<p>B&P, that was such a sad story about your friend. Just heartbreaking.</p>
<p>“I would also love to fast foward to see how she will act as a grandmother, will she basically raise her 1st 6 grandkids or will she say I am too old, I raised you kids, now its my time.”</p>
<p>After growing up in a house with so many kids that it will be impossible to get individual attention, perhaps none of her kids will choose to have kids.</p>
<p>It was very heartbreaking to watch it from the outside as a personal friend. I don’t think a day or two went by in my mind without having my own heart break. I honestly think I know what I would have done, but truthfully you really don’t know until you are there. Easy to say hard to do.</p>
<p>Even though I am Catholic, I would have terminated. I believe I would be forgiven for the action because the higher beings would know that my motive would be totally selfless, it would have been for the children that I have already been blessed with. Bringing children into any family affects everyone. Our DD walked me out of the hospital after my third, I asked her if we could bring him home, she said no. A week later I asked her again can we keep him, she said no. She was 2 and 14 yrs later she still feels that way :eek:</p>
<p>When we brought our younger son home from the hospital we ate dinner as a family with our newborn in his carrier. Our older son, who was 3 y/o, actually held a mostly empty (perhaps a cup full was still left) 2 liter bottle of soda over the newborn’s head and started swinging it. Fortunately we had not turned our backs in that moment, but that was a clear message for us that he was not happy with the new arrangement! BTW, they get along very well and have done so through all of their childhood years, we are very lucky. Yes, there is a huge adjustment for all.</p>
<p>My brother hit me on the head with a tonka toy!</p>
<p>When I had DD, Bullet brought DS1 (2 yrs old) to the hospital he climbed up on the bed and started saying mine, mine, I was holding her and thought oh crap here’s the jealousy and he wants me…nope…he than continued on to say my baby, my baby. He was kind to her until the teens, and now he is at college and away they get along again</p>
<p>
Where? Can you provide some documentation?</p>
<p>“Where? Can you provide some documentation?”</p>
<p>I first realized how much discrimination and hate there is against Arabs when I lived in Detroit. Since then, and particularly since 9/11, Arabs have become targeted by hate crimes and discrimination across the country. In addition to seeing articles like the below, I also have heard of some appalling things from my friends who are Arabs.</p>
<p>"It was Jan. 13 [2009], a Tuesday evening, when parishioners at the Sts. Peter and Paul Antiochian Orthodox Church on River Road first noticed the graffiti. It was scrawled in blue spray paint on a back entryway to the church — according to officials there, a dimly lit area that would make it an easy target for vandals.</p>
<p>Written across the door was a Star of David and the words “Israel forever — Arabs never.”…</p>
<p>According to the Washington-based American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, hate messages against Arab-Americans have been on the rise recently.</p>
<p>“We find a lot of times when there are conflicts going on that our office in particular and the Arab-American community in general is targeted a bit more,” said Laila Al-Qatami, communications director at the Washington-based American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. Al-Qatami reported that her office has received an increased amount of hate messages in the last few weeks. “I’m not surprised, unfortunately, that the church was vandalized in light of what’s going on in Gaza…”
[Anti-Arab</a> graffiti stuns parishioners at Sts. Peter, Paul](<a href=“http://www.gazette.net/stories/01282009/bethnew202730_32486.shtml]Anti-Arab”>http://www.gazette.net/stories/01282009/bethnew202730_32486.shtml)</p>
<p>"WASHINGTON[2008] — The day before releasing their latest hate crimes report, The American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) received a message telling the group to go back to where they came from.</p>
<p>ADC Executive Director Kareem Shora read the message in full to an audience of journalists and the public Thursday.</p>
<p>The e-mail demonstrated the report’s findings. Discrimination against Arab Americans is still rampant…</p>
<p>Kareem Shora, ADC’s Executive Director, estimated that in the late 1990’s, ADC received complaints of 80-90 violent hate acts over several years. Since 2002, the group receives 120-130 per year. These include only cases of the worst kind, involving violence.</p>
<p>Many reported cases of discrimination occur not only in the workforce or at schools, but involve government and law enforcement officials. ADC is receiving increasing numbers of complaints about abuses stemming from the No-fly lists. Most incidents of “flying while Arab” problems arise from misapplication of procedure or screeners acting out of bias…"
[The</a> Arab American News - ADC releases hate crimes report, highlights recent military case](<a href=“http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/index.php?mod=article&cat=Community&article=1750]The”>http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/index.php?mod=article&cat=Community&article=1750)</p>
