“Jessica, a stay-at-home mom of two who lives in New Jersey, is angry that her husband, a mortgage broker who works 11-hour days, manages to carve out one weekend day for his passion — his work as an independent music producer…”
So went just one of the long, long list of complaints against Dads on Parenting.com.
It’s good to be childfree. I think it forces you to take responsibility for your choices in life. Much better than being one of the hapless husbands…whom, no matter what they do, seem to have no chance and can’t do anything right. I found after a while it was hard to keep reading the whining… and of course the anger was palpable. It reminded me of the post on the Dooce blog… more angry, unhappy women and once again children and parenting seem to be common denominators.
Because they want to be mothers. Then, when they get what they wish for, they hate it. They don’t seem to take responsibility themselves, can’t blame the kids, and so, guess what? They blame the Dads!
They’re angry because men can’t multitask, or because they can. Because they don’t do enough or even if they do. If these men are working long days to – wait for it – support stay at home wife and kids – lo and behold - they are resented because they don’t spend enough time at home. Or because they get to go to work. Or because they can carve out an hour for something they like to do and the women don’t. The Dads don’t parent properly, or they parent too much. (Read: they don’t parent EXACTLY as the mothers do, which of course is bad parenting).
After reading the article (and it was a long one, given all the vitriol that came out) I thought I’d never read such a bunch of whining, and complaining. And these are supposed to be “nationally representative women?” It’s like they all bought into the “children are ultimate achievement for being happy” story, found out too late it wasn’t true, and then blame their husbands. They crave babies (some to the point of obsession and IVF) become desperate listening to their “biological clock” and berate men for being immature for not wanting to have kids. Women who don’t want kids are considered lacking, freaky and missing out.
And mothers want the men to be “more like them.”
The thing is, if they are angry the cause is not something without, it’s within. Perhaps it’s the disappointment at finding out that the smiling happy cereal family is just an advertisers dream. Duh. I knew that! I cannot imagine what it’s like to be constantly angry like this all the time.
What kind of atmosphere do the children live in? Do the fathers walk on eggshells all the time? I’ve heard mothers act as if only they know anything about child care – anything at all. Having reduced men (in many cases) to half-present wallets, or clueless idiots – they seem to want them to be Superman caricatures – capable of x-ray vision and mind reading.
I found the moaning pretty self-indulgent… and can’t help thinking as always, how rare it is to meet a woman who doesn’t tell me I’m missing out as a childfree person because I didn’t have kids. Those that do fess up say how damn hard it is.
I’m sure you’ve more to say on this… please leave your comments. I found after a while I couldn’t read half the comments. With all that anger out there, good luck to the kids.
Thanks to the readers who sent me the links by the way… this wouldn’t have come up in a childfree alert, that’s for sure…
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{ 42 comments… read them below or add one }
Interesting read!
If these men can’t multitask, “can step over a basket of laundry on their way to find the remote control”, leave theirs boxers lying around and their hair in the sink, and have never bought any fruit or veggies…, why did those women ever marry them? My guess is, if they behave like sloppy and clueless “man-children”, they probably weren’t doing their part of the chores before the kids were born either. Also, if women with 3 kids or more are angrier than those with 1 or 2, I take it this means things got worse and worse with every child… why keep popping them out?
I also wonder, if all those “bad husbands” need so much time for themselves to do their things, be it watching TV, going to the gym or producing music, did they really want to become dads, or were they just coaxed into it without realizing what it actually meant?
One of my neighbors is an angry mom. I believe that I mentioned her in a previous post. She has one shrieking toddler (and I mean shrieking) and just gave birth to another bundle. A few times I have seen her waiting on the stoop of our brownstone at the end of the business day for her husband to emerge from the subway. She’s just fuming and fit to be tied. Because they walk past our door I hear her carp at him all the way up the stairs to their apartment. “Why was he late”, she’s been “stuck in the apartment all day with the kids” and on and on. From my first hand observation, I don’t think she’s really angry at him, just as britgirl said, but angry at herself. I think she signed up to be a stay at home mom and now she’s going kukoo! Her husband is out in the real world paying for her duplex apartment with a wraparound terrace and she’s stuck at home.
