In a culture that is obsessed with children — especially OMG BABIES!!!!! — and motherhood, the decision to remain childless is one that is often be viewed as selfish. Jessica Handler recognizes this, and has written an excellent article for this week’s issue of Newsweek about why she chose not to be a mother. In Handler’s case, she chose not to have children because she felt it would be “a roll of the biological dice,” as she lost one sister to leukemia and one to a rare blood disorder and later learned she had a 67% chance of passing on the blood disorder to any of her hypothetical progeny. She is happily married, seems to enjoy her career as a college professor, and smiles contentedly when telling people she does not have children. Her life, in short, appears rich and not lacking in anything.
What’s disappointing is not anything that Handler says about her choice, but the fact that this choice is something that needs to be explained to people. American culture praises itself on rugged individuality, but it really prizes conformity when it comes to the state of your uterus — specifically, that your womb should be full of glorious life that turns into a human being at least once in your childbearing years. Women who reject this notion are painted as selfish, career women who don’t understand the moral benefits of domesticity for both themselves and the society. There are those who would argue that Handler could adopt if she is afraid of passing on her genes, but she has concluded that “adoption is wonderful, but not for me: I am too afraid to lose a child I love. I can’t take that chance, even with another family’s genetic history.” Her choice may be seen as driven by fear, but why is fear a less valid emotion than those that compel other women to embrace motherhood?
Some commenters on Handler’s piece think she is in denial because she wrote this article in the first place. Maybe, they think, she really does want children and is only writing the piece to rationalize her denial of this desire. I call major BS on that. Clearly, some Newsweek readers just do not understand the degree to which women are expected to be mothers with no questions asked, and Handler’s piece is as much about that as it is about her own personal history.
It’s astounding how our culture does not embrace the truth that many women just don’t want to be mothers and that they have lives that are just as fulfilling as their counterparts who have children. Can you imagine a man writing Handler’s piece? I can’t, mainly because women are so inextricably associated with children and, as Handler notes, “on any given day, flashy magazines are plastered with celebrity pregnancies, baby weight and motherhood.” Countless magazine covers have featured the childless Jennifer Aniston with some headline about her wanting a baby, whereas I cannot remember a single one with a hysterical headline asking when the childless George Clooney will finally be a father. Women who are deemed the guardians of an oh-so-precious next generation, and for them to slough off that responsibility is seen as careless and callous; men, on the other hand, do not fall into that trap.
So thank you, patriarchy, for making articles like Handler’s necessary because so many people believe baby-free women are selfish. Thank you for making it so difficult to get the point across that women are perfectly within their rights to choose childlessness. Thank you for policing the rights and wrongs of childbearing and the lack thereof for so long that women like Handler are told they are in denial for not getting focusing on their duty of raising the precious next generation.
To close, I’d like to include a bit of Handler’s article that encapsulates everything I am trying to say here: “Our culture presumes that a grown woman’s true responsibility is motherhood….There are a lot of women like me, and for some of us being child-free is our choice, our responsibility not to our culture, but to ourselves.”
Do you think it might be related to the very idea that we have “biological clocks” that literally tick tock in our ladybrains as the years go by? Many people who would not consider themselves sexist overtly probably think it’s utterly scientific to assume that biologically, women can’t possibly escape wanting to be mothers unless there is something wrong with them.
It could be rooted to that idea, Funnyface. At the same time, there is no biological reason why women, but not men, would have an inate and uncontrollable desire to reproduce. Men have an evolutionary “need” to pass their genes on just as much as women. Not that people understand that…
This comment will be coloured by my irritation at my neighbours’ screaming children (ahhhh Brooklyn). But funnily enough even among progressive women who allegedly “don’t care” about this sort of thing, I have a hard time dealing with the societal mores surrounding motherhood. I mean, we’ve all lost friends to the cult of marriage/motherhood, I’m sure of it. And this is treated as “natural,” that people lose all time for anything but their families.
And, ugh. I’m rambling. But here’s sort of what I’m trying to say: I know most people think of their families as a protective cocoon. But I’m often not sure why bonds forged from genes ought to be greater than other kinds of connection, and I’m not sure I understand the “naturalness” of privileging them.
