Ok, tell me that this doesn't represent what's wrong with the world today: http://www.news.com.au/national/desperate-couple-abort-twin-boys-in-desperate-bid-for-ivf-girl/story-e6frfkvr-1225983907853
We pander to every weakness in society today. In Real Life a person needs to learn to deal with their "psychological wellbeing" and their psychological distress. Technology has advanced to the point where instead of addressing their problems, we can give people everything they want and pander to their "needs". It's great that we've advanced to the point where we consider a person's weaknesses as legitimate, and people aren't ostracised for experiencing pain or trauma. But it is not ok that a person who is clearly suffering some kind of post-traumatic stress can simply create a designer baby to cure that.
1. Has our society really not advanced far enough to recognise that neither boys or girls are superior? Yes, I can accept having a preference, of course. But it doesn't have to make any difference to how you raise them or how they live their life.
2. They are clearly not looking to have another child to heal the pain of losing their daughter, they are looking to replace their daughter. Why else would the gender be relevant? So this poor child (if she eventuates) is expected to fulfill the role of the little girl that died. No pressure! Oh, and she will also be vital to her mother's "psychological health" due to her "obsession" with having a daughter. Great!
A couple of quotes from the article:
"After what we have been through we are due for a bit of luck." LUCK??? You are lucky enough to have three healthy children, and you CHOSE to destroy two other potential children, and then complain about it. Life is choices. Yes, losing a child is horrible, but this isn't the way to deal with it. (For the record, I am pro-choice, but there is a limit!)
"The couple said that it had been a traumatic decision to make but that they could not continue to have unlimited numbers of children." Then stop. Nobody is forcing you to have more children. Perhaps focus on loving and nurturing the three children that you have, rather than wasting time, money and energy on a court case. Or, as the article suggests, adopt a daughter. IMHO, adoption should be the only way of assuring that you have a child of a particular gender. Creating designer babies is a horrible idea. And the way this couple is going about it is particularly horrible.
Sunday, January 9, 2011
Friday, January 7, 2011
Procrastination
In November I began a focused effort of telling everybody who would listen that I was going to finish my novel this summer. Why? Because I was ultimately trying to shame myself into actually putting more time into it, knowing that I frequently set goals and fail to deliver on them. To be fair, this is generally because my goals are unrealistic and unachievable - I aim far too high, and typically end up giving up entirely.
This time though it really really ISN'T my fault. I swear. Hehehe.
The first day of my vacation my laptop broke, hard-drive failure apparently. Everybody knows that you can't write a novel without a laptop, right? Wrong. I switched to pen-and-paper and typing on the desktop computer. This sort-of-kind-of worked, and then two days before I went back to work a full OS reinstall returned my laptop to my tender arms.
Still, I've made very little progress towards my goal. Sure, I'm writing semi-regularly, but not enough to actually finish in the timeframe I've specified. In February I start back at university so will need to devote some of my spare time to procrastinating/avoiding study, so it will be interesting to see what happens then. I've already started back at work fulltime as of this week, and am now procrastinating from work by updating my blogs. In a way, it's a good thing that I overcommit myself, because the more I have to do the more I actually get done (although, that also means there are more things that I don't finish at all...).
The problem with my novel is that I've almost planned it out too much. There are too many segments written, and it is hard to just sit down and write because I bump into something I've sort of done and then have to fit it in. That is not a good way to write a novel! It means I'm kind of editing at the same time... still, I love the concept and love the characters and I think it's a fun story. So I just have to get typing and fill in the blanks, then edit the crap out of it.
Watch this space. I'm sure I'll update when I'm trying to avoid doing something else.
This time though it really really ISN'T my fault. I swear. Hehehe.
The first day of my vacation my laptop broke, hard-drive failure apparently. Everybody knows that you can't write a novel without a laptop, right? Wrong. I switched to pen-and-paper and typing on the desktop computer. This sort-of-kind-of worked, and then two days before I went back to work a full OS reinstall returned my laptop to my tender arms.
Still, I've made very little progress towards my goal. Sure, I'm writing semi-regularly, but not enough to actually finish in the timeframe I've specified. In February I start back at university so will need to devote some of my spare time to procrastinating/avoiding study, so it will be interesting to see what happens then. I've already started back at work fulltime as of this week, and am now procrastinating from work by updating my blogs. In a way, it's a good thing that I overcommit myself, because the more I have to do the more I actually get done (although, that also means there are more things that I don't finish at all...).
The problem with my novel is that I've almost planned it out too much. There are too many segments written, and it is hard to just sit down and write because I bump into something I've sort of done and then have to fit it in. That is not a good way to write a novel! It means I'm kind of editing at the same time... still, I love the concept and love the characters and I think it's a fun story. So I just have to get typing and fill in the blanks, then edit the crap out of it.
Watch this space. I'm sure I'll update when I'm trying to avoid doing something else.
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