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 Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 12:19 pm
Inspired by the 2 shows on TLC last night which covered this family. The two shows were called "14 Children and Pregnant Again", and "16 Children and Moving In". Meet the Duggar family. Michelle and Jim Bob have 16 children. They recently built their own house. All 16 of their childrens' names start with "J", and they're all home-schooled. If I remember correctly, there's 1 year or less of an age gap between all the children, the youngest being about 5 months now and the oldest being 17 or 18. http://www.jimbob.info/ <--- the family's website. http://www.duggarfamily.com/ <--- the family's other website. So I watched the shows, and I just could not wrap my mind around the fact that this woman has been having babies almost continuously for 20 years. And although she and her husband have proven themselves able to care for these children, I still had to ask - does anyone really NEED 16 children? At what point do you say "Alright, I think I'm done with this"? Don't get me wrong. Watching them on the TLC shows gave me a lot of respect for these parents, who are able to do something which many people have a hard time do (parenting lots of kids). And the entire family is very close. But I still had some questions. Some issues to discuss in this thread: - The family is close, but how much time do the parents have for their kids? Even with them being home-schooled, is it possible to give all 16 kids the care and attention they need? - On the show, NONE of the girls ever wore anything other than a skirt or a dress, and they all had long hair. In "16 Children and Moving In", the girls all did their share of the construction work in their skirts or dresses, never pants or anything like that. - The family (if I remember the internet article correctly) Southern Baptist, and they don't believe in birth control (hence all the children). They believe "each child is a gift from God", and that if God wants them to have all these children, then it was meant to be. - The age gaps between the oldest children and the youngest ones. How will that affect them and the family in 5, 10, 15 years? - If they leave the Southern US and get out into the real world, what might happen when they see that the rest of the world doesn't/might not operate the way their family does? - The responsibilities that the older children have been given by having to help care for the young children (feeding, watching and taking care of them, etc) - is it fair to put these responsibilities on a 12, 15, or 17 year old? I think in the TV shows, this was referred to as "the buddy system", where an old sibling would help out a younger sibling (instead of Mom or Dad) to do things like read a story, brush their teeth, etc. - At what point do you decide that enough is enough? When does it cross the line from "loving children" to something else?
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 1:02 pm
I saw them on 14 kids and pregnant AGAIN! so uh...two kids ago.
The thing about the Duggars is they just try to portray them as your average middle of the road family that just happens to have a lot of kids. You know your kinda "sweet" religious people who just let the chips fall where they may.
Which is a lie. If you visit their website, you'll find out that they're very VERY religiously conservative. The kind of religious conservative that believes the world is only 6000 years old.
The girls dress only in dresses and skirts because, Nikolita, that is the way girls are meant to be raised (OMG look at the modest swimwear website they link to), the dresses downplay all their other features and uplay their "countenance" or face which is what they almost EXACTLY said in 14 kids and pregnant again. Without the polygamy and the child brides they seriously remind me of the colonies/clans of polygamists in Utah and Arizona (see Colorado City and Warren Jeffs).
Furthermore their new home is a church. It has church meeting rooms and a second kitchen specifically for the church. THAT is how they're able to afford the house, and it helps that Jim-bob was an elected government official at one time.
And I do belive the parents are doing a disservice to the children. Mom "gets" the child for the first year and then the child is schlepped off to a "buddy" who will help them get dressed, get food, get educated, go play, etc. etc.
I do hear (from mothering blogs) that the TLC show seemed to show that Michelle did more and was more involved with the kids than the one that showed on A and E. But they've taken serious heat in parenting circles in general since "14 kids and pregnant again."
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 2:58 pm
For the most part, it just irks me mostly because of the publicity they get. Yes, I think it's good that if they think they need 16 kids, fine. They seem to be able to provide for the children and genuinely love them, something I can't argue with.
However, it just seems off to me. I don't think they should be praised for doing something that people do anyways. They aren't spectacular. I, myself, come from a larger family of 6 children. Of course, that's not 16, but it's still larger than the norm today. If you talk about your family past, I can almost guarantee that a vast majority of us have ancestors that had a large number of children. There are still people who've had LARGER families and don't get the publicity and "commendations" that they get. I don't think they are by any means experts and can really give advice on how to parent. Good parenting has nothing to do with quantity, but quality.
