*sigh*

[omorka]

My flist is awash in baby-celebration today.

I distrust this for many reasons, not least of which is the constant pressure from my father's family to hurry up and get with the babymaking (fortunately, my parents themselves have cut this the heck out), and the omnipresent social pressure for the same, but also because a lot of this seems to be a sly, half-couched way of making women who have made the choice to terminate a pregnancy to feel guilty about their choice, or to feel that they were manipulated into making it. There also seems to be some anti-birth-control sentiment sneaking about.

Interestingly, none of the individual posts seem to quite state either of the above positions out loud, and it's possible I'm seeing patterns between multiple posts where none of the individual posters intended any of the above. But it's depressing, all the same.

Comments

[judo-creature.livejournal.com]

... uncanny coincidence?

I'm sorry to have contributed to that, darling. D: Also I really hope I didn't drop any of those implications in my post, because golly I wasn't trying to approach those angles at all.

Also, to echo what you've probably already heard in various different forms, just for the sake of doing it: Fuck your father's family, and anyone else who tries to pressure you into having kids. And society. G-dit. I really don't understand the baby hype. Some people want kids, some don't. Must half of each side pressure the other?

Then again, I suppose that's life and politics, isn't it.

Feel better, at the very least.

[altamira16.livejournal.com]

Explain this anti-birth control sentiment more. I think that there have been a lot of people saying that if you have a normal cycle, staying aware of your cycles can actually be a legitimate form of birth control. I am not sure if I worded it correctly because I didn't read Taking Charge of Your Fertility (http://www.amazon.com/Taking-Charge-Your-Fertility-Reproductive/dp/0060937645). They said it is not to be confused with the rhythm method, but in my head at this moment it is confused.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

READ IT, READ IT, it's an awesome book and I think the basics of it should be taught in sixth grade health class. It's astonishing and ridiculous that we think of the basic functions of the female reproductive cycle as Forbidden Knowledge that she's only initiated into if she's trying to get pregnant and Something's Terribly Wrong With Her and she can't.

It is not the rhythm method because the rhythm method (a) uses what has previously happened to predict what will happen, rather than what your body is doing right now, and (b) does not involve Touching Yourself Down There, because that might cause Impure Thoughts, whereas the fertility awareness method is all about sticking your fingers up your hoo-ha to find out what your cervix is doing today. And taking your temperature, but that's not nearly as exciting.

The anti-birth-control thing was more about people suggesting that using consistent birth control (FAM, condoms, the Pill, or otherwise) either (a) meant that one was anti-children in a more broad social sense and thus couldn't be trusted as a teacher, or (b) meant that one didn't trust one's partner to love and take care of one if one happened to get knocked up. I have been seeing more and more "If you really loved each other, you'd trust each other and not need to use birth control" lately, and it's seriously pissing me off.

[tenshihitomi.livejournal.com]

...one didn't trust one's partner to love and take care of one if one happened to get knocked up.

That is complete and total bullshit. I trust my partner, but he sure as hell couldn't afford to support a baby. Therefore, NuvaRing for me. I think people who use birth control are doing the responsible thing. There are too many people out there having babies who have no damn business having babies.

/rage

[cifarelli]

Also speaking as a parent... you kind of have to keep in a celebratory mindset. Being a parent has a high cost on so many different levels. Hopefully for most people its still 'worth it' but it can sometime require an overdone routine to keep that focus and not slide into analyzing all the things we've had to set aside for now in the interest of being a responsible parent. And I imagine depending on how much we feel the need to drag others kicking and screaming into helping us affirm that focus new parents can be somewhat insufferable.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

I don't mind the "Oh, look what cute thing my kiddo did today" posts, or even the occasional "I miss being pregnant/having a baby around" posts from parents of older children. Specific individual kids are fine. It's the whole "Babies are wonderful, and what an awful hole in your life you must have not to have them!" vibe that grates, for me.

Especially since I straddle the line between childfree and childless. I could probably have kids if I were to take fertility drugs, but I'm unwilling to put up with the various costs and risks of that, and at this point in my life I'm a little old to be a primapara. I've never been in a space where I wanted a kid nine or ten months from now, but it took a very long time for me to come to peace with the idea that I probably wasn't ever going to have kids of my own. It's okay; I have a hundred and five kids a year, and I don't have to cook for them. But it took a long time to get there, and I get unwarrantedly irked at people who try and disturb that equilibrium to make themselves feel better about their own choices.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

I have definitely been experiencing those things.

My family is seriously driving me nuts with the smug pressuring baby talk. I've been around my dad's family twice in the last week and a half and it is really disturbing how much I am getting this, especially considering some of he very relatives that are doing it don't have children themselves.

And the other two things are very real and very aggravating. While usually I tend to focus on the prior one, I especially don't get the latter at all. Like how does that make sense by any logic?

