The real speech of mothers, and their commentary as mothers on what we're used to thinking of as "the political" is, suddenly, itself part of political speech. Maybe I've been ignorant, but when I read these these voices I think, "holy shit, this is a massive change."
Now you only have forty years to catch up on, amigo.
I don't get the (relative) wave of excitement at the rise of "mommy blogs." I get pretty much the exact opposite impression that ogged does - that it's pretty much a bunch of women defining themselves primarily around the basis of their offspring and their ability to produce offspring. Wooo, they can use curse words in it, too! Big deal. A pig in a dress is still a pig.
Wait...who's the pig in your scenario?
I believe that in his scenario a woman who defines herself primarily around the basis of her offspring and her ability to produce offspring is the pig, and blogging is the dress.
That's what I figured.
I imagine that's going to be a pretty popular sentiment around here.
gluehorse,
How do you define yourself?
I'd really like to hear this.
Gluehorse, have you actually *read* any so-called "mommy blogs"? B/c, not to put too fine a point on it, you are wrong. Moreover, even if you're right: what is wrong with a woman who is highly invested in her kids? Why must she be called a "pig"? Yes, some parents are controlling and/or smothering. But the fact is that parenting kids, especially young kids, is an incredibly demanding job, and I don't see why someone who says "I'm a mom first and foremost" is qualitatively different than someone who says "I am a professor, first and foremost." Except that culturally we've defined the subject of parenting/kids as boring/useless/puerile/silly/worthless/etc. Because we're sexist.
In other words, I agree with ogged. I think even more important is the associated "daddy blog," in which we realize--gasp!--it's not just women who care about the private sphere.
Then again, there's the backlash. Whether it's the moms saying "you're a bad mom" or the trolls. "Bad momming" from other moms, however, is much less of an issue--because moms generally can be counted on to agree, on some fundamental level, that judging other people's parenting is a shitty thing to do (assuming children aren't actually being beaten). Trolls, otoh, are uneducable.
The other thing, though, is that one of the best-kept secrets of motherhood, apparently, is that becoming a mother often makes you more, not less political. The reasons for this are obvious, and the political effect of activist moms is easily discovered if you just look. But we so often don't--and when we do see politicized moms, we tend to be a little contemptuous (e.g. our reaction to organizations like MADD, the Tipper Gore thing with the music back in the day, etc.)--and part of our contempt is *because* it's moms getting involved in the public sphere, not *just* because we differ politically from what they're trying to do.
OTOH, next time you go to an abortion rights rally, check out how many of the women there are carrying kids.
It's an expression, along the lines of "you can present X as any sort of other Y, but it's still X." I myself am pretty fond of pigs.
It is an expression, yes. The implications of the expression in this particular context are extremely offensive.
I myself am pretty fond of pigs.
So, is that the most pitiful climbdown ever?
Now you only have forty years to catch up on, amigo.
I'm not that ignorant. I do have to think a bit though about just what I'm saying is new here.
Arguably what's new is that non-moms are reading and enjoying the mom stuff.
Since gluehorse won't answer my "how do you define yourself" (aka "what is the purpose of your life") question, I'm free to assume that he did not answer because it would expose what a selfish prig he is.
The sad fact is that when we are ready to slough off this mortal coil and look back on our life then "producing quality offspring" may be the only accomplishment worth noting.
Few other accomplishments can compare with that.
The sad fact is that when we are ready to slough off this mortal coil and look back on our life then "producing quality offspring" may be the only accomplishment worth noting. Few other accomplishments can compare with that.
Maybe some folks will think back on that zinger they posted on that blog that one time.
Teaching is a hell of an accomplishment. So is writing well. Also being a good cook, an excellent host, a doting aunt, a nurse, a doctor, a kind pet owner, a musician, and so forth. Kids are indeed great, but there are lots of other ways to bring joy into the world.
Umm.. So a childless woman blogger who defines herself in terms of something else (JUST a career?) is not covered by the porcine example? A male geek in his pjs ranting on is also not covered? Do come on. That was classy, really classy.
If the so prevalent contempt for motherhood (parenthood) continues, I see big problems for our society.
BPhD: One of the biggest eyeopeners for me in life was just how political i became on becoming a father. So I agree fully. Infact I think there'd be a place for Daddy blogs too.
There are daddy blogs. Try daddyzine for starters. It's awesome. (We already have big problems socially b/c we disdain mothers/parents.)
I do have to think a bit though about just what I'm saying is new here.
The lack of topic/audience segregation? There was always political content in 'women's magazines', for example, but its effect was limited because the audience was women-only. What's new about 'mommy blogs' is that they're one click away from any other blog that links, so the insights that have always been out there are now available to a much wider audience.
The sad fact is that when we are ready to slough off this mortal coil and look back on our life then "producing quality offspring" may be the only accomplishment worth noting.
Are you serious? Is life so bleakly reductionist that it just becomes a matter of cranking out a kid every couple years? I'd like to make my own life a little more meaningful than the process of making one more blip in the population spike.
Few other accomplishments can compare with that.
You have a very slight imagination.
bitchphd,
Personally I think "making the world a better place" or "bringing joy to the world" are good "purposes of life."
I also agree that the examples you give accomplish that purpose. I think it is a matter of degrees and for most people (Daddies as well as Mommies) raising fine children will be the greatest among all their accomplishments.
gluehorse,
I'd like to make my own life a little more meaningful than the process of making one more blip in the population spike.
Fair enough. What do you propose to do?
You have a very slight imagination.
I've been asking you to enlighten me. Please, expand my imagination with your plans.
Umm.. So a childless woman blogger who defines herself in terms of something else (JUST a career?) is not covered by the porcine example? A male geek in his pjs ranting on is also not covered?
My point is that this is not some great new wonderful revolution to gush over. It's just another subculture yammering on about whatever their obsession of the moment is. This particular subculture happens to encapsulate the majority - the borderline-natalist "you must crank out a baby to truly experience life" people. Everyone should have a blog, and get to babble on about their own obsession of the moment and what they think defines them. But to think that this subset is somehow new and different and radical and somehow "empowering" - well, this is just silly.
I'd like to make my own life a little more meaningful than the process of making one more blip in the population spike.
Fair enough. What do you propose to do?
I'm not gluehorse, but I'll say: practically anything. At least depending on how you start out. I think having a child because you think it will lend your life meaning is deplorable and incredibly irresponsible; if you happen to have had a child for some other reason and find in retrospect that it has, in fact, lent your life meaning, that's another story.
I've been asking you to enlighten me. Please, expand my imagination with your plans.
I don't like to talk about my own life on the internet. My plans are specific enough that they're trivially googlable even in the abstract, and I prefer to remain anonymous to other anonymous web-types.
But I reject the notion that the sum of one's life necessarily devolves to the production of offspring and that having higher priorities than the establishing of a family makes one a "selfish bitch," or whatever ogged called me upthread.
a "selfish bitch," or whatever ogged called me upthread
?? Show me.
To answer more specifically: having a child pretty much transforms my life forever and derails a career path I've been reaching for since childhood. Am I less of a person because I want to put my own goals and dreams ahead of bringing one more person into a world that already has plenty of them?
Ah, gluehorse, let me guess. You are Proudly Childfree.
Having kids isn't a "subculture" thing to do. It is a major part of what defines living beings as "alive." Yes, the cult of idealized childhood is annoying but what you will find if you read or talk to actual Real Live Parents is that we, for the most part, don't buy into that cult. The cult, like the cult of "feminists are hairy-legged man-haters" is deployed for political purposes only and has nothing to do with reality. By equating parents, including mommy bloggers, with the politicized hype about the Joy of Children (which is deployed against women, just in case you hadn't noticed) you're being a massive tool.
Apologies, ogged. I confused you with Tripp.
ben,
This is a very heavy topic. What do you want your obituary to say? Ben's life was meaningful because he did practically anything? You really think doing anything has as much meaning as raising a fine child?
From my perspective (being 48 years old) the offspring thing has gotten of greater and greater importance. Perhaps it is because I have not written the great american novel, I have not patented anything of significance, I have not performed for more than a thousand people at a time.
Some colleagues have already died. What is left of them? Contributions fade. Memories fade.
Don't have a kid. No one here is saying you should.
Just don't project your defensiveness on the subject onto us and infer, erroneously, that people who value children are therefore saying that those who do not have children are valueless. Go in childless peace and have a happy life. We'll respect your choices. Do you think you can maybe give us the benefit of the doubt that our lives are not boring, babbling idiots?
It is indeed empowering and feminist to talk openly about children. Precisely because of misconceptions like the one you're demonstrating.
Bphd, I don't know what your issues are here and frankly I don't care.
My initial point was that it's far from new for women to identify themselves primarily as mothers, or for men to primarily identify themselves as fathers. That this is happening in a new medium, complete with its own new tics and quirks, doesn't mean that something remarkable is happening.
Tripp said "prig," not "bitch." "Bitch" is referred for me on this blog and all others I frequent.
And I think his point wasn't that you are selfish for not having children. His point was that by making sweeping statements to the effect that parents are dull narcissistcs, you're being obnoxious and sexist. I agree.
gluehorse, my point is that mommy blogs are not about people primarily identifying themselves as mothers. Which you'd know, if you read them.
My "issues" here are very clear. I'm a feminist, and I don't let people get away with sexist crap. I.e., I'm a bitch.
it's far from new for women to identify themselves primarily as mothers, or for men to primarily identify themselves as fathers
Now you're just missing the point. No one said that that's what was new. What's new (which we've been trying to work out in this thread) is that the honest voices of mothers are being heard more directly by people who hadn't heard them in such a way before.
I don't know what your issues are here
What issues? She's engaged your points; saying she has "issues" is dirty pool.
gluehorse --
The point of ogged's post (it seemed to me) was not that women are now identifying themselves as mothers; it's that they're talking about it in a public sphere in a way that was never possible before the internet. You're turning that into cursewords or something, but if you don't think that the idea of blogging has the potential to create a real shift in how we interact and identify with one another, then I'm not sure that a fruitful discussion with you is even possible on this issue.
Ogged, welcome to the world of mommy blogging. Fun, isn't it? (She says, dryly.)
Now this mommy is going to go fix lunch.
That this is happening in a new medium, complete with its own new tics and quirks, doesn't mean that something remarkable is happening.
Excepting that women being invidual mothers does not get communicated about much. So if that changes somewhat because of El Blogonet, that's interesting. Remarkable is a different question, depending on who is being exposed.
Beyond that, what?
ash
['Besides the not wanting kids?']
Tripp, I don't care what I leave on my tombstone. I don't believe anything happens after death, I believe my existence will effectively end when I do, and any memories that anyone has of me or my children or my grandchildren aren't going to change that. The most I can do is live my life the way I want to live it and do the things I want to do while I can. My plans don't include children. I'm not an evangelist, telling other children not to have kids because I'm not having kids. This is my choice and it doesn't make me any more or less a person than you or anyone else.
this mommy is going to go fix lunch
Lightly toasted, easy on the mayo. Thanks.
gluehorse,
Apologies, ogged. I confused you with Tripp.
I called you a selfish prig, meaning one who is selfishly arrogant or smug. I don't like the word bitch, and have trouble using it even in bitchphds name.
I also assumed you were male.
If you can find lifetime meaning in having a certain career then more power to you. Personally I've had the career, had the successful career, and the meaning has faded. I certainly have no love or loyalty from my employer. Expecting fulfilment from a corporation is a big mistake, in my opinion.
Again, speaking as one who is 48 and has had a good career and has done most anything I wanted it turns out for me there is very little meaning in that.
So I am very interested to hear what other people saywill make their life meaningful. Almost anything they say, such as raising fine children, may be easily dismissed if I wanted to.
Some colleagues have already died. What is left of them? Contributions fade. Memories fade.
That's the way it goes. So what? My obituary will say what it says, if I even merit one: that doesn't mean my life won't have had meaning to me.
(True story: there was a discussion in a german romanticism class (I was absent and have it only at second hand) in which one of the students asked friend of mine who had disavowed any sort of grand meaning to life why he bothered to get up in the morning. He said something like "well, I might be going to a concert or have a date that day", and the professor said "probably not, at this school".)
The most I can do is live my life the way I want to live it and do the things I want to do while I can. My plans don't include children.
Good for you.
This is my choice and it doesn't make me any more or less a person than you or anyone else.