It also bothers me about the buddy system they have going on with the older children. If I recall, on their website it says that the older children are responsible sunup to sundown for basically all the functions of the younger children. Yes, people have done this before, hell in my family we had that, but not to that extreme. It, in my opinion, isn't fair to the older children to be mothers of the children. It definitely made me not want a larger family.
Also, I feel that one-on-one time for children is important. I know some other sites and mothers might disagree, but for me, it's really important. The SAHPs site on MSN really likes to cheer them on and think it's great.
Really, I don't mind that they are religious, but it's almost to the point of overly zealous. It's great that she can do everything, school, sewing, food, hell I know I couldn't, but I feel getting lost in the clan of children takes its toll. I know I HATED being dressed in similar clothes growing up to save money. I almost felt like I loss a sense of identity at times, being one of the Chow clan. My mother wasn't as extreme as these people, but we have 4 A names out of 6 which I hated too.
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 3:59 pm
Well looking at their photos, it doesn't look like individual identity is something highly sought after in that family.
I do think it's unfair. A kid needs to be a kid. Having to be a parent as well, and not by their own volition but by the simple fact that mom and dad can't keep their hands off each other just seems completly unfair.
Not to mention the schooling. Are they all learning properly? Or are the 17year olds forced to learn at the level of teh 14year olds simply because there isn't enough time in the day to teach 16 different grades? What is the quality of what they are learning?
I also worry about the overly religious aspect. It's one thing when kids have friends and school and "the rest of the world" to balance everything out. But when their entire society is their parents and siblings, when they don't go to school and most likely don't have many friends outside the family and church, I think it's like putting blinders on a horse. And, as mentioned before, stops them from developing an individual personality.
My personal view is two kids = one too many. The only way I would consider having more than one child is if I adopt one once our own is older (say a teen or going off to college). That's because I want to be able to devote all my attention towards one kid and do the best job I possibly can. I also need MY time to pursue my own interests and all that and I just don't think that I would be able to handle it with more than one child.
For other families, I usually start to c**k my head to the side and wonder "why?" at more than three.
There was a time when many kids was the norm. Then, it was ok. That was what society called for and I don't think there was anything wrong with it. But the world has changed and I think in this age of individuality, it's just no longer ok to have so many children.
EDIT: I would have been more forgiving of them if they had gone down the alphabet or something with the names.
kid 1: Albert.
kid 2: Bernice.
Kid 3: Charles.
lol wink
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 5:00 pm
Nopen - I meant nothing bad about the dresses, just for the record. Sorry. sweatdrop It was just something that caught my eye during the 2 shows that I watched. So if I offended you, then I'm sorry.
Luna - Yeah the buddy system bothered me a bit too, and made me feel sorry for the younger kids stuck with an older sibling as their "parent".
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 5:06 pm
Nikolita Nopen - I meant nothing bad about the dresses, just for the record. Sorry. sweatdrop It was just something that caught my eye during the 2 shows that I watched. So if I offended you, then I'm sorry. Luna - Yeah the buddy system bothered me a bit too, and made me feel sorry for the younger kids stuck with an older sibling as their "parent". No no, you didn't offend me, I was just saying it sarcastically. Like, OH WELL OF COURSE, silly Nikolita, girls wear DRESSES. ALL the way to the ANKLES. and make sure to cover the ankles too, or it wouldn't be modest...don't you know. /sarcasam wink heart
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Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 5:09 pm
Nopenname Nikolita Nopen - I meant nothing bad about the dresses, just for the record. Sorry. sweatdrop It was just something that caught my eye during the 2 shows that I watched. So if I offended you, then I'm sorry. Luna - Yeah the buddy system bothered me a bit too, and made me feel sorry for the younger kids stuck with an older sibling as their "parent". No no, you didn't offend me, I was just saying it sarcastically. Like, OH WELL OF COURSE, silly Nikolita, girls wear DRESSES. ALL the way to the ANKLES. and make sure to cover the ankles too, or it wouldn't be modest...don't you know. /sarcasam wink heart Thank you. 4laugh Glad I didn't offend you or anything. One of the shows was "14 Children and Pregnant Again", but the other one was "16 Children and Moving In", and in the 2nd show, the girls all did the construction work while still in their dresses/skirts.
