Broke people making more kids...

[Lyzelle]

Originally Posted by Izzy's Valkyrie

You're assuming people have no control over themselves. Sort of the same way we blame women when they get assaulted because they shouldn't have dressed a certain way; you're assuming men have no control over their base urges. It's untrue and I think with proper education people can learn how to keep it in their pants because they understand the consequences.

Abstinence has never worked, no matter how much it's been preached in the past.

Do you have an odd few people who just don't have sex? Sure. But it isn't the norm, and we shouldn't expect it to go away any more than we should expect drugs to go away. Except sex is actually natural and a part of life.

[Izzy's Valkyrie]

Abstinence has never directly produced a child, that's 100% effective if you ask me. I am not saying we push abstinence as the only way to prevent pregnancy. What I said was that people who have had Birth Control fail on them before and can not afford to produce more children and offer them a decent life should consider it as a way to completely avoid having another child.

Nowhere did I say abstinence only anything. An intelligent person understands that birth control can sometimes fail but there is also the probability it will not so they can have sex safely on BC. However, if children have been produced more than once on birth control, it is much more likely pregnancy will continue to happen if you have sex. Therefore, a reasonable person will stop having sex until such a time that they are ready to have more children or one/both of the partners can no longer produce children.

This assume people are reasonable or intelligent. Not everyone is but as Sparks mentioned, this is a completely viable course of action just not one people enjoy. Being intimate without sex can definitely keep a couple happy so there is no reason sex has to happen.

[Dizzy]

Things are so much more complex than just sex. People have children for 1000s of reasons. People who've had 8 kids adopted will still have more kids. It's not skin deep, or as simple as having the means to have them.

[Romy]

From the sound of it, we can all agree that no BC is 100% fail proof (even vasectomies and stuff).

We can also agree that abstinence is, but isn't terribly realistic.

And that people shouldn't plan to have more children than they can take care of, though people have varying definitions of what children need.

Back to the OP, I don't see not being able for afford presents as an income problem as much as it's a, they don't care to try problem. You can always find a way to get your kid presents if that's something your family views as important. Not ipods and game systems by any means, but you can usually find new in box toys at the local thrift stores, and at garage sales. My parents were really poor when we were kids. Way below poverty level, but they didn't go on public assistance. They couldn't afford to run out and drop hundreds of $$$ on presents every Christmas, but we never knew it by the kinds of Christmases they gave us.

We'd get up and there'd be a stack of loot obscuring 3/4 of the tree. lol. Most of it they picked out throughout the year at garage sales, because you really can get nice new stuff, even in the package, if you look. They probably paid less than $50 to give us so much awesome, and it's not because they were rich. It's because that was something important to them so they found a way, even if it meant getting something that was a good deal 5 months ahead of time and hiding it until Christmas day.

That, I think, really shows what makes a devoted parent. Not so much that they gave us tons of loot, but that they thought so many months ahead of time and prepared within their means so that they could give us something that was important to us.

I wouldn't have traded them for the world, and am grateful I had such loving parents even though we weren't well to do.

FWIW, my brother is pretty wealthy by most people's standard. He has four kids. They don't do birthday presents. Instead each kid picks a day trip they'd like to make and the family goes out together. That's almost better family-wise than buying a bunch of crap.

[darkchild16]

Originally Posted by Romy

From the sound of it, we can all agree that no BC is 100% fail proof (even vasectomies and stuff).

We can also agree that abstinence is, but isn't terribly realistic.

And that people shouldn't plan to have more children than they can take care of, though people have varying definitions of what children need.

Back to the OP, I don't see not being able for afford presents as an income problem as much as it's a, they don't care to try problem. You can always find a way to get your kid presents if that's something your family views as important. Not ipods and game systems by any means, but you can usually find new in box toys at the local thrift stores, and at garage sales. My parents were really poor when we were kids. Way below poverty level, but they didn't go on public assistance. They couldn't afford to run out and drop hundreds of $$$ on presents every Christmas, but we never knew it by the kinds of Christmases they gave us.

We'd get up and there'd be a stack of loot obscuring 3/4 of the tree. lol. Most of it they picked out throughout the year at garage sales, because you really can get nice new stuff, even in the package, if you look. They probably paid less than $50 to give us so much awesome, and it's not because they were rich. It's because that was something important to them so they found a way, even if it meant getting something that was a good deal 5 months ahead of time and hiding it until Christmas day.

That, I think, really shows what makes a devoted parent. Not so much that they gave us tons of loot, but that they thought so many months ahead of time and prepared within their means so that they could give us something that was important to us.

I wouldn't have traded them for the world, and am grateful I had such loving parents even though we weren't well to do.

FWIW, my brother is pretty wealthy by most people's standard. He has four kids. They don't do birthday presents. Instead each kid picks a day trip they'd like to make and the family goes out together. That's almost better family-wise than buying a bunch of crap.

Thats what we do too Romy (your parents and your brother) I might pick them up a few gifts cheap for their birthdays but mostly we do stuff together as a family. This year I think we are taking Bev and her friends to the Chuck E Cheese we had *MY* 5th birthday at. Jeremy and Morgans we are trying to do Disney. Ive also gotten A BIG gift for Savannah and a NICE one for Bev free keeping a eye on our free sites on FB. I picked up a free basically brand new excersaucer and a free princess bench.

Family time is much more important then toys.

[sparks19]

I have been buying gifts all year round for birthdays and Christmas (not just Hannah but everyone i buy gifts for). Between yard sales, thrift stores, couponing, promotional sales online and earning gift cards online various ways... I have paid next to nothing for anything. I bought Hannah a brand new full soze barbie vet table and paid $2 out of pocket for it from amazon. Full price it is close to $60. Waiting on another amazon giftcard to credit and that will buy her a doctors costume.

I am ALL about being thrifty and frugal lol the more frugal the better lol. Hannah is a chip off the old block. She asks me all the time "is this on sale? Do you have a coupon?". Lol for her birthday presents she got a big my little pony castle playset. She asked me "how much was this mommy?". I told her it was $35 then she said "and how much did YOU pay for it?". $8 (target clearance) lol she finds that so exciting lol. My mom got her this really fancy flower girl esque dress for $2. Hannah may have been more excited about it being only $2 lol.

Family time is absolutely more important than any material item. We are SO blessed to have a lot of time together as a family just having fun. Brian doesn't work on weekends so we get two whole days every weekend to just BE and do whatever we want.