the children of men and women

Pardon the advertisement mess. I figured I'd give it a go, see if I can't make a few cents out of it. It sure would be funny to receive direct deposits of $0.37. It'll be like WTF, except real.


I decided to watch one of my favorite films again, Children of Men. I actually do like quite a few films that don't fall in the Hollywood blockbuster category, but don't mistake me for a movie-phile. You probably won't catch me having dirty, back door sex with films anytime soon. But, I do like me good movies, and this is one film I particularly love.

What I probably find most interesting about the film is how the problem of infertility, which goes unexplained in the plot (as is Cuaron's habit), is focused on women, not men. Though this is contrary to popular scientific belief that men will eventually be infertile, it does make for some interesting observations. If, in the film, men were infertile, then it would have mattered less, probably. If the one man that was fertile were found, most likely they'd just harvest his sperm and begin impregnating women everywhere again. Kind of like a baby factory.

But, because women are the ones who are infertile, not men, somehow it becomes extremely urgent that the one woman who is found to be fertile to be protected. When you think about how most women are still treated around the globe, it makes you think, if only for a moment, how very little women get appreciated, or more importanly, how little they are valued. That is, until push comes to shove. Even more important still is how the woman in this film, Kee, is an African woman, and how the father of the child is unimportant. What primarily matters is the saftey of Kee and her daughter.

I think that the film also provides excellent commentary on how fragile politics really are under strained circumstances such as this. A lot of things can fail in a country and in a government. But when the most important piece of the machinery, the ability to leave behind a genetic legacy, goes missing, everything else falls apart. A lot of people like to brag about how they want to leave behind a legacy, especially men. But the truth of the matter is, it's much less important to leave behind buildings and paintings and novels and movies, as it is to leave behind a son or a daughter. Otherwise, who will continue to live in your buildings, or look at your paintings, or read your novels, or watch your movies?

Finally, the film comments on how fragile humanity is, and how useless things like ethics, morals, and law become when faced with a daunting future. Somehow, given the circumstances, it becomes less important to save others or to help others, and far more important to shoot the guy next to you because you don't know who he is.

Still, as long as we can reproduce, the world is fine and dandy. But, given our real circumstances, for how long might that last? This is something both men and women need to give serious thought to, rather than arguing or criticizing or locking yourself up in a room filled with money from all the gas your company's sold.

Sometimes things need to get worse before they get better though. But I have hope that someday, we'll think more of our kids than of our petty problems.

Hollywood vs. reality

I think I should start off by stating that Juno is now one of my favorite movies. I watched it, fell in love, and I have it on DVD because I even bought the box edition that came with a shirt. So I guess the content of this entry might be a bit scewed in perspective and a bit biased. But it might not be.

So, there's still this debate floating around about Hollywood and its attitudes towards teen pregnancy lately, most especially exacerbated by Jamie Lynn Spears who, as some might know by now, has already delivered, and has been quoted by whats-its-name, "being a mommy is the best thing ever!" Well, as usual, there're two sides. One is the "thank you baby Jesus, we're finally getting over the hatred of teen pregnancy and are able to speak of it openly!" The other is, "psh that's nothing like a real pregnancy, I didn't keep the guy at the end/I don't have bazillions of dollars to take care of a kid."

I can't help but notice a few things though. First, when speaking about Spear's pregnancy, almost no one makes mention of the fact that she didn't use protection or was on any form of birth control whatsoever. If any reference is made, it's simply stated that she had premarital sex. And that's something I don't understand about American society. Why are its people more preoccupied with the fact she had premarital sex, or underage sex, then with the fact she failed to use birth control? She had a variety of options. She could've used condoms, which aren't that expensive, not for her anyway. She could've gone on the pill if she were going to be sexually active. She could've used Emergency Contraception if something had failed or she'd messed up. Or, last and seemingly most horrific, she could've had a quiet abortion. But no, it's just that she had premarital sex.

And how many other underage people are having premarital sex? Exactly. (I lack specific statistics to back my fabulous statement, but I will look if anyone wants them.) Just remember folks: it's not premarital sex unless you plan on getting married.

