Octuplets: Mother of All Issues
America’s latest responsibility riddle is defined by simple math and compounded by complex issues:
1 single mother
8 newborn octuplets
14 total offspring
15 minutes of fame
From miracle mom to mother of all outrage, Nadya Suleman’s spectacular fall from public grace continues in an avalanche of revelations: disability, inability, food stamps, no job, no spouse, and no viable plan for raising 14 children under the age of eight.
The responsibility dragnet snared her fertility specialist—at a clinic now under government scrutiny—and settled squarely on Ms. Suleman, who declared in a TV interview that she is a responsible parent, even though California taxpayers have been asked to pay the million dollar-plus hospital bill for her eight preemies.
“I personally do not believe I’m irresponsible,” Ms. Suleman said. “Everything I do revolves around my children.” Saying she was a single parent by choice, she questioned a perceived double standard between her unconventional lifestyle and that of couples who experience multiple births. “Why are they exempt from being called irresponsible?” she asked.
Selfish. Unstable. Irresponsible. The opinions continue to pour in by the thousands on talk shows and blogs, in headlines and on the street: Put her in therapy. Change the laws. Take her kids away. In a season of Wall Street bailouts, a Sesame Street bailout for the 14 kids of America’s mega-mom has not only angered many people, but, as one journalist put it, “exposes how publicly divided and personally judgmental we are” about the reproductive decisions of others and the question of how many children is too many.
“The ‘right’ number seems to lie somewhere between China and Nadya Suleman,” wrote another journalist. “But on what do we base that belief? The ability to pay for the children? The limits on the attention they will receive? How many is too many, and who gets to decide?”
Tell us what you think: Is there such a thing as too many children? Other families receive welfare, food stamps, and disability payments for their children; should Nadya Suleman be held to a different standard? Should Ms. Suleman’s reproduction—usually a private matter of personal responsibility—be the subject of such public debate?
Add Comment Share This
Comments
Unfit
I feel sorry for the children. The mother is unfit for them and they should be adopted. She needs to work and pay the state back what she owes. It is not something we should have to do for her. She is unfit, selfish, and had them for her own selfish reasons. Clearly the laws need to be changed.
Jane Moreau | 1 month, 3 weeks ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
Why do we have to pay?
It seems that while some people plan, save and work hard to build future for themselve other make ways around the system…. and have us the taxpeyers to pay for their needs. i am sure that the mom knew she will receive all kind of help that is available. I will love to get some help when I will have a baby, does it mean I should be alone with 14 kids?…. very intresting way to obtain benefits.
I myself cannot afford to have a baby at this moment and I will hold on with this decision until I can provide for my baby….
Magdalena Gross | 1 month, 2 weeks ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
You want to pay for some whack jobs babys go ahead
My mother was a single mom 3 kids and a social worker we sometimes didn’t eat because she was too proud to take food stamps but we all survived and remain happy as adults and remember our childhood as an adventure but to pay for some whack jos to have an enormous amount of children on the publics dime I don’t thin k is even legal is it????
Where’d she get the monet to be implanted and that doctor shame on him…
jana Bradford | 1 month, 2 weeks ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
where is the doctor?
I keep waiting to hear if the government (state, federal) is going to take the
doctor to court and demand payment for bringing this mess about. He alone
should have known that she was unable to care for so many children, since
she already had six. It would seem that he would have found her unstable when
he discovered that she had all those children and wanted eight more. I wonder
also (like others) how she got the money to pay of en vitro!!. Does anyone
know if the jerk doctor is going to pay?
peggy dye | 1 month, 2 weeks ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
na
I dont see what the problem is i mean she has 14 children and the duggars have 19 so whats the problem she’s single i love both of the families very much
jc | 1 month, 2 weeks ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
Mrs.
JC, the problem is that Ms. Suleman can’t take care of one child, let alone 14. She is a blood sucking parasite on the backs of the WORKING taxpayer.
I had two children, 11 years apart, because my husband and I knew that bringing children into the world would be OUR responsilibity to support, not everyone else’s. What is so difficult about the concept of providing for one’s own family?
Jane Marsee | 3 weeks, 5 days ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
I am a mother of 6 children
raised all my children with my husband and I both working. we would of loved to have more, but we want them. Knowing we can’t afford any more but to have them and have someone else pay to raise them..that isn’t right..and look she even got a free house and money..I just feel like this is a big joke..now who will be next to see how far they can go and get their children raised for free..
Cindy Moss | 1 month ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
Who has the right to say "ENOUGH!"
It is my belief that Nadya thought she would be a media spectacle bigger than “Jon and Kate plus Eight.” With the attention and lifestyle they received with twins and sextuplets, she must have supposed that hers would draw a larger audience. I mean fourteen children under eight!! And then we have “19 and Counting!” This married couple have very recently added child number nineteen to their brood. Again, media seems to make such a fuss over these two alone. Could Nadya have done better if there was a mister Nadya? Would the media have lavished her with all the things and opportunities had not there been such a negative reaction? I’m sorry….but I’ve had ENOUGH!!! Surely there is something else we should focus on!
Mary Rose Smith | 1 month ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
Just because you can do something doesn't mean you
The question this article asks about the government (or anyone) limiting the number of children a woman/family can have is irrelevant. The important question is, why are we funding in vitro with taxpayer’s money?!
Taxpayers should not be expected to fund in vitro fertilization. The government is not a charitable organization; fertility treatments go above and beyond welfare assistance.
Sara M Shafer | 1 month ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
Abenaki Motherhood
Well, I have to say that when all of this unfolded, I was outraged, to put it mildly. And not at Nadya. I couldn’t believe the way she was being treated. I felt that the real issues bothering people weren’t the ones they were talking about, because there are many people out there on public assistance having kids, and they don’t get harassed like she was/is. So, I think the real issues were; she had children without the “act” with a man, which means the father has no legal parental rights whatsoever. This is an example of a woman having total power and control when it comes to reproduction and being the sole head of a family and household. I think this was very bothersome to alot of fundamentalist christians, who place women above the status of a child, but below far below the status of a man. Of course, no one wanted to be politically incorrect enough to actually come out and say that this was the real issue bothering them, so they attacked her economic status, which to me is another form of extreme prejudice. In my native american tribe, we are matriarchal. Which means that being a mother is the highest and most respected status a person can have. Also, traditionally, the entire village or tribe helped with the raising of a child, not just the parents. So, from my cultural point of view, Nadya being on public assistance would be a non-issue. In fact, if you look at what she actually did, which was to carry and deliver 8 living babies, she is amazing, and would be considered very blessed and favored by the Creator. I think it all comes down to your perspective. So I think people in this country need to understand that we are all different, and that no one has the right to interfere in another person’s life.
Kelley Folsom | 3 weeks, 3 days ago
Add Comment | Post Reply
« First < 73 74 75 76 > (76 pages)