For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for October 03, 2009

XD! That’s messed up!

Try, try, and then give up. Why keep shooting craps?

Know of too many in that generation who were in that same position. Still have no idea why boys were so desired, especially if the father had brothers to “carry on the family name”… Put your family into financial difficulties all for a gender preference. Not really smart.

The old male ego thing. He’s got to have a son or he looks like a weenie to the other men.

My favorite SIL had 4 boys before she finally had a girl. She loves them all though- she did want a larger family. It would stink to know you were what your parents weren’t trying for. (As SIL she got older, she wised up and adopted 2 more girls, which is a little less risky.)

Avolunteer said, 11 minutes ago

Know of too many in that generation who were in that same position. Still have no idea why boys were so desired, especially if the father had brothers to “carry on the family name”… Put your family into financial difficulties all for a gender preference. Not really smart.

Not just “to carry on the family name,” but also to protect the family line and property from alienation. It’s an old mindset that dates back to the days when women couldn’t own or inherit property, wealth or position; any property, wealth, or position that the family possessed automatically went to a daughter’s husband instead of to the daughter. Thus, there was a huge risk that the wealth, property, and social position that a man spent his life earning and accumulating could be taken from his own direct family line and transferred to a complete stranger’s family line, unless he had a son to keep everything in the family.

The push for a son, therefore, is the instinctive response to that threat (it’s one of the main reasons, for example, that Henry VIII was obsessed with having a viable male heir and went through six wives to get one), and it persisted culturally long after the law was changed to allow women to own and inherit property, wealth, and position outright.

Men want sons so they can pass on lessons of their youth.

When I was your age, I only hit home runs

When I was your age, I nailed all the cheerleaders

When I was your age, I was audited 3 times by the IRS

I have friends where it’s more similar to masnadies’ story. They had boys and kept trying for a girl. I think the problem is the selfishness of human nature (at least in modern times). We all want what we don’t have. And this causes all sorts of problems because we don’t see the bigger picture.

I have 2 girls and get asked a lot, “are you going to try for a boy?” I always say “no way!”. I think if they’re all the same gender, then they play better with each other and are closer. I know plenty of parents with one of each who say their kids never play with each other. But they think they are so special to have “one of each”, like their kids are a collection or something.

Macushlalondra said

The old male ego thing. He’s got to have a son or he looks like a weenie to the other men.

As Nina Paley once said “Look! Ogg make little Ogg!”

masnadies said

My favorite SIL had 4 boys before she finally had a girl.

Until my brother adopted twin girls, i had four nephews - no girls in that generation. (I now have five nephews; about the time the adoption was final, brother and his wife managed to have one of their own as well.)

When i met my current wife (before Dave adopted the girls) and her fourteen-year-old daughter, there was much rejoicing.

So how is it that people with a load of income have few if any kids and people with little if any income have loads of kids?

cabroset- more income=better birth control Even though you can get if for free at those family planning places, they don’t bother to teach people how to use it properly. I met a woman who had all three of her children while taking birth control pills. They told her if she missed a day she could just take two the next time. She got in the habit of taking three or four twice a week, which of course didn’t work. She thought birth control was a scam until I explained it to her.

My husband’s employer had four girls and then got a vasectomy. His daughter got pregnant and had a boy. So, in a round-about way, he got his boy after all.

I went through IVF for both of mine and ended up with one of each. When people would ask me what I was hoping for, my reply was always a healthy baby. I went through too much to be picky about the gender. All I wanted was a baby.

And they do play well together.

Funny, but when I talk to people who came up at the time to which Elly is referring (the Depression era), many of them came from large families. And their parents considered large families a blessing, not a burden.

My daughter has an older son and two younger children - a boy and a girl ( 15 & 16.5 year old). the two younger ones have been close since infancy and still (as of just last weekend) love to spend time together as well as separately with their friends. The extra special part is that they seem to really enjoy spending time with their grandma, too. When they are not in school, I take them for a week at a time and we always have a great time.

When I grew up “in that era” there was no TV and for a family lacking in funds, movies were but once every 2 or 3 months…i.e. after the sun went down, board games became boring when other more ‘fun things’ were available, hence larger families. My dad was the oldest of 13.

As for gender preferences, a dad wants a son to pass his wisdom down to and a pal to do guy things with. A dad also wants a daughter for the added femenine touch and to adore her as her mother. We never had a daughter and I miss her terribly even though she never was.

Perhaps a mother has similar feelings.

