The octuplet birth story takes an ugly turn into racism and Muslim bashing.
The perceived race of mothers was often a key component of how stories of large families were treated in the media. “When the pregnant woman is not brown or black and the drugs/technologies are provided by big pharma, the discussion focuses on questions of ethics. But if the issue is childbearing by low-income women of color, and the drug is homegrown/illegal then the debate is a question of punishment through the criminal justice or civil child welfare system.”
This angle was sadly confirmed by some blog comments speculating whether the name “Suleman” had a “very ethnic ring to it – Middle Eastern in fact.” Conservative blogger Phyllis Chesler took these insinuations a few steps farther, swiftly dispatching with the makeup of America’s most prominent pronatalist activists – complementarian conservative Chrsitians – to hang the mantle of over-the-top procreation on fundamentalist Mormon polygamists and Muslims (whom she refers to as “outlawed, break-away Mormon and law-abiding Muslim men,” in case her meaning isn’t clear). After noting that “Osama bin Laden’s father had 57 children,” Chesler wonders whether Suleman’s ethnicity is determining her family size, writing, “Once this gets out-will she become a poster child/mother for….free baby formula and diapers? Or for Jihad?”
