It has been in the news quite a lot lately that we are about to hit the 7 billion mark on the planet. This piece of data has been on my mind a lot. Read Dark Vador’s blog here’s the link!  DV has a link on her posting today, to the BBC website which can calculate how many people were on the planet on the day you were born. I am completely staggered to find that since I was born, the population of the world has more than doubled.

It has doubled and added an extra billion on top! I still find it amazing that so many  people do not seem to be as  bothered about adding to that figure with having extra kids, or for that matter, kids at all. Many people think the problem  of overpopulation exists only in  places like Africa. In my humble opinion there is an underlying ‘us and them thing’, ‘Western world vs. Third world’ thing going on here, that I am really not comfortable with. Do  people in the West seem to think that their consumation of the planet which includes the bearing of children  is less of an issue? Why?

Also someone sent me a poster today about a non-consumer day in November…’don’t buy anything for a day’, perhaps people should try not making babies for a day instead – no sex for a day, it might at the rate the planet is filling up, do more good than me not going down the local shops and buying a pound of carrots. Then people gasp and get on their moral high horses, being all pro-lifey and sentimental. My shout to them is “get a life…your own!”

Once again, someone had a go at me for the amount of coats/jackets I own. Once again, let me put this into perspective for a minute.  I do not own a car, so I am outside in all weathers.  I do not have any children, so I do not have to buy anyone else coats apart from myself. I am older, so have had longer to keep my coats…some of my coats are very old. I have probably bought a coat /jacket every 2 years of my life. I send my coats to the charity shop when they are not being used, so someone else get to use them when I am finished with them. Some people have a child every two years of their adult life and then they have to buy the child a coat every 2 years and then all their children, and their children……..shut up about my coats and shoes and look at your own stuff…….

Blimey did I get out of bed on the wrong side this morning? Actually I feel very strongly about people’s lack of thought and responsibility about just ‘having another baby’ when the world is on the brink of a population explosion, especially people who are supposed to be intelligent and responsible. There are unwanted babies and orphans a plenty for everyone to have someone to care for, without having to have another opportunity to see one’s own gene pool multiply. This is a political as well as moral debate.

I am sort of jesting here, but also am not. I have many friends who have children and I love them and their children..I am in no way bitter (really!) but I am sure DV and many of my child free friends would agree that we are  often looked at as  being selfish or freaks. A quote from a blog! I read somes it up “The poor childless couple are so wrapped up in themselves, you have to feel sorry for them. They don’t fight over the child’s discipline, don’t blame each other for the child’s most obnoxious characteristics, and they miss all the fun of doing without for the child’s sake. They just go along, doing whatever they want, buying what they want and liking each other. It’s a pretty pathetic picture.”  It is not so easy not having kids with opinions like this around. The pressure in this world to have kids is immense. You really have to break the mould in some ways, to walk this planet without a child from your gene pool hanging off your arm. There are many places where being childfree is still difficult. You have to work hard on your sense of self, and know that parenting is not  just about giving birth or sowing the seeds. I  joyfully parent many children, and many children are joyfully parented by me, would do it more if people were not so attached to “owning their kids”. Also much of the way you have friends in a community is through having kids, so it can be very lonely not being part of the school run, the kids parties, etc etc….you can end up feeling like a bit of a mis-fit. I have often been in social situations with all women and I am the only child free woman in the room. I made a conscious choice not to add to the exploding population, and am often treated as some sort of wierdo. ha ha!

Robert Smith from the Cure, when interviewed by The Guardian  “So he’s never wanted to pass on his own genes? “I’ve never regretted not having children. My mindset in that regard has been constant. I objected to being born, and I refuse to impose life on someone else. Living, it’s awful for me. I can’t on one hand argue the futility of life and the pointlessness of existence and have a family. It doesn’t sit comfortably. I really understand that too. Enough ranting for one day, I is going down the amusement arcade.

SONG OF THE DAY – The Cure – Close to Me

The most amazing video directed by Tim Pope. Robert Smith is nearly my twin. Our astrological charts both look like hamster wheels as everything aspects everything and there is a planet in almost every sign in the first few degrees.  I would like to meet him one day and swap life stories.