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We Need Larger Families


Mr. Boyce

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I am not so sure it's religion, but things man does in Religion's name for conquest. In WWI, the Germans singing O Tannebuam while the Englidh sang O Christmas Tree and the Christmas Day Soccer game. Religion didn't play a part there. WWII was not based on Religion either, in the west, Germany pretty much wanted religion out of its society and have its society worship its leader, in the east, Japan wanted to conquer and saw the US as the main impediment to its plans. It may have seen the US as an agreesor, but not as a Christian agressor, just as an agressor.

 

yes, plenty of wars have been based on religion, but if not reliously base, you dont think another reason woudl not have been used? Relgion is easy because it's an easy my side your side tool, but if it didnt exist, there wouldnt be less wars.

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OK, how about this:

 

God save us from True Believers who are utterly convinced that their religion is the one and only True Faith, who have no tolerance for other people who don't believe in the same way, and who are perfectly willing to resort to hatred and violence to achieve their goals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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It's unfair, and a violation of good etiquette, to say that Mr. Boyce is a nativist. Who knows what this really means anymore? The 1830s are long over. . .

 

I do believe the U.S. Constitution is extremely important to the United States. And I think any clear-eyed and truly open reading of world news would show anyone who considers himself to be objective, that there really ARE people who despite the United States and the constitutional principles upon which the United States is based.

 

In 2009, there are European nations wrestling with this problem of maintaining liberal individual liberties in the face of opposition. It really does happen, like it or not, and because I point it out, it's a logical leap to assume that I'm implying more.

 

And BACK to the original point by this original poster: large families have been villified in recent decades, I believe, and I think there are many positive points to them.

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Two more points to chew (sorry!):

 

---it's a mistake to immediately toss political issues into a "liberal vs. conservative", "black vs. white," paradigm. It may be convenient, but it may also block a fuller view into a subject.

 

---Looking around various forums here and there, I'm amazed at how often religion is getting attacked. I'm not sure this is a good thing in the long term, and I think it's probably a mistake to demonize Christians and muslims as the source of all troubles.

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When we lived in CA, anyone who had more than two children would be greeted with, "You must be military." It was a sneering, nasty comment that sprang from either contempt of women procreating instead of investment banking or envy that military get pre-natal, L&D, and post-natal, plus pedes, immunization, meds, basically for free from our military hospitals and clinics or through TRICARE (old CHAMPUS). Most military families I know do seem to have either two or more likely three children. Four is pretty common of, five rarer, and six+ isn't unheard of.

 

I also think we should encourage larger families for those who can afford it. It just feels nice to have lots of kids around. The children learn a lot more about cooperation, sharing, conspiracy, and leverage. Parents figure out that kids will survive without constant attention and can do things for themselves, sometimes too much.

 

Of course, I'm the mean mommy who tells her kids, "Go play in your room, the basement, or outside, but you're not staying here with me" after school.

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With education and opportunity, family unit size decreases. Sociologists have been plotting this trend for quite awhile, and it keeps on happening in the third world as well.

 

My wife and I have two sons. They each have their own bedroom, though the littler one prefers to camp on the floor of his big brother's bedroom. If we added more, we would have to go into debt to pay for college. Our family size works well for the opportunities that we wish to give our sons.

 

I will also say that the largest impact on the environment is population growth. While we may have built an American empire on cheap labor at the bottom that kept on coming in from overseas, that is not a long-term sustainable model if we wish to keep on having places to take boys camping, fishing and hunting. Here in Southern California I can see the impact of a large population - we don't need to encourage more of it.

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My parents generation, families were much larger. We are people of the earth, farmers. Ma came from a brood of 9, one died at birth. Large families were your free workforce. It wasn't uncommon to lose a few kids due to illness or farm accident. So you needed a large family to make the farm work.

 

Now that we are an urban society, and all the farms are going the way of corporate mega-farms, we no longer need the large family to make a go of it. Having more than two kids, just enough to replace you, is the norm and socially acceptable. Everyone of my generation in my family did just that. Except one brother who had 3 and another brother who had zero.

 

Next time you have trouble merging on the freeway, just think, do we need more people?

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