And she’s not just angry at him, she’s angry at anyone who has freedom. My husband and I found that out first-hand. I work out of my home and I sometimes get fedex deliveries from clients. Well one day the Fedex guy rang her bell because I wasn’t here to sign. She was FURIOUS! She sent her husband marching downstairs to our apartment to talk to my husband about my business deliveries, which woke her child up from his nap (this happened once). Her sheepish husband asked my husband (who just stared at him as if he were quite insane) to call Fedex and make sure they never rang her bell again for my deliveries. My husband finally said, “I have a terrific idea! Next time they ring your bell why don’t you tell them or better yet call them yourself and tell them not to ring the bell as we don’t manage FedEx employees and have no control over who they ring or don’t ring. Also, my wife isn’t going to quit her job to accommodate your child’s nap times.” Hen-pecked hubby turned a brilliant purple color and turned tail and ran back up the stairs and we haven’t heard a peep since.
I actually felt sorry for the guy. I’m sure she chewed his ear off and made him come down. I had to ask why she didn’t come herself. Way to win over the neighbors (they moved in about six months ago).
She did retaliate though. Because she has not swept the leaves off of her terrace and drainage pipes the snow piles up and leaks down through the building until it starting bubbling through the plaster and paint in the units below her, including ours. When the maintenance crew called her to go in and clear the terrace and unblock the drain so they could fix the walls and prevent more damage, she said they couldn’t come in because she had a newborn in the house. WHAT!!! Again, someone else has to sacrifice and be inconvenienced because she has children.
So here we have not only angry mom but entitled mom (she and her child are more important than me, my job, our apartment) and let’s not forget grandiose mom (apparently we and her poor husband are here to do her bidding). She’s mad at me because I work and she doesn’t and she’s mad at her husband because he leaves her at home all day with the kids and she’s mad at the building maintenance people because they want to disrupt her baby protocol. Angry, angry, angry. That’s what happens when you drink the cultural kool-aid–so bitter is the punch! Now when we see the “Resident Evils” we just look at them like they are wearing tin foil hats and cut a wide berth. I pride myself on my self-control
. Hopefully they will soon abandon city life for the burbs and leave the rest of us in the building to our Fed-exing receiving, no plaster buckling, no toddler screaming, no diaper changing, bliss!
I can understand why women get angry at men who they don’t feel do their fair share in the house. I’ve had to really put my foot down to ensure my fiance contributes equally (though, I have to say, he is a splendid cook). What I can’t understand is why a woman would think it’s a good idea to have kids with a man before being sure that they are both on the same page? And why on earth have more?
Hello, what exactly do these silly women expect when they decide to be stay at home losers? I totally do not understand where they get the nerve to demand that their husbands, who go to work, then come home and do “their fair share.” That’s the arrangement, dummy – you stay home and do EVERYTHING with the house and kids, and he goes to work and takes care of EVERY bill for EVERYTHING. Don’t get me wrong, I would think scrubbing toilets, listening to dumb blather and screeching, and wiping, washing, scrubbing all day long is suicide-inspiring and agree that going to work is waaaay better, but hey, you signed up for that deal! A guy is not going to go to work for 12 hours a day and come home to do laundry and make dinner every other day, it just isn’t going to happen. If wiping poopies and dragging around a foul-smelling 20-pound dumbell isn’t rewarding enough for you, GET A JOB and then when both of you get home, THEN you can talk about everyone doing their fair share of childcare and cleaning. When did working men ever do half the child care while women sat on their behinds watching Oprah and drinking cocktails, anyway? Nice idea, but no way! I feel so sorry for all those guys. They get completely blindsided. The women they marry all of a sudden turn into angry, screeching trolls with floppy breasts and droopy bottoms, and the guys are not even allowed to then have a hobby or read a book, ever. I think honestly women’s ridiculous expectations are the reason for the high divorce rates. They expect financial support, unconditional love when they gain 50 pounds, equal parenting and cleaning, complete adoration, and approval of everything they do, and when they don’t get it, they either dissolve in tears or get furious. Of course they never feel that this same level of perfection is also expected of them – that would be wrong, sexist, pig-like, bla bla bla. They want to be loved and accepted and have tons of babies while the guy is expected to just take her as she is, however she wants to be.
What I find sad about this sort of thing is that it leads to the emasculation of men. Men are ripped to pieces by some women – especially mothers – who demand so much of them. When the men cannot provide, these women then say that they can do just fine without men. Society now seems to accept that you don’t need a man to bring up a child because they can do fine without that role model. You don’t need a man to bring in the money because women can work, or as seems to be the increasing case in Britain: you’re better off not working and just raking in from the benefits system more than you could ever earn. And people want to be able to produce children without ever having any involvement with a man. How demoralising and emasculating.
