SHADOWING
#1
How Many Is Enough?
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#1 How Many Is Enough?
precious: Children are precious. No one would argue with
very valuable or that, but how many children is enough? Michelle
important Duggar, the mother of one of America’s most
famous large families, says that she leaves that
question for God to answer. In 1988, Michelle
and Jim Bob Duggar had the first of many
children. By 2006, they had 16 sons and
daughters and became the subjects of a 1-hour
TV documentary about their unusually large
reality TV: family. By 2007, they had 17 children, and
TV about normal became the stars of a weekly reality TV
people
program. The TV show was aptly named 17 Kids
aptly: and Counting, because they weren’t finished
appropriately having children. In 2009, the show name became
18 Kids and Counting, and in 2010, the name
again changed to 19 Kids and Counting, to reflect
their growing family. Michelle Duggar now says,
that even though she is a 47-year-old mother of
19 children, “We would love more!“
At Duggar’s age, the health risks of pregnancy to
both the mother and child are high, but some
people question her desire to keep growing her
ethical:
family for different reasons. Is it responsible or
following what
society says is ethical to have this many children? Of course,
good or right the environment cannot support everyone
having large families, but the Duggars are
wealthy, live frugally, and have no problem
supporting their large family. They live in a 7,000
square foot home, and own 8 cars, including a 21
seat bus. They consume a lot, but they also
rarely buy anything new, and all their cars are
bought used. They do laundry 35 times a week
and go through 36 eggs, 5 pounds of bacon, 3
pounds of green beans, 2 watermelons, 2 pans
of brownies, and a gallon of ice cream every day.
© Deep English, 2011-2015 | www.deepenglish.com 02
#1 How Many Is Enough?
On the other side of the planet, China’s one birth
rural: policy, taxes people severely for having more than
describes people one child. Even though people living in Chinese
or places in the rural areas are exempt from this rule, the
country Chinese government says that the one child
policy has prevented 400 million births in Chinese
exempt:
cities from 1979 to 2011. While this policy has
free from
obligation lessened some of the social, economic and
environmental stresses created by a population
well over a billion, it has also caused problems.
Because of a cultural preference towards having
boys that can help support parents as they age,
some families have chosen to abort female
babies in China. This has created an imbalance in
the ratio of men to women in the population. By
2020, there will be 24 million men of marrying age
that will be without wives because of this
imbalance.
© Deep English, 2011-2015 | www.deepenglish.com 03
#1 How Many Is Enough?
While no other country has followed China’s one
child policy, in many countries people are
voluntarily choosing to have less children.
According to surveys of Americans, 2 children is
the ideal family size. What do you think is the
perfect number of children? Do you think there
should be limits on how many you can have?
Photos / Credits:
Photo #1 (cover) – by Fe Ilya:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/renneville/2908748583/
Photo # 2 – by Roberto Taddeo:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/robertotaddeo/10330878953
© Deep English, 2011-2015 | www.deepenglish.com 04