@Pilgrim: I think that privileging those bonds is artificial. If it is solely a biological determination, then I would not be so close with my stepfather. If it’s a social construct, then everyone who has crap relationships with their family are breaking some kind of unwritten contract. The politics of motherhood are really sublimely idiotic. And anyone who loses “all time for anything but their families” makes me a bit worried of how they would react if that family ideal comes tumbling down.
I wonder if this phenomenon should really be blamed on the patriarchy. It seems to me that perhaps this boils down to fear of the Other. Thoughts?
If “our culture” is made up of women who feel that it is their responsibility to be mothers without much thought about their true choices in the matter, it makes sense that there would be pressure/accusations of selfishness towards women who actually made a choice. If I have children despite not wanting them, shouldn’t you do the same so I can justify my life.
It reminds me of a quote from my grandmother when I told her I was a feminist, “you women who think you have rights!”… she was angry that I was making choices she never got to make.
I think we need to continue to make choices that are right for us and worry less what “they” think. Even when “they” are other women.
Kivrin you’d have to elaborate.
@soalg: yeah, well, tell that to all the young married couples among my friends that I never see.
@Kivrin: But who made it the Other? The whole cult of maternity would presuppose that every woman wants to bear children, and I definitely think that stems from the patriarchy. Otherwise, childless men would constantly be asked the same accusing questions that childless women are, and that’s just not the case.
Well, I think it’s obvious that a majority of women do desire to procreate. Whether that desire was biologically or sociologically generated is kind of beside the point. The fact is that those of us who decide we don’t want kids are “different,” and so we are pressured to (and/or feel pressured to) conform. It’s a social psychology phenomenon that is (or could be) distinct from any discussion of patriarchy, IMHO.
As for men not being asked accusing questions… Women are the ones who physically bear children, and we are the ones whose bodies generate food for our offspring. So our biology dictates that we are the sex most closely associated with childbearing. The patriarchy isn’t responsible for the fact that women have uteruses.
(I just think that it’s tempting to automatically blame all female ills on the patriarchy, when sometimes there are less sinister explanations for some of the crap we deal with as women. That’s all.)
I think I’ve said this before, but my mother in law asked when we were going to have kids at my wedding reception. And, one not being enough, she asked about a sibling for our son while I was still in the hospital after the c-section that ended a miserable pregnancy.
Because there’s nothing more important that I can do for her son than give him children that will sap my energy, take my time and attention away from him, and use up money he could be spending on his expensive hobbies.
@Pilgrim: I could call and rant at them on your behalf, but they probably would just hang up on me.
@Kivrin: I think it is worthwhile to examine where the desire comes from, because I think some (not all) of it is generated by societal dictates, which I do think are handed down by the patriarchy. I say this as a woman who wants children, who wants to both bear and adopt, and who was making motherhood an integral part of my identity before losing my son. But I never for one second thought this was entirely sui generis, and believe that some of my motherhood “cravings” are sociologically imposed.
Having a child is such a huge life change and a choice based on so many personal factors, that it’s bizarre in many ways to me that people feel as if it’s their business to ask other people (related or not) when they’re going to have kids. The assumption is, of course, that you ought to be planning for said kids.
This accusation of selfishness on the part of childless women is just rich, too. Before you can take care of anyone– child, partner, relative, friend, pet– you need to take care of yourself. And like other commenters have said, there are many ways for men and women to nurture, not just through their own progeny.
It’s possible Jessica Handler is letting fear drive her decisions, but it sounds like she weighed the reality of having children against the fantasy of having children, and decided it’s not for her.
@PilgrimSoul: I just read this great book by Amy Richards called “Opting In” about feminist parenting. She suggests that sometimes people claim they have no time for anyone but their families because they don’t WANT to have time for anyone else. For example, a friend of hers who never liked to go out anyway now has a “legit” excuse for choosing to stay home and relax.
@Kivrin: Yeah, you make some good points re: patriarchy.