The second thing I notice is how Jamie Lynn is not only being under attack for having premarital and underage sex, no one seems to notice that, compared to her older sister, she has handled the situation far more maturely (up till now anyway) then her older sister, Britney Spears. Unlike her sister, Jamie Lynn has not rushed into marriage (though is in the process of one), and doesn't seem to run the risk of risky behavior and habits. Plus, I think because she's underage, she might be better off than Brit, if only because there will be more people watching her. Maybe.

So she's not a realistic bar towards which other teen mothers-to-be should measure up to. But she's a Hollywood kid, and really, who is real in Hollywood? (Seriously, if they're not ODing on drugs they're jumping on couches.)

Finally, that's the biggest thing I have against those who criticize Juno: that it's not a realistic portrayal of a pregnant teenager. Let's put the pieces together though. First, her social class. I think her parents' reacted in one of the two spectrum middle-class parents' react to a pregnant kid: they were disappointed, but felt that she had just made a genuine mistake and rather than tossing her out of the house, they helped her. (Not without reminding her most of the time that she shouldn't be in this mess anyway.) Second, Juno's (Ellen Page) personality: instead of taking a "poor me" attitude, she took a good look at the situation, made a mature (albeit naive) decision, and stuck to it, realizing that it was a mistake, but that mistakes are made to learn from them.

Third, and most importantly, it's a movie, not a documentary. It's not meant to show us every single stupid step of the process. It's only meant to tell us a story. Juno's pregnancy isn't even the center of this story, it's used as a plot device to tell the story of how she had to grow up quickly, and show the world that not all girls take self-pity attitudes towards themselves. In fact, I applaud the movie for not taking the view most pregnant-girl films take, the one where it's all the girl's fault for getting pregnant.

As I'm about to repeat: it's Hollywood. Do you honestly expect reality? If you want to make sure your teenage girl doesn't get pregnant, do the responsible parent thing: talk to her about it, tell her to use protection, offer to accompany her to a gynecologist visit for hormonal birth control, and, if she does get pregnant anyway, be there for her and be sure that she and the guy who got her pregnant takes responsibility for their mistake and make the best decision.

How hard is it to be a parent instead of letting school/the media/their friends do the job?

"She got pregnant...but I'm not sure how."

So I was minding my own business the other day, as I usually do, in fact. Anyway, I was just walking around town lazily, when my ears picked up the fragments of a conversation of two women not too far ahead of me. I really don't know the context of their discussion, but this one particular piece stood out.

(translated roughly into English)

"So did you know [random girl] is pregnant?"

"Really? Wow, I can't believe how irresponsible she could've been."

"Yeah, I know, you'd think she would use her head and at least avoid getting pregnant..."

(end rough translation)

What stood out here for me wasn't the fact that apparently another teenage girl has fallen victim to lack of information or any kind of sensibility. It was that there was absolutely no reference to a man at any point of this topic. And that's when I stopped to think about it. At least 95% of the time (a fabulous statistic made up by yours truly), you never hear about the man when someone becomes pregnant outside of marriage, and most especially with a teenage girl. In other words, it's as though the girl became pregnant on her own because she was not smart enough to be more careful.

Pardon the crass language, but what the fuck?

I'm serious here. Okay, I get it. I get that because it's the woman that carries the baby in her womb for nine months and then spits out the baby through her vaginal canal and, unless she gives it up for adoption or custody gets taken away, the kid is legally under her care until the age of 18/21.

But let me make this clear. Women, no matter what the age or what their marital status is, do not get pregnant on their own. Women do not regularly pull a Virgin Mary (nor can they get away with it). Women cannot tango alone.

I think it's more irritating for me because, despite laws to ensure that children have a father that has to at least pay child support, people will not budge on this. I don't know, I mean, sure, we could call the girl involved irresponsible till the cows come home. But why don't the men involved in these situations get the same treatment? Seriously, keep it in your pants or wrap it up. I hate to hear such crap like "but I don't feel anything". What would you rather do, not have the same warm wet feeling your penis usually gets but prevent an unwanted pregnancy, or father at least ten illegitimate children with no job? I mean, it's not mathematically possible for men to have had sex with at least twenty women and for one woman to have had sex with only three. And it's not fair that the woman has to take the brunt of it all.

I can't wait for the day this changes. But my grandchildren might be grandparents before that happens, unfortunately.