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Serious question about the Duggars...


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I think this is appalling and completely support the efforts to promote healthier moms and babies via breast feeding.

 

From link above.

 

Only 47 percent of Indian mothers exclusively breastfeed for the first six months, compared with 98 percent in countries such as Sweden

 

"Mothers are often inundated with incorrect and biased information both directly, through advertising, health claims, information packs and sales representatives, and indirectly through the public health system," the WHO said in a statement earlier this week in which it called for countries to do more to support breastfeeding.

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The disagreement here is some view articifial birth control as a need of every woman and others simply do not.

 

 

 

No.  You've missed the point entirely.  The argument is NOT that every woman NEEDS artificial birth control.  The argument is that artificial birth control should be among the CHOICES to which every woman should have ACCESS.

 

Tangentially, every woman should also have access to a life free from forced servitude, state approved spousal rape, the daily threat and/or enactment of guerrilla gang rape, genocide and the condescension of privileged western princesses with reductivist "solutions" based on nothing more than religious ideologies that have no bearing on the reality of their lives.

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I have just as much right to petition and argue and work for laws that reflects what I think is good for society as anyone else. In that regard, yes, I'm well within my rights to spend my money as I see fit and to encourage legislation that follows needs and priorities I see as socially good.

 

I never mentioned taxes at all or the bible.

 

But according to your logic, it's not your money either (it's Caesar's) so you should have no say or opinion in government not spending on birth control. Or anything the government spends money on or doesn't. If you're actually okay with that, well I guess that's your choice, but I disagree.

I'm not arguing for "my" tax dollars to be withheld from giving options to certain demographics of society. I didn't argue that you have no say; I said that if you attempt to leverage your legislative voice to block options for poor people, that is a form of oppression.

 

Jesus said his yoke is light; I'll never understand those who feel it is their religious and civic duty to increase the burdens of the poor by leaning on them politically.

 

Your exercise of political power does not affect MY choices as a middle class woman, who can afford to buy birth control if I wanted it. It does affect the poor woman, for whom NFP is not an option, nor is abstinence a viable choice.

 

Think about that, the next time you are angry about the health care crisis, and the lack of affordable health care for your family. For some wealthy people, and other folks, the current system works just fine, and they are exercising their right to promote for-profit health care, because it's what they believe in and what they feel is best for YOU. So, they will use their money, and their lobbyists, and their political clout to ensure that your options remain limited, because in their opinion, universal health care is just not an acceptable option.

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For some wealthy people, and other folks, the current system works just fine, and they are exercising their right to promote for-profit health care, because it's what they believe in and what they feel is best for YOU. So, they will use their money, and their lobbyists, and their political clout to ensure that your options remain limited, because in their opinion, universal health care is just not an acceptable option.

I suppose they could be doing it because they feel it is best for others.

 

It's just as likely they could be doing it because they feel it is a social good in general.

 

They are allowed their opinion and they are allowed to push for and support legislation that conforms with what they feel to be a social good. I do think about that. Daily actually.

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I suppose they could be doing it because they feel it is best for others.

 

It's just as likely they could be doing it because they feel it is a social good in general.

 

They are allowed their opinion and they are allowed to push for and support legislation that conforms with what they feel to be a social good. I do think about that. Daily actually.

Except the evidence does not bear out that what they believe to be good actually translates to "social good." Every measure of health care shows the US to be lagging far, far behind other countries that have adopted universal health care.

 

At some point, personal belief must contend with hard evidence.

 

Not that it matters, but to me, it's rather abhorrent that the U.S. spends in excess of 17% of its GDP on health care, but it remains out of reach for millions of its citizens.

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At some point, personal belief must contend with hard evidence.

 

You'd be surprised at just how well sizable populations of U.S. citizens whose belief system is predicated on personal experience and divinely revealed knowledge, can procrastinate, if not completely ignore, contending with hard evidence. 

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Long term breast feeding combined with the mild to severe malnutrition faced by many helped keep many women from ovulating often enough to have 20 children. Look at the Ingalls kids. It is believed that childhood malnutrition deeply affected their adult health and fertility.

 

Yes, I forgot to mention lactational amenorrhea.  That being said, it does not work for everyone to widely space pregnancies.

 

As for the Ingalls, They had 5 live births, though only 4 survived.  Now we think of 5 children (or even 4) as a lot.  Back then, it was pretty normal.

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Yes, I forgot to mention lactational amenorrhea. That being said, it does not work for everyone to widely space pregnancies.

You will note that my post combined it with malnutrition. The more nutrients a woman consumes and the fat she carries contribute to whether she starts ovulating again. Women with higher fat stores produce more estrogen and will be more likely to ovulate.

 

As for the Ingalls, They had 5 live births, though only 4 survived. Now we think of 5 children (or even 4) as a lot. Back then, it was pretty normal.

I know.

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I find this thread interesting in light that wide-spread use of birth control is a rather modern thing. Look back even 100 years - you could use animal skin condoms (which I imagine were less effective than latex) or insert things like lint "up there" to try to block the sperm. You could abstain or use withdrawal. Or you could have a very dangerous abortion. Most women did not use anything to prevent pregnancy. Poor nutrition probably had more of a bearing on number of children than birth control did.

 

19 kids, historically, is still larger than most families, but it was a lot less striking in a time when families would routinely have more that 2 kids apiece, which seems to be average today. It also would be less likely for 19 kids to survive into adulthood - which is probably why the Duggars have 19 living children. 100 years ago maybe 11 would have survived...

