speaking of books...

Speaking of books...I've been reading much more than usual lately, especially in my research on the candidates thus far and just generally intriguing things, like the tenets of the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement. Short story: they promote non-reproduction. No babies. Not killing people, just no more babies in the hopes thatwith a slow and gradual die-off (as compared to the drastic extinction event that overpopulating animals in nature suffer) our planet with be able to repair itself and return to it's natural paradise state since all the humans no longer present to fuck it all up. In a nutshell.

I'm not sure if it's serious or not. But even as a satire (though I don't think it is) they've got a point. Which brings me to my next point- I realized while reading their little chart (that presents their responses to common reasons for having children) that I have never in my entire life considered NOT having kids. Not once. Except in horror in some kind of deranged spinster nightmare. Even if I were a lesbian I'd adopt. It's always been treated as an inevitable part of life-but is it? "Go forth and multiply". GOAL MET. I think we covered that one as a planet. So why do we have kids?

My general reasons are 1) I think they'll be really neat people and I can't wait to meet them. Mostly because I like Erich, and I like myself, so it's logical that some kind of combination of us would be something that I like. I'm a nut and he's fun. nut + fun = nutty fun. Funny nut? Something.

2) It seems like to ultimate expression of our love. Or was that the sex? I love Erich so much it's generally assumed that I'll bear a child that will initially make my hips painfully widen, breasts sag, and cause pain so terrible that the mind, according to the women in my family, seems to have developed a natural amnesia to it. Not to mention the common-yet-unexpected dookie. Why don't we ever see that on those natural birth shows where you can see *almost* everything? For the most part they've made me feel more comfortable about the whole thing, but I still think their editing out the dookie. But I digress.

So, the love thing. The VHEMT people (as they call themselves) basically disregard this idea as a selfish -we think we're so great that we bring a new life into the world despite that fact that many of the lives already here are suffering terribly. True. Not that I really think I'm that great. I am, however, okay with them thinking I'm selfish. And to be fair, they did get me considering the issue, and that's what counts.

I want to address the fact that I implied above my body will be ugly after having children. I hear this complaint a lot from women who never lost all their pregnancy weight, or who blame their poor eating habits on the easy availability of their kids' fruit snacks. (Mmmm, high-fructose corn syrup. What's that? You use organic cane sugar? Well, fancy sugar has no calories whatsoever.) American obesity and sedentary lifestyles aside, I think that issue has just as much to do with how we view post-pregnancy bodies as a whole. Just as I object to being expected to shave and starve my body into a pre-pubescent (aka hairless) form, maybe the next step is to start respecting the way healthy, active bodies change after childbearing. What's a stronger act than building a new human being, cell by cell, and bringing them into the world? So why do we shame ourselves for the ways our body strengthens, builds, and delivers this child?

Now this is all easy for me to say, what with my still-a-normal-width feet and my unfertilized eggs running amuck. I guess we'll see. But whose boobs are really that perky to begin with? Sure as hell not mine.

I'm sure that I'll love my children when the time comes, but for now, I'm in no hurry. Sorry Grandpa Bacher. (But don't tell him to read this for pete's sake, he doesn't want to hear about my eggs).

courtesy of Nat: Shape of a Mother

I'll be first to admit that some of these images freak me out a little. I have to deal with body image and weight like most other people (and I say people intentionally). I'm just like everyone else- I expect a body to look like those of the magazines. Models, even the ones in the Dove commercials are exceptionally beautiful to begin with, and then the air-brushing puts them over the top. But that's the whole point! It's like a child who has only eaten junk food growing up picking up a potato or a piece of fruit and calling it gross because it doesn't come in a clean wrapper, and requires some effort to consume. They've never seen the real thing, but what they consider real cannot nourish the body.