Great. From an evolutionary angle, you are a deadend. If you enjoy your genetic deadendness, spiffy. Have a good time. On the other hand, people with kids are continuing life, which is the point of this entire gene business in the first place. If they like it, good on them.
Well, now I feel all tolerant and shit.
ash
['Has no kids.']
Excepting that women being invidual mothers does not get communicated about much. So if that changes somewhat because of El Blogonet, that's interesting. Remarkable is a different question, depending on who is being exposed.
Here I think you're giving far too much credit to blogging as a phenomenon and its observance by the mainstream press. Only three percent read blogs daily; more Americans have heard about blogs from TV or print than from reading actual blogs. So what will happen to the individual voices of the mommybloggers when this new phenomenon becomes big enough to be noteworthy? Do you think people will actually stop to read them, or just hear easily-caricatured accounts of them from mainstream sources? I hear these "bloggers" are all fiesty, pajama-clad partisan firebrands...
gluehorse,
The most I can do is live my life the way I want to live it and do the things I want to do while I can.
Thank you for your response.
So you are not looking for meaning and have settled on hedonism, at least for now.
I'm sure this sounds harsh, and I don't really mean it that way. Personally hedonism was probably one of the happiest times of my life. After I've finished the 'fine children' thing I kind of hope to go back to it!
But, for me, hedonism grew old, just as raising fine children grows old.
What really set me off was your calling mommies (as a group) 'pigs,' which was totally uncalled for.
Great. From an evolutionary angle, you are a deadend.
If your main concern in life is becoming an evolutionary deadend, I suggest you (1) donate plenty of sperm or ova at every opportunity, and (2) spend the rest of your life fighting climate change, nuclear proliferation and anything else likely to cause the extinction of your ancestors.
ben,
My obituary will say what it says, if I even merit one: that doesn't mean my life won't have had meaning to me.
I want my tombstone to say "I knew this was going to happen!"
If you can find meaning in 'most anything' then more power to you.
This daddy is going to lunch.
Gluehorse, this is a discussion worth having, but you can't just make stuff up, like
Only three percent read blogs daily
The latest poll figure is 15% who read "regularly". That's a huge audience, and the percentage is significantly lowered by the number of elderly who don't read them.
So you are not looking for meaning and have settled on hedonism, at least for now.
Beautiful. Not having children is the same as hedonism, is it? Do you crib all your talking points from Alan Keyes?
What really set me off was your calling mommies (as a group) 'pigs,' which was totally uncalled for.
I really don't know what your problem with pigs is.
Actually, gluehorse, since the important thing isn't whether or not you have children, but whether your children have children, it's probably better to have kids that you raise yourself than to scatter your seed/eggs willy-nilly across sperm/ovum banks.
Tripp, I didn't say I can find meaning in most anything, but I think most anything could potentially be source of meaning for someone.
Only three percent read blogs daily; more Americans have heard about blogs from TV or print than from reading actual blogs.
Excepting that that number is slighly fishy from several points of view, given the emphasis on daily.
On the other hand, I can certainly see that blogonet triumphalism tends to get out of hand very easily. As does triumphalism about invading foreign countries. Woo woo.
Do you think people will actually stop to read them, or just hear easily-caricatured accounts of them from mainstream sources?
I suspect that the definition of mainstream sources will change.
WHAT it will change to is an interesting and entirely undecided question, which is why the appearance of 'mommyblogs' (nasty terminology there) is interesting. If it eventually constitutes a widespread new social phenomena then it WILL be remarkable.
ash
['Bleh.']
I didn't make that up. The "3% daily" figure is from Gallup. I don't know what "regularly" amounts to in the same poll (Mystery Pollster is referring to the same one, apparently), but it's not "daily."
Gluehorse, you came on here to say that mommy blogs are boring and self-indulgent (more or less). And then people who are parents called you a selfish prig. And then you got all high and mighty about not wanting to have kids. In other words, you insulted people, then got "offended" by their anger. Give me a break.
Ogged, we're having quesadillas, avocado, homemade salsa (the only way to go) and fresh tomatoes. If you want a sandwich you can make it your own damn self.
,i>If your main concern in life is becoming an evolutionary deadend, I suggest you (1) donate plenty of sperm or ova at every opportunity, and (2) spend the rest of your life fighting climate change, nuclear proliferation and anything else likely to cause the extinction of your ancestors.
Well, one, my ancestors are already dead and two, it doesn't matter because the human race starved to death in the 1980's/1990's and the planet is owned by giant talking cockroaches now.
ash
['They're the BOMB!']
Just give him a lightly toasted quesadilla without much mayo. It'll teach him to be more specific.
No a quesadilla will be fine, thanks. But easy on the avocado. Thanks.
w-lfs-n, quit sneaking in front me in line.
Come and get it. It's on the counter.
You don't like avocado? What the heck is wrong with you? Freak.
And gh, "regularly" is glossed by the AP as "at least a few times a month."
I thought it was the Iranian custom to refuse food several times?
Or is that only when offered?
I'm not Iranian. If I cook you something and offer it and you say no, then I don't hassle you about it.
This means, of course, that my German mother-in-law, when she visits, doesn't eat much, b/c she expects to be fussed over. Tough shit, say I. I'll do the work of cooking, but I'm not gonna do the work of babying you into eating.
Well, this conversation is all well and good, and I find mommy blogs to be just like any other kind: the 5% that are good writers are consistently entertaining and the rest are mostly uninteresting with the odd gold nugget here and there. However, being one of the few non-anonymous folks that hang out here, I'd just like to point out that I make pretty children. Boo-yah!
I gotta get me some of those quesadillas, man, I gotta make some more sperm.
ash
['Wait wait...brain doesn't want to continue following that train of thought! Quick! Pretend I didn't write this!']
I love avocado. Makes you fat though.
Good point about the Iranian custom Joe, but the beauty of assimilation is that you learn how not to go hungry in the new country. Ah, and I see that b just made my point for me. When in Rome...
Them are some good-looking kids, a.
Luckily, pseudonymous kid's age is right between 'em, so I can confidently assert that he is the cutest child of his age in the entire world without insulting you and yours.
Avocado does not make you fat. Jesus. See? All that being fussed over to eat just made you have major food issues.
I would just like to state, for the record, that I am from San Antonio, Texas, and I hate avocado.
There. Now I can never run for public office in Texas.
Or California.
I suspect that the definition of mainstream sources will change.
There might be some time in the future when blogs are mainstream sources, or blogs exert more influence on TV/print than vice versa, but if that time comes, it won't be for quite a while, I think. I say this partly out of skepticism toward blog triumphalism and partly out of the observation that most mainstream reporting on blogs has distinctly placed blogs as an "Other" - some strange, exotic, unwieldy element raging far offstage. The vast amount of reporting on blogs has been on blogs as a phenomenon themselves, not on the stories blogs are discussing. Attempts to compile "blog digests" in the mainstream media usually focus on the elements that make blogs strange and different - usually crazy ranting bloggers like Powerline and LGF, who can be reliably counted on to spew invective, leading the mainstream press to sit back and ponder, "Are blogs affecting The Discourse?"
The breakthrough moment for blogs will happen when a blog breaks a story and it's reported as if it's coming from just some other source, without the novelty element of "new media vs. old media" attached. This seems so distant right now - because the established media has so effectively defined blogs as being essentially defined by their "new" and novel nature - that it's hard for me to see this coming within the next several years.
Avocado does not make you fat.
Does so. By weight, they're super high in calories (note: I'm not complaining about all that good monounsaturated fat).
Eating high-calorie food does not make you fat. Avocados have high calories, but they also have a lot of good things in them. It's the empty calories that are bad for you. That and the lack of exercise. Which I believe is not something you have a problem with. Eat what you like, don't be all high-maintenance about it.
Gluehorse, you came on here to say that mommy blogs are boring and self-indulgent (more or less). And then people who are parents called you a selfish prig. And then you got all high and mighty about not wanting to have kids. In other words, you insulted people, then got "offended" by their anger. Give me a break.
No, I really didn't say any of those things, and the fact that you pretend that I did in order to get offended at the drop of a hat says more about you than me.
Excuse me.
I don't get the (relative) wave of excitement at the rise of "mommy blogs." I get pretty much the exact opposite impression that ogged does - that it's pretty much a bunch of women defining themselves primarily around the basis of their offspring and their ability to produce offspring. Wooo, they can use curse words in it, too! Big deal. A pig in a dress is still a pig.
If that doesn't imply that mommy blogs are boring and self-indulgent, then I don't know what is.
And I've already labelled myself a bitch, so there's really no need for you to imply that there's something wrong with my character. I've saved you the effort, see?
Avocados make you fat
Ogged, we established long ago that you're too skinny.
"then I don't know what does."
Shit.
The vast amount of reporting on blogs has been on blogs as a phenomenon themselves, not on the stories blogs are discussing.
Sure. The mainstream cannot cope with new things any other way. That they did so, does imply some importance.
The breakthrough moment for blogs will happen when a blog breaks a story and it's reported as if it's coming from just some other source, without the novelty element of "new media vs. old media" attached.
Maybe. But by then, the whol ething will have bled together into a big guacamole-ish mess. Like Movies v. Books, Radio v. Movies, Radio v. TV and so on.
No channel ever dries up, but then total dominance takes awhile.
ash
['...']
ash, you need to just go to the store and get some avocados.
Whoa.. NEVER go to a meeting when a thread is taking off. So lets see, what happened...
Not to get sidetracked too much, but "Eating high-calorie food does not make you fat" is just false. Since we generally feel full as a result of the volume of food consumed, foods that are high in calories relative to their weight make us more likely to consume more calories than we burn.
If that doesn't imply that mommy blogs are boring and self-indulgent, then I don't know what is.
I said that as far as I could tell, there was nothing new about women defining themselves by their status as mothers. There was no "boring" or "self-indulgent" in there.
Now, almost all blogs are self-indulgent to some degree. This isn't necessarily a bad thing; there's nothing intrinsically wrong with being a little self-indulgent. As for being boring, well, the right writer could blog about toenail clipping and make it exciting, so there's nothing inherently boring in mommy-blogging any more than there is in anything else. Nor did I ever say there was. My assertion all along has been that this is nothing new. This only starting getting personal when Tripp called me a "selfish hedonish" for not having children.
ash, you need to just go to the store and get some avocados.
I'm goin', I'm goin'.
ash
['Ok, mom!']
Oh bah, whatever. I eat whatever the hell I feel like eating and I'm not fat. Obsessing about food is just so ridiculous. If you like avocados, eat them.
Come off it, gluehorse; pretending that "pig in a dress" is neutral is funny the first time, but are you really going to base your argument on it now?
I eat whatever the hell I feel like eating and I'm not fat.
I'll be the judge of that. No, I mean, lucky you. I have to eat constantly, and if I ate high-calorie foods, believe you me, I'd get fat.
This only starting getting personal when Tripp called me a "selfish hedonish" for not having children.
A pig in a dress is still a pig.
Not quite.
ash
['I'm goin' already!']
Okay, ogged, I'll admit: bad choice of words. But to me, the stigma was honestly not there. I was raised by the worst Jews in the world and ate nothing but pork since childhood.
You can all back up and pretend the pig is, I don't know, a bunny rabbit made of swans or something.
Gosh, and here I thought I detected sarcastic dismissal in that "Whoo... big deal." Guess I was wrong. Deeply, unutterably wrong. I'm terribly ashamed, and I can only beg, nay plead! for your forgiveness, gluehorse. I've seen the error of my ways and you're right, it was only Tripp who got personal, and he had absolutely No Reason to do so, and your comments about my "issues" and "says more about you than me" weren't at all grade-schoolish or ad hominem. You've been entirely noble and above-board and I have just been terribly, terribly mean to you.
Can you ever forgive me? Here. Let me fix you lunch, honey.
Gluehorse can have the avocado I didn't eat.
I also was naive enough to think I was having a conversation on the subject of "Blogospheric Triiumphalism/ New Media Conquers All/ Livejournal Warrior Womyn Overthrow the Patriarchy" in which a little haphazard snark would be acceptable, and not be interpreted, as it apparently was, as my attempt to personally spit on the face of a thousand babies.
Its evening here, and Im starving. A light something would be just the job...any spare Avocados?