In that respect, society has been destroying the role of men for a long time. And then these already emasculated men have to come home to some woman who does nothing but bitch and beride them for doing the duty that she expects him to: working. I’ve seen how this kind of attitude of mothers who are both demanding and have an air of entitlement destroy men. It destroys marriages and it destroys people, yet even after the break up of a relationship men still seem to get the short end of the straw and are still made to feel useless by their ex-partner. It simply doesn’t seem fair, it even borders on cruel.
It’s one of these articles that makes me so glad to be Childfree and glad that I saw the light.
I’m with the rest of the posters here. I actually started to laugh as I read this article – which got tougher and tougher to read. There’s no being rational to an angry bear like an angry mother. She’s stressed, worn out, tired, resentful, angry, bitter …. really, who wants to be around THAT?
Dorian Gray makes an excellent point: men are being emasculated. I find it disgusting. It is interesting that the women I find who value men and treat them as men more than any other group of women are the childfree women. It’s the MOTHERS who essentially castrate men and push them further away.
The fact of that matter is men are different than women. I think so many of these women got feminism wrong. Feminism was about equality, sure, and for women’s choice. But it was nothing about being the same as men or about men being the same as women.
We’re not.
(As a side note: many women get pissed that their doctors treat them the same as a man and yell about how we’re different physically. Well. Hello. Our bodies, as whole entities, means that even mentally and emotionally the genders are different while our wants are generally the same.)
One of the things I noticed in this article is that the women interview seemed to have had expecations I have learned the having expectations – without expressing them, and then EXPECTING them to be fullfilled (hence, “expectations”) leads to resentment. I have also known and seen how many women think they can change a man. This I never got. Why did they pick THAT man if that wasn’t the man they wanted but a different one? I guess they are part of the female fantasy that a woman can come along and make a man “want to be a better man.” Sorry, that’s the stuff for movies.
Reality: men are more real to women than women are to men. (On average. There are, of course, exceptions.)
All of that being said, it appears that these women haven’t learned how to train their partners to treat them with respect. Also, another generalized statement I’ll make that will probably inflame many mothers reading this blog: they need to learn to dump the kid off with him, LET HIM CARE FOR THEM THE WAY HE DOES WITHOUT GETTING ANGRY, and go off and have fun. Without guilt. Men do this. And if you want ot be the same as a man, then get to it.
One more note and I’ll shut up.
When I read that the first thing that came to mind was: how many of those women were at a picnic telling their CF women friends that motherhood was such a blessing? How many of those 60% told CF women “you don’t know what you’re missing” as if being a mother was the best thing to happen to a woman? How many of those women insisted you were less of a woman because you didn’t breed? How many of those women insist that a CF woman doesn’t know what she is talking about when in reality, it was THAT MOTHER that didn’t know what SHE was talking about, or thinking, when she decided to have kids, and further still, have MORE kids?
I’m sure it is a very high number of that 60%. Articles like this only confirm what we CF women know, and have known, who also have powers of observation beyond mothers. (Regardless of much these mothers can “multitask.”)
Really, by page 3, while I started to just skim the article (in quiet and peace!) I also started to laugh. I also said a little prayer to God thanking him for continuing to grant my prayer of NO CHILDREN in my life.
I agree with SwissBarb — I bet many of these men really weren’t on board for having kids, they just went through with it because it was expected and they figured the wife would do most of the work.
However, I do not agree that these men are “emasculated.” Many of them are exercising inherent cultural privilege in order to blip right over the shorts on the floor and the hair in the sink. I live with a man who does these things, we have no children, and I do work for a living. Over time, he’s gotten better at noticing things and helping out unasked, and when he does I always thank him because I know it goes against his upbringing. In his house, Mom did all that.
That is the thing to remember: many of these men grew up in times when MOM DID IT ALL and they are just playing out the same old script. Men are never taught to cook, clean, sew on buttons, or NOTICE messes; Mom just does it for them! Then when they marry and “wife” becomes “mom,” guess what! Lather, rinse, repeat.
When I have the opportunity to do so I always say to mothers of boys: teach your son to sew on buttons and iron shirts, boil water and fry eggs, sweep up dirt and wash dishes. These are ADULT SKILLS, not “women’s work.” There is no reason in the world that men can’t learn to fully care for themselves — and it might even extend their lives, as widowers often develop problems related to lack of self-care skills.
People who think feminism is an outworn, unnecessary thing are very much mistaken. Women who get angry at individual men and don’t realize this stems from cultural training, not personal defects, are missing the point.
