I finally had a chance to check out this article, which is basically just a long-winded rant on why people should not have children.

The article is so transparently written, and makes it SO absolutely clear that the author has her own personal agenda, that I'm astounded that anyone actually gave her writing the time of day.

The author essentially offers no facts or hard evidence - she simply makes vague reference to some recent journal study which apparently claimed that the first few months of having children are "hard work."

No shit, genius!

So, if something is hard work, we should shy away from it, and concentrate instead on our own selfish needs? Is she for real?? Just what is our society coming to?

It's probable that this author has some kind of skin in the game - I do NOT want to be insensitive and start to speculate about what would motivate her to hate kids so much, or what would cause her to have this apparent urge to discourage people from having children, but if we're honest here we've got to admit that the CHANCES ARE there must be something there:

Yes, having children is difficult. Yes it puts strain on marriage just like any other difficulty - but HELLO - last time I checked there was a LITTLE something called "furthering the human race" - something that people who don't have children are not really helping to do. No one wants to point this out, especially in this neighborhood, but furthering the human race is also something that gay people are not helping to do - FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE, and yes I do have plenty of gay friends and colleagues and family members (like everyone else in park slope), so I'm not judging them, but I also think that GAY people and/or people without children shouldn't be chiming in with vague scientific "studies" mocking children and the people that have them. 

In summary, if we can learn to tolerate each other and not CRITICIZE the other's lifestyle - extend to each other the same RESPECT that we'd want the other to extend to us - we won't get so hung up on using misleading or phony statistics to prove that the other's way of life is "wrong" or "lesser."

A little tolerance goes a long way.