Alright, Bphd, I hate your babies and I personally want them to die because my own womb is a radioactive hellscape where no seed can find its purchase. Do you feel better now?
This gluehorse thing is just getting weird.
What? I didn't say any of those things. Why are you offended?
Sorry, o., I will let it go. Look! I am practicing my zen meditation technique. It goes along with the avocados. In that hippy kind of way.
I'd like to try this one out:
I contend that IF you say you believe in the social contract. If you believe that society is more than just the sum of individuals squabbling over the avocados, then it is selfish NOT to have children. Id soften that with a proviso about a sufficient set of circumstances, but what would they be?
Move to reject or approve.
Austro -- what about things like population issues?
The societies in which most of the posters to this blog live will experience a population decline in the next half century. This IS not intended to go to a discussion about immigration. Although, hell why not? The two are intimately related.
Fair enough. I was just trying to think outside the box.
And by "box," I mean "Adam Smith."
I don't understand the proposition, austro. Why is it selfish not to have children?
Moreover, whether or not my specific society (say, the U.S.) will experience a population decline isn't the point. Blah blah resource consumption, blah blah pollution doesn't respect national borders, blah blah.
I will go along with saying it is selfish and anti-social to actively dislike children, to privatize child-rearing to the point of withholding all public support for parents or parenting (we're well on the way), or (as so often happens, foolishly) to mistake having kids as a "choice" as if not having children were the default mode for living creatures. But I don't see why not having kids and contributing to society in myriad other ways (many of which are much easier without kids of one's own, especially given how far we've already gone in privatizing child-rearing), including the supportive auntie roles I referenced up thread, isn't in fact extremely socially responsible.
Seriously. I'm not even arguing here, I saying I don't get the hypothesis.
I think having a child because you think it will lend your life meaning is deplorable and incredibly irresponsible; if you happen to have had a child for some other reason and find in retrospect that it has, in fact, lent your life meaning, that's another story.
Ben, that's just silly, at least on my understanding of "meaning." Perhaps yours differs. I don't have any fantasies about meaning as a transcendental signified, as if it had some transcendental nature which I was looking for. To paraphrase Deleuze, Meaning is Use. I'm with Tripp on this one, no matter what you do, even if you're President of the United States AND selll 30 Million Albums AND write a book that's on the NYT #1 Best-seller spot for 32 weeks, raising your children well, if you choose to have children, is no less important or meaningful than those other accomplishments.
On the Gluehorse issue: Ms Bitch, the ONE TIME I was rooting for you to bitch someone out. So let down.
Gluehorse off the bat decries mommy blogs as uninteresting, and compares them to an animal that has been used a hundred thousand times in literature as an insult, and then feigns ignorance that people would take it as an insult. She claims that, contra this huge history, she's using it in a new way, and, of course, EVERYONE should have JUST KNOWN. What an ass.
Is life so bleakly reductionist that it just becomes a matter of cranking out a kid every couple years? I'd like to make my own life a little more meaningful than the process of making one more blip in the population spike.
Wow. That has to be up there along with the "most insulting things one can say to a parent." What an asshole. Then:
My point is that this is not some great new wonderful revolution to gush over.
No, this is not a point that encapsulates your previous posts. This is a new point you are making. If you want to retract your previous points, fine, that would be wise.
But I reject the notion that the sum of one's life necessarily devolves to the production of offspring and that having higher priorities than the establishing of a family makes one a "selfish bitch," or whatever ogged called me upthread.
Total misreading of the other comments. Defending herself against charges never made.
My initial point was that it's far from new for women to identify themselves primarily as mothers,
NO. You never before made that point.
Ok, my annoyance is mostly vented, and I need to clean, so I'll stop there.
oh, one other thing, before getting huffy about the "hedonism" charge any more, you should probably look it up in a dictionary.
My point is not about population decline and resources.
My point is about changing age structure and the sum of the problems this loads onto a society deprived of sufficient human resources to deal with the issues that raises. Umm sort of. I guess in an american social context those ifs at the beginning are the point.
I know this: In a European welfare society, not having children AND expecting "the system" to stump up my pension and otherwise underwrite my standard of living while at the same time being sceptical on immigration is to engage in moral hazard.
Bphd: Please believe this. I'm just floating the idea. It is something I have thought about on and off for the last few weeks since a certain rightwing politician here in Austria made a speech in which he attacked the idea of supporting immigrant children. THAT throws a whole host of issues with me, but I feel I see here a glimpse of the inconsistency in the argument.
I would never say that the irresponsiblity cancels out any other social good we might othewise do.
I simply felt inspired to ask the question.
Michael, will you have my babies?
ah, Austro, ok, I get your point. Yes, in terms of entitlement packages not having children is economically risky and arguably selfish. I'll go along with you: people who live in welfare states with well-developed pension plans and the like (yay welfare states!) AND who grumble about kids AND who grumble about immigrants, those people suck.
It goes along with the avocados. In that hippy kind of way.
Let your soul be as the smooth pit of the avocado.
And by "box," I mean "Adam Smith."
That fucking Smith was such a box.
You should feel his invisible hand sometime.
Right... its been fun and all, but if I dont pack up and go home now, I'll still be hitting the refresh button at midnight in this office. So please be nice to each other 'til I get home.
Quick, Austro's gone, let's break out the booze.
No avocado, no booze... I feel deprived: Its mobbing.
I thought you were going home? Pick up some avocados and some booze on the way, would you?
On my way, hun.
(That must sound so strange with a Brit/Austrian accent - like Arnie on speed)
Gone already
OK, too bad I'm opening up the flamewar again, but without meaning to defend gluehorse in any way this:
From an evolutionary angle, you are a deadend. If you enjoy your genetic deadendness, spiffy. Have a good time. On the other hand, people with kids are continuing life, which is the point of this entire gene business in the first place. If they like it, good on them
was really goddamned insulting to the childless. (Also to FUCKING ADOPTIVE PARENTS.) None of us really matter on the scale of evolution. And if you're saying that childless people are missing out on the purpose of life, reread b's 16.
I think having a child because you think it will lend your life meaning is deplorable and incredibly irresponsible; if you happen to have had a child for some other reason and find in retrospect that it has, in fact, lent your life meaning, that's another story.Ben, that's just silly, at least on my understanding of "meaning." Perhaps yours differs. I don't have any fantasies about meaning as a transcendental signified, as if it had some transcendental nature which I was looking for. To paraphrase Deleuze, Meaning is Use. I'm with Tripp on this one, no matter what you do, even if you're President of the United States AND selll 30 Million Albums AND write a book that's on the NYT #1 Best-seller spot for 32 weeks, raising your children well, if you choose to have children, is no less important or meaningful than those other accomplishments.
I think you're overanalyzing "meaning" here; I'm not speaking with any sort of technical sense in mind. At any rate, I don't see the relevance of your first four sentences. (Perhaps if I were at all acquainted with Deleuze I would be able to extract some meaning from your Gnomic Utterance, though.)
Raising a child well isn't just as important as, it's more important than selling 30 million albums or having a bestseller—once the child is already in the picture, that is. I think I am being misunderstood. My second or so comment (24) could be construed as saying that I think having children is meaningless, or will not create meaning in your life, or will not make you feel you've done something worthwhile (which is I think what's most operative); I don't, not absolutely, anyway. I think that having children because you think it will give you a feeling of meaning or make you feel that you've accomplished something or done something worthwhile is, as I've said, deplorable. I'm talking about the motivations that might lead one to have children. To actually create a new person and set him or her out into a life, because you have some sort of existential dread and corporate life just ain't satisfying you right? Vanitas vanitarum, man. But, let's say you arrive at a child for some other reason. You may very well find that raising that child gives your life meaning, and is your proudest doing in the world. Great! But I wouldn't want that to be why you had a child.
(Of course, deciding whether or not to have a child is really only possible if you have access to effective pre- and post-intercourse birth control and the option of abortion, as is possible but not even close to being generally the case even in the developed world these days.)
I agree with Pat Metheny Matt's 116, but didn't want to say anything before because, let's face it, that line of argument is just idiotic anyway.
I must steadfastly maintain that, like tanning in February, eating avocados in March is tacky.
Ben, most people have kids because fucking tends to produce children. Not for high- or low-minded reasons, it's just the way it works.
Which I think is what ash's point was. I don't see that it's insulting to people who don't have kids (or who adopt) to point out that, if you step back from anthropomorphizing people (I know, but bear with me here), that the primary goal of living organisms is to reproduce their own kind, and that therefore those living organisms that don't do so have, in those terms, "failed." Of course, we like to think of ourselves are having somewhat more complicated societies than, say, amoebas, and there's a case to be made that people who don't themselves breed but who help raise other people's children (directly or indirectly by simply creating a better society) are, in fact, aiding the perpetuation of the species. But viewed as a flat statement of biological fact, I don't see why it's offensive.
Mitch. It is still fucking subzero where I live. I have a pot of forced tulips on the dining room table and I am damn well eating Mexican-grown avocadoes because my identity as someone who doesn't live on the frozen tundra of hell is important to me. Lalalala, I do not see the snow, I do not feel cold....
Yes, I realize this completely contradicts the post I made directly above. I reserve the right to contradict myself.
B, I'm aware of that. Actually having a choice about whether or not to have kids (where that choice isn't identical to the choice of being celibate or not) is rather recent as a phenomenon.
Living organisms don't have a goal, it just so happens that, in the course of doing the things they do, they make more of each other. Success and failure are foreign concepts.
You're right re. living organisms. I amend my statement to "the primary identifying characteristic of living organisms is that they reproduce their own kind."
Mme Bitch, I think I would make a decent house-husband. Except don't get the impression that I clean that often.
Ben, apologies, was irritated when writing that post. If I had a do-over, I would have been nicer and less pedantic.
We're almost in agreeance (or maybe we are and it's just your sloppy writing which is causing the disagreement. :)). Let me revise one setence:
I think that having children only because you think it will give you a feeling of meaning or make you feel that you've accomplished something or done something worthwhile is, as I've said, deplorable.
If you agree to that, we're in agreement. Having children may well entail those things, and so I don't mind them being among a couple's reasons for having children. Further, I have no problems with people seeking to create a productive human life at home with their children, and doing so because they see it as a relief to the corporate world. If that was their only reason, however, then, yes, it would be unhealthy.
And it's offensive because it asserts something along the lines of "in the grand scheme of things, I matter and you don't; I'm advancing the species and you're a frivolous waste of resources; I'm going somewhere and you're a dead end". Even if it weren't intended as an insult, it's very hard not to read it as a breezy dismissal of those who have no biological offspring. It might be true that, if you take a strict view, the sentiment is accurate, but by the same token, if you take a strict view, gluehorse's pig comment shouldn't be offensive, since all he was saying was "X remains X despite superficial changes".
there's a case to be made that people who don't themselves breed but who help raise other people's children (directly or indirectly by simply creating a better society) are, in fact, aiding the perpetuation of the species.
Yes, I would say a pretty fucking strong case. In fact people who don't themselves breed are ipso facto helping those who do: this world isn't made of resources.
Isn't "ipso" a fun word to say? Ipso. Ipso.
I can accept that revision, Michael.
Pat Metheny? When you say that, smile.
Agreed with 126 about the breeziness. There might be an underlying point that's not objectionable (although I really dislike vulgar evolutionary teleologism), but the way it was stated was insulting.
Now, in the (ahem) dialectical context, I can understand why ash was so insulting. When you're confronted with someone who says "people with children suck [are boring, whatever]," it's understandable to respond "no, people without children suck [aren't fulfilling their evolutionary function, whatever]." Gluehorse deserved no better. But when you're posting it where everyone can read it, some innocent people will get splashed by the mud.
Weiner: I Agree with Pat Metheny.
That's fine, then. I agreed with Pat Metheny as well, though not so much as to actually want to listen to any of his own stuff. (Sideman work with Ornette or Kenny Garrett is fine.)
My apologies.
I can't countenance the notion that Richard Thompson is best known as being the guitarist in Fairport Convention, when his solo stuff is so very very good and he was only with them for a few albums.
gluehorse,
Here is what I said:
(quoting you)"The most I can do is live my life the way I want to live it and do the things I want to do while I can."
Thank you for your response.
So you are not looking for meaning and have settled on hedonism, at least for now.
Notice I make no mention of children. My definition of hedonism is: "Pursuit of or devotion to pleasure." I will admit that I assumed when you said you were going to live the way you want and do what you want that involved pleasure, but I may have been mistaken.
