A fascinating discussion today on the
NPR' affiliate WBEZ' show Eight-Forty-Eight regarding the ethical debate surrounding having children, always a potential outcome for having sexual intercourse as a heterosexual couple. Christine Overall, a philosophy professor at Queen’s University,
Ontario, is a guest on the show to discuss her new book,
Why Have Children? The Ethical Debate,
in which she argues that people should be thinking much less about
themselves and much more about society at large when deciding to have
kids.
The choice to have a child is often not so much a choice but an urge, an emotional response, a religious belief, an outcome of behavior, more than a conscious action. This desire to have a child, and whether or not it is an appropriate choice given resources, income, ethics, et al, is at the center of
FOURPLAY: AUSTIN, in which a couple debates whether or not to have a child and comes a startling "decision."
You can't have a film about sexual intimacy without having babies be some part of the mix, and given the range of sexual expression on display in FOURPLAY, we've included for our heterosexual segment a highly charged story that hopefully will raise similar questions as this radio show: "When is it NOT a good idea to conceive? Will we ever know when is the right/wrong time to have a child? And isn't the choice to have a child ALWAYS fraught with risks and danger?"