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Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 2:14 pm
Up until two days ago, I had never heard of these people and I find their website rather alarming BUT they don't personally bother me other then the attention thing. If they want as many kids as they can have and can afford them, more power to them. It's not up to me and my kangaroo court to decide what's right for the world or to pass judgement on it.
For me, yes, 16 kids is excessive and we will probably never have the financial resources to have that many children, let alone I don't ever want to be pregnant that long. But I don't believe that having more children makes you less attentive or loving to them because I truly believe love increases as family size does: you just don't run out one day. I also am not the type who will ever have just one child unless there is a medical reason that I can't have another because I have as of yet to meet a single child that was not self-absorbed, spoiled and thought way too highly of themselves and couldn't share and be decent or accept that the world isn't just about them. Personally, I'd like 3, hubby is ok with 2 but doesn't think we should have more then that. And I'm willing to accept it because it's not right to force him to do something he's uncomfortable with and have him possibly be resentful for it. He came from a family of two, me from three and all our family had the same number, so it's what we're familiar and comfortable with. But that's up to every individual family to decide and it's not really anyone else's place to be commenting on it and deciding what they should have done. My reproductive system is my business and mine alone.
Childhood is still a very modern concept and didn't come into being until well into the 1900's when they finally started developing child labor laws: before that, there was no such thing as childhood. You were a small adult and treated as such. Being the oldest of three, I've never experienced this magical 'childhood' everyone screams about upholding because since I was about 4, I was in charge of my sister-two years my junior- when I was home and mom was at work. Our dad didn't like to be bothered with 'babysitting his children' and other then feeding us and changing diapers, we were on our own with the TV. When my brother was born when I was 10, I got to do all that stuff too. And you know what? I'm not permanently damaged because I had responsibility at a young age. Was it fair? Maybe not, but it didn't kill me. So I can't really get outraged at the buddy system because with that many kids, that woman needs help making sure they're all taken care of and get their daily routines done. Because if she weren't doing that, you'd all be screaming about how she's an unfit parent...which seems to be the way some people are arguing it now.
As with all things in life, damned if you do, damned if you don't. Someone will always dissapprove and try to tell you how much better they have things figured out and what you should have done.
We live in a judgemental world and people forget we all live in glass houses.
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Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 2:29 pm
I think my main problem with the Duggar buddy system is that it seems to go beyond necessity.
If a parent is unwilling to parent (in the case of your father) than that is borderline negligent, an older child stepping up to take care of the other is necessity.
In the case where a parent works and the older child is responsible for babysitting/looking after the younger child while the parent works that is a necessity.
But because the CHOICE was made to have faaaaaarrrrrr more children than could physically be watched/cared for/monitored all at once that the older children are assigned a JOB of watching the younger child 24-7. That seems more like, well s**t, look what we've gotten ourselves into....Oh wait, we have all these OTHER kids just sittin around doing NOTHING might as well make them in charge of literally RAISING their brothers and sisters.