I couldn’t agree more, my mother MADE me learn how to look after myself, she brought me and my sister up alone, my father was violent and an alcoholic, he was a talented man but a poor father and my parents divorced when I was ten. (Although I’m sick of people telling me that’s why I don’t want kids, I have no fear of being as bad a father as mine was, I just don’t want the stress and the hassle that kids bring and if someone’s to love me I want them to do it because they choose to, not because they are genetically obliged to).
I enjoy cooking, I don’t enjoy ironing (who does) but I can press clothes with the best of them (being in the Air Cadets as a teenager helped that too), I can sew on a button, I can do household repairs and renovation, fix cars, etc, basically everything I need to know to be totally independant. Having said all that, in all of the long term relationships I’ve had (all of which bar none ended because my girlfriends wanted kids) I often felt that I was EXPECTED to do the stuff that they couldn’t, sometimes I felt a bit resentful and wondered why they needed to be looked after when I didn’t. Since they struggled to care for themselves I often wondered why they thought they were qualified to care for a child. Then I realised; it’s the ‘entitlement’ to be cared for that they yearned for, nothing more, nothing less, the security of knowing that they had me in a position where I couldn’t walk away and I’d have to eternally put up with their unreasonable demands and complaints, they’d have probably complained when I burned out because I had to do too much. Being a single CF’s not so bad on balance!
Its amusing when some cow expect you to treat her with the same “respect” as her domesticated husband does..
I am certain the article is not fair to the majority of women…it cant be…?!?!
Just read a fresh study from Scandinavia. They interviewed about 6000 persons aged 40-80. The conclusion was that children ment nothing for happiness or lonesomeness. The clue to a happy life was a good relationship, interesting career, friends and hobbies.
Great post Britgirl…
…And I am extremely happy I am not stucked with some women just because we have a child together. Thats FREEDOM!
I tire of people whining about the consequences of the choices they make. People – and men are people, none of yer lip! – rarely change once they hit … well, perhaps “adulthood” is too strong a word for many of us – shall we say two or more years post-puberty? … anyway, when MEN are marryin’-high, no matter what the women think, they rarely change (neither do the women, but we’re not supposed to mention that). All the things post-sprog that these angry mommies find fault with in their male mates were there before and after courtship, marriage and daddyhood.
Mommies, you CHOSE mommyhood, often brow-beating that boxer-strewing dude you share the nest with into repro-ing your share of a burgeoning new generation of environmentally UNfriendly consumers, so live with it.
No – let me be blunt: you chose the cradle, you stand beside it. You chose that cave-dweller as sperm donor, don’t be shocked/angry/passive-aggressive when he behaves like the (butt-scratching, beer-drinking, privacy-seeking, conflict-avoiding) MAN he always was.
Shut yer pie-holes, breeders.
(I think I’ll sleep until 11 a.m. Saturday morning in celebration of the choice -I- made with my life)
“Also, another generalized statement I’ll make that will probably inflame many mothers reading this blog: they need to learn to dump the kid off with him, LET HIM CARE FOR THEM THE WAY HE DOES WITHOUT GETTING ANGRY, and go off and have fun. Without guilt.”
This. Any time I read mommy blogs, or anything written by mommies about their partners, it’s ALWAYS about how inept he is and how he does everything wrong. By wrong I mean, simply not the exact same way she does it. It’s not like these guys are putting the kid in the microwave, or crapping the floor to get it clean. He’s just holding the child a little differently, cleaning in a different order, whatever. Then she rides his ass about how he’s doing it all wrong, or plays the martyr and redoes the task as soon as he’s finished…who the hell is going to continue to want to help when their partner is saying their help is worthless? Certainly, I wouldn’t in that situation. I’d gladly say “Do it all yourself then, since every time I even attempt to try, I screw it up so terribly in your eyes.”
Feh–that’s interesting that you mention the “martyr” mommy syndrome. I was talking to a woman recently who was considering whether she was going to start a family. Both she and her husband work and she was concerned that she would end up in the role of primary child wrangler. She said that the last thing that she wanted was to become a “martyr mommy”, who willingly entered into parenthood and then complained about it constantly. Oh. so unappealing.