I don’t think I want kids – I’d say I’m 70/30 on it, although I’m over 40, so it’s probably moot at this point. I won’t be upset if doesn’t happen. Been married to lovely bloke for 13 years now, so it’s not like we couldn’t have if we’d really wanted to. Just wanted to chip in and say, I know three other women my age who are vehemently child-free – never wanted them. I personally have never been put under any pressure either way by anyone. Spent most of my adult life in he UK, though; don’t know whether that’s relevant?
I think that a lot of young parents probably legitimately don’t have time for their friends and I’m not sure why that is a point of conflict. Their childless friends presumably don’t have time for kids, that’s why they don’t have them right? I’m not sure I understand the anger at family-oriented people who privilege their families over their friends. I’m a practical person. My parents took care of me when I was dependent on them, and I take care of my family members when they can’t take care of themselves. Friendship can and does take on that order of relationship sometimes.
You know, we can’t take care of everyone on earth the way they deserve to be cared for, so I think that the family provides a sort of caring community and represents the people who you have a special responsibility to — otherwise you would go crazy trying to care for everyone, right?
I suppose my issue with privileging friends over family is that you choose friends. Something I appreciate about strong familial bonds is that I feel called to love and care for people who I might otherwise not even know or care about or care for at all.
@Diziet_Sma: I’m really glad you never felt pressured. I actually had people asking when I would have kids when I was 25 and single. My stepsister got married when she was 23 and had her first child was she was on the cusp of 37, and for 14 years all she heard was people questioning why she wasn’t a mother yet.
In general I think we would be served by a more collectivist approach to children. You know, to recognize that giving birth to and raising the next generation of people who will pay for our social security (if such a thing exists by then), govern our countries, and decide the policies that affect us as elders is a project that concerns us all, but that doesn’t mean that each person has the same role to play with regard to that next generation. I do believe that parents should be venerated for the difficult and sacred role that they occupy, but it should not be to the exclusion of other roles — for example, one might argue that parents don’t do well in very demanding but necessary jobs that require heavy travel, commitment to a cause, or the ability to be available and well rested all the time. It is necessary for us to have some people who can focus more on work, on art, or whatever, than parents can.
I guess I just object to the over individualization of parenting — like oh you chose to parent, you get what you asked for, or if you don’t choose to parent you get equally alienated and accused. It would be nice if parents and non parents felt equal responsibility for the welfare of the next gen.
@SOALG: That’s terrible! I’ve just been lucky, I guess – I’m not saying it doesn’t happen. I left home at 17 to go to college and then pursue my career and I think people just knew i wasn’t into kids from the way I am, so they just don’t go there. I have an uncle and aunt who never had them, so there’s a precedent in my family. They always seemed to have the best life to me – lots of traveling and disposable income to spend on their various interests and hobbies.
I mean, I talk about it with friends who do have kids, but they’re all like, yeah, it’s fun and hard work and worth it, but nobody ever expressed horror or surprise at my decision. That might be because I can be pretty fierce about my beliefs, so they don’t want an argument, though! Also, as most of my friends are British, there is a reticence to poke your nose in other people’s lives. Maybe they talk behind my back, who knows?
I have never understood the reasoning behind women who don’t want children are “selfish.” If you know you aren’t ready for a child or don’t want one at all, you and your family would be a lot better off not having a child. People who have children without caring enough to take care of them are selfish. People who give your their advice/opinions without taking your thoughts/opinions into account are selfish.
@JD: I won’t speak on Pilgrim’s behalf, but I know that when I was pregnant I definitely had to push myself very hard to go out and do things with people (I always do, really), and I feared that I would become a hermit once the baby was born. I also know that I would have gone insane after three months. Because of that, I do wonder about people who all but drop relationships once they get married/have children, partly because I can see myself doing the same thing and not for the “right” reasons.
@JD: I don’t entirely disagree with you, but coming from something of a broken extended family, your ability to rely on your family this way looks like something of a (wait for it) privilege, and not all of us can say the same. When my parents are gone, I’m gonna be entirely on my own.
I think people who HAVE kids ask because their whole frame of reference for life is tainted by their own children. They can’t even remember what it’s like to be childless.
Shannon – It really does seem like an incredibly personal question, especially since it’s related to both a private medical history and one’s sex life. No one would ever ask “So how many yeast infections have you had this year?”
