Like It Is

Recently a newcomer my blog sent me an email. In it she said she was happy being child free and supported by her partner. A good situation to be in as I’m sure many would agree. What wasn’t so great was the pressure from certain families to produce grandkids.

Make no mistake, a bingo can appear in many guises and from people who know you (and therefore who should know better) as well as strangers. In fact, I believe the worst bingoes come from family. Where you don’t have completely supportive parents, you will more often than not have to square your shoulders… and face the pressure to re-produce, which, if you live in close proximity to them or see them often can be hard to escape. The pressure can often be accompanied by feelings of guilt – parents are adept at playing the guilt card to the hilt when it suits them – unless you’re able to:

• develop a thick skin
• be prepared to state or restate your child free intentions
• steadfastly avoid treading on the liberally sprinkled land-mines or
• move to a different country

Either way, the pressure to have children so that someone can have grandchildren is still very prevalent and it can be unsettling to have to deal with pressure from one or more of your parents. They know all the buttons to press.

I covered this topic about a year ago and while I acknowledge that for some parents the desire for grandchildren runs deep. However, like those who say they “need” a child to feel fulfilled, (or for whatever reason) neither children nor grandchildren are a personal “need” they are a desire. So putting pressure, however subtle, on children to have children is self-centred – again only the needs of the ones who desire the grandchildren seem to come into play.

And while I am fortunate not to be under parental pressure to have kids, I know there are many other childfree people who are.

Of all the bingos childfree people get this is one of the most devastating. Read the rest of this entry »

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If you’re childfree and you already feel that mothers get advantages in the workplace this article should give you some idea that when it comes to politics, there’s nowhere too low to stoop. And far from things getting better, they can get worse. Even if you don’t live in the UK, this article should still ring alarm bells. It has overtones of the French system, only it’s trying to be subtle - and failing. Thanks to Mercurior for finding this interesting link.

The UK Conservative Party plans to reward families where one parents chooses to stay at home to look after a child.

It seems that buying the female – (read Stay-At-Home-Mother) vote has become all important.

Tories Plan Rewards For Stay At Home Mothers

According to the Daily Mail, David Cameron, Tory party leader says:

“Millions of mothers have been “pressurized” by Labour to return to work.

And, according to a report ordered by David Cameron the Government’s approach to working women had been to “compel, to lecture and to condescend”.

Funny, I thought that going to work meant bringing in money…which you have to do to pay the mortage, put food on the table and presumably all those other things that working enables us to do.

The report also says that benefits and regulations have been skewed to help working mothers – to the disadvantage of those mothers who stay at home, such as tax breaks.

In response, the Tories are pledging to:

“re-balance the tax system to reward families where one parent chooses to stay at home to look after a child.” These “reforms” could mean an extra £3,000 a year for some couples. Read the rest of this entry »

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This post is inspired by ChildfreeSinceSix. Read it to the end and you’ll see why.

Louise Sloan, author of the book “Knock Yourself Up” – thinks I’ve judged her rather unfairly in my article about her book. For a fair crack at her she suggests I read her book, you know the book about ways to have a baby if, sorry, when there’s no man in the picture. No need to hang around waiting for a man. You can “Knock Yourself Up.”

It’s supposedly a “humorous look at the new breed of single mothers.” Frankly I think it’s about women whose need to breed makes them determined to have a child at all costs and if a man hasn’t turned up, no matter. A supply of readily available sperm is is all that’s needed, plus an ability to work out the little matter of logistics, – getting the sperm into the right place at the right time. Funny to some.

Ms Sloan advised me that she’d been misquoted by the UK media (that seems to be the new excuse for people who seek the press but don’t much like how they represent them if such representation isn’t favourable), according to her they’d put words in her mouth. Seriously? Judging from her site – where it appears that a lot of the media input came from – they didn’t seem to need to put much in her mouth at all.

Ms Sloan thinks that if I took the time to read her book and spent more time on her site I would see that she “cared about the needs of the child too”. Well, I visited her site. I’m not interested in reading her book. And she’s wrong.

When I read the article about her (and her book) the thing that hit me most was her self-centeredness and that of those I’d now call the single breeders. I haven’t changed my opinion even after visiting her site .

I don’t need to read her book to know that despite her protestations that she does think about the needs of her child, deliberately having a child in a way that is going to deprive that child of it’s father is completely disregarding the needs of the child. The child isn’t given a choice to have a father because all that matters to these women is that they want to have a child. Read the rest of this entry »

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More bingoes a little later. Or maybe not.

This particular childfree bingo is cleverly disguised as a supposed or intended compliment, and is usually casually tossed out at your average childfree person with such certainty it almost makes your head spin. Like, how does 2+2 equal 6?! But, yep – Bingo Is His Name-O.

It can come in various guises and isn’t particular to men or women – regardless of whom it’s directed at, it’s still stupid. The bingo of course is the gushing “ooh, but you’d make such good parents/such a good father/such a good mother!” WTF? I tell you I’m childfree and you tell me I’d be a great parent, based on… based on what, exactly? Because children like me? Or something you discern that in all my years of knowing myself I’d never actually discovered myself. It’s a mystery, since usually the people who say this usually know next to nothing about me or the childfree person they happen to be addressing. Yet somehow they know we’d make great parents??

Personally I think that childed people say this to childfree people when trying to get them over to the childed side. Whatever their reason it’s a subtle version of “you’ll change your mind.” Or rather – “you should really change your mind…look at how good you’d be!” And note, it can be based on something as simple as getting a child to go to sleep, reading them a story or simply if the child takes a liking to you. I mean, please!

A friend of mine goes to see an old friend of his. They knew each other when they were at school. My friend who we shall call Sam is happily childfree. His friend (who’ll we’ll call Bill) is divorced and has two kids. His lifestyle is isn’t one that Sam would want to imitate. Turns out that Bill’s ex-wife had insisted on having the kids – even though he was a bit on the reluctant side. Obviously not reluctant enough as it turned out, since it takes two to tango. Anyway, x years after the divorce, he’s just happy to be able to see his two kids as frequently as he does within the agreement. Read the rest of this entry »

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