I was watching a story on the news about a group of 17 high school girls who made a 'pregnancy pact' and methodically got themselves impregnated from various sources, including a homeless man. I suppose in the grand scheme of things, what with Jamie Lynn Spears getting pregnant in the public eye in her teens, and Jessica Alba et al minimizing the need for matrimony before conception, it was only a matter of time before something like this happened.
Financially, maybe these girls are on to something. The US has the worst maternity leave policy in the western world (I mean, even Ethiopia, the country of the famed famine, has more paid time off!) If the workforce is so unforgiving to new mothers, perhaps the time to have a baby is before entering it. No, of course, this isn't right. But maybe its time for America to take a look at the impact 6 paltry weeks is having on its working populace- the people who could actually afford to have children, often can't comfortably take time off from work. I was fortunate enough to be able to stop working for my entire pregnancy, but a lot of women don't have that luxury. It just seems in poor form that women who are responsible enough to have a job and be pregnant are allotted such a tiny window of time to recover and care for their child.
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