<p>I don’t think anyone on there is backlashing on her because of her Iraqi descent. Nobody is backlashing on the grandmother or the grandfather. They are actually looking like good parents who are just as confuse, befuddled and disappointed in her decision. Grandpa gets points from me for risking his life to be an interpreter in Iraq to financially assist the 6 she already had. </p>
<p>This is not nor has it ever been about ethnicity or immigrants. This is about people not understanding how anybody with no spouse or mate, no real income(she won an injury settlement and according to grandmom has not worked since then, and used that money to do IVF), living with her parents because she lost her own home would travel to somewhere in the US, but outside of her city (let’s face it I think LA has a ton of IVF docs) to do IVF.</p>
<p>IVF is not cheap. She could have used that money to put a roof over her kids heads. She could have used the money for special assistance for her autistic child. SHe could have used that money to finish her education and get a job. </p>
<p>IVF is painful. The shots to stimulate the ovaries are not fun, and stimulated ovaries hurt…any women can tell you how cramping feels. My girlfriend had 4 children via IVF. One single birth and 1 set of triplets. I remember when she was going through it the Macauleys (?) just had their kids, she had yet to get pregnant. She stated that she thought they were wrong for not doing selective, because of the risks. IVF patients know the risks, they don’t walk in and hand over a check. They are suppose to have thorough medical and psychological backgrounds done. IVF now has a higher success rate than yrs ago, but many times it also doesn’t result in a pregnancy. For those women going through the process now, and those that did not have successful outcomes, that is where my pity goes. They don’t do it to have another daughter, they do it have a child. They don’t try to risk their life or the babies in this process. This girl just watched too many episodes of J&K plus 8 and the duggars. I can never ever understand a rationale explanation, unless they come out and say she only had 1 or 2 implanted, but even then as a parent and an adult I think I wouldn’t accepted b/c I would still feel for the 1st 6 she had.</p>
<p>Her mother has stated she used up all of the embryos so no more will happen and the publicist is declining to answer how many embryos were implanted. Publicists are paid to put a positive spin…if she declines to answer it, you know she did 8 implantations, b/c the public might have a more favorable opinion of her if it was only 1 or 2. Gerber has not made an offer, nor has any other baby company…I am sure that they would have had the public not felt so strong about the morality of her decision </p>
<p>I do believe discrimination exists, but nobody is making her ethnicity an issue</p>
<p>I don’t believe there is a backlash against Arabs and never have. One incident of stupidity does not a backlash make. There are many, many more incidents of anti-Jewish bias. That said, I do think this woman will be discriminated against, but not because of her ethnicity. Because she is unmarried. Did anyone else read Kate Gosselin’s comments?</p>
<p>" don’t think anyone on there is backlashing on her because of her Iraqi descent. Nobody is backlashing on the grandmother or the grandfather. They are actually looking like good parents who are just as confuse, befuddled and disappointed in her decision. Grandpa gets points from me for risking his life to be an interpreter in Iraq to financially assist the 6 she already had. "</p>
<p>I’ve never said that anyone here has expressed concern about the octuplets due to the mom’s ethnicity. Fortunately, such racist statements are rare on CC. I have seen anti-Arab comments on threads about the octuplets on nonCC forums, including reader comments after mainstream media articles about the octuplets.</p>
<p>My point was that Arabs and immigrants have been targets in the U.S. of hate crimes and discrimination, so even if the mother didn’t have 6 other kids, and the other issues we’ve discussed here, she still would have had a harder time gaining support and endorsements than she may have anticipated.</p>
<p>For example, there has been public speculation that if the surviving Houston octuplets hadn’t been black and kids of Nigerian immigrants, they would have gotten more endorsements, etc. than they have gotten.</p>
<p>I know that as a black person, I’m very glad that the California octuplets aren’t black. Even in my liberal college town, every time the local story’s on-line site publishes a picture of a black person who has done anything wrong, a slew of racist reader comments follow, including many that suggest that one person’s criminality or stupidity reflects an entire race.</p>
<p>i just stopped in on this train wreck -
</p>
<p>what does Kate have to say?</p>
<p>I just read her comments.(Kates)</p>
<p>To be hoonest that woman drives me looney. I have seen only a few episodes, I know she is feuding with her sister right now (aunt Jodi, has openly blogged about them) The few episodes I saw made me walk away questioning her.
