on wrestling your biological clock

The only reason I am reading Penelope Trunk is because I am taking a seminar on careers as part of my MBA program. I am interested in promoting conditions of human flourishing on broad social level but at the same time, I recognize that individuals are generally powerless over the social and political and even organizational conditions in which they live. So I’m also interested in working with individuals in the whole area of “life management,” because I believe, even in less than ideal circumstances, there’s a lot we can do to achieve personal and professional fulfillment. I also believe that when individuals change, there are ripple effects in circles in which the individual operates – in the family, organization or community, and even in the larger world. I took the course as a way of exploring how, as individuals, we can construct self-actualizing careers, and how, if we’re stuck in less than ideal jobs, we can make the most of them – employer be damned.

Penelope is interesting. Her column has definite appeal, and it’s not the writing – although her ability to distill things to lists is one I admire (because I have serious left brain deficits and I’ve just never been able to do that – extract the important points from a book or article). I think what I like about her is the brazen personality she has constructed – I am curious how it meshes with the real life writer. I am struggling so hard now to find my own voice, I wonder if assuming a completely alien one would not make writing easier?

Anyway, Penelope’s March 2 column on “Effective Ways to Wrestle Your Biological Clock” has generated some buzz and I wanted to write something in response. It’s basically a warning to women who are pursuing high-powered careers to consider the consequences, if having children is important to them, because after a certain age, it gets harder, more expensive (if fertility treatments are required), and sometimes it’s just not possible.

I’ve talked to people who are “incensed” by the tone of the article, but I don’t think Penelope can be faulted for pointing out what is, in fact, biological reality. She’s not saying women have to get married, or have children, or that they won’t be happy if they don’t. She’s saying if it’s important to you (and apparently it’s important to a lot of people or reproductive technologies, if they existed, wouldn’t be the huge business they are) here’s something to think about.

The flaw in the article lies not in her presentation of the facts but rather in her presentation of the decision to get married, or have a child, even in her own life (hiring a dating service for 10K), as a matter of “rational choice.” The assumptions of rational choice theory are that humans are goal-oriented, that we have “hierarchically ordered preferences,” and that in choosing among options, we make “rational calculations” in order to maximize “utility.” I would argue, in fact, that the decision to have a child, today, is decidedly irrational in a utilitarian framework. (There are utilitarian arguments to getting married but more often than not they don’t explain the choice of mate.)

But if the utilitarian calculus calculus is flawed, interestingly, in this instance, a Kantian, or rights-based framework, is even less helpful. I do not believe we have the right to bear children. The Slovenian philosopher and sociologist Renata Salecl raises the question of the psychological inheritance of children who are “demanded.”

As a Christian, I would argue that the use of reproductive technologies is “defying God’s dominion.” Here I am influenced by the work of Christian ethicists Stanley Hauerwas and Amy Laura Hall (my colleague at Yale Divinity School). I simply do not believe it is “right” (in any moral framework) to spend thousands (often hundreds of thousands) of dollars to conceive a biological child when there is a whole continent of orphans. Why does our “right” to bear (white) children trump these kids’ “right” to loving parents?

There is no basis in Christian theology for the privileging of genetic offspring; it is, in its essence, a theology of adoption. Jesus himself is adopted, and the right of gentile Christians to the salvation promised to Abraham is garnered through adoption – we are, according to St. Paul, the “ingrafted branches.” In the early Church, Eucharistic ties were stronger than blood ties – believers were called to “leave” their families in order to follow Jesus.

There are strong secular (and even utilitarian) arguments to be raised as well.

It’s funny – I am not a utilitarian – I will never sacrifice the one for the many – and I have long argued that the appropriate moral framework is a libertarian, or “rights maximizing,” one. But here is an instance where the “right” in question – to bear one’s genetic progeny – is irrational and selfish. A very, very difficult question. Kudos to Penelope for putting it on the table.