It’s About Making Babies!

Sharon at Casaubon’s Book mentions a recent CNN report about the Italian region of Lombardy offering cash to women considering an abortion – to keep the baby.

I understand the issues – the Muslim religion is exerting tremendous pressure toward population growth within their community (averaging 8.1 births per couple). This pressure must destabilize any non-Islamic nation.

I think I am coming closer to answering a question that concerned me some five or six years ago. Telling kids to not get pregnant – or not to have sex – seemed short sighted. That was the initial question that got me started here at ItsAboutMakingBabies.com.

What if we explained why they should have babies, and work from there on when and where it works out for the very best? Only, I couldn’t see an answer. The Bible claims “be fruitful and multiply” which is a means of growth for the Church – but lacks anything but an authoritarian “Do it because I said so.” Don’t get me wrong – for that particular Authority, that is a pretty persuasive argument.

But I wanted an answer that fit non-believers, and a secular culture and society.

I consider culture to be the rituals and traditions, with the values and definitions of right and wrong, that a family chooses. Here I mean family as adults choosing to care for progeny; extended family is the families that the adults were raised in, and the families of their siblings (brothers and sisters). The cultures of the families in a community make up the culture of that community. In times of affluence (cheap energy), communities can tolerate a lot of outlying, non-conforming families (family cultures). During periods of harsh choices – during conflict, scarce resources, and other periods of stress – there will and should be less tolerance of “not our kind”. Communities have a vested interest in assuring that children raised there, and newcomers, come to assimilate the general definitions of right and wrong, the median values, the most common rituals and traditions. Without the communal culture, the community loses the ability to care for itself, to provide a secure environment for its families.

So. Why should we (as a member of a family or community), choose to have a baby? To honor the culture of our extended family and community.

We learn what we are raised with. If we respect (not necessarily the same as enjoy or adore) our parents – we must feel a need to grow into their examples of adulthood, including the family they raised us in. We would need to produce the next generation, to assert the fulfillment of our destiny, to recreate the role models of our parents and family and respected members of the community.

The notion of romantic love as a basis of forming a family – or having a romantic “relationship” without benefit of family – is quaint, and since its invention in Renaissance Italy, has sold a lot of soap, cosmetics, provocative clothes and fancy vehicles. What Romeo and Juliet point out, poignantly, is that ignoring the effect on the community and extended family when choosing a mate can be catastrophic to the lives of the people involved.

I note that weddings in the US typically require one or more witnesses to complete the marriage certificate; none are needed to proclaim “I love you, your place or mine?” That is, that forming a family is a public event, a community event, and creates a new member of the community – the couple joined together choosing to raise progeny.

I am not denigrating marriages that don’t contemplate having children, not even adopted. It is just that such couples have chosen a form of genetic suicide, and even a disparagement of their extended family cultures, since they are refusing to teach their values and definitions of right and wrong, their traditions and rituals, to the next generation. For whatever reason, as of the next generation – their legacy is no longer active, in a community sense. Adults sharing time and home serve many useful purposes to nation and community. Serving the next generation, however, isn’t one of them. (Choosing to unilaterally reduce one’s own society and community is akin to cowardice in battle – it gives aid and comfort to the enemy, and increases risk and danger to one’s companions. Pursuing mutual goals might be different.)

Let us tell our children, “Grow up and have babies, because that is the strength of our community and family.” “Grow up, and choose a mate to make a family, and your children will be a blessing to your faith, your family, and your community.” Maybe even, “Any person that wants sex with you, but doesn’t want to participate with you in the community and your extended family, is refusing to be a mate or co-parent.” “No rebel is ever really happy.”

Don’t tell the poor single girls “don’t have an abortion.” So called Right To Life activists have always offended me. They wait until the ladies and girls have an unwanted pregnancy, they intervene with their own moral interpretations of life, and walk the hell away. I could respect an anti-abortion activist that signs up to pay the medical bills and adopt the baby from the unwanted pregnancy – nothing less is conscionable. In my opinion.

Instead, tell girls and boy, and men and women, that their community needs them to form families. That they need to find a mate-prospect with similar cultures, with excellent character, with suitable life skills and character – discipline, honor, honesty – and build a home. That marriage, or a so-called relationship (fornication, cohabiting, whatever), is not about “the last first date you will ever have”. That forming a family is a stepping stone, carrying their truths and beliefs forward in the same manner as their parents and grand parents before them.

Many states in America, if not all of them, have statutes making sex with minor children illegal. So – explain to me why we worry about whether pregnant teens (and preteens) have abortions – when we aren’t sending some man to jail for each and every pregnancy, let alone every sexually active minor? When single women have an unwanted pregnancy, why are we concerned about whether she has an abortion – when we used to enforce community and state laws forbidding sexual intercourse outside the bonds of marriage.

For the ladies in the Lombardy region of Italy, my sympathy. The elevation of ambition (“I scored last night!”, and “He was so fine!”) has replaced contentment of family life and community. There may come to be a culture and society that provides a context for a fruitful life for the single woman or poorly married woman with children and no culture, few assets, and reduced prospects. But it hasn’t happened yet.

As for the anti-abortion people, what I recall at the time of Roe v. Wade, was that abortion was illegal – thus only unlicensed procedures were available. And lots of women died, unnecessarily, in the face of unwanted pregnancies. My personal feeling is that I hope no one I know ever needs and abortion – and I pray it is available to anyone that believes they need one.

NML writes about the terms and conditions of a relationship. That even if you get through the fine print at the start and don’t find any red flags, be aware that your partner’s agenda might change – and if you stay, you will be “accepting” the changes. She focuses on reading the signs and what they mean, and writes well and convincingly.

I think a long term relationship is bigger than a personal choice.

If you meet someone, and get closer because of feelings, this has the makings of a decent, to great, episode of social recreation.

If you want something more, a shared life, a life partner – a mate, then you are looking at building a couple. And couples interact with their community. You will each, as a couple, be making choices and efforts outside the coupledom, because of being part of the couple – at work, shopping, at play, with friends, with family. You need to be sure that your prospect shows good character with you and with others.

Selecting a mate has to take more into account. For one thing, you don’t just have to trust and respect him when he is with you – you have to be sure that he is competent, respectful – trustworthy, trusted, and respected – with those you know and those you meet.

One really big red flag is how he treats you with his friends and family – are you a visitor or a cherished guest? Are there indications he often has “dates” tagging along (! Might be a Perpetual Dater!), or does he have no friends or contact with family (! Might be *unable* to connect emotionally!) or pets? Is he proud of you, like a trophy of some kind (!), is he possessive that you don’t talk or contact anyone (! Isolation issue!), or is he genuinely making you and his relationship to you a part of his private and social life?

Do your friends find him substantial as a member of the community, does he have a life (do you?) socially and personally, outside the dating scene?

How he behaves with others doesn’t matter much between the sheets (or it gets really kinky really quick). But if you want someone for the long haul, then you need to know where you stand with friends, family, and community – few people can sham and manipulate everyone, everywhere, and still seem genuine. That is the place, socially and within the community, to look for more red flags. Do you matter to him only skin to skin, or out in public, too?