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Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 5:47 pm
Pirate Dirge I have as of yet to meet a single child that was not self-absorbed, spoiled and thought way too highly of themselves and couldn't share and be decent or accept that the world isn't just about them. I'm an only child.* *two half sisters. One of whom lived with her mother and visited us a grand total of twice in my entire life. The other was in her twenties and married by the time I was born. Pirate Dirge Childhood is still a very modern concept and didn't come into being until well into the 1900's when they finally started developing child labor laws: before that, there was no such thing as childhood. You were a small adult and treated as such. Being the oldest of three, I've never experienced this magical 'childhood' everyone screams about upholding because since I was about 4, I was in charge of my sister-two years my junior- when I was home and mom was at work. Our dad didn't like to be bothered with 'babysitting his children' and other then feeding us and changing diapers, we were on our own with the TV. When my brother was born when I was 10, I got to do all that stuff too. And you know what? I'm not permanently damaged because I had responsibility at a young age. Was it fair? Maybe not, but it didn't kill me. I hardly think you can compare your situation to that of children working in factories or as chimneysweeps at the turn of the last century. And if you can, then I have great pity for you. These children were beyond "not having a childhood," they were dying at 15-20 because of all the chemicals they were breathing. Not to mention working 12+ hours a day as soon as they were old enough to do so. So I disagree that you didn't have a childhood, at least in the 1850s sense. Maybe you had a lot more responsibility as a child than most of us, but it was a childhood none-the-less. Besides, being treated as a young adult is ok when that is the social norm. It's quite different when it isn't. It's all a matter of perspective. * I agree with Nopen. These parents were simply irresponsible in having far more children than they could possible manage. It's one thing to have two kids and have to leave them with a babysitter when you go to work, it's quite another to just keep popping them out and handing them off. *What I mean by that is that social expecations are different now from what they were. For one thing, being an individual and thinking as a self rather than as "farm hand 22" is also a relatively new invention and mostly came with the rise of the nuclear family. These kids are going to have expectations from their society to a) share certain childhood experiences with their peers, b) understand certain social/familial structures that do not include having 15 brothers and sisters as the norm, and c) display a certain amount of individual thought. All of these things are not things that would have been expected of people 150 years ago, but they are now. Raising them as if it were 150 years ago, I fear, will leave the children ill-equipped do deal with what society asks for in a person now. EDIT: I also think it says a lot that the parents' names are all over both those websites, but I am having a hard time finding ANY of the children's names. It's like they are almost a background for them.
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Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 7:49 pm
There you go shoving the words in again to try and make a point. Not what I said at all. whee I was clarifying that 'childhood' is a new concept and is constantly evolving to have new meaning but prior to that time period, it didn't exist at all. Sorry if I caused confusion.
Now what I WAS actually saying was that according to YOUR definition of being a kid, I didn't have a childhood, so I can relate to this family and the necessity of an older sibling looking after and caring for another and even having to act as a parental role. Since I myself, did just that and have been told repeatedly that I was robbed of my childhood.Kukushka I do think it's unfair. A kid needs to be a kid. Having to be a parent as well..."
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Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 7:04 am
Aaaah, I see. Yeah, you wrote those two separate points a little too close together, lol. My mistake!
I see what you mean. Looking at it from the child's perspective, it's similar (although, I'm sure there were times when your mom was home and you could do your own thing for a bit. These kids don't get a break at all). From your mom's perspective, I don't think it is. Like I said, having 2-3 kids and having to work is one thing, having 16 kids just because you feel like it and not taking responsibility for them is something else entirely.
From the snippets of information I have about your parents and these parents, I'd say I'd put your father in with them. Not "Horribly bad parents OMG! Call social services!" but definitely in the range where I would say that they shouldn't have had these kids if they weren't prepared to care for them all. On the website, the parents even say that the older children are responsible for the homeschooling of the younger, Jana (aged 14) does all the cooking, the older children are responsible for making sure the younger kids have washed and brushed their teeth, etc... I'm reading through that and I think "so what does the mom do?" Well... she reads the bible to the older kids in the afternoons. They even have their piano teacher doing the laundry for them.
I think I need to make it clear that I am more judging the parents for biting off more than they can chew than saying that the children will grow up to be "broken" and "defective." I think that they will have trouble in modern society without strong personal identities, but I think it's quite possible that they may get over that if they live in certain types of communities. Kids are amazingly resilient and can be "normal" even after going through the most unexpected things.
But the parents... I just think they should take more responsibility for every individual child they have. The mom pretty much seems to just nurse and care for the youngest and then pass him/her/them on as soon as there is a new youngest. The older children to the rest of the work.
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Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 9:19 am
See, I think where this is going is "one-on-one" time with each individual child. That's really debatable for each family. I'm not sitting here defending the Duggars because while I don't agree with some of the ideas and such, I do stand by that they do seem happy, healthy, and can provide for their children, even if they are unusual.
Yes, I came from a family of 6 children. We have a couple years seperating each of us. We had the "big kids" and "little kids." While we weren't responsible fully for the younger children (and I'm being silly here, I got the short end of the stick and got stuck with my brother, who is the ONLY boy), we were often paired up with them. I don't cry about a wasted childhood. I had to share a room for probably 16 years of my life with another person. While I previously mentioned that a large family is NOT for me (mainly monetary reasons), I don't think it is a bad thing.
