Children - Why the Thinking Person Should Abolish Them

Over the last few years I have been watching with growing consternation the arrival of a train of babies in my circle of friends. This had never happened to me before, thus suitably alarmed I sat down to think about such things. I realized that I was of an age when people tend to gaze longingly at babies and display a pathetic yearning to get married (at least in India). They do so, and
then start reproducing frantically to make up for lost time. Like some kind of yeast colony, the house is a seething sea of wailing leaking babies, and then I stop visiting them because there is no entity more unbearable than a new father or mother, and nothing is worse than the disgusting scenes of nauseating baby noises that they produce as they pepper the conversation with the exploits of their newborn. "Did you see? I mean did you actually SEE what she said? She said 'Daa'!" Quite fascinating I am sure, but it bores me to death.

We had a friend who proudly announced to us one day: "I am pregnant!" and then added redundantly, "I am expecting a baby." We didn't want to squash the poor womans enthusiasm, so I politely added: "Really, but how terrible for you! Sunali here is also pregnant, but she is expecting a SUN workstation. They are so much more useful." She didn't see my point at all. She hissed at me. Strange woman. The most irritating question that people in India ask newly weds is: "Any good news?". I had this question popped to me within a week after my
wedding. An even worse question popular among South Indian brahmins is: "Any issues?". Like we are the post-office or something. Fortunately we left India soon after for the United States.

After arriving here I discovered that Americans are even more besotted with babies and reproducing than Indians. They go to astonishing lengths to document the distasteful process. With the possible exception of the process of conception, they have everything on film or video. Down to the gory details. So much of afterbirth, so many stitches, so many contractions per second, the babies heartbeat, the mothers heartbeat, the fathers heartbeat. Cardiograms, angiograms, ultrasounds, EEG, ECG. Of the entire family if necessary. No wonder
obstetrics is thriving business. So many eager parents lining up and ready to spare no expense just to be rewarded with a baby (belonging to the woman in the next cubicle who paid less and, therefore, didn't quite deserve a baby as this couple who lost theirs during a Ceaserian. Who knows? Who cares?) They even have pre-natal specialists who specialize in foetal psychiatry I believe. "Now you just relax there and tell me how long you have been obsessed with your
mother?" Bizarre, but a lucrative business.

Thankfully, I estimate that in a few years the flood will have dried to a trickle, and will eventually cease by the time I turn forty. After that, ah! bliss. The problem of reproducing in sufficient numbers having passed to a future generation, I can relax in the company of sane individuals. The darlings will have grown up to be thoroughly ungrateful little bastards who shoot junk and give their parents hell. Getting them to talk about their children will be a
difficult thing. "Has your son appealed the death penalty?" is not a
easy question to ask.

What prompts me to write is the growing number of requests for baby names on the net. I mean, netters are reproducing in such prodigous numbers that they have run out of names. The mind boggles at the incredible dissipation of intellectual energy which this effort demands. Frantic emailing, overloading of ftp sites, phone calls across the land. The damn things are arriving so fast that we can no longer keep count of them, and know not what names to give. "Please fax, or email new names". This could be the basis for a thriving
cottage industry. People will be patenting names and will be assured of royalties for generations.

My request to all of you is, Please Stop! I mean stop reproducing and the problem of name hunting will also automatically cease. Babies are a biological issue. You don't really need them. They are purely vestegeal, like your appendix. No one has any use for them anymore. They leak at both ends, produce noxious and sticky effluvium, wail at all hours of the day. They are selfish, utterly uncaring of the trouble they cause, and ruthlessly monopolize your energy and time. They grow up with all these problems multiplying manifold. If
they wail today, they whine in their adolescence. If they are leaking fluids today, they are consuming with ferocious energy tomorrow. They are never satisfied with what you do for them, they want more. They just aren't worth it. May as well put a stop to it. People in India should be especially warned. The worst nightmare could come true - their little pumpkins could end up joining the Indian Institute of Technology, and end up becoming social retarded and overly numerate.

The wise ones give their children odd names hoping that they will commit suicide in the near future. Names like "Bodhya" or "Kuram". The wiser ones having realized their mistake quickly suffocate them with pillows. Forestalling the almost certain electric chair that awaits the child. Some parents plead insanity and hand their children over to the state. Unfortunately the stigma of returning their babies to the state is so great that most are simply saddled with them for life. This is a cunning ploy by the state and was probably put into practise in the early civilizations: Abolish The Returned Babies Department, otheriwse people will be queueing up by the truck loads to return the little tadpoles. Only, only the really wise ones just DON'T have babies.

Society has advanced to a point where one can't learn enough in a lifetime. Wonderful new avenues of education and new ways of pursuing leisure. So many ways to stimulate the intellect and do creative work. For gods sake who needs babies to come along and waste your time? Abolish babies. And along with them abolish the tyranny of ingratitude. Intellect cannot be fostered when the hands are busy changing diapers, or the ears are subject to waves of jarring Metallica which deaf adolescents listen to. Children cannot be forced down the garbage dispenser because the hideous creatures have choked them up with junk food. Prevent a life of wasted potential. Don't have babies. Don't croon over the next one you see on the street. Rather, draw the parents aside and counsel them on their moral obligation to future society. If they resort to specious arguments like "There will be no future society if there are no babies", point out that if humanity had spent time researching immortality instead of rearing the cretins, then the future we make is ours. If someone
mentions a new arrival, advise them to get rid of it, before it learns to recognize them and can crawl back from the land fill. If someone mentions a pregnancy, arrange to file a public interest petition that could lead to an arrest and a long jail sentence. Do anything but have babies.

With this admonsihment I conclude by stating that, as always, I believe in setting an example by doing. Or not doing as in this case.