RE: the isolation. If it weren’t for the internet, I would have talked to exactly 0% of my friends since I had my baby two weeks ago. Not because I don’t like them anymore but because it’s exhausting to try to carry on a conversation when the baby could start crying at any second. We’ll see how long my self-imposed hermitness lasts.
@Pilgrim Soul, re: privilege of extended family: Same here. It’s probably a good thing that I don’t want kids, because I would not have any family support (on my side of the fam, anyway). I don’t think this has anything to do with my lack of interest in childbearing, but…it’s certainly something that would give me pause should my biological clock decide to start ticking someday.
I think it’s important to note that the desire to have a child does not equal the capacity to raise a child well. It’s not logical to say “well, it’s good person X isn’t having a child because X isn’t ready to take care of a child anyway”. Many times I think we don’t know our capabilities in a situation until we’re in it.
I think there are plenty of people out there who may not have been well prepared for parenthood when they had a child or who didn’t want children, got pregnant anyway, and still somehow managed to turn out to be a great parent.
@misscalculate
Agreed. I’m sorry if I implied that this was the case. I certianly didn’t mean this. It’s really a matter of telling someone they are selfish is they don’t have kids is a selfish thing to say. When a person tries to tell another person what they should do with their lives (especially if they aren’t taking into account reasons why that person might not want children), they are valuing their unimformed opinion over others.
And while people who didn’t origionally intend to have children often end up great parents, it is not a good idea to try to guilt them into having children. Having children because you want a child (even if you didn’t want a child prior to your pregnancy) is a good thing; having a child because someone else told you that you should want one is not a good thing.
Good post and nice timing. My BF is having issues with his brother who has recently adopted 2 twin girls. The brother is now taking the attitude that all (extended) family life should revolve around him and his needs and his girls and it has seriously pissed off my BF.
And as the BF and I have been together for over 3 years now, I am constantly fending off those marriage/kids questions. It shouldn’t make us less important in the grand scheme of things because of the choices we are making.
I do not want kids and have known this since I was a child. As you can well imagine, I am constantly told that I will “change my mind.” (I’m 33.) Does anyone have any witty comebacks for that comment?
I had mixed feelings reading that article. Glad to see it, but it was sort of like the genetics was her permission card to not want to have kids. You don’t need a genetics permission card. Also, she had to note that she wasn’t a child hater and had to produce the evidence she is actually around a sufficient number of kids in her life.
Now, I liked the author, but you don’t have to have a genetics card or have to prove “gee, I have nieces and nephews…” etc, etc…you know where I’m going with that.
Nevertheless, with all the very understandable reasons, I want to see an article from a child-hater! Just kidding. But once, don’t you wish someone would just say to the interviewer “I hate kids?”
Seriously, you don’t have to have a legal brief of reasons to not want to be a parent. I want an article like that: with no waivers.
SOALG and PS, point taken on the filial privilege. It is probably only more evidence of it that i tend to interpret it as “duty,” like whether I like these people or not, I am beholden to them, but I realize that even that attitude assumes a certain level of civility/they pick up your phone call when you call.
JD, I feel a duty to my family too, which I sort of talked about in the birthday cards post. Everyone’s family is different. My family has been very good to me, so I want to be good to them too. I like hanging out with my family and I like hanging out with the boyf’s family. I can see how some people might not feel those ties to their relatives, depending on how they grew up.
I’m conflicted because I would like to be old and gray with a few children and a dozen grandchildren running around. But I don’t want to be pregnant or raise babies.
What I’d like, I guess, is for the be-familied to take a little pity on the rest of us. I don’t know what I’m going to do at Christmas when my parents are gone, let alone when I’m old.
Well come to think of it I don’t know what I’ll be doing at that point either. Because if my parents are gone, then my grandparents are most likely gone too. And I don’t know that I’d be invited to my aunts’ and uncles’ because while I like them all, I am not close to them. It’s a scary prospect. When our parents are dead we’ll drink hot cocoa by the fire and buy each other presents.
@tilly: I think it’s interesting to note that even with her genetics “excuse” for not having children, she still faces pressure from it and is accused of being in denial/cowardly for making this choice. But I understand what you’re saying. I do think that even if this is driven by fear, that’s no less valid a reason not to have children than any other. The “I’m-not-anti-child” thing was a bit disheartening, but I frankly have a hard time imagining such a mainstream publication would let anything more hardline appear in their pages.
