This is something I've thought about a lot. No, for real, go with me here. First of all, marsupials are hilarious, as are most animals that call Australia home - it really is like the Land of Misfit Toys, but for actual living things. But despite their inherent hilarity, marsupials have really got this child-rearing thing figured out.
Kangaroos are the most obvious example, or wallabies (which should really just be called mini goddamn kangaroos, they don't need a whole new name just because they're small, but whatever) - you see them bouncing around with a little baby's head poking out of a pouch on the mom's belly. Not only have humans actively tried to copy this (see: fanny packs and baby Bjorns), but it serves even more of a purpose than you realize.
We humans have to go through nine terrible months of pregnancy, getting giant and fat, often feeling completely horrible and unable to control our vomit and pee. Kangaroos, however, are pregnant for 33 days. DAYS people. Then it "gives birth" to the teeny tiniest underdeveloped baby kangaroo ever possible, which continues growing and developing in the pouch. Instead of growing something ENTIRELY TOO LARGE to be properly expelled from our bodies without lasting damage, kangaroos are like "oh, hey, I'm going to give birth to this thing while it's small enough to feel like I'm just taking a shit."
When our babies come out, they're ugly, gross, noisy, practically blind and dumber than a pet rat. But they HAVE to come out because if they got any bigger inside they'd explode out of the mother's stomach at a very inopportune time. You have to feed them every few hours. They do absolutely nothing in return. Now if we had a POUCH, that baby could have 24/7 access to food, warmth, and whatever the hell else it needed to survive until it grew into a being that can at least walk. Kangaroo babies hang out in that pouch as long as they want, then when they have enough cognitive ability to become bored, they jump out and start living without any unnecessary explanation from mom or dad.
If humans had pouches, the baby wouldn't need to cry because it could just go get its own milk three inches away. I'm not sure about the poo and pee situation but let's just assume something as gross as that couldn't be piling up in the mom's pouch for months so it's somehow evolutionarily taken care of. The baby could pop its head out of the pouch and watch what's going on around it so that it would understand that it needs to get its shit together before it tries to get out and mosey around on its own. It'd listen to conversations, learn language, learn what things are, understand that walking is a necessary skill and see that adult humans don't plop themselves in the middle of the floor and start crying whenever they want. Well, most don't.
So many things would be solved if we were marsupials. I might even consider (CONSIDER) procreating if I knew that my child would appear out of my pouch understanding how to walk and get attention in a non-annoying way. Babies can't even tell you what they want. They just lay there and cry and won't shut up until you figure it out. My CATS can tell me what they want. They meow, look at me, and walk over to their empty food bowl and look at me again as if to say "Get with the program, bitch, we hungry." They don't randomly roll on the floor and meow just to hear their own voice. Puppies learn the word "walk" or "outside" as quickly as they learn to walk, and that's all you have to say to get them over to the door with their leash. Human babies have no idea what the fuck is going on.
If you've ever watched or listened to a baby play through a baby monitor, you know that they just make random noises for no reason. Oh look, I can SHREEEEIIIIIIIIK really loud! That was awesome, let me do it again! Ha! All the while the parents think the kid has hurt himself but in reality he has just discovered that he can make noises that he doesn't seem to understand are some of the most annoying noises that will ever grace this planet. Or even just yelling gibberish. Whatever it is, it's fucking annoying and it needs to be stopped. Marsupial kid would be able to watch other humans interact without random squealing and come to understand that he, like his parents, has a voice that will soon learn to use words which can form conversations.
If nothing else, he'd at least learn how to communicate with minimal language skills - kind of like when I went into that noodle shop in Hong Kong where no one spoke English and I simply pointed to the picture of what I wanted and said "Coca Cola" and was able to pay by the woman pointing to the cash register numbers. During no time while I was eating said noodles in the shop where everyone was speaking Cantonese did I decide I was going to see if my voice worked by squealing or making random noises. If I had, I likely would have been carted off to the looney bin.
Babies should be more like pets - SMART. Oh, I don't have any food? I'm going to tell my mom. I have to use the restroom, I'll go stand by the door and bark. It's dark outside and mom just turned off the lights. I guess it's time to sleep. I'll curl up next to her and sleep until she's done sleeping, and won't wake her up to get food because it's RIGHT THERE and I can just walk over, get some, and come back.
So if we were marsupials, our kids would stay in our pouch until they could at least be as smart as a dog or cat. That's all I'm asking for. I don't need you to have a 5th grade education coming out of the womb, but dear god, stop making all that stupid noise and flailing about like an overturned turtle. And really, the pants-shitting has got to stop. At least be able to run to the bathroom and bang on something until we pick you up and put you on the toilet - I mean the DOG can do that. Get with it, humans.
