Last week, the Associated Press reported that Nadya Suleman, a.k.a. Octomom, has run into some serious financial trouble. Apparently, she has amassed $1 million in debt to a range of creditors -- including her parents. It's also reported that she may have to resort to doing a porn movie in order to make ends meet.
For anyone one who has followed Ms. Suleman's saga over the last three years, none of this should be a surprise. She has made a series of troubling and unwise choices, most notably her decision to have 14 children with no apparent financial means to support them. Alas, actions have consequences, and although one can choose their actions, no one can choose the consequences of their actions.
You might recall that much of the initial reporting about Suleman's decision to have octuplets was positive, even glowing. Our culture tends to respond to these kinds of "scientific miracle" stories like proud 3-year-olds showing our adoring parents a new skill, boasting, "Look what we can do!"
But the tone of the news stories soon turned negative, even vicious, as reports surfaced that Ms. Suleman was a jobless single mother with six more young children who subsisted on a combination of welfare checks, food stamps and student loans. The situation got even worse after a widely seen interview of Ms. Suleman by NBC's Ann Curry. Ms. Suleman reportedly even received death threats.
Why were (and are) so many so incensed by this situation? Is it because children are involved? Maybe, but there certainly have been worse stories that involved children. Maybe it is because Ms. Suleman does not have the money to support her family. Possibly, but could one really make that case in this season of billion-dollar bailouts?
No, I believe the real issue is that Ms. Suleman has been smugly putting in our collective faces something about ourselves that we do not want to see and refuse to acknowledge. Ms. Suleman's story exposes the fact that for the last few decades, our culture has been carefully constructing a modern-day "Tower of Babel" in celebration of "personal choice," especially in matters related to sex.
We have constructed this tower brick by brick -- one brick to unlink marriage from childbearing, another to unlink fatherhood from family life. We have been on a march to climb our tower without taking the time to consider the consequences.
Worse yet, any courageous soul who dares to try and stop us on our "upward" march is shoved from the tower, sans parachute, as an example for others.
Ms. Suleman, a learned product of our culture, knows our dilemma well, or at least got her money's worth from the many PR consultant who have coached her. For example, when Ms. Curry asked, "Why is it responsible for a single woman without a job... to have eight more children?" Ms. Suleman responded, "Yes, I have chosen to be single... If there is a couple... just together, why are they exempt from being called irresponsible?"
When Ms. Curry queried why her fertility specialist, who knew that she already had six children, transferred so many embryos, Ms. Suleman responded, "It's a subject of choice... so he did not judge me. [He was] Very professional."
Even when Ms. Curry tried to challenge Ms. Suleman by suggesting that children need a father, Ms. Suleman had all the right answers. She said, "I absolutely believe that. And they do have a father."
The problem is that Ms. Suleman, like many others, has chosen to view fatherhood as merely a biological transaction. In a culture where choice trumps all, who can "cast the first stone" at a woman who undervalues the need for children to have a physically and emotionally present father in their lives? This is despite reams of social science research that support the fact that children need involved dads.
In short, the more Ms. Curry tried to turn the mirror on Ms. Suleman, the more the mirror was turned back on the culture that produced her.
Indeed, the truth is that choices are never personal; they are always communal. Her children are our responsibility, too -- your tax dollars pay for the programs that support her choices. Ms. Suleman's story illustrates that in our politically correct, choice-saturated culture, there are more and more things that you dare not say. However, the problem is that there are fewer and fewer things that you dare not do.
Roland C. Warren is president of National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI) (www.fatherhood.org). NFI is the nation's largest non-profit organization promoting the importance of involved, responsible, and committed fathers, and is the #1 provider of fatherhood skill-building resources.
I was angry with all the other Americans about the irresponsible choice she made. However, now its time for people to circle the wagons around this mother and help her with her children. Suleman is financially and emotionally overwhelmed. Did anyone see the inside of the house on TV? It was a zoo--holes in walls, etc. It is time to pull the community together and help her. Mental health is first then helping her with producing productive children.
because our culture sees birth as an important and tender subject. Suleman chose to have an
unmanageable amount of children. If she already had six children, she surely knew the
responsibility that even one baby requires. If she knew this, then how could she have imagined
being capable of single handedly taking care of fourteen?
Our culture emphasizes the importance of caring and loving the people we bring into the world.
One mother could not possibly provide all the attention and care that a baby needs to fourteen.
Taking care of even one baby is a job by itself, leaving no time for a career that brings in money
to support that baby. Suleman must have known this, already having six children, and so the
idea of having eight more seem irrational and unthought out.
At the same time, if women have the choice to get rid of their babies before they are born, they
should also have the choice to have an unnatural amount of children. Abortion, however, is a
rational and mature decision made by women who understand the responsibility and time a baby
would require. Women who choose abortion understand that they are not capable of handling
that responsibility. Suleman's decision, in comparison, seems unreasonable. But who are we to
judge? Suleman probably loves all of her fourteen babies tremendously, and if that is true, then
she is not completely in the wrong.
Ha! Warren is trolling. What Warren is basically saying is: you (radical feminists) have made this bed (of reproductive freedom), now sleep in it! Absolutely hilarious trolling. No, not everyone is going to make great decisions, and when they don't and make such spectacularly bad decisions as bearing and raising 14 children on your own with almost no financial support other than from the state, we are allowed as a society to shake our collective heads and sigh.
He probably knew she had issues, but who is he to decide right? Isn't this the whole point of the article? If he'd said no, or refused to implant more embryos wouldn't he have been opening himself up to claims of discrimination? Probably spearheaded by a well funded feminist group claiming to be "appalled by this assault on a woman's reproductive rights and her right to 'choose'..."
And I certainly don't agree with her lifestyle choices being OUR responsibility. If you can't afford that many children then simply don't have them. Especially when you already have 6 that are living on handouts and welfare.
A lack of a father in the picture is just one of the problems surrounding this sage. Ms Suleman claimed to have been injured at work leading to $160,000.00 in payment yet there are pictures of her giving her children horsy back rides, she also became pregnant once again.
This mess is riddled with scams against the government, private companies and individuals. Do I think having a father around would have changed anything, no..Ms Suleman shows no respect for her own father why would the father(s) be any different.
I do agree these children are crying out for a male role model but the reason we are not seeing the father is, in my opinion, there is not ONE male involved as she claims but many sperm donors.
Fathers make a big difference in a child's life but in this case I don't think it would have made a difference.
"If her fertility specialist was so very professional, why exactly did he lose his licence then?"
Where in there does it say he's still practising - I specifically asked why did he LOSE his licence. Albeit with a touch of sarcasm, which you may have also missed.