This has been said by many before me, but I really can’t help but think that most people who have kids don’t–think first. Routines and patterns in a relationship between two get disrupted when a third, helpless unit enters the home. If one or the other has grievances about how household tasks are managed before the baby comes, I would imagine it would only get worse. Another woman I know who had a child last year admitted to me that she and her husband were both TOTALLY unprepared for it. They didn’t realize that it was being on call 24/7. I didn’t actually believe they didn’t realize it since they got pregnant after several years of IVF which would give plenty of time to ponder the future, but I guess it’s possible. After one month of sharing baby duty they were both looking for a day care center. I didn’t even know a baby that young could be put into day care! But then I don’t know nuthin bout birthin no babies!
Well I honestly couldn’t read much. I skimmed through much of the whining because I just seen the need to waste my time reading their pity-party stories. I did notice though that a lot of the women complained about their men. The men they chose…and chose to have kids with. Now I might be wrong but when I chose the wrong man I got rid of him! If I had kids with him I’d have still gotten rid of him for all the same reasons they were complaining about. I’ve now ended my search with a wonderful man that fits all of the important criteria and I know what I’ve got! I understand that it is in a man’s nature to ignore or simply not notice the little things that bother us womens to much…but they ignored those things before the kids came along too. Either sit down, talk it out and see if he will try to improve, decide to stay anyway and live with it (But NO complaining) or else leave! Don’t have kids and blame the same man you married for being the same man you married and especially without having a conversation about what was bother you in the first place. Men aren’t mind readers….neither are women.
I think that’s where half the problems in any relationship come from – communication or lack of it. I enjoyed the book ‘the 5 love languages’ there were some very interesting points in it about how one communcates and percives affection. I, for instance, do not view taking out the trash as an act of affection – it’s a neccessity and he filled up the can too. He DOES view it as that. We had a talk about how I do appreciate his doing things like that very much but I don’t get the warm-fuzzies off of that. We talked about what gave him the warm-fuzzies and what he felt was just expected and we continue to share with eachother what we’re thinking from clothing choices to financial decisions. I think I am in a very good relationship and we enjoy a very calm and happy life together. May it forever continue in our blissful, childfree state!
This is going to sound so lame, but here’s the deal. I’m pregnant, due in July, so I recently began a blog and started reading parent websites and blogs and the like. Somehow, I found some mom-blog thing where a few moms get together and video-tape a conversation, and the topic was about child-free couples. Specifically, the question asked was whether or not child-free couples should be entitled to the same sort of maternity/paternity leave and tax breaks (I’m not sure how this translates to Toronto, obviously the women speaking were all American), but they weren’t very good at staying on topic. So the question wasn’t ever answered, but the video did make me seek out child-free blogs to do some reading.
And that is how I found this website. So that’s that.
Moving along, I’ve read a couple of your posts now and all I think I can offer is that I hope that when I have this child – and if I have more children – I also have someone in my life who kicks me in the ass every now and then, kind of like this blog did. I wish more people respected your choice and were willing to consider it viable, even if it wasn’t the same as their own.
So thanks for opening my eyes a little bit. I hope I remember to come by again sometime!
I do have sympathy with women who have partners who completely disregard things they could be doing when it’s obvious that their partner needs some help. To a point.
I have a friend who I haven’t really been in contact with because of her 3 kids under the age of 8. She used to moan about how stressed out she was…
Her: I’m so stressed out! Bob doesn’t help with the kids and I’m so tired and I never do anything!
Me: Hire a babysitter for a day.
Her: Oh we don’t have the money for that!
Me: Your husband and his family have a million dollar construction business. Are you saying that he can’t fork over $50 or $100 so that you don’t do an Andrea Yates on your kids?
Her: … BOBBY! STOP SITTING ON YOUR BROTHER!
Me: Get a babysitter and come hang out.
Her: I’m so busy… BILLY! PUT THAT DOWN!
Me: Well, you’re stressed out and you need a break. Get one now.
Her: Bob doesn’t understand! He would never say okay to this! BOBBY! STAY AWAY FROM THE TV!
Me: Fuck Bob. Tell him that if he doesn’t give you the money, you’re leaving him alone with the kids all weekend to teach him the value of a dollar vs. killing your offspring.
Her: … oh I couldn’t do that. He doesn’t know how to take care of them! BUCKY! LEAVE THAT ALONE!
Me: He’s their father. What do you mean he doesn’t know?
Her: Well, he doesn’t know that Billy needs a diaper change every 4 hours and Bobby is allergic to strained peas and that Bucky cries if he doesn’t have his rabbit… BOBBY! DON’T TOUCH THAT POT!
Me: He. Will. Deal.
