So one day I'm over at her house in the afternoon when kids are getting back from school, and she sees her neighbor across the street pulling his mini-van into his garage, and his kids (4 or 5, in their Catholic school uniforms) tumbling out, kinda skipping and jostling and buzzing hither and thither, like kids do.
"Gosh that makes me mad," she remarked to me.
"What?"
"Just evey day, it makes me angry to see them."
"What? (Blink.) I mean, why?"
"Because it's so selfish. It's so selfish and irresponsible for them to have that many kids!"
"What? (I'm thinking adjectives: abundant? plentiful? generous? Are those sysnonyms for selfish?)
And then cautiously: "Why do you say... selfish?"
"Because they're taking more than their share. They'll need more of everything. They'll compete. It's unfair for them to compete like that against my Kenneth."
Well, that floored me. I don't think I said anything after that. But it stuck with me for (sigh) probably almost 40 yeats. Competing against her Kenneth? Competing for what? Schools? Her Kenneth wasn't going to a Catholic school. Money? They had none of hers. Marriage partners? One of those girls could end up being his bride (Heaven Forfend!) Jobs? But don't "people" also represent customers, clients, producers, developers, suppliers, colleagues, employers, vendors, --- every other category of people who comprise an "economy" once you pry yourself away from that one irksome concept, "job competition"?
What she was angry about was "human society" --- that little slice of human society she could see out of her front wondow. A.K.A. "other people".
Back to the thread. I haven't read it, and ain't gonna because...
Yes, what we're seeing is baby-hatred and it's sex-hatred (disgust for sex which is normally functional, which makes a bond and takes root and is fruitful and multiplies)and particular contempt for the female procreative role. I've seen FReepers use the phrase "popping out" babies (that makes me see red.) I've even seen "farting out" babies (that makes me see red with bolts of lightning).
Yes, it's misogyny, and it's misanthropy actually. "Bah, people. Walking on my earth. Breathing my air."
Excellent post, Mrs. D.