Posted on 01/02/2002 6:49:27 AM PST by dead
Is it really so hard to understand, asks Rachel Roberts, that there can be more to a couple's relationship than having children?
I am one of a growing number of women who will elect not to have children. And at least in my experience, the decision to not have children isn't one that is met with much enthusiasm.
From the family, there are comments like "But don't you want us all to have kids playing together at birthday parties and barbecues?" and "I've just always thought that part of a couple's life together is having a family".
From friends, there are protests like "But you'd make such great parents!" or "You've had such a good family life, don't you want to re-create that yourself?"
On the whole, though, the standard response is scepticism. Brush-offs. "Oh, you say that now, but wait till you turn 30!" And "I thought that, too, when I was your age but, trust me, that biological clock really gets you."
Well, I am fast approaching 30 and I have never been surer that I don't want children. My partner feels the same. We have thought about it a lot and have decided time and again that no, it's not for us. We don't want to be woken up at all hours to attend a screaming infant that knows only the need to suck. We don't want to sacrifice our time and energy chasing death-defying toddlers or taxiing around teenagers who have recently learnt to hate us.
More importantly, neither of us (me, especially) wants to see my body torn asunder during childbirth. We already love our life the way it is, child-free. And that is why the brush-off response interests me the most.
It's as though those who either have, or some day want, children refuse to recognise other possibilities in life. They are mentally closing off to paths different from their well-worn one. Particularly for women, it seems that in the face of all political and cultural change, we can always rely on some things staying the same.
Thirty years on from second-wave feminism, people are still incredulous of the woman who declares she doesn't want to be a mother.
Feminists have long argued that the social and political resistance to women who choose to remain child-free reflects a far deeper cultural anxiety about what is expected of women. Traditional femininity is inextricably bound up with notions of mothering, nurturance and birth.
Since day dot, motherhood has been viewed as the natural female career. And now, thanks to an enduring belief in biological determinism, the desire to bear children continues to be seen in terms of instinct, as a drive that is universally hard-wired into the female psyche. To be a normal woman, we must at least want children, even if for some reason we cannot have them.
Yeah, yeah, I hear you say, we've all done Feminism 101 - tell us something we don't know. Well, having experienced the reactions couples meet when revealing that they do not want children, I suspect there is something more at play than simply challenging the traditional ideology that surrounds women. Certainly a woman who elects not to have children is treading a less orthodox path. However, it's not just the woman's decision to not have children that disturbs convention, but the man's as well. As partners they upset traditional understandings of what heterosexual love is about. Why do I think this? Well, when was the last time any of us saw a romantic film where one lover whispers to the other "I love you so much, darling, I never want to have your baby!" It just wouldn't seem right.
From wedding ceremonies to popular culture, we are saturated with the idea that children are the symbol of a man and woman's love for each other. Undoubtedly the outcome of their physical union, children are moreover portrayed as the embodiment of a couple's emotional bond. The place where a man and woman's DNA and souls enmesh.
Having children remains integral to our contemporary mythology of love and desire, and those couples who reject parenthood disappoint our romantic expectations. They let us down by not making what is seen as the ultimate declaration of heterosexual love.
So perhaps that is why society shrugs off couples who don't want children. Perhaps the sceptical comments from family and friends reflect an unwillingness to accept romantic defeat. At the very least, it shows a distinct lack of imagination when it comes to recognising signs of love.
After all, for couples like us, the real romance is in being child-free.
Rachel Roberts is a freelance writer.
And for those of you who call such folks selfish, tell me, is it less selfish to have a child only to lock it up in daycare soon after its born?
If you are at all happy with bachelorhood...don't let yourself be "talked" into marriage. Ever.
Y'know, I can respect the decision not to have children, though maybe I can't understand it, having been maybe one of the few men, who always looked forward to being a husband and father. Thing is, there is a lot more to children than the above, especially with regard to toddlers and teenagers.
There's more than anger at people who wonder why she doesn't want children here: There's anger at children and the families that have them.
Mind you, we're not psychotic or anything. We're not going to kill your child, we won't even allow them to come to harm through deliberate inaction, we understand the social importance of kids and that parents are usually emotionally attached to the little beasts. We just don't want to be around them and certainly don't want to live with one. There's a difference between "hate" and "wish destroyed", there's a long list of things I hate but a rather short list of things I wish destroyed. And remember, most of the people that are really dangerous to kids just love them, ask John Wayne Gacy. We're not the enemy, we just hate kids.
AB
I suppose if you consider Autralia an English speaking country, anything is permissable, right mite?
Sure do.
My kids aren't a drag at all. And I hope to have two more by the end of next month since we have decided to adopt.
Sure do."
But many here wouldn't, and that is my point. That's all.
Which double standard? I certainly did not express one.
AB
I'm just trying to get you to understand the difference between hate and dislike. "Hate" is a very passionate, violent and distructive emotion. "Dislike" is a strong and much more rational emotion.
I "dislike" Brussels sprouts. I don't hate them. I don't start "anti-Brussels sprouts" campaigns, in order to make it politically correct for everyone to hate Brussels sprouts.
I believe the term you mean to use to discribe your feelings toward kids is that you dislike them. That's fine. This woman appears, by her hystrionic ranting, to HATE parenthood, and seems to be on a campaign to make it politically correct for everyone to hate parenthood, as well.
I know lots of women that hit 40 and decide they want to have a baby. Then they get upset when they don't get pregnant.
I'm not even sure this article would have even been posted if it was written by a man. What do you think? :)
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