Nowhere did I call you a hedonist for not having children, so take that strawman back to Oz.
Tripp, I didn't say I can find meaning in most anything, but I think most anything could potentially be source of meaning for someone.
Fair enough. There isn't much nourishment in 'most anything could potentially be', though.
I'm interested to hear what you, personally, have as a source of meaning. In my experience not many people really think about this and the list of answers is pretty darn short.
Kinda like if you ask people to sing a Christmas Carol and frigging Jingle Bells shows up 9 times out of 10.
Oh, and just to be a real blog hog, it seems to me the good thing about Mommy blogs is the good thing about most every blog - it brings together people with similar interests.
I'm thinking back on the 50's mothers could 'network' at home during the day, but that was lost when mothers scattered into the work force. Mommy blogs let the mothers get back connected with other mothers.
I think the claim is that "For anything, there is some person for whom that could provide meaning." Or maybe "Most anything could provide meaning for some person--but they've got to settle on one thing."
I would consider it to have given my life some meaning if I could make some lasting contribution to the field of philosophy. Or to inspire a lot of students to think deeply about it. Or to write fiction or make music that gives pleasure to people sometime. Or just to be a good person that has positive impact on people's lives. And to appreciate a lot of music and art and fiction and become deeper myself as a person is part of the meaning of life too. Perhaps having children would also eventually be something that was meaningful in my life, but I don't feel right now as though life would be meaningless without them. If I had children, I trust and hope that I would feel that way.
Really, bitch covered this pretty well in post 16. I don't think there's any reason to get imperialistic about anyone's life choices, except Republicans.
I don't get why y'all are so touchy about ash's comment, I truly do not (and I don't think ash has kids, either). Gluehorse wasn't just saying "X is X" -- there were overtly dismissive touches there. I pointed out some (and Michael pointed out many others). In contrast, ash framed his flippant comments pretty specifically: "From an evolutionary angle . . . life . . . is the point of this entire gene business in the first place." It just really didn't seem all that insulting to people without kids. Presumably we (you, who have no children) don't view yourself primarily or solely as biological specimens, and if folks choose not to have kids then they realize that this means "not passing on their genes," which bfd, so why would someone be touchy about having that pointed out?
I don't get the rules of engagement here.
You guys are amazing. Great defense from bphd. Said so many things I wish I'd thought of.
Here's a perspective on motherhood that might have been missing from the discourse before blogs opened up a different kind of reflection. It cracked me up, and it looks like Dooce won a couple different categories of bloggy awards, so she's found a reasonably big audience.
One of my serendipitous discoveries through blogs is how damn funny lapsed mormons are. Between Dooce and Jesus' General, there's always some fun to be found.
bitch, you really think that "deadend" is not prima facie insulting? It looks insulting to me. "Overtly dismissive," even. And given how frequently evolution is invoked as explaining normative properties, adding "from an evolutionary perspective" to "you are a dead end" doesn't soften the blow much.
I'll grant you that ash wasn't as insulting as gluehorse, and I'll grant you (in fact, I already said) that in the context there was some reason to be insulting. But still, maybe you don't always pick up on insults directed at people without kids.
bphd,
Ash said the point (not "one of the points") of life was to have kids.
This tells people who have no kids that they have no point.
Telling someone that they are meaningless is insulting.
Hm, the last sentence of 139 sounds very insulting to bitch. I don't mean it to be. What I mean is:
Here there is what I, as a member of group X, perceive as an insult to group X.
You, a non-member of group X, do not perceive it as an insult to group X.
In this case as in most others, I think the intuitions of members of group X ought to be given more weight on the question of what's insulting to group X, unless there's a specific reason to think that members of group X are likely to be wrong here.
I rewrote the last sentence of the previous post a bunch of times to try to make it relatively neutral, but I don't think it worked.
bitchphd claims "Arguably what's new is that non-moms are reading and enjoying the mom stuff."
Well speak for yourself, but I certainly am as little interested in mommy (or daddy) musings as I am in sports musings, and when I come across posts that deal with this stuff, I skip over them as aggressively as I ignore sports posts.
So yeah, have fun making all these claims about how this will change the world, but you all may, at some point, wish to calibrate your theories with a group that isn't self-selected.
Well, Maynard, this is all anecdotal, so yours counts, but just in this thread you have me, w-lfs-n, Weiner, and Michael who are single, childless men who read mommy blogs. And, I'd guess that three years ago, none of us was reading much mommy anything.
I would consider it to have given my life some meaning if I could make some lasting contribution to the field of philosophy.
That's "proper human discourse," to you, bub. But is an interesting statement, though, and I hope I'm not being too picky on your language, this being a blog and all. But your choice of "given" is what strikes me, as it gives an nonsubjective aspect to your use of "meaning." Further, this meaning is given to you because of a contribution which depends on there being no more "you." So this seems to imply that by giving in a mode in which it is otherwise impossible for you to actually benefit, you do in fact benefit through the gift of meaning. (This is assuming fame, fortune, and ready supplies of willing women are not your ulterior motives, of course.) Is this correct, or would you upon reflection change "given"?
me, w-lfs-n, Weiner, and Michael who are single, childless men who read mommy blogs.
Manly men.
I hope I'm not being too picky on your language
Good heavens, man! You can't do that here!
Manly men.
Funny, because I was thinking more along the lines of "Man-Child."
But maybe that's the old mirror talkin'.
146. ha! Yeah, what am I doing bothering with caveats when it concerns you grammar-nazis?
Well, Michael, when you leave a comment like 144, the only proper response to which is, "Why is Michael commenting drunk again?" caveats don't hurt.
Ok lets do this. A deeply held conviction will be packed out and held up for inspection.
The point about the gift of life (even if "life" is accidental and our consciences ultimately a pointless by product) is to bear witness to being: i.e To Be (no E-Prime here). How one goes about bearing witness is subject to individual choice. Some write the symphony, others write the book, teach and inspire in field. Many have kids and fulfill their duties of witness that way. For me an extension if hedonism is to simply use the time and to leave no witness of existence, assuming that you have the luxury of not needing to invest all your time in just staying alive.
On the next level of subjectivity, I have a suspiscion that getting that software package installed in time and on budget lacks some of the qualities required to fulfill the programme.
Short version:Do something with your time, just dont over eroticise your career as a substitute.
Here endeth the lesson
Matt, maybe it's my thick skin, but I really don't see "evolutionary deadend" as insulting. Or at least, I find it insulting in a joking kind of noone really takes this all that seriously kind of way. Like calling someone a neanderthal (which I'm sure I've done at some point on this blog).
Tripp, depends on what you mean by "point." If you mean, "meaning," then yes; it's insulting (and dumb) to say that the meaning of life is to have kids. But if by "point of life" you mean, literally, that life is defined as "things that reproduce their own kind" then it's merely a statement of fact. I honest to god read it that way.
Matt again: I'm all over the "if so-and-so says they're insulted, they're insulted" argument. On the other hand. I will stick my neck out and say that it is my experience that many, though not all, adults who do not have and do not intend to have children are very very touchy on the subject. This, I presume (and my childless friends tell me) is because people without kids are so often given shit by their parents, relations, work colleagues, and other nosey parkers. So all I'm doing in defending ash is saying, not that it's invalid to be insulted if someone says or implies "people without kids are wastes of space," but saying that I honestly do not think that is what ash was saying.
Maynard: I did not say "all" non-moms are reading mommy blogs. But a surprising number of non-moms are. I, for one, think that this is a good thing.
**This is a very heavy topic. What do you want your obituary to say? Ben's life was meaningful because he did practically anything? You really think doing anything has as much meaning as raising a fine child?**
**Having kids isn't a "subculture" thing to do. It is a major part of what defines living beings as "alive."**
Oh give me a freaking break.
(1) Having children is not some amazing feat that deserves applause. Here's some news --- pretty much all people can do it, as can monkeys, fish, snails, trees and even pigs in dresses. It's cute when 2yr old children ask to be praised for trivialities like walking without falling down --- it's pathetic when adults expect to be praised for what comes naturally.
(2) Since when did "what is natural" become the standard for "what is good". Do we really want to go down that slope?
I expect bitchphd and friends are happy to mock the evolutionary psychology types who tell us that aggression, clannishness, wanting to rape hot teenage women and so on are natural, but suddently, when it comes to having kids, "it's natural" is so good a justification that nothing more needs to be said.
(3) There's been a whole lot of ad hominem attacking in this thread. People are suddenly called "loudly proudly childfree" and mocked as though they're some sort of crusaders for living their lives a certain way. I gotta tell you, it looks a whole lot different to me reading this thread --- those who are making a big deal about defending their decisions are the ones with children. And I have a pretty good idea of why they are making so much noise --- they're realizing the price they paid for having kids in terms of lost opportunities and general hassle, and they pissed off. Of course you can't go around telling people you wish you'd never had kids; quite apart from what people will think of you it's not fair on the children. So, like a gadget buyer the day after his purchase, you're now desperately scanning the internet and talking to your friends, trying to find ex post reasons for what you did.
Ooh, this ad hominem stuff, imputing motives to others, is fun!
(4) No-one is going to remember you in three hundred years, whether you have kids or not, if you are an average person. That's life. If it upsets you terribly, go find god.
And if you're non-average, well go do non-average good deeds. Write great literature, create great art, make scientific discoveries, invent something.
Personally I am happy to admit that what I hold precious about humanity is the accumulation of art and knowledge, not billions upon billions of barely differentiated lives.
People are suddenly called "loudly proudly childfree" and mocked
That would be people who started off by gratuitously insulting other people, if you catch my drift.
Well, Maynard, this is all anecdotal, so yours counts, but just in this thread you have me, w-lfs-n, Weiner, and Michael who are single, childless men who read mommy blogs.
I do what now? (Is BPhD's blog a mommy blog? It's a blog written by a mother, at any rate.)
[I was typing a longer response to Michael's 144, but I see ogged's is briefer.]
Personally I am happy to admit that what I hold precious about humanity is the accumulation of art and knowledge, not billions upon billions of barely differentiated lives.
And I'm happy to admit that that's a goddamned frightening thing to say. I would trade a fair chunk of art and knowledge to save billions and billions of undifferentiated lives. They're not undifferentiated to the people living them, y'know.
(4) No-one is going to remember you in three hundred years, whether you have kids or not, if you are an average person. That's life. If it upsets you terribly, go find god.
And if you're non-average, well go do non-average good deeds. Write great literature, create great art, make scientific discoveries, invent something.
Personally I am happy to admit that what I hold precious about humanity is the accumulation of art and knowledge, not billions upon billions of barely differentiated lives.
Misses the point I think. The meaning of my life is personal. It is personal fufillment, not contribution to Humanity that is important here. The measure is different.
How "humanity" sees me interests me not one bit. It is after all nothing other than a collection of undifferentiated lives. How those I love see me and sees me life might just be different.
OR: What Matt said
Maynard, you are a nutcase.
Neither Tripp nor I expect you or anyone else to hand us medals for procreating. We just expect not to be put down for it.
Other than that, though, you're right. I deeply, deeply resent my child and the way he has stymied my career and ruined my girlish figure and sapped my brain so that all I can now talk about is diapers and playdates and yes, my entire purpose in life now--other than raising my child, that is--is to find people I can insult for choosing not to have kids. You're onto me. That's why I started the fight.
Oh no wait! I didn't start it. Shit. Oh well, it was a theory.
No-one is going to remember you in three hundred years, whether you have kids or not, if you are an average person.
Well, if at some point nobody has kids, this certainly will be true.
It's a good thing that many people actually want to have children - and consider it an opportunity fulfilled.
That was a long time ago, Ogged. I've cleaned up since then. I'm contemplating clarifying 144, but maybe I'd just look like I was deeper in the bottle.
About 143, I'll say that I've been a huge fan of Alice Munro since I was an undergrad, and at least some of her work deals with motherhood. (Much more of it deals with daughterhood perhaps.) But it does seem as though I ought to be able to think of more examples off the top of my head.
To be a bit less snarky about 144, the thing that I was thinking of as giving my life meaning in that case was meant to be an activity of mine: the work that I do. It doesn't actually require my being dead.
Also, I'll note that with 149, Michael has by Godwin's law lost the argument. Whatever it was.
