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Parenthood as a Privilege
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Abstract
In most cases, Parenthood is considered the highest, essential role that grown individuals
adopt cross-culturally, but as this paper shows, becoming a parent is culturally full of both
meaning privilege. In particular, I specifically dwell on the cultural pressure of biological
parenthood, exploring more about biological mutual between parent and child method for
different groups, and how biological concept is judged differently regarding the populations.
Furthermore, although the paper mostly focuses on young parents and efforts to prevent and
reduce teen pregnancy, life courses have also shown consequences for infertility and their
interchange with the biomedicine model and healthcare system. From each population, we can
gain more nuanced insight into the role of biology in framing parenthood and how society
determines whose parenthood is "acceptable," allowable, and supported. Lastly, I look at
recommendations from each aspect, hoping to go deep into how changes to sexual education,
reproductive advocacy, adoption policy, and how the healthcare system can improve lives for
less fortunes, marginalized populations, and the best way to achieving parenthood for everyone.
Keywords;parenthood,reproductive,adoption policy,less fortune
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Parenthood as a Privilege
Parenthood is the act of being a parent specifically, but parenting is a privilege to many
societies as the position of a parent. Although having children is a human right, it's a basic and
natural part of being human; privilege doesn't fit well unless persons are prepared for repressive
government measures. Governments impose some level of accountability on parents to ensure
the safety and wellbeing of children and protect the rights of the children. Thus, parenting is a
privilege that can be lost in some circumstances. This dissertation focuses on parenthood as a
privilege.
Parenthood in modern culture is a problematic, opposed concept. It is most glorified,
condemned, presumed, avoided, and abused. And, mostly, within the complex term
"parenthood," there is twain motherhood and fatherhood, which don't mean the same. There are
activities devoted to the pursuing of parenthood for same-sex parents, for single parents by
choice, for those experiencing infertility; there are activities directed to conditional rejection of
parenthood through birth control and abortion; there is another motion directly eschewing
parenthood – the childfree movement (Finer et al., 2018). Approximately 22 percent of births in
any given year result from unintended pregnancies – over 1.4 million children annually. A
prospective measure of unintended pregnancy in the United States has shown how early
pregnancy has resulted to many childfree movements.
Additionally, infertility affects only 11.8 percent of women in the United States – a significant
minority, but a small minority nonetheless. In fact, by not having a partner with complementary
gametes, such cases are usually referred to as "situational infertility." Regardless of what
pathway they choose, these potential families are already violating the presumption of two-
parent biological reproduction, so these cases are of minimal utility when trying to deconstruct
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that presumption. (Goodwin, 2020). Biological parenthood is presumed because of looking at the
numbers. It ought to be presumed; it is the most common way of becoming a parent. However, it
requires a significant amount of awareness and work to avoid biological parenthood, let alone
challenge it as the primary mode of family building.
In conclusion, while it would be wrong to declare a "right" to parenthood, parenthood should not
be a privilege conferred to those considered most meritorious within social rankings. When
children do not have homes or have been removed from unsafe homes, they should be given
every chance to join an adoptive family that provides a loving, permanent home and validates
their biological relationships by preserving connections and contact when possible do so. We
have to explore the range of our interpretation about family structure to recognize it,
substantially, as a social justice matter.
References
Tedds, J. (2020). Having it all:: How do women with fertility struggles manage the multiple
goals of wellbeing, career progress, and biological parenthood?.
Finer, L. B., Lindberg, L. D., & Desai, S. (2018). A prospective measure of unintended
pregnancy in the United States. Contraception, 98(6), 522-527.
Goodwin, A. N. (2020). Educational Attainment's Unequal Benefits? Differences in Impaired
Fecundity and Infertility Between Black, Hispanic, and White Women in the United
States (Doctoral dissertation, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill).
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