[geki-burakku.livejournal.com]

I decided long ago that I didn't want kids at all, and in my 20s I had to put up with constant smug statements along the lines of "Oh, you'll change your mind," and also how I was so horrible and selfish somehow to not want the most WONDERFUL GIFT OF ALL. Yeah, whatever. My reasons for not wanting children are centered around the simple fact that: 1) I simply don't feel cut out to be a parent, and that I lack the necessary patience, etc., to be such, and 2) I find it intensely unfair that all a man has to do is contribute a squirt of DNA and we're done while the woman does the rest of the job with pregnancy and childbirth. I always make comments to the effect of how if the human race had evolved along the same lines as seahorses, where the male does his fair share, not only would it be more fair, but men would not be so eager to spread their seed. There are also cultural reasons that the whole parenthood thing leaves me cold, but I won't go into them here. I like kids just fine, as a certain terminally adorable and sweet 8-year-old girl helped me realize...just let them be other people's kids that I can give back at the end of the day. If that somehow makes me a selfish monster, then I wear the badge proudly. Far as I'm concerned, it's up to the woman as individual if she wants children or not and her decision should be respected regardless of what it is.

[tenshihitomi.livejournal.com]

1) I simply don't feel cut out to be a parent, and that I lack the necessary patience, etc., to be such, and 2) I find it intensely unfair that all a man has to do is contribute a squirt of DNA and we're done while the woman does the rest of the job with pregnancy and childbirth.

You've summed up my own reasons for not wanting children exactly. How in the world do other women get past the unfairness of men getting to be in on the *fun* part of making a baby where the woman has to go through all the pain?

[geki-burakku.livejournal.com]

*INTENSE SARCASM ALERT*

It's the most MAGICAL and SPECIAL part of being a WOMAN, don't you know? Yes, being a walking womb is the most SPECIAL THING IN THEIR LIVES and is the REASON THEY EXIST!

*END SARCASM ALERT*

I was raised to believe that a woman could do whatever a man could do just as well if not better, and that led to me thinking in a decidedly pro-choice in more ways than one vein. Besides, one of me running around is plenty, thank you very much!

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

You know my positions on this, but it can't hurt to reiterate them:

1) Every child should be a wanted child. It's amazing how many of the people who would unhesitatingly agree with this utterly fail to see the disconnection between it and pressuring reluctant people into having children.

2) Do not even START with me on the "but it's different when it's your own" or "you won't understand until you have one" thing. The ONLY thing that's different when it's your own is that you aren't allowed to talk about wishing you hadn't done it.

3) I am convinced that #2 is actually what fuels a lot of the pronatalist pressure. By not having children, we serve as constant and resented reminders to unhappy parents that they could have made the same choice; by actually daring to be HAPPY while not having children, we threaten to make their personal sacrifice meaningless. "Misery loves company" is a much stronger motivation for emotional blackmail than genuine happiness.

[ghostdogmeta.livejournal.com]

But you should have a baby.


They're delicious.


M's sister having a kid definitely lessened the load, as did the obnoxious relatives being a long way away.

[bibulb.livejournal.com]

They're delicious.

I haven't told you lately just how awesome you are, have I?
If not, lemme rectify that.

[laughingrat.livejournal.com]

Augh, like anyone needs that feeling. D: I'm sorry if my linking to the review of that one book made you feel that way; hopefully you know me well enough to know that I am all REPRODUCTIVE CHOICE WITHOUT SHAME NAOW PLZ but if you were already feeling dogpiled-on by the interwebs, well. :(

Are you feeling all right, otherwise? Still sick?

It's interesting about posts and intent and how we feel...how you feel is legitimate, no matter what was intended. Which you probably don't need me to tell you, but still.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

I'll admit, my first thought on reading the blurb of the book was "Oh, great, yet another way to make women who did choose to abort rather than have a child they didn't have the emotional or physical resources to love and support feel ashamed of their decisions." :-/ I'm absolutely sure that's not the intent of the author, but I'm deeply suspicious of anyone presenting the cultural default pro-natalist position as somehow "rebellious" or "pro-woman." That message is too easily twisted into an anti-choice position.

That, and I've read too much Sarah Blaffer Hrdy. ;-)

I still have a bit of a sore throat, but otherwise I'm doing much better, thanks. And yeah, if it had just been one post, or even two, it probably wouldn't have been quite so irksome; it was just that it was something like six posts in twelve hours.

[laughingrat.livejournal.com]

It is really easy to twist it, and I think if anyone but Lauredhel had reviewed the book, I'd be giving it a rolling and jaundiced eye. Well, that and it seems like the editor's trying to frame it more in the context of anti-eugenics than pro-natalism. I want to be more open to how women with disabilities experience oppression, sometimes in ways with intersect with other types of oppression, so it seemed like something to ping up, so to speak.

Also, I need to find different words for some of my uses of "ping," although at least none of them mean "water meadow." [/Pratchett] Glad the physical stuff has backed off a bit. Yeah, some days the internet is just full of fail from beginning to end, and on those days it's hard not to wonder what I've got in my fridge that goes well with rum. ;)

[peoriapeoria.livejournal.com]

And, I'm sorry if my timing contributed.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

Eh, there's a reason I almost never read kid!fic. I'll live. :-)