Her: Oh well, it’s not so bad. When are you coming up to visit? BILLY! GIVE THAT TOY BACK!
Me: You know… work, the dog, SCA stuff… could be years. Greattalkingtoyoubye!
Sarah, in answer to your question:
Yes.
I dont want to attack Sara for her comment.
But..Its attitudes like that among parents which strenghten my desire to not becme one of them. I simple dont want to put myself in the same miserable situation and sink down to their lower standard of thinking.
People who cant stand for their choice and suddenly think they are in a position to judge others just because they took up on the most “honourable” job in the world..
Spare me! CF are equal citizens and humans. But as usual its probably not the brightes and most content parents we end up hearing from…
What this demonstrates is that many people who choose to breed, do so from a place of incredible personal and social immaturity.
This is why it’s so important for kids to be pulled out of their family units to interact with diverse others. Otherwise they’d stay connected at the navel to mommy forever, and never get past that or grow and evolve. This is why I consider “home schooling” to be something allowed only in the rarest cases, and only with huge supervision. Most “home schooling” women I know simply have major narcissistic complexes. While it may be OK for immature women to play with babies, a child’s psyche can’t evolve properly unless it’s exposed to evolved people and ideas.
As all of you do, we know people of this ilk: whipped always drunk/stoned dad, impatient perfectionist martyr SAHM raising two Royal Spawn…according to books on Attachment Parenting. That’s the brilliant approach where you never say no to kids, they sleep in “the family bed” and stay on the tit till age 5 or 12 or something.
To my eye it is simply the mother’s incredible immaturity (thirtysomething, no experience whatever of working for a living, supporting others, etc.) projected onto this Fabulous Life Experience. Face it, it doesn’t take any qualifications to squirt out a sprog.
But it’s something more insidious. She doesn’t want their dad (not sure whether they’re married) to have power. It’s that simple. The kids rule in that family. Dad says do X, they screech, they scream, they tantrum, they kick, they hit. And they get their way. Same with mom. Oh, but you can’t tell them NO, or slap them upside the head for acting like hellspawn. Meanwhile dad bot is constantly doing whatever he can, like working late and doing complicated contracting projects on the house, to stay as far away from actually having to interact. When he has to interact, he’s drunk or stoned. It’s a really ill cycle.
I view part of a dad’s job to be the Bad Cop. I don’t mean that judgmentally, I mean in the sense of the kind of harsh power that, let’s face it, is part of life: authority, which adults grow into accepting in themselves and others. Some moms can provide those boundaries and that sense of direct, no-nonsense power. But so many women breed who lack any adult, mature authority themselves. Their breeding comes out of their own desire to stay childish and have absolute power at their own tantrum-y whim and will.
I view this as a serious impediment to equality and justice, especially since many of the most immature breeder women I’ve known have claimed to be feminists. (Co-opting all women’s lives under the umbrella of breeding.)
I’ve known many women who choose a strong, authoritative man as partner or co-breeder…then proceed to try to demolish his sense of self, claiming he’s doing it all wrong. It’s as though they are drawn to that strength and authority, since they don’t possess it themselves, and they yearn for it. But having reeled it in, they proceed to try to destroy it.
My view is that when women are constantly complaining about the kids, the house, etc., they are trying to assert the kids/house as having power over mom, who has power over dad. A bassackward way for women to get power. But it’s the way of the breeder: get your needs met indirectly, passive aggressively. It’s not ME being the bitch, honey, it’s the kids for screaming, or you for being unreasonable, or whatever.
It was fun to read Lee’s quote of Butterfly McQueen’s “Prissy” character. Butterfly was an awesome woman. A lifelong atheist, child-free, left her body to science, and left part of her estate to the Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF), of which she was a life member. She also left money to humane societies, and in her will deeded her house to her renters. She took a bachelor’s degree in her 60s, and she loved playing Santa Claus for children in NYC. I mean literally–a black, female Santa…with That Voice. In the 50th anniversary year of Gone with the Wind, FFRF named her its annual Freethought Heroine.
“the question asked was whether or not child-free couples should be entitled to the same sort of maternity/paternity leave and tax breaks”
Well duh. Just because we didn’t create beings who are completely dependent on us, does not mean that we are not called on to provide care to members of our families, or friends. My parents are just as important to me as I, their child, am to them. Any rational parent would see equal benefits to child free people as a good thing…one day their kids may need those benefits to care for THEM. Considering that one of the main bingos from parent to nonparent is “Who will take care of you when you are old?”, I wouldn’t hesitate to say that any parent who thinks that CF people should not have the same opportunity for leave, or tax breaks as adult caregivers, is a horrible thoughtless person who probably shouldn’t have children.