@SarahMC: Same here on not wanting to EVER be pregnant. The fiance and I aren’t sure if we ever want to be parents. If we do decide to do the kid thing, it will definitely be awhile – at least 5 to 10 years (I’m 28 now). Also, I’m guessing we’ll only want one child. I know deep down in my core, however, that I never EVER want to be pregnant. There are so many children in our country who need homes, I just couldn’t justify adding more humans to the planet. Anyway, my reluctance to grow a living thing inside me for 9 months is met with stares and raised eyebrows from pretty much every one. I’m fucking dreading getting married in a year because of all the baby questions and prodding we will undoubtedly get at the goddamn reception. I need to start preparing my bitchy replies now.
Sarah, maybe I should be your surrogate. I’m kind of dying to be pregnant (when I say this Mr. Regent laughs his ass off, knowing what a whiny baby I am likely to become and to immediately promise never to do it again) and want to raise kids but only from the age of like, four. It sounds to me like we would all benefit, as usual, from a commune of some sort.
@JD: Oh hell yes! I am so not ready to be pregnant again anytime soon, so I will automatically take you up on that. Plus, I have a ton of experience potty-training kids, so I promise to return the kid to you with the basic hygiene skills.
I don’t really have what I’d call a career…it’s just a job, but I don’t want kids either. My ovaries have never ached at the sight of babies and I can’t imagine changing my entire life to revolve around a child. In that sense, yes I’m selfish. I don’t think it makes me a bad person though. Being a good person shouldn’t require giving birth.
It might surprise you to know this but women get questioned, criticized, and sometimes face huge career costs for HAVING children.
This is called the ‘double bind.’ It means whatever women do they are criticized and questioned.
It’s also very difficult for women to fulfill the circumstances in which society thinks it is OK for her to have children in. The circumstances in which people just give women a free pass for having children are very narrow (can’t be single, can’t work too many hours, etc.)
Women who don’t have kids get hassled more, for sure. I just wanted to point out women tend to be given crap in many different circumstances, for making totally opposite choices.
“American culture praises itself on rugged individuality, but it really prizes conformity when it comes to the state of your uterus”
No, Americans prize conformity when it comes to everything.
After attending a matinee screening of “Megamind” on Friday – my decidedly childless self was appalled at the moms that not only came in right as the movie started, but that they let their children YAMMER the whole way through the movie…!??!
Yes, it was an animated feature, but it was by no means a strictly ‘little kids’ movie (yeah, you try to keep women away from anything w/Brad Pitt associated!?!?). I came home, updated my FB status that I really enjoyed the movie, but that my experience was somewhat impaired by the brats. Yeah, I used the term “womb nuggets of joy” (being sarcastic of the fact that all moms seem to think their little ones are angels…maybe if they say it enough, even they will believe it…?). Well, a friend who is a single mom (divorced from an utter a-hole abuser) took EXTREME offense at my lambasting the kids’ behavior and the moms’ lack of shushing them and told me “come back to me when YOU have kids…!”?!??! Seriously? Because I don’t, my ability to attend a movie at a time that is convenient for me and pay a pretty penny for is restricted to the mixed ages that the film draws and that I haven’t reproduced!???!
I’m 43…I have dated enough a-holes myself over the years that I THANKFULLY didn’t have kids with. Granted, now I have a guy in my heart and life that is the best thing ever and the one guy I WOULD repro with IF I was up for it anymore. I don’t want to be at the kid’s graduation in my Hoverround scooter… I don’t want to pull time away from my finally great man b/c I/we have to run junior/junioress around.
But because I paid good money to see a movie and had it trashed by moms that would NOT shush their kid or take them out until they settled down – MY lack of ever having been the occupant of an LDPR suite makes my opinion of bad parents invalid???? Frak that. Sorry – had to vent. I think she must have had someone shush her and her kids and thus she took it personally. Not my fault – teach your kids to behave appropriately in a theater…it’s not ‘their’ time, it’s not open play at Gymboree, it’s a MOVIE.