Not sure I'd qualify that as abuse or very lousy parenting though- or that it calls for name calling or vilification, and I mean instant vilification of them or all families of large size.
You're also the first person who's brought up anything about the kids' rights to not be raised in such a way, or anything like that. Most of the people who've managed to piss me off today did it by instantly going offensive, without looking into anything, or giving reasons beyond "people shouldn't have big families because I said so!". And when I say going offensive, I do mean name-calling bullying against the entire family.. dehumanizing them and anyone who might be like them with big blanket statements.
As someone not into that kind of brood-mare religious mentality, I'll say that with any luck, the kids will find different paths when they grow up. But I still won't go so far as to condemn the couple utterly for what they're doing, or call them names over it.
The snap judgements and blanket statements are generally what irritate me (and this particular post was spawned by a few other people deciding it was funny or something to send me serious-looking messages saying exactly things that I'd mentioned earlier I didn't want to see.)
Now, when it comes to the hubbie's anti-abortion stances, those things I'll fight tooth and nail and maybe even get rude and angry over.. they have the right to make kids, other people have the right to prevent having them. It cuts both ways.
I wonder if the mother got raised the same way, though. She's handing those babies off to girls as young as seven-years-old, effectively ending their childhoods.
My mom's family was a bit like that with the 10 kids. The older ones did a lot of the raising of the younger ones. VERY strict, conservative family situation.
There were problems, and some resentment, but it wasn't a horror story like it seems a lot of folks are assuming big families HAVE to be, and I'm hoping that this bigger family isn't one either.
They grew up to be pretty wonderful and fine adults, and most of them wound up with much smaller families when they started getting married. Though admittedly half of the 'smaller family' thing may have been luck/genetics scaling down, and not actual planning for smaller ones.
I guess I just wish some of these shouty people would put some of the energy they're putting into condemning this family's setup into coming up with more clear and level thoughts on family size issues, or into doing more/speaking out for the families where the kids ARE starving, beaten, or totally neglected.
It's a personal bias with me, really I guess, since most of my friends growing up who were in abusive homes were really from small families, while the larger families I knew with 3-6 kids seemed to have.. a little more of a support situation going.
I know this isn't always the case, and when there's real bad stuff happening.. gods yes, then those parents need to be smacked upside the head.. just really, the Duggans in and of themselves didn't/don't seem to warrant the flames and outrage.
While I understand why someone who came from a family where there were more kids than the parents could feed might be upset, this family can't necessarily be compared automatically to that, and lumped into the same category.
And I have a nagging urge to tell the people who only are harping on the fact that the human race is overpopulated, and people 'shouldn't be allowed to breed like rabbits' or what have you, that if they really hate the human race so badly that they want to make snap calls about neutering, sterilizing, and enforcing breeding rules, they can just resign from it. (Or maybe move to China, do they still have the rules about breeding numbers there?)
You're also the first person who's brought up anything about the kids' rights to not be raised in such a way, or anything like that. Most of the people who've managed to piss me off today did it by instantly going offensive, without looking into anything, or giving reasons beyond "people shouldn't have big families because I said so!". And when I say going offensive, I do mean name-calling bullying against the entire family.. dehumanizing them and anyone who might be like them with big blanket statements.
As someone not into that kind of brood-mare religious mentality, I'll say that with any luck, the kids will find different paths when they grow up. But I still won't go so far as to condemn the couple utterly for what they're doing, or call them names over it.
The snap judgements and blanket statements are generally what irritate me (and this particular post was spawned by a few other people deciding it was funny or something to send me serious-looking messages saying exactly things that I'd mentioned earlier I didn't want to see.)
Now, when it comes to the hubbie's anti-abortion stances, those things I'll fight tooth and nail and maybe even get rude and angry over.. they have the right to make kids, other people have the right to prevent having them. It cuts both ways.
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My mom's family was a bit like that with the 10 kids. The older ones did a lot of the raising of the younger ones. VERY strict, conservative family situation.
There were problems, and some resentment, but it wasn't a horror story like it seems a lot of folks are assuming big families HAVE to be, and I'm hoping that this bigger family isn't one either.
They grew up to be pretty wonderful and fine adults, and most of them wound up with much smaller families when they started getting married. Though admittedly half of the 'smaller family' thing may have been luck/genetics scaling down, and not actual planning for smaller ones.
I guess I just wish some of these shouty people would put some of the energy they're putting into condemning this family's setup into coming up with more clear and level thoughts on family size issues, or into doing more/speaking out for the families where the kids ARE starving, beaten, or totally neglected.
It's a personal bias with me, really I guess, since most of my friends growing up who were in abusive homes were really from small families, while the larger families I knew with 3-6 kids seemed to have.. a little more of a support situation going.
I know this isn't always the case, and when there's real bad stuff happening.. gods yes, then those parents need to be smacked upside the head.. just really, the Duggans in and of themselves didn't/don't seem to warrant the flames and outrage.
While I understand why someone who came from a family where there were more kids than the parents could feed might be upset, this family can't necessarily be compared automatically to that, and lumped into the same category.
And I have a nagging urge to tell the people who only are harping on the fact that the human race is overpopulated, and people 'shouldn't be allowed to breed like rabbits' or what have you, that if they really hate the human race so badly that they want to make snap calls about neutering, sterilizing, and enforcing breeding rules, they can just resign from it. (Or maybe move to China, do they still have the rules about breeding numbers there?)
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