Skoora–thank you for sharing the info about the actress who played Prissy. Very interesting! She sounds like a fascinating person. I sometimes also use a variation of that line when asked to babysit during the day–”don’t know nuthin’ ’bout watchin’ no babies.” I know a woman who thought that because I work at home I would be keen on watching her child while she goes to the gym and art classes that she had to stop after she gave birth. She can’t afford a nanny/baby sitter and I guess in her mind my time is free in more than one way.
It is easier for me to make a joke (though I’m not sure she got the “Gone With The Wind” reference) than it is for me to say–”Okay let’s see if I get this straight, you decided to have a child but failed to assess the impact that it would have on your life/finances/hobbies/freedom and now you want me, someone who made that assessment for herself and took a pass on baby makes three, to now take time away from her work day to watch your child?” I do understand given the lack of interest shown by some parents in my work (while regaling me with tales about the supremacy of baby love) that they think the life I have carved for myself is a poor substitute for being a mother. Lucky for me, I don’t care what they think.
However, I admit I do find their self-absorption very tedious.
It was interesting to read the comment about whether and how many people consider the childfree lifestyle “viable”. If something works, makes you happy, and is good for the planet, it’s viable. Perhaps I missed the study about approx. 40% of childfree women having intense anger for their partners–or intense anger period for that matter? I can’t help but think that the “angry moms” were looking for a child to make their own lives viable and are now steamed that the choice wasn’t the winning ticket. Know thyself! And as many others have pointed out here, know thy partner! People tend to not morph into ideal humans after they become parents. It’s just more of the same in a different context. From what I’ve witnessed, the self absorbed just become more so after they have children. The self-absorption/entitlement just expands to how they expect the world to accommodate their offspring. Double-yawn!!
The self-absorption/entitlement just expands to how they expect the world to accommodate their offspring. Double-yawn!!
this is so incredibly true and comes back to so many myths about how having children makes you a better person. Its the same old crap that is dished out time and time again and its making me so angry.
My mother in law barely talks to me these (having children is natural she says) and pretty much considers everything I say to be irrelevant as I dont have kids. They take nothing we do seriously.
You may love your partner but seriously assessing their fitness for parenting is not an unreasonable thing to do before you actually decide to bring them into the world. I honestly feel that perhaps men get away with too much but i have seen it in my own family and friends. If he (or she) was lazy or immature before it wont improve once the child arrives.
There has to be responsibility on both side of the equation and it may stop mummy from turning into a bitter twisted soul who cant understand why kids didnt bring them closer together or magically turn their partner into better person.
Children only exaggerate flaws and issues and dont improve them.
And yes some women I know wont leave the kid cos they are worried about dad looking after them. OMG what the hell is going on there. Did you actually decide to have children with a completely incompetent person….wow good move? or are you just a control freak.
Seriously have a good look at yourselves people out there before deciding ooo baby so cute I want want want… A bit of self analysis and forethought might be a good idea.
Lee, I didn’t mean my comment about Butterfly McQueen as a spank to you, and if I left that impression at all, I’m very sorry. I just think she was an awesome woman…and I’m always looking for excuses to talk about her.
I used your comment as one.
Skoora–no worries. I didn’t take it as a spank at all. I was remiss in adding quotation marks. I also shouldn’t assume everyone is a fan of old films, so should be more careful with my references. My bad. I only knew the actress from the role she played in the film. It’s very interesting that she spoke the “know nuthin” line and remained child-free herself. It sounds like she was a VERY unique and truly caring person! I’m on a Hitchcock roll these days. Absolutely hysterical critique of society from Joseph Cotton in “Shadow of a Doubt”. But not relevant to child-free so I’ll save that for another time.
Highly recommend it as a rental though!
men have been told for many decades women can do it all. it is our fault we beleived them at their word. So we must apologise for trusting and being told they can do it all and beleiving them.
(sarcasm off i think ). so either these women are lying about being able to to it all, or they are complaining about the choice they made, but its never their fault.
the first man he words 11hours a day, to earn the money to provide her with a lifestyle, yet when he needs a little down time, thats wrong, he should spend more time with her. he is working for her. for his kids. yet nothing is ever good enough.