Not entirely accurate or helpful. Breastfeeding, no artificial nipples, co sleeping were the norm. Woman's bodies naturally hosted ecological child spacing, uninhibited by the existence of hormones in food, artifical lighting, and other factors that today combine to hasten fertility.

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Ugh, three times I've tried to post and Google keeps crashing. I see the thread has moved on, but I'd like to point out that like most if not all of Europe, Canada, and China, the US birth rate has dropped to far below the replacement rate of 2.1. In fact the US just hit the lowest point ever of 1.89 even without a child policy like China's. And that's including the Duggars, high birth rate immigrants, and the WTM families. What's more, fertility rates around the globe are dropping like a rock. This isn't necessarily good news. Strong economies that can't hold to replacement rate will begin to face dire consequences. If this article is to be believed: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323375204578270053387770718.html we are already seeing some of the fallout here in the US. China is considering a change to. A 2 child policy as a result of some of their problems. And their birthdate is only a hair below Canada at 1.53.

 

Another interesting article about falling worldwide fertility rates: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/05/13/why-are-birthrates-falling-around-the-world-in-a-word-television/ One more about why a falling birth rate is a serious problem for the US: http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/rick-newman/2012/12/03/why-a-falling-birth-rate-is-a-big-problem

 

The US and Canada are on their way to being the next Europe. Europe is on its way to becoming th.e next China/japan. Quickly Google "european population crisis" to see why this is a very bad thing. I would go so far as to say those of who are doing our best to raise multiple contributing, well-adjusted members of society are doing society a vast favor. I think that includes pretty much everyone on this board. It looks as if we are going to need each one.

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I'm skeptical of all the dire warnings about decreased fertility rates. The big "under-population" scare articles I've seen always seem to come down to Social Security, health care costs, and "oh no, not more immigrants!"

 

I don't think we're anywhere close to a worker shortage. We have millions of un- and under-employed people, because jobs are being shipped overseas and because people are being automated out of work. I really doubt the automation is going to slow down in the next few decades. If there ever is a real worker shortage (across the board, not just in select industries), then wages would rise and working conditions would improve as companies compete for workers. Also, why are people assuming that the Baby Boomers and generations following will all retire by age 65? Many of them can't afford to and some don't want to. As more people work desk jobs that don't wear out their bodies, more people will be able to continue working, whether part or full-time, in their careers.

 

Health care costs would be a problem, but they are already a problem. I've read that an enormous percent of our healthcare spending is spent on the last weeks or months of people's lives. Some sort of cultural change where people stop demanding treatments that cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars but only extend life a few weeks would be helpful. (That's aside from making changes to make health care costs reasonable.)

 

If they raise the age to collect Social Security to age 70 or more, that would do a lot to fix that problem. When it was set up, about half of adults died before collecting and most didn't collect more than a couple years. It was never designed to have people living off of it for two or more decades.

 

 

 

 

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I'm skeptical of all the dire warnings about decreased fertility rates. The big "under-population" scare articles I've seen always seem to come down to Social Security, health care costs, and "oh no, not more immigrants!"

 

It's going to be interesting seeing how Japan shifts from an exclusively growth focused economy in light of its declining population.

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It seems like any economy that relies on always having increasing populations isn't sustainable in the long run. Why are American businesses so insistent that profits and profit margins must be ever rising? What's wrong with stable profits and profit margins? Maybe the problem is that investors expect to earn their money from capital gains (which is often just speculation, in my opinion), rather than from dividends paid out of corporate profits.

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I'm skeptical of all the dire warnings about decreased fertility rates. The big "under-population" scare articles I've seen always seem to come down to Social Security, health care costs, and "oh no, not more immigrants!"

 

Yes. But.

 

Now the conversation has shifted from, "The population bomb is going to do us all in," to "Well, I'm not so sure decreased fertility rates are such a big problem."  Honestly, I'm not convinced either, so I keep reading.  But I am convinced that population is taking a major shift from rapid growth to mild growth to stasis or even a decrease in the distant future.  I think the best case scenario would be anything from mild growth to mild decrease with an increase in human innovation to keep up with the changes.  At any rate, even though we can't do a Hands Across Jacksonville I don't think the Duggars need to worry as much about taking resources from everyone else.  It isn't as if our entire country is made up of Duggar sized families.  With a birth rate of 1.89, we can afford to leave them alone, I think.

 

Barb

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It's going to be interesting seeing how Japan shifts from an exclusively growth focused economy in light of its declining population.

 

I almost linked an interesting article about the economic consequences of the population bust in Japan over the last 20 years or so last night but was afraid of link overload.  I'll see if I can find it.  I do remember reading that their population is going to decline by a third in 50 years, and by half in 90 years.  That's pretty drastic.  We should be watching to see how they handle it.  Their economy (as well as China's and most of the Euro countries) have faltered for population-related reasons and I think the short term could be very uncomfortable. Unfortunately that's going to land on our shoulders and that of our kids and likely grandkids.  But long term I think we may all be better off. After we're long gone, anyway.

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It seems like any economy that relies on always having increasing populations isn't sustainable in the long run. 

 

Also, I don't get the sense that we need to rely on population growth as much as the maintenance of the replacement rate.  A rapid decline could prove to be as bad as a rapid increase.

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