I was my father’s 4th and final attempt at a boy. So, I became his de facto son.

I knew what a “down” and “scrimmage” was before I could add or subtract

oddly enough, all of my sisters and myself had boys and Dad didn’t live long enough to appreciate his grandsons

I come from a big family 5 girls, 3 boys. We are close and still spend a lot of time together. For the most part we got along pretty well. Of my 20 nieces and nephews nearly all of them are “birth control” babies. Only a few of them were planned.

I knew a couple in a situation similar to that of Connie’s parents, and upon the birth of their sixth daughter they named her, “Johnnie.”

I don’t judge couples for wanting children of both sexes, or of a certain sex. It could be a deeply-seated survival instinct that causes it, either from a “survival of the species” standpoint, or perhaps a basic human desire for balance.

in my day it was common to have large families, ,even though now people are earning a lot more money it is still outrageous to think about raising a lot of kids, i struggle with just one kid left at home

@cabrobst, I may just be cynical, but I associate kids with expenses. It costs a lot of money to raise them. So if you don’t have any kids, you save a lot of money. But there’s a part of your heart that stays forever closed. I associate money and no kids with selfishness (NOT ALWAYS, @Macush! Peace!).

@mrsmcvargas, good for you. That’s what really matters - just that the baby be healthy.

And something people sometimes forget: each baby, when it’s born, is already a unique person, with its own personality. You can influence it to some degree, but it is not a blank slate for you to write on, a lump of clay for you to mold. But I think most people know this instinctively.

I know some people whose religion does not usually allow the use of birth control. They tend to have large families (not always, tho), and they also tend to see the children as a blessing.

One lady told me that the older ones help out with the younger ones. Their religious beliefs make for a certain kind of peaceful atmosphere in the home that you don’t usually see otherwise.

BUT some of these mothers are totally overwhelmed and exhausted. In these exceptional cases, they may be allowed to use birth control. I like the consideration for individuals that this shows.

If I have kids, I’m not having more than two, so what I get is what I get. cabrobst, my husband thinks like you, but I’ve been proving him wrong. I know plenty of people who have “loads” of money that are having kids. He also thinks that more dumb people than smart people have kids, but people with money tend to be smart. Smart=good job=good money. Like the movie idiocracy, if you’ve seen it.

My late mother was the youngest of two older sisters and three older brothers IN THAT ORDER; 13-year difference. The other sister –which is a ten-year difference– has ten children- (five of both genders) with a 22-year difference.

My father is the youngest of three older borthers. With the oldest being twins, there’s a 19-year gap.

As for me and my older borther (my only sibling), we’re in a 14-month difference

Legal Eagle is quite right about the female-as-disenheritor thing; and, Blitz, deeming a large family a blessing rather than a burden is also a left-over mindset, from even more ancient times: (a) they needed farmhands, and (b) infant/child mortality was such that you had to produce many to hope for a few to survive to (c) support the parents in their old age.

My younger brother and I are 17 months and 11 days apart. My mother was the fifth of eight and my father the third of three.

I agree re better educational opportunities and better birth control education means more women finally have the chance to CHOOSE, hence smaller family units now. I thank whomever created the Pill every day of my life that I have a choice. As for whether a boy or girl is better, really who cares as long as the child is loved? People who have kids should have them because they want a CHILD, not a mini-me to try and mould into their image.

Fortunately, nowadays, you can have the boy sperm separated from the girl sperm, so you can deliberately have one or the other …if you want to forgo the fun of making the baby yourself. That said, I’d still like to have a son to corrupt just as bad as I was corrupted.

@cabrobst, I may just be cynical, but I associate kids with expenses. It costs a lot of money to raise them. So if you don’t have any kids, you save a lot of money. But there’s a part of your heart that stays forever closed. I associate money and no kids with selfishness (NOT ALWAYS, @Macush! Peace!).

~~~

No problem Rina, I’ve been accused of lots of things and given grief by well meaning people for not having kids. Some have accused me of thinking of my cats as my kids but that’s not so. I wouldn’t say part of my heart is closed because I don’t have kids, I know a lot of kids and have opportunities to spend time with them. But I’m glad they are not my total responsibility.

Haha, ireg. I’m oldest of 8 kids (5 girls 3 boys).

It is funny how rich people tend not to have many kids. My dad always told us kids we were the family riches.

My best friend from school now has 6 sons. No daughter in her Karma. :( And my Dad was from the Depression Era, and yes big families were a blessing – no-pay farmhands. :(