And the moral of the story is, if you write anything at all about mothers, you can be sure someone will come along to tell you how stupid and meaningless it is.
"Eating high-calorie food does not make you fat."
Excuse me?
Well OK, this sentence is true in that it is not eating "high calorie food" that makes you fat, but eating lots of calories. It is, however, a whole lot easier to eat lots of calories when they are densely packed in high calorie food.
Let me guess, bitchphd, you didn't study science at college, did you?
Godwin's law refers to Hitler, Matt (and, strictly construed, doesn't mention winners or losers either).
Maynard, now you're just trying to pick a fight. Anyway, I addressed the calorie business at 81.
Let me guess, bitchphd, you didn't study science at college, did you?
Well, that was totally reasonable and called for.
Ya know, all this refreshing uses bandwidth, expensive bandwidth on a cardphone. So er Maynard: please make it worth my while.
Matt, your snark was funny, forget about it.
It doesn't actually require my being dead.
As you phrased it, I think it does. "lasting contribution" implies after your death, as I read it. If you had simply said, "to contribute" that would be a different thing. Now, I believe you would find meaning in contributing to philosophy, but also in making that lasting contribution.
My clarification/defense of 144 has 2 parts. The first is easy: it is at least possible that Matt has an argument for "meaning is given, not taken." The second is the one that might make me look drunker.
b, just one more go-round, I hope (but you like thrashing things out, right? So maybe it's OK):
I think this:
On the other hand. I will stick my neck out and say that it is my experience that many, though not all, adults who do not have and do not intend to have children are very very touchy on the subject. This, I presume (and my childless friends tell me) is because people without kids are so often given shit by their parents, relations, work colleagues, and other nosey parkers
isn't so much evidence that childless people are oversensitive to insults as that things that might be harmless to other people--"Neanderthal!"--really are insulting to childless people. If you'll pardon my saying so, what you're saying is a teeny bit reminiscent of the old "feminists have no sense of humor" line.
Now, I don't think that there's any parallel between child-freeness and feminism. Honestly, as a childless person I have it pretty great in a lot of ways--I never have to find a babysitter or daycare or anything like that. I think US society is, by a huge margin, too tough on people who have children.
But, I guess, I would see the following as being touchy:
[truly innocent questioner] Do you have any children?
[childless person] No, and why do you think I should? [etc.]
But the following:
[evangelist for childbearing] If you don't have children, you're an evolutionary dead end.
[childless person] Get stuffed.
[efc] Can't you take a joke?
is I think a genuine insult.
Another thing--it would be bad if nobody had children. It is bad that many people lack the choice not to have children. But there seems to be little risk of people choosing to stop having children entirely (Austro, immigration is OK), so no need to worry on that score, I think. (directed kind of at eb's 159, though I think that was directed at Maynard's childfree evangelizing rather than the live-and-let-live approach I favor)
re 164: That doesn't appear to be true.
"My point is not about population decline and resources.
My point is about changing age structure and the sum of the problems this loads onto a society deprived of sufficient human resources to deal with the issues that raises. Umm sort of. I guess in an american social context those ifs at the beginning are the point.
I know this: In a European welfare society, not having children AND expecting "the system" to stump up my pension and otherwise underwrite my standard of living while at the same time being sceptical on immigration is to engage in moral hazard."
So there are two choices:
(1) THIS generation has fewer kids, there are transition problems, but the end result is fewer people in, say, 100 years, and a chance to sort out the legacy of overpopulation of the 20th century OR
(2) We encourage people (let's assume this would work) to have enough kids that there would not be transition problems, and, in say 100 years, we are screwed because so many resources have been used up, so much earth ravaged, that recovery is impossible.
Now Austro chooses option number 2, because 1 would make life a little inconvenient, and THEN HAS THE GALL TO CLAIM THAT THIS IS THE *UNSELFISH* CHOICE. This must be some strange new street meaning on unselfish that I'm unfamiliar with.
Matt : I am ALL for immigration. I really mean that.
Godwin's law
No, no, no. As noted above, strictly speaking, Godwin's Law involves an invocation of Hitler. More importantly, while Naziism was an exceedingly ugly and murderous philosophy, grammar-Naziism is next to godliness. If Hitler had just stuck to grammar-Naziism, rather than lumpen-Naziism, we'd remember him like this.
But re: 161, I referred to you as a grammar-nazi, which is qualitatively different from a plain ol' nazi. So, Godwin's law doesn't apply.
As you phrased it, I think it does. "lasting contribution" implies after your death, as I read it. If you had simply said, "to contribute" that would be a different thing. Now, I believe you would find meaning in contributing to philosophy, but also in making that lasting contribution.
He's just talkin' 'bout kleos.
The first is easy: it is at least possible that Matt has an argument for "meaning is given, not taken."
I read "it would give meaning to ..." as opposed to "I would take meaning from" more as an acknowledgement that, first, one can't simply go out and make a meaningful contribution to philosophy, or inspire others to think seriously about it, or what have you—these are hard things to do and one might fail, and, second, success at them is the condition is the condition of meaning. I think it's clear from the way Matt started off his paragraph saying that he would consider his life meaningful if so-and-so that he is taking meaning on his own terms—but one must acknowledge that sometimes the activities from which one takes meaning have external success conditions and that therefore, it is also appropriate to speak of their successful execution as giving meaning.
I am happy to admit that what I hold precious about humanity is the accumulation of art and knowledge
And the thousands of voices lost for lack of a room of their own, because there's been so little reliable social support for women to be mothers and artists? Even if your sole focus is accumulation of art and knowledge, there is a huge social cost to the way we've organized families. Amazing writers like bitch or flea or dooce often didn't have an outlet or a path to be recognized. A sculptor like Louise Burgeouis who could work without showing for a decade or more while she raised kids is far rarer than many, many who dropped out.
I think Ogged's original point was that diaries of the lives of women like these might have some impact on how we think about women and men and family, and if we're smart it might change how we allow people to blend family and work or calling.
This pissing about who's in the majority and who gets more respect is bullshit. But the idea that we could arrange things much better so that work and family was a more comfortable option for women and men is really important, and hearing the real voices of mothers and fathers in a dialog with other writers and political observers is a baby step towards that.
Nice picture, apo. But the linked Wiki shows that even the proto-formulation referred explicitly to the Nazis as well as to Hitler.
As for the distinction between grammar Nazis and real Nazis: I'm sure that Hitler would've been very comfortable with such a distinction.
Funnily enough, Maynard, the largest growth in resource usage has occured in societies with a stable or declining population base. Cutting or even stabilising individual demands on resources in developed economies will stop the ravaging.
Interpret the framework of the contension.
The Malthusian Catastrophe refuses to be realised on numbers alone. It is per capita consumption that will do for us. That means you and I. Not having kids wont save the planet.
Alas, even the Jargon File supports Matt's contention. Ah well.
Matt, re. #169: On the other hand. I will stick my neck out and say that it is my experience that many, though not all, adults who do not have and do not intend to have children are very very touchy on the subject. This, I presume (and my childless friends tell me) is because people without kids are so often given shit by their parents, relations, work colleagues, and other nosey parkers
isn't so much evidence that childless people are oversensitive to insults as that things that might be harmless to other people--"Neanderthal!"--really are insulting to childless people. If you'll pardon my saying so, what you're saying is a teeny bit reminiscent of the old "feminists have no sense of humor" line.
Now, I don't think that there's any parallel between child-freeness and feminism.
I do realize the slippery slope I'm treading on with the "childfree folks sure are touchy" line. You may not say it, but I will: I think there is a parallel between not having kids and feminism, and the connection is pretty damn clear: for the most part, it's women who are pressured most to have kids (though guys get it too). I wasn't trying to say oversensitive to insults, in general; just that in my years as a mommy on the internets, I have run over and over and over again into people who label themselves "childfree" who are convinced that "breeders" rule the world and those without kids are a shat-upon minority because of things like, oh, employer-provided health insurance covering dependents. No one here (well, no one who is a regular commenter) is doing that, of course. But anyway, she says loosely, I've seen a lot of touchy "child free" folks who take offense at people even mentioning children. Sadly, it seems, the "child free" label has become synonymous with "aggressively anti-children." So that's really what I was channelling in saying that.
Now, as to the "dead end" comment; ok, I will accept that you and Ben (if memory serves) found it insulting on genuinely non-touchy grounds. I was just, in my hashing-it-out way, saying that I didn't see it that way and suggesting that maybe it wasn't inherently insulting. You continue to find it insulting, ok, I'll take that as evidence that it is. Truly. I still think it's excusable in light of the provocation (and again, ash doesn't have kids, I'm sure he said so upthread), but I'll concede that your (or Ben's, I forget) point that it implicitly insulted more people than just gluehorse is valid. I withdraw my argument that it isn't insulting.
Maynard, in fact one of my college majors was biology. I also studied chemistry and some physics. And it is true: high calorie foods do not, in and of themselves, cause fatness. Their effect on a person's weight or bodyfat depends on a number of other factors including (as I said) nutrient value and activity level.
Nice try, though.
Amazing writers like bitch or flea or dooce
CW, thank you very much for that. I'm gratified to be put in that company.
"Funnily enough, Maynard, the largest growth in resource usage has occured in societies with a stable or declining population base. Cutting or even stabilising individual demands on resources in developed economies will stop the ravaging.
Interpret the framework of the contension.
The Malthusian Catastrophe refuses to be realised on numbers alone. It is per capita consumption that will do for us. That means you and I. Not having kids wont save the planet."
Huh? So you concede my point, but insist of having kids anyway?
Yes, OF COURSE just having children won't stop people wasting resources. But not having children and hot having resources are not orthogonal issues. Whether people do or do not stop wasting resources, children ARE going to require resources, and are going to turn into adults who require even more resources.
Sure, go out and encourage people to waste less; walk to the supermarket, library and post office; don't engage in frivolous driving or flying just because you can afford to do so; switch to compact fluorescent lightbulbs; etc, etc. I certainly do all these things.
But don't waste my time and other people's time by making assertions that are blatantly both stupid and mendacious, namely that having children will not utilize resources and won't exarcebate the upcoming problem.
'K, then. One of the reason I was reluctant to draw the parallel between child-freeness and feminism is because the folks who took offense were men. The observations you make in that paragraph sound pretty accurate. I'm not child-free, anyway--not even committed to not having children. Just don't feel like it this week.
re: 169
(directed kind of at eb's 159, though I think that was directed at Maynard's childfree evangelizing rather than the live-and-let-live approach I favor)
Yes, my comment was directed at the idea that people defending - not necessarily evangelizing for - their decision to have children are merely covering up their resentments over opportunities lost.
I don't have kids, but I'm all for being able to choose one way or the other without being insulted for my decision - whatever it may be. So, I'm all for live-and-let-live.
Damn Maynard, you sure are a mean drunk. Why can't you be a happy drunk, like Michael?
One of the reason I was reluctant to draw the parallel between child-freeness and feminism is because the folks who took offense were men.
Heh. Feel free to include men in the feminist camp. I'd like to see more of it, to tell the truth. I'll even give you a pass to get past the barricades.
"I have run over and over and over again into people who label themselves "childfree" who are convinced that "breeders" rule the world and those without kids are a shat-upon minority because of things like, oh, employer-provided health insurance covering dependent"
Gee, why would they think that?
Maybe because the tax system strongly subsidizes people with kids who live a very specific lifestyle. Of course the child deduction is part of that, but the biggie is mortgage interest deduction. There are plenty of others, of course, for example things like the cliff in the medical deduction. For the last ten years or so I've paid total rates of oh, 35% or so of my income(federal and state, but not including sales tax), while my colleagues, earning just as much, pay a rate of perhaps 20%.
Now you can say how this is good for society, building the future, blah blah, and I agree with some of that. But don't spread this BS that people without children have UNJUSTIFIED resentment about how society treats them.If "breeders", to use your term, are justified in kvetching about all the terrible ways society treats them, from not being able to show their breasts in public to being forced to pay for childcare, why should the childless not be allowed to voice their complaints?
One of the reason I was reluctant to draw the parallel between child-freeness and feminism is because...
I elide your failure to pluralize "reason" to say: reason is THAT, Weiner! Unless as you clearly aren't you are stating the existential conditions for the reason's being in force.
Since we generally feel full as a result of the volume of food consumed, foods that are high in calories relative to their weight make us more likely to consume more calories than we burn.
