week I came across an article from Time Magazine that labels fertility [in women] as a stumbling block to higher education. A recent study has found that:

"...women who had children early — by their mid-20s — were much less likely to continue their education beyond the required first two years of high school; they were also less likely to achieve a higher degree later in life than women who delayed childbearing until they finished their education."

The researchers of this study find it is necessary to inform young women about this potential difficulty in pursuing an education. It is their belief that by educating young women, they will be able to make better decisions, like how many children to have. But what does God have to say about education?

The researchers of this study "find it necessary" to inform people of their findings, because that's what researchers do. It's not like they're conducting a smear campaign against pregnancy, here. They're pointing out that women are far more likely to finish their educations if they do so before they have children. This is factually correct, and something to consider if getting an advanced degree is one of your goals. So why would our author object to this?

I can make a guess, of course: children are a blessing, so if women are putting off having children in order to pursue advanced degrees, then clearly they aren't receiving all the blessings they could be... and by extension, they're depriving the rest of us of those blessings as well. But, of course, our author does not explicitly say this.

Instead, he asks: "But what does God have to say about education?" I'm just going to go out on a limb here, and suggest: "Not much."

And, look! I'm right!

With the help of Bible software, I searched for the word 'education' in a few of the more popular translations of the Bible and did not find it once.

But is that going to stop us from drawing conclusions anyway? No, of course not.

However, the Bible does mention the word 'knowledge' 130-169 times, depending upon the translation. In fact, Proverbs 1:7 declares that "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge." Before we can have a proper understanding about anything, we must first acknowledge Adonai as God and His Holy Word as relevant for our lives today. Only then will we be able to see the world through His eyes and make decisions that are in alignment with His will.

And this is relevant how, exactly? I mean, okay, points for a boilerplate restatement of basic Christian doctrine, but this has nothing to do with higher education. It does nothing whatsoever to support your thesis.

And then, just as I'm shaking off the whiplash from that abrupt change of topic, our author changes direction again:

Am I saying that women should not pursue a higher education? Of course not.

See? His Christian beliefs aren't repressive. Education is fine for women, as long as they understand that having as many babies as possible is far more important.

The point I am trying to make is this: we must be very careful when we handover our young adults to professors and teachers in secular universities and colleges.

Oh, and we should be careful about letting women get educated. It might be dangerous. He's saying that, too.

So, to recap: education is fine for women, and it's dangerous so we have to be very careful about it.

When believing young women become immersed in a secular educational system, they can sometimes become too smart to have children. They may end up rejecting the blessings that our God desires for them.

That's right. God desires the same blessings for all women, and those blessings are children. Advanced education, rewarding careers, and personal development are never blessings from God; babies are always blessings from God. Get your priorities straight, people: babies. Babies are the priority. Face it, if you're not having babies, you are not being blessed!

We may be one of the smartest nations in the world but we are obviously[1] not receiving all the blessings that God intends for us to have.

And the solution for that is clear: less education and more children.

But wait! The Apostle Paul clearly states that celibacy is the Christian ideal, and marriage is for people who lack the self-control for celibacy. So by delaying having children, and possibly even educating themselves to the point of complete unmarriageability, these young women that our author is so worried about may actually be moving closer to a Godly lifestyle! Clearly,[2] this is something we need to encourage.

[1] I love the way "obviously" gets tucked in the middle of that sentence. It's the sort of thing that college Sophomores tend to stick into papers when they haven't actually defended or supported a conclusion, and they're hoping the professor won't notice.

[2] See the note on "obviously", above.