"Fatherhood" & Control over the Female Body (was re: Yoshie's sacred sperm)

[W. Kiernan]

Rob Schaap wrote:
> 
> ...But it should be remembered that one of the things that makes this
> difficult (if still the only conclusion logically possible in our
> world) is that men have, at a particularly decisive moment, all
> responsibility and no rights.  I did nothing with my genitals my
> partner did not do with hers, yet she has the womb - which grants
> her rights and obligations specific to the bearer of a womb.  As
> the bearer of a penis, I share much of the responsibility, but none
> of the rights...

Me too.  I've got three kids, by which I mean I stood around and did
damn near nothing for a few months, during which months my wife Judith
got to where she couldn't get in the car because swelled up like she had
somehow swallowed a bowling ball, couldn't pick up things off the floor,
suffered the usual variety of ever-changing medical symptoms, e.g.,
nausea, sleeplessness, etc., etc.  

Then after those uncomfortable months of pregnancy the kids were born. 
I "delivered" two of them myself (not because I wanted to, but the
midwife was late both times) by which I mean I mostly stood around
biting my fingernails and watched, and then at the end I caught the kid
and snipped the cord.  Meanwhile for hours on end Judith underwent
labor, it's kind of unnerving for me even to remember just watching it;
judging by the sounds and the expressions on her face during those
hours, if I had ever had to put up with what she put up with I would
expect the Congressional Medal of Honor.

"All responsibility and no rights"?  Considering our different efforts
and travails, that sounds fair to me.

Yours Old Dad - WKiernan at concentric.net