Responsible Parenting

In light of both of these editorials, several things come to mind. Being a responsible mother (or father) requires more than just time, and more than just effort. It requires a tremendous amount of money and the ability to dedicate a large portion of your life to the child. Being a responsible parent involves making the decision to have a child at the right time in your life, and to not have too many kids than you can take care of at any given time.

If a woman is planning on joining the military, or is currently in the military where she can be deployed at any time and the idea of dying for her country is considered a part of the job, having a child is not a responsible choice at that time. A child needs his or her mother, and a military deployment will obviously hinder that. In addition, a person who can't support themselves financially can obviously not support a child as well, let alone 14 of them. In that case as well, having a child is an irresponsible choice.

I'm not saying there is something wrong with having a large amount of children, what I am saying is that it is irresponsible to have more children that you can support. My mother is one of nine children, but the age difference between the first and last is 20 years. There was not one time when they were all living together, and my grandpa made enough money so my grandma could be dedicated to staying at home and raising these children. This may not be how I want to live my adult life, but it was their choice, and they made it responsibly. Nadya Suleman, on the other hand, did not make her decision responsibly. She has no financial support, and now cannot have a job for all of her time is required to be spent with these 14 kids of hers, who are mostly going to be living in her 2-bedroom house at the same time.

How is this even allowed? How have these kids not been taken away to child protective services? These are humans, not objects to be collected like she seems to consider them. Bringing another person into this already crowded world is a decision that needs to be taken extremely seriously, and if your life at the time doesn't allow for it, it simply shouldn't happen.