THE CHILD-FREE VS. “BREEDER” WAR: WHY ARE WE FIGHTING IT?
I recently read a blog entry on a child-free website that was followed by a comment from a woman who went on for some time about how physically disgusting she thought pregnant women were. She wrote that only the child’s father should have to be subjected to the sight of the woman’s bulging abdomen. (It’s very possible this woman is tocophobic.)
Other child-free people will refer to parents as “breeders.” Technically accurate, yes, but offensive nonetheless.
Too often (not most of the time, but often enough), the tone used by some of the child-free when talking about parents is one of not-even-remotely-veiled contempt.
Parents’ joy over their children, the issues they face as parents, and even the fact that they chose to become parents is cause for ridicule among a certain child-free population.
What I don’t understand is why.
I’m all too aware of how emotionally exhausting (or even just annoying) it can be to have society and the media subtly, but fairly consistently, reminding me that as a (moderately) healthy woman with a functioning uterus, I should probably have a ten-year-old child by now. (*Shiver* Even the thought…) But where is all this anger for anyone and everyone who has kids coming from?
I’ve always liked to think of child-free women as people who relish their freedom and their free-time, who are confident and happy about the choice they’ve made, and who will defend that choice when it’s questioned or criticized.
But seeing many of them subjecting parents in general to the same kind of judgment and ridicule they so hate to be the targets of leaves me utterly baffled. I might expect it from someone who’s just come into their choice and is feeling tender and defensive (it’s a little bit like being a teenager in love who views all adults as the enemy saying, “You don’t know what love is!”), but when it comes from those who have been child-free for some time, it’s confusing...
http://feministing.com/2011/09/22/the-child-free-vs-breeder-war-why-are-we-fighting-it/
Other child-free people will refer to parents as “breeders.” Technically accurate, yes, but offensive nonetheless.
Too often (not most of the time, but often enough), the tone used by some of the child-free when talking about parents is one of not-even-remotely-veiled contempt.
Parents’ joy over their children, the issues they face as parents, and even the fact that they chose to become parents is cause for ridicule among a certain child-free population.
What I don’t understand is why.
I’m all too aware of how emotionally exhausting (or even just annoying) it can be to have society and the media subtly, but fairly consistently, reminding me that as a (moderately) healthy woman with a functioning uterus, I should probably have a ten-year-old child by now. (*Shiver* Even the thought…) But where is all this anger for anyone and everyone who has kids coming from?
I’ve always liked to think of child-free women as people who relish their freedom and their free-time, who are confident and happy about the choice they’ve made, and who will defend that choice when it’s questioned or criticized.
But seeing many of them subjecting parents in general to the same kind of judgment and ridicule they so hate to be the targets of leaves me utterly baffled. I might expect it from someone who’s just come into their choice and is feeling tender and defensive (it’s a little bit like being a teenager in love who views all adults as the enemy saying, “You don’t know what love is!”), but when it comes from those who have been child-free for some time, it’s confusing...
http://feministing.com/2011/09/22/the-child-free-vs-breeder-war-why-are-we-fighting-it/
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