Yes avocado has more calories than, for example, the same weight of apple. But avocado will make you feel fuller and more satisfied faster than apple will. Feeling "full" is actually a rather complicated affair, physiologically, and has to do with a lot more than just volume of food consumed.
In mommy blog comment sections "child free" may mean "aggressively anti-children." But that is just because they are trolls. In real life, most people respect other peoples' choices. You wouldn't call your coworkers and neighbors "breeders" or "childfree and selfish".
I think mommy blogs are a good thing. If you don't like them, it isn't hard to avoid them.
When will the "upcoming problem" become an actual problem, Maynard? When we stop having children?
The resources problem is with us now. If the world population remained stable now the world will be ravaged by growing energy/resources demand nontheless. So my contention is that it is the consumption per unit ( I realise i repeat myself here) that is the real issue.
I personally believe that the transition problems you mention can be overcome with immigration.So I see no reason to maintain that a society must produce more kids. Read again what I wrote: It is the combination of demands that I was decrying as selfish. Not purely the not having children.
If you must be abusive at least have the decency to read what is there and not what you would have liked me to say, so that you can pick a fight.
Maynard,
The morgage interest deduction is a stupid idea, but you are allowed to buy a house without having kids.
In mommy blog comment sections "child free" may mean "aggressively anti-children." But that is just because they are trolls.
You would think that. But if you google "child free" and spend maybe fifteen minutes reading around, you'll find that that's not the case. Moreover, in real life, I have lost friends because I had a child. True fact. I have also transitioned from passing judgment on my sister's parenting and occasionally fighting with her over it (pre- my own kid) to having a child of my own and calling her to apologize and take it all back. It isn't true that in real life people don't judge and hassle parents.
Maybe because the tax system strongly subsidizes people with kids who live a very specific lifestyle. Of course the child deduction is part of that, but the biggie is mortgage interest deduction. There are plenty of others, of course, for example things like the cliff in the medical deduction. For the last ten years or so I've paid total rates of oh, 35% or so of my income(federal and state, but not including sales tax), while my colleagues, earning just as much, pay a rate of perhaps 20%.
Now you can say how this is good for society, building the future, blah blah, and I agree with some of that. But don't spread this BS that people without children have UNJUSTIFIED resentment about how society treats them.If "breeders", to use your term, are justified in kvetching about all the terrible ways society treats them, from not being able to show their breasts in public to being forced to pay for childcare, why should the childless not be allowed to voice their complaints?
Let me point out in passing that "breeders" is not my term. Do the googling of the child free sites. You'll see that, and much worse. Do you really want to associate yourself with those people?
Now to continue. There is a substantive difference between asserting my right to breastfeed in public without being glared at, and blaming parents for what you percieve as iniquities in the tax system. I didn't write the tax code, you see; but you (the rhetorical "you," not the literal one) did, in fact, tell my husband that he shouldn't let his wife do that in public (true; this happened to us. You can well imagine what my response was).
Now. Let us have a little lesson on what "ideology" means. It means the collection of unarticulated and inconsistent beliefs. So, for instance, our society does indeed give a great deal of praise to the idea of families, to honoring mothers, to adjusting the tax system to benefit families, and so forth. On the other hand. We also, as a society, expect ambitious people to work hours that are incommensurate with children, fail to provide social security benefits to parents who stay home to care for children, believe that taking maternity leave does not give you the right to maintain your income or get your job back, and broadcast extreme hostility to parents with small children in public spaces if and when the children are anything less than perfectly behaved.
The fact of the matter is, the lip service about "family values" that we love to spout, in fact, fucks over real families. It substitutes for a genuine social committment to support parents with small children--the same small children, I might add, who will grow up to write your symphonies, treat your cancer, and pay your social security benefits. So yes. Your resentment of parents is damn well unjustified. As is the clear fact that your position in this comment thread has been pretty much to hassle me personally, rather than to actually present anything resembling a reasonable argument.
"Maynard, in fact one of my college majors was biology. I also studied chemistry and some physics. And it is true: high calorie foods do not, in and of themselves, cause fatness. Their effect on a person's weight or bodyfat depends on a number of other factors including (as I said) nutrient value and activity level.
Nice try, though"
Well, I gave you a face-saving out and you refused to take it.
Let me quote from a textbook _Understanding Nutrition_ by Whitney & Rolfes, 8th edn, 1999.
Earlier we are presented with the fairly obvious points that calories in must equal calories out, and that excess calories (ie more calories eaten per day than are expended in metabolism) will result in some of those calories being excreted while others will be absorbed by the body and saved as fat.
At this point let's note that, to first order, issues of "empty calories", whether you exercise, how many vitamins and anti-oxidants you food consists of, and so on, while interesting and relevant to the issue of the length and quality of your life, are largely irrelevant to the issue of calorie balance. If you're a non-exerciser, your basal metabolism runs at 2000kCal/day, and you eat 2500kCal/day, you will (as I said, to first order) gain a pound of fat a week. If you're an exerciser, your basal metabolism runs at 2500kCal/day, and you eat 3000kCal/day, you will likewise gain a pound of fat a week.
Now let's quote from page 231 which considers interesting twists on the above first order statements
"It stands to reason that a person who eats 3500 extra kCal should gain a pound, and that a person who cuts 3500 kCal should lose a pound, but this does not always happen...Furthemore, people seem to gain more body fat when they eat extra fat kCal than when they eat extra carbohydrate kCal, and they seem to lose body fat most efficiently when they limit kCal specifically from fat. Whether a person chooses extra potatoes or extra butter may make a great deal of difference to body weight and body composition".
Let's point out, apropos of the above, that, while "empty calories" is an imprecise term, it tends to refer to foods with carbohydrates (at least in my experience). As regards avocado, we have that "with the exception of olive oil, no other fruit contains as large a percentage of fat as the avocado", whose fat content varies from 7 to 26%. This puts it in the same category as bacon, peanuts, cheese and butter as regards the dietary fat impact.
There are further interesting things on page 233. Specifically they discuss the difference between what makes you feel like you no longer want to eat any more at a meal (Ogged's point above about your stomach being full), and what keeps you feeling non-hungry (so that you don't snack). Most interesting, IMHO, is that proteins do the best job of making you feel full for a long time. High fiber also does well, (the infamous celery sticks and unbuttered popcorn of serious, knowledgable dieters) while carbs are adequate and fats are bad. This seems to imply that to the extent that Atkins works, it works if you are eating a high-protein diet rather than a high fat diet --- this may be why different people seem to report very different results from trying an Atkins diet.
I just figured out that the comments here automatically end html coding at the end of a paragraph. So please extend the italics in par. 3, above, to include par. 4: both of those were Maynard's, not mine.
re: 188, I'm all in favor of men being feminists, in fact I try to be one myself (though maybe that's hampered a little bit by the little man in my head who is trying to make me say "good and articulate points, b!"), but in this case I'm not sure that men's desire to be free from the encumbrances of children is a force that works on the whole in women's favor. Ask Newt Gingrich.
b-wo, "reason because" is redundant rather than incorrect, and sometimes it aids comprehension. Deal.
My dear Maynard, that long quotation from an introductory college text book merely supports my contention that the correlation between caloric intake and weight gain is complicated. It doesn't refute it. One of the benefits of/requirements for studying a subject is being able to actually understand what one reads.
Dammit, b, it's all over between us.
Matt, no one in her right mind wants to be married to Newt Gingrich. The real solution is to provide government subsidies to single mothers and let them dump the asshole men who want nothing to do with their children. Kids are better off without those people in their lives.
You didn't major in math either, did you b?
I didn't major in math. If you're referring to my numbering of the paragraphs, though, look again. I was right.
And thanks for fixing the html.
#202, oh, I scooped your #200. I apologize. You can have it next time.
203--sure, absolutely. It's just that men's desire not to have to deal with children can be and is slaked without doing anything to help the single mom--or the woman who doesn't want to be a mom--at all. So, women's desire to have the option of childlessness is inseparable from feminism; Gingrich's desire to have the option of childlessness (or at least of dumping the mother of his kids) not.
204--you got to 200 before I did, thus making my 201 look stupid. Just making fun of myself there. 100 comments is just a yawn now, but 200 is still something special even if it takes two trolls to get there.
Ah, yes, but Gingrich doesn't want the option of not having children. He wants the option of not caring for them, along with the option of blathering on about traditional values while dumping his wife when she has cancer. Big difference.
"My dear Maynard, that long quotation from an introductory college text book merely supports my contention that the correlation between caloric intake and weight gain is complicated. It doesn't refute it. One of the benefits of/requirements for studying a subject is being able to actually understand what one reads."
So that's your answer? "Things are complicated, all is in flux, no-one can know the truth."
Very new-agey and holistic of you, but, assuming you don't actually have scientific refutations of the statements I made, the fact remains that what I posted gives at least three reasons
* fats, for as yet unknown reasons are more efficiently converted to human fat than are other food types with equal calories
* fats don't fill up your stomach much because they are dense in calories
* fats lead you to feel hungry after eating rather sooner than other food types
for why your statement about "high calorie foods don't make you fat" is seriously misleading.
though maybe that's hampered a little bit by the little man in my head who is trying to make me say "good and articulate points, b!"
I must protest. I am not a little man, and I am not inside your head. I may, however, be trying to make you say that.
But you can't prove it.
And Maynard, seriously, we're going to have to stage an intervention for you if you keep this up.
Bphd: You want to hold my coat? or shall I hold yours?
Maynard. I was talking about avocados. Not animal fats.
Now, will someone please take Maynard outside and kick his ass for me? What's the point of hanging out in a frat house if I can't call on some muscle when I need it?
Because, as we all know, I'm far too new-agey (and fat from eating avocados) to fight my own battles.
Heh, jinx. You're a guy, you do it. I'll hold your coat and squeal with admiration.
Ah.. I think I should perhaps have written "Troll Hunting" its getting late, you know.
Gee its way too many years since a girl squealed with admiration while holding my coat... jux you're on.
Maynard may be wrong and a little nuts, but he hasn't really gone too far over the line, has he?
Maynard, darling, post 154 was meant as a mild suggestion that maybe coming to a blog where you don't post regularly and spewing random insults at the regulars is sub-optimal behavior. Now that b has cut your arguments to flinders--really, if you're nitpicking on the difference between "cause in itself" and "contribute to," you should say so calmly--will you kindly go the fuck away?
I don't think he has, I just want him to calm down a bit and make his points without being needlessly insulting and embarassing himself with all the spittle and foaming and general highschool antics.
Well Bphd and I had the same thought simultaneously. Not a good test of correctness, but still!
No No, he has not gone to far, yet.
* shrugs coat back on*
Fine, it's ogged's blog. Ogged, I do feel that Maynard was a touch over the line in insulting b--the last sentence of 163 for instance. Also blatantly both stupid and mendacious, which I think was directed at Austro, was a bit much.
ogged, he's picking on a girl. Can't you at least yell at him a little?
Which is to say, I think he needs to sober up or face an intervention, but not an asskicking (yet).
You had a yes vote from me and Austro before you asked the question. And didn't you yourself tell him that he was going to far when he dragged the calorie aside back into the thread in the first place?
I mean Im new here an all... but Mendacious and Stupid? and the trip on B was beyond the call of rugged interchange, or do i miss something?
"Maynard. I was talking about avocados. Not animal fats."
And why is this relevant to calorie issues? Yes there are differences between animal and plant fats that are relevant for some health purposes, but we are not talking about things like essential vs non-essential fatty acids, saturated vs not, or trans vs cis, heart disease and manufacture of cell walls and so on. We are talking energy metabolism, and, as far as I know, for caloric purposes they are equivalent, and as I said, the textbook I quoted from explicitly grouped avocados with peanuts, bacon and butter/cheese as equivalently high-fat items for calorie purposes. If you believe that this is not correct, please point me to something that says so (preferably with lots of background and supporting material).
Maynard, quit picking on the girl, you pussy.
Seriously, toning down it down is a good idea. There are real issues to discuss here.
(My concern, for those who care, is that we're not too quick to shout down people who aren't "regulars" when they disagree with those who are. So yes, I think Maynard is on the line, but the calls for asskicking seemed premature.)
I don't really want you to beat him up. But he's not just disagreeing, he's deliberately being an ass, and I'm not interested in providing "background and supporting material" to prove that the fat in avocados is not the nutritional equivilant of the fat in bacon, a fact that anyone with half a brain already knows.
