Who’s to say a woman can’t have 14 kids by whatever means possible?

AMID the encircling gloom, it was a story to melt even the hardest heart: octuplets, six boys and two girls, delivered alive and well. Isn’t Mother Nature a wonderful thing, we thought? And well done the doctors, midwives and nurses for helping them all into this world safely.

It didn’t take long for the story to turn sour. No one has a good word to say for these little bundles of joy any more, it seems — or for their mother, to be precise. As more and more details emerged, seemingly every interest group had reason to pour scorn on Nadya Suleman.

The God squad didn’t like it that the babies were conceived using in vitro fertilization — something the clinic was reluctant to disclose at first. To make matters worse, there was no obvious father, let alone a wedding ring to be seen. In fact, the sperm donor was, apparently, a neighbour of Nadya’s.