You're going to love this story. This man has 21 children and he's only 29 years old.
Outraged?
I think it's strange that there is so much outrage. Is it only me? Here's a fellow who is doing nothing illegal. It sure looks like he didn't rape anyone. It looks like the ladies knew what they were dealing with. Here's a fellow who earns minimum wage and proudly states he had four children in one year. Twice. And this is a guy you wanna "get with?"
Slim pickins out there, I guess.
Sure, as a Christian, I would have to state right here that sex is a gift best reserved for marriage. I'd also state that the young man is rather irresponsible, as are his mistresses. (Is that what I should call them? I want to be reasonably respectful, but blunt. Maybe those two qualities don't go together very well.) These folks are not thinking about the consequences of their actions in regard to the people they'll bring into this world.
But here's what I'm thinking: without Jesus, this behaviour makes a lot of sense. As do a lot of other things.
Without Jesus, why WOULDN'T it be ok to have sex with whoever, whenever you felt like it? You'd only have to consider the potential consequences to yourself if you lived like that. You could reason that you're not hurting anybody, and totally flip off the nutty religious folks and say it's "love." Then you could fall in "love" with a different person every few months or so.
What's wrong with that? I mean, without some moral framework that says such behaviour is wrong, what's wrong with that? (And yes, I recognize that some folks have a moral framework apart from God. I used to be an atheist, you know. I think I still have the T-shirt somewhere. But my moral framework came from within myself and what I felt was right, and was not based on outside, unchanging things like the Bible and Truth. Then again, I'm following the Bible and what I feeeeeel to be Truth. So round we go... Um, another post.)
And yes, you can get all hopping mad if you want to that all of us are supporting these children with our tax dollars. (I'd agree... though calls to castrate the fellow are a little over the top, don'cha think??) But look. If anything, that shows a little planning on the part of ol' Mr. Desmond here. His kids might not vacation at Disney World, but they're provided for. They're not starving. And all you folks getting all outraged have to realize that this is the sort of thing that we encourage when we provide a "safety net" for the poor and jobless.
It's for the children.
I mean, I might disagree with the whole premise of the government giving handouts to people, but I can understand that the outrage is a bit misplaced when the funds are there for the KIDS. Shouldn't we be glad that these children are being helped by someone? And instead of getting all mad at the moms and dad in this situation, can we get angry that we've instituted a system that allows this to happen on such a regular basis?
Jesus said that you'll always have the poor with you. To my mind, it's just a question of who should be helping the poor and under what circumstances. Are we comfortable helping poor people who made poor decisions? The question is an important one. Maybe it's just my little brain thinking off-kilter... but we're not called to help just those who lived moral lives and are going through hard times. We're called to help the drunken homeless and everyone else. Not to enable, but to help. Which sometimes means saying no, and letting that person go through a hard time. Sometimes that means "throwing good money after bad on people who won't change." If it's my money and I get to decide how to spend it, I hope that I do the best I can with the resources I'm given.
Another matter altogether to talk of government spending on the poor.
Another matter even after that to act all surprised that people take advantage of Uncle Sam!
I hear alarming statistics about out of wedlock births and the dependence of the poor on the government. May I gently say... all it takes is one economic downturn, and we're there with them. On the other hand, all it takes is one massive economic downturn, and these children might not get the support they need...
If I were to get a VOTE on whether this lifestyle were legal and ok, I'd vote no. But I don't get a vote. It's too bad, too, because if y'all think I'm intolerant now, there's a whole lotta other stuff out there I'd be nyet-ing.
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Look Out, Dad!!
My father is the purple dot above the blue weather station. He's juuust outside Milton's evacuation zone. Well! My brother and I jus...
Very interesting! I think that man may wish he hadn't a done that later. The kids are certainly going to pay for his lifetstyle. I don't see how he could even possibly keep track of all of them. That is what is the saddest. Those poor babies will probably never have a relationship with their father.
ReplyDeleteAnd you are right about most of us being one paycheck away from disaster. It is more apparent now than ever.
Well I live in a country that pays single mums & the jobless as well as people like us who have a disabled person in the house who can no longer work & the person who has to care for him ~me. We get by on very little ~ lower than minimum wage ~ but all the debt we have is our mortgage which we pay off from our pension. I am far more likely to get riled by people earning good money who whinge & whine that they are in debt & can't afford things we consider major luxuries. I am grateful if the car works & there's food in the cupboards to feed the hoards with. That being said, not sure why I felt the need to say that; it has been a long weekend & the ol' mind's unravelling, anyhoo, what the godless choose to do no longer surprises me. What was it Paul said...everyone will do what seems good in his own eyes. How true is that. Sad, but true. I don't really care about the money so much; it is a symptom not a cause, but it really worries me that the next generation will be even worse because they will not be held to even the minimal standard of what used to be acceptable behaviour. Hence we have kids outraged they can be charged for assult for filming said assult on their own phone while assulting said victim [true story:(], or playing party games that can give them STDs, or making alliances to get pregnant at 16. I should stop. Sometimes this world just makes me sick to my little pink toes.
ReplyDeleteWhether the Bible says it's wrong or not... you are right. There are other things, consequences, that come from this kind of lifestyle. Our kids have it good because they get to grow up in a 2 parent home. Dinner every night (with the same set of parents). They don't have to be switched to another home on the weekend. Or just have a mom to kiss them goodnight. I mean, my kids have is really good in this day and age. These kids you are talking about aren't going to be able to have that. Their father doesn't have a good name by any means. If those moms, made those kinds of choices, knowing who this guy was...and they don't care, that's really sad. Not only do they have no father, you wonder about their mom. There was a girl I knew personally who would take her little babies with her when she would meet strange guys at hotels to sleep with them. Sooooo sad. I try not to think of the Bible as a list of rules. Naturally, there are just consequences. God cared enough to warn us of them. :)
ReplyDeleteZimms, I'm not sure. He seems a personable enough fellow, and maybe he really does visit his children frequently. I don't buy the idea that he's "done" having kids, though. He said that for the camera, I'm thinking! But it isn't the same as having Dad there every day, no doubt about it.
ReplyDeleteGaneida, you are blessed because around here? Good luck with that. And the carers get zero bucks. Somehow the disabled are supposed to find someone who will help them on their income. It's wrong. Then again, it bugs me that just getting fat can be considered a "disability." Um, totally insulting to the people who really struggle with getting things done, daily grooming and that sort of thing. Totally insulting.
Virginia, I would make a joke about Take Your Daughter to Work day, but I just don't have the heart. That is a sad story, hon. BTW, I hope you are feeling well.
Mrs. K, I thought of that, too! Though women aren't able to produce too many more than 14 kids without major health consequences. I'm thinking Guiness had a record of 29 or something and Duggars have a ways to go to meet that. But most of us PHYSICALLY could not do it.
There. Something a man can do better. LOL.