Anyway, since you called him a pussy, I'm gonna take that as license to call him an ass and tell him to fuck off.
So where were we? Avocados not having children or something.
Speaking of the reproductive capacities of avocados, do you remember growing them from seeds with toothpicks in a glass of water when we were kids? What the hell are you supposed to do with them when they sprout? I don't remember.
Ogged. Respect man. That last comment would have torn it for me. Given the timing.
"Pussy" was a joke. (Isn't it always?)
Tcha.. I was 20 when i saw my first avocado. We grew cress from seeds.
Oh, well, what makes you think I wasn't joking when I told him to fuck off?
Come back, Maynard, and be my monkey some more.
Ogged, that's a good idea. If Maynard's posts from the beginning had read like 229, I wouldn't have swored at him; and it might be interesting to have that discussion.* But at this point I think b is well within her rights to refuse to engage with him (and has been for about 50 posts)--it's not that he came in and disagreed, it's that he did it in such an insulting and condescending manner.
I've found Maynard to be an interesting commenter elsewhere, though, so maybe there's something about the dynamics of this thread.
*Actually, the discussion would have been boring as fuck, but nothing wrong with that.
You know, I had a friend in college who had never eaten avocado before I made chicken monterey for him. (Chicken, white wine, mushrooms, and avocado. Delicious!) I was shocked.
He was a small town midwestern boy, though, and didn't like it.
Later he decided he was gay and moved to SF. Where I believe his tastes have been somewhat broadened.
Now what you do, what you do is this. You make the carpet good and wet, then you sprinkle lots of cress seeds. Wait a few days, so the victim has to be away for a few, then you rustle a sheep on the day of victims return and let it graze in the locked room on the cress you grew.
Which is Maynards room?
#240: My theory, unsurprisingly, is that it's not the "dynamics of this thread." It's the subject matter. You know. Women's stuff.
Later he decided he was gay and moved to SF. Where I believe his tastes have been somewhat broadened.
No doubt.
So B, do your avocado dishes often have that effect?
I'll let you know when pseudonymous kid grows up. Avocado is a favorite of his.
If you believe that this is not correct, please point me to something that says so (preferably with lots of background and supporting material).
Why? You obviously haven't been reading such stuff so far before running off at the mouth.
Well, anything that broadens the mind, I ssay!
With that I need to get to bed. Its been fun, thanks.
This thread's already overburdened with how to live a meaningful life among the world's scarce resources, and whether your kids will do enough philosophy--or have enough kids!--to make up for the oil they'll burn; I'm surprised there's rage left over to spend on fatty foods.
(after the avocado sprouts you can get a pot and dirt and it'll grow up into a little tree! at which point you forget to water it and it dies, if i recall correctly.)
You know, didn't Maynard used to comment here fairly often? Are we sure this isn't a troll who's usurped his name?
g'night Austro. We'll see if we can't start another li'l flamewar for you tomorrow.
Matt you are wrong wrong wrong about "reason is because".
Id like that I think. Ogged: Good post.
G'night.
I don't want to cause trouble, and, since everyone seems to want me silenced, I won't post anymore on this thread.
But honestly, apart from Ogged, I think people are being completely unreasonable. Look at what I posted in succession (it's easy, just do a search for Maynard in the thread).
* I said that I was not interested in mommy blogs, a personal statement that insults no-one --- and just to show it's not that I'm some sort of women/child-hating moron I included that I also am not interested in sports blogs.
* I stated a personal opinion that self-congratulation about what a fantastic achievement it is to have kids is unwarranted, that the fact that this is natural has nothing to do with whether it is good or not, and I pointed out in a sarcastic/humorous tone that it's not a good idea to claim that people are posting xyz because of abc if you don't know them and their motivations because two can play at that game, that anyone can start claiming that someone else's argument is worthless because they have some secret motives hidden even to themselves.
* I pointed out that the statement "Eating high-calorie food does not make you fat." is misleading and, offered a paraphrase that I thought was perhaps justified. I made a crack at bphd which some would consider unreasonable, and which is, IMHO, the only unreasonable thing I have said in this whole thread. But come on, the statement as presented,
"Eating high-calorie food does not make you fat." just smacks so strongly on non-scientific wishing-it-were-so that
can you blame me?
* The paraphrase was rejected, at which point it seemed reasonable to justify my ridicule of the statement as presented.
* Meanwhile Austro repeated a common canard, that the problems inherent in a shrinking population are so serious that we should revert to a growing or stable population. This is a subject near and dear to my heart because it is so serious. I tried to refute it as clearly (but succinctly) as possible, by pointing out the two alternatives we face and their consequences. I had angry words for Austro at the end of this post, but these I don't feel I have to justify. Austro made such a big deal of how those not having children were selfish louts that I felt the true state of affairs needed to be made quite clear.
* Subsequent to this Austro went off on a tangent about how developed societies, most of which have shrinking populations, use substantial resources. This is true, but has nothing to do with my point which is that population has to shrink at some point, and doing it now rather than later, makes it a whole lot easier to do it without catastrophe.
* Finally in response to a bphd post about how childless people complained (in her opinion unjustifiedly so) about how they are treated by society, I pointed out that these complaints are not completely unjustified.
And that get's us to here. In summary
+ I insulted bphd once for reasons I thought were justified, but which I concede others may feel were unjustified.
+ I insulted Austro twice, both times for reasons I feel were completely justified.
+ I have ignored all sorts of contumely thrown my way because I'm not interested in personal fights, I'm interested in the real issues and facts, and I have largely confined myself to the issues and facts. Looking back at my posts and the responses, I see frequent attempts to muddy the waters, to go off on tangents, to bring up irrelevant asides, but I see not a single instance of substantive criticism or correction of a point I made. My primary sin appears to have been to state a number of truths that people don't want to believe.
Now what you do, what you do is this. You make the carpet good and wet, then you sprinkle lots of cress seeds. Wait a few days, so the victim has to be away for a few, then you rustle a sheep on the day of victims return and let it graze in the locked room on the cress you grew.
What is this, Caltech?
Maynard, are you illiterate? Seriously. Because we've been full of substantive criticism and correction of your "points"--so much so in fact that we have treated snark as points, rather than as mere assholery. And because your summary of what you actually said is so completely inaccurate as to be laughable.
This is the Mommy thread, and 255 is a special number leftover from my 8-bit days, back when mom was always hasslin me to do chores and eat my vegetables while I had More Important Things To Do (like save princesses).
Your eight-bit days ... when you were under 256 months old (21 years, four months)? When your allowance was a dollar?
"Austro made such a big deal of how those not having children were selfish louts that I felt the true state of affairs needed to be made quite clear."
So, once more, I linked the not having children with two other points to get to selfishness. PLEASE read what I read.
That the tangent was a tangent was painfully clear to me.Neither did your argument refute my actual contention.
It may be dear to your heart and if you'd used a different tone and less invective, I might have engaged in the debate. Hell, you might even be right.
Finally. I was floating a discussion, as I believe I made very clear. So the invective was not called for.
With that I reall MUST get to sleep.
Goodnight
Take the errors in that last post as proof of tiredness.
Huh. I could see a similar prank in Cambridge, Mass. in MIT, though I guess at both Caltech and MIT large ruminants would be hard to find.
Austro, we've established that Maynard is illiterate. He can't read what you wrote. Stop embarrassing him.
And get some sleep. Isn't it like the wee hours over there or something? What are you, me?
B: Its 1:30am. At the last check I was still me. But who knows. I ll be hallucinating soon. More so than Maynard would accuse me of.
Ben: Cambridge England is fairly rural, ya know. But I d bet finding "Nutzvieh" in MIT is not too hard.
So I m out of here already.
the fat in avocados is not the nutritional equivilant of the fat in bacon
Nothing is the equivalent of the fat in bacon. NOTHING. I'll thrash any man or woman who says otherwise.
Re: 261
Nintendo, Ben. Nintendo. And my allowance was $3. I was rich!
How long until that new kid of yours starts getting his bacon grease, apostropher?
Bacon is awesome. I actually have a bacon story that is also about maternity, if anyone wants to hear it.
Is Bphd the only woman here? And what's all the stuff with calories? I skipped the last 50 or so comments because I wanted to make a point about taxes based on Maynard's comment:
Maybe because the tax system strongly subsidizes people with kids who live a very specific lifestyle. Of course the child deduction is part of that, but the biggie is mortgage interest deduction. There are plenty of others, of course, for example things like the cliff in the medical deduction. For the last ten years or so I've paid total rates of oh, 35% or so of my income(federal and state, but not including sales tax), while my colleagues, earning just as much, pay a rate of perhaps 20%.
What specific lifestyle? And I didn't get much of a child tax credit? And I pay $1000/month in childcare and I get only about 5% credit for that on my taxes. I'm all for providing some benefits for childless/free people, especially through work. I don't know what those would be, maybe a higher tution reimbursement for yourself, extra conference travel? I don't know; there's gotta be something.
As for the original post--the point of which I think is long gone--I think the point has been somewhat proven here. I think people will/do read the good "mommy blogs" (god, I hate that term) and with any luck, what they are saying will get through to someone. Maybe not Maynard, but someone . . .
Geekymom! I love you.
I'm often the only women here. It's b/c the boys are so fratty, you see. There are a few others who pop in occasionally, and now there's a woman on the masthead, but mostly it's a boys club. They deny it, but it is.
BTW, I kwym on "mommy blogs"--otoh, of course, detesting being called "mommy" (I do too) is surely evidence of internalized sexism.
I'd like to hear a story about bacon and maternity.
Ok, well, it's kind of gross. But it's short. More an anecdote.
So when I was pregnant, I had morning sickness for seven months. That "first trimester only" crap is, well, crap. Anyway, so one of the weird things about being pregnant, though, is that you can be nauseous *and* hungry at the same time. Because, of course, you're always hungry. So, like, for some reason in months five and six, I would puke and then I would immediately want a bacon sandwich.
Every time.
Now I'm going to go fry a pork chop. I'll check back though, don't worry. The joy of being alone is that you can websurf and eat at the same time.
God, this multitasking thing has really gotten out of control
Lord God Almighty. I go out to get some avacados (yes, I have no avacados) and I come back to find half the people in this thread think I've insulted them (???) and BPhD is covering my ass and I reread the thread to catch up and you've added 40 bloody posts.
ash
['Sigh.']
And I can't spell avocados today, neither.
ash
['Double negative, no shit.']
I stopped covering your ass. You're on your own.
Bacon sandwich? You mean you don't just eat the bacon straight up, as god intended?
When I was pregnant, it was bacon sandwiches.
I take a day away from the blog and it's little green footballs day in the comments box.
Can I strike the middle position that:
a) yes, non-parents often get the shaft
b) libertarian models of "chosen costs" do a very poor job of explaining how parenting has been viewed by most human societies throughout history. If you are a libertarian-inclined single person, you are in for some irritation. Also, you should adopt a new moral philosophy. May the house recommend...
c) Yes, there is something as tiresome as hearing someone natter on about his kids spitting up -- it's hearing a single people complain about getting screwed by a parent-centric society
c) In the original "pig in a dress" comment, I took the dress to refer to blogging and swearing. That is, kibbitzing and ruminating over parenting that has happened since time immemorial is now being given a 21st century gloss, but not transformed. Isn't this just the truth? Blogging has, I suspect, done much less for topics like sports talk, mortgage talk, and childrearing talk than for topics with high value of expert opinion.
d) I think Handley got a bad rap.
e) how did this end up being a discussion of human metabolism. Do I really need to read all 400 comments? Ben W, you're a paralegal. Can you precis this for me?
I can get it down to 284 comments as a rough start, if that'll help.
How long until that new kid of yours starts getting his bacon grease
Assuming that isn't some sick euphemism, as soon as he's old enough to ask for it. Rest assured that in our house, he's already getting plenty of second-hand grease.
[truly innocent questioner] Do you have any children?
[childless person] No, and why do you think I should? [etc.]
But the following:
[evangelist for childbearing] If you don't have children, you're an evolutionary dead end.
[childless person] Get stuffed.
[efc] Can't you take a joke?
is I think a genuine insult.
Great. Bears no real resemblance to what I said.
