Comparing Save the Children's data with other statistics, with the exception of New Zealand and Australia, secular countries having high populations of atheists/agnostics are the best places to be a mother. Countries having the most restrictions on abortion fell into the worst countries to be a mother and conversely, those where abortion is legal were the best environments to be a mother.
The United States ranks 25 out of 43 developed nations, up from 31 last year.
While the US has moved up in the rankings, ahead of last year’s 31st place, we still fall below most wealthy nations,” said Carolyn Miles, President & CEO of Save the Children. “A woman in the US is more than 7 times as likely to die of a pregnancy-related cause in her lifetime than a woman in Italy or Ireland. When it comes to the number of children enrolled in preschools or the political status of women, the United States also places in the bottom 10 countries of the developed world.”
The study analyzed factors like education, economics, health and politics for mothers and their children.
It makes sense actually, a parent who raises a child with access to logic and information to use as their guide, is ALWAYS going to do a better job than somebody who is encouraged to utilize the "spare the rod, spoil the child" approach or to tell their little one that if they misbehave they will burn for all eternity in the fiery pits of hell. Don'tcha think?
Happy Mother's Day! (Of course it will probably be even happier if you live in a secular country. I'm just saying!)
In a secular country there are options everywhere. Going through life without options is difficult.
ReplyDeleteFrom my experience, Holland seems to be the best place to be a parent. We get many kids from Holland now to our hospital getting a new innovative cancer treatment. Holland allow the entire family to relocate to the US for 6 months, there is a national foundation that pays for their rental housing and a NANNY to come care for the other kids, if applicable, while the parents are with the sick child, the parents jobs are secured and they get 2/3 pay while away. Plus a stipend for living expenses, miscellaneous, incurred while away.
ReplyDeleteTHAT my friends, is how it should be.
Let's juxtapose this against many US parents' experiences. Mortgage foreclosure, job loss, divorce from the stress of a sick child, siblings left to fend for themselves and all the problems that will ensue later from the abandonment....
I am just so impressed with Holland right now. Also, these are just the coolest, calmest, most loving parents and kids....despite cancer treatment the kids are just so well adjusted.
The families speak English perfectly...along with Dutch and German, sometimes French as well.
Really shows me how much we SUCK as a nation.
Now I've woken up properly, I realize I actually have read some of Boswell's work, back in the days when gay and lesbian studies were being established in academia. I remember controversy over his interpretation of the real nature of some of these rites. I'm not taking a position on this obviously, as I don't have the knowledge. The following gives you an idea -
ReplyDeleteMore recent scholarship, however, has challenged this picture of unrelenting homophobia. Biblical revisionists now speculate that the Levitican prohibitions were more narrowly targeted than they appear, intended only to quash blasphemies and paganisms the Bible associated with sodomites (1 Kings 14:24), or to curb male prostitution and public bawdry. In the 1990s, scholars from the Conservative Judaic tradition interpreted homosexuality as no more sinful than not keeping kosher, breaking the Sabbath, or violating any of the other 613 Talmudic commandments. More controversially, John Boswell's landmark studies Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality (1980) and Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe (1994) offer highly contested evidence that until the Middle Ages the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches actually condoned homosexuality and sanctioned pseudomarital homosexual partnerships.
I think what is important is that human sexuality is polymorphous. The sharp divisions we make between heterosexual and homosexual doesn't even begin to tell the story. Likewise, neither does claiming sharp divisions between acceptance and non-acceptance of same gender love throughout history. Complexity, however, is not appreciated nor enjoyed by the right wing, right/wrong crowd.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Gay_and_lesbian_studies.aspx
Oh dear, I obviously haven't woken up. I think I just posted my gay marriage comment in this thread by mistake. My apologies.
ReplyDeleteYep, I've wanted to move to Europe (France, Holland for years - all it takes is one trip to a child's sport in the U.S., and I learn why we're called ugly Americans. (One sport and one set of parents excepted.)
ReplyDeleteAnd our education system is abysmal - especially for academically gifted kids. Spiraling - ARRRRRGH!
Anyone else emigrated and want to share about the process? Teen and pre-teen kids now.
Ireland has really strict abortion policies, so I am confused as why they are pointing this country out in this article. I may be mistaken, but I thought the UN was being asked to get involved to encourage them to make it legal. They must have some really great free pre-natal care or something else to make it better than the US.
ReplyDeleteBlame on those socialist health care policies in the top countries! How dare they nurture and provide for their people! Don't they know that people who are not wealthy don't deserve any help? Bunch of welfare queens - all of them!
ReplyDeleteWe're Amerikuns: we punish our poor and sick. It's the Puritan way. Get out those scarlet letters and have at it.
Not to worry. Considering the current war on women and children this country will be back down to 31 or lower in no time.
ReplyDeleteThe countries that beat America, for the most part, value silly things like education, health care, human rights, care for the poor and elderly. Some of the poorest countries (compared to U.S.) have healthy lifestyles and attitudes, and don't equate "money" with "happiness".
ReplyDeleteI've lived in Italy, and teachers are revered and given support and tools they need to advance their children's education. When I was there, workers got paid 13 months plus a paid month of vacation. Women weren't relegated to breastfeeding their infants in rest rooms, both partners had paid leave, and the government pays a stipend to people who care for the elderly and young, be they professionals or family members. They have socialized medicine, it's not the best, but it works well for the most part. (they're trying the "austerity" thing now, I understand, and it may have changed since I left.
We had an exchange student from the Netherlands for two semesters, and he was SHOCKED at the length of our school year and days. He was also surprised at how much we waste as a society and how prudish we are about the human body and sexuality, How short maternity leave is, and how little "free time" we have with our families.
The next war will be the war on Public Education.