the bureaucratic phenomenon of the baby ministry

[foxtongue]

Wow! The Ministry of Social Engineering medical adjudicator has approved my application for baby benefits, much, much faster than anticipated! Apparently Parliament just passed a bill giving precedence to the development of registered parent lists to combat the grim business reality of an alarmingly low birth rate, even while giving a lot of lip on TV to synthetics, rejuvenetics, and "aging gracefully" to avert the financial crisis. (I hate those posters, don't you? Always at the bus-stop, next to all the other ads targeted at poor people.) This is all so unreal, like I've fallen down a rabbit hole. Never in my life has the government ever been so helpful! They've even given me a chit to register with a far more luxurious creche than my income bracket would allow, because of my high test scores and because I'm such prime birthing age.

Next step: asking the new partner how he feels about the whole thing.

Comments

[cloud-atlas.livejournal.com]

This alternate reality is starting to sound like a pre-curser to The Handmaid's Tale...

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

Now that you mention it, I do love me some Atwood, yet I've never read that one. For shame, me.

[drcuriosity]

Congratulations on your application approval and high offspring eligibility scores! I represent an Albertan fertility research consortium that provides a new epigenetic matchmaking service. You've expressed a concern for the new partner's feelings about childbirth. You could entirely avoid the new's potential heartache, and the risk of repeated, unsatisfyingly non-viable reproduction attempts, by contracting with one of our Edmonton-based free range active lifestyle SurroGents™!

Certified for top-decile motility and totipotency indices and available via telepresent or SEM:AMP fertilization methods, SurroGents™ can help you to do your part in bringing a new generation into the nation!

[dwights.livejournal.com]

Wow. This is a bit hard to wrap my brain around, I suppose because I'm not familiar with the programs you're talking about... so congrats and good luck? You certainly are one to bring interesting/cool stuff in to my life via LJ.

[fluffymcdeath.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you got in as the window (for you and for wombs) is closing fast. Thousands of viable eggs enter the waste treatment system every week and teams are combing through refuse for kleenex and suspiciously crunchy socks. With all the raw materials assembled our keepers will soon be able to produce their own livestock almost at will and such lavish inducements as you will receive will no longer be necessary.

I look forward to those days when people will no longer be called upon to perform despicable acts. There will be far more time for television.

[mordicai.livejournal.com]

Argle bargle, I forgot.

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

Awww. I liked your frowning videos, though. They SEEMED appropriate.

[mordicai.livejournal.com]

That really happened!

[hundun.livejournal.com]

I think that you'd be an excellent influence, so I hope that you are approved for post-natal guardianship as well as gestation, if that is your goal.

This said, as a synthetic, I get the vibe that these fertility programs are a government measure to defer "the dreaded synthie takeover." So, if/when you go ahead with it, I just ask that you milk it; make it cost them.

[coffeeman.livejournal.com]

Congrats! Your post makes this alll sound very Orwellian.