Original gluehorse comment I was responding to:
Tripp, I don't care what I leave on my tombstone. I don't believe anything happens after death, I believe my existence will effectively end when I do, and any memories that anyone has of me or my children or my grandchildren aren't going to change that. The most I can do is live my life the way I want to live it and do the things I want to do while I can. My plans don't include children. I'm not an evangelist, telling other children not to have kids because I'm not having kids. This is my choice and it doesn't make me any more or less a person than you or anyone else.
I adopted the same (calibrated as exactly as possible) light and breezy tone here:
Great. From an evolutionary angle, you are a deadend. If you enjoy your genetic deadendness, spiffy. Have a good time. On the other hand, people with kids are continuing life, which is the point of this entire gene business in the first place. If they like it, good on them.
Well, now I feel all tolerant and shit.
ash
['Has no kids.']
I have no kids. I am 37 years old. I may or may not ever have kids. Any 'insult' intended for 'childfree' people applies to me as well. That was why I intentionally included the kicker 'has no kids'.
From an evolutionary angle, you are a deadend.
Is this disputed somewhere? Evolution doesn't function without reproduction, and since living organisms on Terra are not immortal (not true, theoretically, in the case of organisms that reproduce by division, but let's skip that), if everyone and everything stops reproducing, 'life' ends, in geologic time. If an organism does not reproduce, its genes are not passed on. Therefore any mutations or special combinations are not replicated. From the viewpoint of the evolution of genes, the person may as well not have existed. However, many organisms, family groups and species go extinct, so from the day-to-day point of view, they may as well not have existed either, excepting in terms of the fact that their reproduction help result in the existence of the current generation.
I am implicitly skipping over the argument of altruism versus gay uncles and so on, because nothing has been satisfactorily resolved at this point. Not from my POV, anyways.
If you enjoy your genetic deadendness, spiffy. Have a good time. On the other hand, people with kids are continuing life, which is the point of this entire gene business in the first place. If they like it, good on them.
Which is counter to the argument that people who reproduce should feel BAD, which was implicit in gluehorse's argument, and is also a negation of the demand that people without children should feel bad.
From an evolutionary point of view, how you feel about other people having or not having kids is irrelevant. I could counterargue that it does matter, that genetic imperative causes people to argue people without kids should feel bad, excepting that people not having kids leaves more room for the children of those that do have kids.
That's all very weak tea really.
Anyhow, then I said:
Well, now I feel all tolerant and shit.
Which is me poking fun at myself and also the 'childfree' and anti-'childfree' argument, as people are not terrifically tolerant when discussing this issue, which they should be, because it doesn't matter very much from the long view. If the human race 'fails' and somehow destroys itself and most other life with it, evolution will start over with bacteria living in Antartic ice sheets. Whee.
Whether you like this outcome or not has nothing to do with anything, really.
And then I get this:
was really goddamned insulting to the childless. (Also to FUCKING ADOPTIVE PARENTS.)
It is? Why? It's either true or it's not, from an evolutionary point of view. (Putting aside that perhaps it will all turn out to be a product of (gasp!) Intelligent Design, or possibly Intelligent But Tasteless Design) Are you insulted by the color blue? Do you get mad at dirt for being so dirty?
None of us really matter on the scale of evolution.
Ok, so then calling someone an evolutionary deadend is hardly insulting, is it? In fact, it therefore (from an evolutionary point of view) doesn't matter whether they adopt kids or not.
I do think individuals matter from an evolutionary point of view. They matter like .0000000000000000001 or something in the larger scheme of things. If there's only one individual, then that .0...1 bit of mattering goes away. In the long view, then, it doesn't matter very much.
And if you're saying that childless people are missing out on the purpose of life, reread b's 16.
Posted by: Matt Weiner
You are overreading. Life, as in 'organic life' not life as in 'people's lives'.
From an inorganic super-intelligent entity's POV, we may be a perfectly disgusting form of planetary soap scum that is polluting a perfectly nice pile of rocks, and so it keeps sending asteroids this way to get rid of us, but it hasn't succeeded yet. If it (the inorganic entity) gets really annoyed, perhaps it will blow up the sun. Or not.
If it does and the terrestial strain of DNA dies out, does it matter?
Good question! I've no idea really!
Now, if you want to be offended that I made an offhand reference to Paul Ehlrich and giant talking cockroaches, feel free.
ash
['Do we need to tread over this worn ground any more?']
baa, that's all quite reasonable. As to human metabolism, bitch was having quesidillas with avocado, offered me some, I said avocado makes you fat, she disagreed, and we were off.
I do think there's something more significant about mommy blogging than what you'll allow. I might be generalizing from the scales falling from my own eyes, but I'm not convinced of that yet.
You know, come to think about it, it's kind of weird to be okay with the cheese but not with the avocado.
I'm just saying.
You talking to me? I'm lactose intolerant, no cheese anyway.
It'll be hard to enjoy your quesadilla, then.
generalizing from the scales falling from my own eyes
You know, as you say this, I realize that in fact you are completetly right. What's new isn't the content of the blogging, it's that men like you and me can reach that content. Mothers have been talking about this stuff since kingdom come, but not (usually) around men, or in a form readily (wait for it!) interrogatable by men.
Here's the analogy: Howard Stern. Men have been pigs for eons, but he was the first guy to be a pig on the radio where women could hear. Thus, a breakthrough.
I wasn't going to come back. I was just going to slip away, not caring what happened, but instead I'm sitting here lmao because the conversation now sounds like we're all sitting around a campfire and have smoked too much weed. And there's bacon and avocados involved so you *know* there's weed.
What really got me was ash's defense of himself. I know it was supposed to be serious and all and he did a good job, but my face was doing that thing it does when you're holding your breath and trying not to laugh and you kind of look like you're going to throw up and then air explodes from your mouth like a fart and if you have been drinking beer at the same time (which I was), beer comes out your nose and you then laugh hysterically without stopping.
Now I have to pee.
Yeah. Now it's even weirder that you said "quesadilla's fine."
Bah, women always knew about that Howard Stern cock talk. Men think we're invisible when we're washing dishes/waiting tables/etc.
Geekymom, will you please be my best friend?
I realize that in fact you are completetly right.
Yup, that was my point ;)
it's even weirder that you said "quesadilla's fine."
I have, in fact, had quite yummy quesidillas without cheese, but I admit, cheese is one my favorite things in the world and life kinda sucks without it.
"Queso," you see, means "cheese."
So whatever, you had, it wasn't a quesadilla. It might have been a quesidilla. Whatever the hell that is.
Ogged, make yourself a dang kaysadilla.
Someone had to say it.
Sounds like ogged is looking for a fajita, not a quesadilla. Or perhaps since at lunch he asked for something toasted with mayo, he was after one of those bacon sandwiches. (Belching bacon fumes for 8 hours straight was how I found out I was preggers w/ the second kid, to be semi-OT.)
Completely OT: is like half the 'net gone right now or is my ISP Fubar? I can get here but not to B.'s blog; I can get to Unqualified Offerings but not to Andrew Olmstead, etc. etc.
Re: 235: I once lived in a student apartment up by Columbia where one of my roomies had an avocado tree fetish. He planted every @#$%&* avocado pit he could convince to sprout. And named the resulting foliage.
So the answer is: Pitch the little buggers as soon as possible, before your roommates/children/resident primates plant the things.
Hey, wiseasses, I know the difference between a fajita and a quesadilla. The nice Mexican folks at the Mexican place will make a quesadilla without cheese, but I do normally order tacos. You can even order a taco with fajita meat--whatever to make of that?
MAD Magazine had a pet avocado tree, but I can't remember its name. Arthur, maybe.
There's a taco place near me that's taken to offering "Inauthentic White-Boy tacos" with hard shells.
That's pretty funny. But that doesn't mean you're allowed to order them.
I'm sure they're making you something, ogged, but it ain't a quesadilla. By definition. Even if they let you think it is.
Jesus it's a bunch of w-lfs-ns around here. I have nothing invested in calling it a quesadilla. I did it once, and it was yummy.
I'm going away now. If you want to flirt with me, I'm online in the chitty chat way.
I did it once, and it was yummy.
This was back in college, I assume?
ALTERNATE:
Then why do you keep going back to The Mineshaft?
I'll miss ya, but you know I don't like IMing. Or maybe you don't know, but a boy can't just get up and walk around when he's IMing.
302
And let's not forget that screen classic "Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death"...
this and the one below it are pretty good.
Ogged, that's lame. I get up and wander around all the time while im'ing. Everyone accepts that sometimes there are just pauses in the conversation.
Unless you're having a fight or something. But we've gotten past that.
Everyone accepts that sometimes there are just pauses in the conversation.
I feel dismissed and marginalized. I like the email presumption better: you might not get an answer for hours, or even until the next day. That's more my speed.
But with email you have more time to compose the answer, so there's a greater expectation of, well, thorough composition and answers. IMing is really the best of both worlds in that respect: you can take time on the pretext that you were doing something else, but it's still quite low-pressure.
If you're easily wigged out by the thought of interacting with people that's very important.
Well, it takes getting used to. Anyway, I thought the point was that *you* get up and walk around, not that other people do.
I had no idea that internet communication caused so much anxiety.
I thought the point was that *you* get up and walk around, not that other people do
Well, yes, but I hate to leave someone hanging. I always feel like I have to respond RIGHT NOW. I will not be reassured on this point. It is called "instant messaging," people.
I think you're a nutcase. Whenever I email you the turnaround is pretty quick. It's the same darn thing, only you don't have to keep reloading a web page.
Man, ogged, you are some uptight piece of work.
Ben, buddy, you've met me; did I seem uptight to you?
B, it's all about the expectations.
Ben, isn't he? I mean. It's just incredible.
I reserve the right to judge for myself. You're a bit rigid. It's weird.
I'll just leave that low-hanging fruit for someone else to pick up.
What am I supposed to say? So, bitchphd, tell me, here on my blog--which is read by millions--why you find me rigid, so I can perhaps explain myself and bare my soul to the world?
No no not at all, I wouldn't ask that and I guess I've irked you again. Sorry. Write it off as a joke. I'd discuss it with you in another venue, but you don't like chat.
Millions of people read unfogged? I'm impressed.
And let's not forget that screen classic "Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death"...
That movie was just about the last place I expected to find Heart of Darkness jokes.
Amazing. I click on the comments link at unfogged, and I find myself magically transported to the Washington Monthly.
See if I ever try a substantive post again.
I only skimmed, but I don't get the Washington Monthly comparison. It looked like the
a) the vast majority of posters in this thread were the regulars, who weren't really talking past each other
and
b) not nearly enough trolls (have you seen Kevin's Konscience? I don't know how he does it)
What really got me was ash's defense of himself. I know it was supposed to be serious and all and he did a good job, but my face was doing that thing it does when you're holding your breath and trying not to laugh
It was supposed to be serious? I thought it was supposed to be ridiculous, albeit serious sounding, as that entire part of the conversation was ridiculous. Not ridiculous like the Marx brothers, but ridiculous like a really bad Kung Fu movie.
Gluehorse was trolling (hint: gluehorse, death is the end, etc.) and I trolled Gluehorse right back (hint: gluehorse, evolutionary dead end), and here I was hoping to catch a bass, or a perch or something and look. A drum. Drum's nice and all, I guess, but I don't really like all the tiny little bones. Here little drum, back into the water with you, me want real fish.
we're all sitting around a campfire and have smoked too much weed
I don't smoke dope. I sound like this naturally. In fact, if I smoked dope, I'd pass out cold. So, I suppose, you could say that the threads wherein I say nothing, are the threads wherein I am stoned. Immaculate. Through space and time with Maya and stuff, even.
FL:
I find myself magically transported to the Washington Monthly
? Yeah, and? You mean the stupid obnoxious people (you can include me in that group or not)?
Dude, more skulls to bash!
ash
['And then you can set them on fire, and then you can pee on them to put it out.']
From comment number 46: "(2) spend the rest of your life fighting climate change, nuclear proliferation and anything else likely to cause the extinction of your ancestors."
You mean the extinction of my progeny.
I'm sure someone else caught that mistake first, as there are 3,000 comments here, but I just couldn't help myself...
Re 232: "the fat in avocados is not the nutritional equivilant of the fat in bacon"
Bacon and guacamole - spiritual kin?
suddenly veered back to the counter playing black jack Professor if something does go wrong tonight if I dont get my .