I learned to not be selfish and myself comes first. I learned that sharing and being thrifty is a good thing. I learned family management. I could go on and on the positive things I learned along side the negatives. HOWEVER, that is the SAME for large or small families. You are going to learn different things, but positives and negatives will still be there. It's like the opposite side of the fence having only one child. I could not do that personally and in ways, I don't think it's fair (my opinion). It's really a flip side I think.
Also, like I said, I don't know the Duggars' workings of their life, but just because she is home (stay at home mother) doesn't mean she doesn't DO anything all day long. They do run a church in their home and she also does homeschool all the children. While yes, the site said the older children help, that could mean being a teacher's helper, it doesn't really go into details. I stay at home with my son and a lot of times I don't really mention what I do and I do focus more on talking about my child rather than staying at home, mostly because of the stigma some people place on that choice.
We also have to take into consideration that the Duggars seem to be extremely old-fashioned. Would this have been foreign and odd to us60 years ago? I can't say they bit off more than can chew because like I said, the children are provided for, which is surprising to most. I suppose the test of time will be what the children will be like when they hit 18 and go out into the real world and reflect on their upbringing.
Like I said before, it's not really so much them that bothers me, it's the fact they are getting publicity for having a large family, which I don't think is different from so many large families out there. Also, sometimes I like to play devil's advocate.
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Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 1:34 pm
I find it funny that we have someone who has plainly said that all only children are selfish and we have someone else who has implied that learning to share is a benefit of having a large family.
We weren't rich, but we were definitely in the upper ranks of middle class (we had very nice houses and as a child I always had my own bathroom and usually at least two rooms if not an entire floor to myself). I was, for all intents and purposes, an only child.
Yet, I didn't grow up selfish, nor am I a big spender. My parents taught me to share and not interupt others (or demand attention when those around me are busy). I never had my own clothes freshly bought just for me, I got them secondhand from cousins or the children of my parents' friends. Not because we couldn't afford them, or even because my parents didn't want to buy me my own clothes, simply because they raised me to appreciate gifts and to be happy for everything I have, even if it's not brand new and even if I didn't get to pick it for myself.
I honestly resent the implication that just because my parents felt that they wanted to spend all their energies raising the best possible me that I would automatically be a monster or something. It's not about the situation, it's about how the PARENTS act and how well they take responsibility for promoting good values. Having 4 kids is not an automatic guarantee that they will all be well behaved and always willing to share.
When I criticize the Duggar family, it's because a) the mother seems to pass off all the responsibilities (true, she doesn't explicitly mention that the older kids are solely responsible for the education of the younger, but it is certainly implied), and b) that they do not seem to promote any individual thought (as I mentioned, the names of the children are not even mentioned on the FAMILY website. They are simply "the children" as an extention of the parents).
Yes, I am judging then based on very little information, but we do that every day in this guild. People present themselves and we make assumptions based on what we are told so that we are able to give advice. Every single person in this thread is guilty of that. Not only that, but this is the information THEY chose to put forward, I assume from this that this is their best side (for who would put their worst foward for the public?). If their best side doesn't even acknowledge that their children have names, I can only assume how bad their worst side must be.
EDIT: err, just to clarify, I'm not upset at anyone or defensive. Just adding to the argument. I'm perfectly A-ok with everything that's been said smile heart
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Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 7:01 pm
(This is at last count, 16 kids, with the oldest being 17 at the time of the article where I got this list from.)
The children's names are:
- Joshua (17)
- John David (15)
- Janna (15) (they're the first set of twins)
- Jill (14)
- Jessa (12)
- Jinger (11)
- Joseph (10)
- Josiah (9)
- Joy-Anna (8 )
- Jeremiah (6)
- Jedidiah (6) (the 2nd set of twins)
- Jason (5)
- James (4)
- Justin (2)
- Jackson Levi (1)
- Johannah (5 months, born Oct. 2005)
And although I don't have the article on this computer, there was an article I read awhile back about Michelle winning an award for Arkansas Mother of the Year a couple of years (?) ago.
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