Ugh, what jerks. Things like this make me ponder the possibility of requiring licenses for becoming a parent. ...and become absolutely terrified of what's going to happen when my baby girl gets to be a teenager. (Then again, she's not allowed to date until she's 34, so there should be _NO_PROBLEMS_DAMMIT_. *whimper*)

parents like hers dont deserve to be there, yah the kid might have screwed up but still, ITS YOUR DAUGHTER!!! I have a hard time with that as well, her boyfriend should be shown how a real dad and father should act before the baby is born, that way he can truly see not to be like her folks. How did you not say anything? In a way I cant wait to be a daddy, but like I can.

Call me a heartless bastard, but I could imagine scenarios where I'd act the same way as the parents/boyfriend. I'd want more information before condemning them as jerks or horrible people. One point in their favor is that they're there. They may not be thrilled, or even happy about it, but they did go with her.

Truly heartbreaking. It's ironic that people have to have a license to drive, register to vote but anyone can reproduce. The parents and the boyfriend should be deeply ashamed of themselves. We will never know the entire story of this young mother, but your snapshot depiction of their behavior makes me sad for humanity.

I know and have known people like those, all four of them. Sometimes, the roles are reversed- the girl is unhappy, the boyfriend excited, etc.. well, roles reversed except for the fact the girl is the pregnant one.

I have to admit that when I first heard I was having a daughter I was a little disappointed. I wanted a boy. I wanted to do father/son type things. I know action figures, cartoons and team sports (at least I used to). I was scared of tea parties, dolls and boys coming around the house when she's a teenager. I know boy stuff. Girls were, and are still somewhat, a mystery to me.

Now that my daughter is two, I wouldn't trade her for the world. She's a real little Daddy's girl. I'm someone's hero! It's the best feeling in the world.

The situations are probably very, very different (my wife and I were trying), but I wouldn't judge the father too harshly for the initial reaction. He may or may not come around, but time will determine that.

Now, the grandparents deserve a swift kick in the ass.

Whenever I see other people do stuff I don't like, I try to qualify my judgments by the knowledge that I don't know a thing about what's been going on in their lives until the moment I see them or what they're going to do once they're out of my sight. I consider myself pretty judgmental overall, but holy crap. You people are hardcore.

It's hard for me to pass judgement without knowing the whole story. I don't want to assume anything without understanding their side of it.

That said, I think there are some situations that just trump circumstance. Finding out the gender of the child, knowing you have a healthy baby, just understanding what is coming is cause for some kind of excitement. Maybe she tricked the boyfriend into getting her pregnant, maybe this was an accident, maybe the boyfriend is a loser, maybe the parents are fundamentalists who have forgotten the lessons about grace, maybe this act caused her to have to quit college. The list of possibilities go on. Doesn't matter, for the child to have a chance you have to celebrate the little important things about childbirth.

In short, there was no excuse for crapping on her like that.

EDIT -
Now that I think of it, this closely parallels something going on in my life. My sister-in-law keeps trying to have more kids but all she does is complain about how much money they don't have. As her husband is a teacher, they never are going to have much money. She already has three boys and still wants more. I don't care that she wants more kids, but please stop complaining about how poor you are! Obviously, kids are not going to make you richer!

All the same, as much as I despise her attitude or why she wants to have more kids if they can barely support themselves now, my wife is still supportive of her sister. When she had a miscarriage we didn't go "Oh Thank God! She can't afford the kid anyway!" We were still sad. My wife still acted supportive of her before the miscarriage even though we thought she was being stupid. There really are just some things even a jerk like me won't touch. There is definite line you cross where you go from being an average jerkwad to complete asstard, and I have no desire to cross it.

I was told this is a common thing, and a long time ago was introduced to the idea of "paradigm shift". It's really fascinating how you think one way, for better or worse, then a little more knowledge or information completely changes the thought process.

I could see the grandparents being pissed if they're the ones that are going to have to raise the child.

There's no excuse for the douchebag boyfriend though.

This is indeed frustrating. I don't have any children, and don't have any prospects for having any in the near future, but it seems entirely unnecessary to spoil the joy of this. You'd think her mother would at least have the sense to see that.

Many people are talking about licenses to have children, but really, how do you enforce that? Abort the children that are conceived without a license? That will NEVER fly.

Adoption agencies, orphanages and foster homes are already overcrowded with the children of people who either had the sense to realize this wasn't something they were going to be able to take care of, or other, less fortunate circumstances. You certainly can't put them into a system like that without a serious uptick in the number of people willing to adopt.

No, the world would have to be a very different place to be able to enforce that rule.

Little did you know, there was no conception except for a nightmare, and it is the Unholy Child that will come to usurp the world as we know it the day it emerges from her womb.

... which will be tomorrow, due to his disturbingly accelerating growth. The family went broke with all the silver crucifixes they had to place around the house, so of course they're pissed.

Perhaps he was a victim of the "get pregnant to keep the boyfriend" ploy. I'd be pretty pissed too.

I must have missed that thread so here is my late congrats! I'm sure Elysium 2.0 is excited.

Considering this sort of thing happened with my sister when she got pregnant (out of wedlock, she wasn't a teenager) and my brother having 2 kids out of wed lock with two different women and the crap they both got from my parents while I defended them and told my parents to STFU, I *know* how I would handle it.

It's called being a decent human being, especially with family.