- Trip to Disney…come to find out they keep potty seats in the car on a daily basis (not just for long trips)…this is a woman that admits to being germaphobic, but lets urine slosh around in the car…YUCK
- Her vanity…hair plugs for Jon, and kids are always having to match…the disney trip of her flipping out that the kids got ice cream on their clothes made me laugh…what 2-3 yr old doesn’t spill ice cream, let alone 6 of them.
- The only other one I saw was about her tummy tuck…now that one I can roll with, I completely get it.</p>
<p>Kate basically says ignore the stares and what people say.</p>
<p>
I think that’s very sadly the truth. My thoughts about the new octuplet mom is that she has so much going on otherwise that she’ll be disqualified from endorsements and the like long before anyone notices that. Frankly, I think the whackjob factor is immediately disqualifying. </p>
<p>I think the Dilleys have handled their “six-pack” pretty well. They did get a lot of donations, but they generally hold to having one interview with Diane Sawyer and one magazine cover of the kids every year. Probably enough to supplement their incomes.</p>
<p>Kate said that she didn’t think it was a good idea to bring such a large group of babies into a home with only one parent and that she wouldn’t have had her own children without a supportive, helpful husband. She also said that the mom in California can’t possibly know what she’s getting into and that taking care of those children will be next to impossible for one person. The gist of it was that she doesn’t particularly approve of the single mom status and she’s probably right about that in this instance.</p>
<p>I really like Kate in some ways. I see myself in her controlling behavior and it’s something I work on. But I completely relate to how madly she loves her kids. I’m not sure I would live my life so publicly and I’m not a particularly greedy person, but I think all the Gosselin and Duggar kids are deeply loved and they all seem to have their own personalities. For me, I hold stay-at-home-mom envy so deeply that I really admire those woman and know I couldn’t do what they do.</p>
<p>I feel really sorry for those 14 kids. Whatever happens, I think they have a rocky road ahead. I can not imagine what it would be like being with 8 infants, 6 other kids under 8, and also having at least one autistic child in the mix. More than likely, some of the others also are special needs.</p>
<p>Whatever happens to the kids – whether they get to stay with their mom, go into foster care or end up being taken away and adopted – it seems they will have challenges that it’s sad for children to have to face.</p>
<p>I think with medical advancements people now also question anybody about carrying multiples. People can understand when you have a couple of embryos implanted, it is when you push it to carry 6,7,8 that questions begin to arise. Most people are titilated by the number, but than it becomes the realization that the chances of all of these children living a normal medical life is very slim and you begin to question why they took the risk. The chances that all of these 8 children living a life without some serious conditions would be astonomically high. The big deal of them being off of oxygen is that it can do more damage than it might help. I am not sure if any large multiple birth has resulted in children without medical issues. The Mcaugheys have 2 children with CP, The Dione quints had medical issues, the Dilleys kids also have medical problems. Not sure about the Gosselin children. I know at least one has vision issues</p>
<p>I’d like to know who’s paying for the publicist just hired by the mom - the one who went on the morning news shows today (Fox, Today Show, maybe others). </p>
<p>I heard the Today Show interview and all she did was sidestep the questions.</p>
<p>I do think both families adore the kids, and I admire how they tag team as parents to give all of them more quality time. </p>
<p>I also do not begrudge them for opening up the house for tv. The difference from J&K and this mother is they were married and sfe was infertile, This mom is not infertile, but just wanted kids.</p>
<p>She did the same on Fox, my bet is the publicist is going to get a cut. Even if nothing comes monetarily, the publicist is getting free marketing because now others will use her.</p>
<p>"I’d like to know who’s paying for the publicist just hired by the mom - the one who went on the morning news shows today (Fox, Today Show, maybe others). "</p>
<p>She’ll get a percentage of what the mom makes. Plus, the publicist is getting tons of free publicity.</p>