I’m pretty sure I’d have been an angry mom. In fact, I know it. That could be because I have never wanted kids in the first place, so envisioning them in my future includes images of my being bitter and resentful. Then again, it could be because I know how much I treasure my free time, and how easy it would be to be angry with someone else who takes the free time I don’t think I’m getting.
It would be hard, I think, to not feel a little bit of resentment toward a man who takes a day for himself as a stay-at-home mother who takes no “self” days.
Then again, all the stay-at-home mother has to do is TAKE THE SELF DAY.
(“Doing it all” is probably the most ridiculous modern notion. No one wants to make choices; they must have it all. Good grief. )
Hi Sarah,
Well, I would at least like to praise you for having the courage to admit that you may need a kick in the ass, and that you need to consider the point of view of the childfree once you are a parent. Keep that up, and any parents’ groups you are in, make you nudge them in the right direction when they start heading down the wrong path. You can be our mole!
Haven’t had a chance to add my own yet, but there are already so many excellent comments… really good reading. Some of these comments should have been on the actual two mommy/parenting blog, they’d be more informative than the ones I saw that were actually justifying the anger… no-one seemed to be asking them the pertinent questions being asked here.
I really think that women are done a disservice with all the Oprah-fication and sit-coms that portray men as idiots. Stay at home means YOU do all the work of home, and if you don’t like it, rethink the idea, jeez. Stay at home mom means you get to do all the work at home and with children while someone else finances every single thing you eat, wear, touch and use. It really does sound kind of fair, if you want to go that route. What’s with all the whining about how hard and unfair YOUR dummy choices are? It seems like they are all 11 years old and discovering that hey, youhave responsibilities, and some things are not fun or easy, but still need to be done!
This article really made me laugh. I showed it to my – brilliant – parents, and they were one part furious and one part in stitches. My father stayed at home with me and my brothers when we were younger (admittedly, that had a lot to do with problems with immigration) and he pointed out that if you are a stay at home parent, it’s your goddamn job to do everything at home. You don’t go into your spouse’s work and start “helping out”, do you? He always tried to make things easier for the breadwinner.
My mother was pretty pissed at how the women all acted like they were the victims in this. They chose to have children. The women she knows all seem to be constantly on watch, stepping in the moment they perceive that something is going “wrong” (i.e, differently from their completely perfect way) or when they believe that it won’t be done immediately. They then whine that they’re tired and their husbands are useless. What do you expect if you’re constantly supervising? You can have complete control or you can have some rest.
When my parents first gor married, my mother just didn’t automatically do the housework. My father soon got the hint that if he didn’t do certain things, then they weren’t going to be done. He likes to joke that everyone else in the house has forgotten how to use the iron. I mean, good lord, take some responsibility for your life or, if you really must whine, then stop then turning around and being vicious or condescending to the people who actually had the foresight to avoid a situation you clearly hate.
Did you notice how many women on the Dooce site were on anti-depressants and thanked their pills profusely? Very telling and disturbing.
Hi there
I think a lot of women have kids because they CAN, because they think they want them and then, quite often, it’s easy-peezy -lemon -squeezy.
Before they know it they have three or so kids, three years apart. Of course it’s going to be…ERM…difficult to manage. Suddenly you’ve got a six year old on the brink of tween-dom and the beginning’s of obsession with Hannah Montana (ear plugs necessary to watch shows like that), a three year old toddler that still likes to wipe messy little fingers on everything, and a newborn shrieking it’s head off.
I’m a mother of one eight year old, and I love her and I’m glad I had her young, young enough to still be footloose and fancy free. However, I would love a brother and sister for her, but, unfortunately for me, it’s been problematic, with the end of the road not quite in sight.
BUT, though I hope that one day it will happen, looking at my friends who popped kids out one after the other and are now chaotic, miserable and a little unfulfilled, not to mention a little haggard, perhaps I should be grateful for the Gap. Perhaps, also, and more to the point, when it happens I will be MOST GRATEFUL. In other words, I SHALT NOT COMPLAIN ABOUT A THING. It would be most GROSS to do so because to complain would be to disregard all those women out there who have wanted children -really wanted them – and not been able to have them for many reasons. Yes, having a baby can be tough at times (I still remember). There can be isolation, boredom, lack of freedom …..dot dot dot (all the things the CF point out are often true) and counteract all the good times to be had -and i won’t recount them here. However, I am certain of one thing: I will smile like an angel each time I change a diaper like it’s – I don’t know -a rose petal wrapped around a peach.(Sad I know -pukish -a little -but true) I will sing like a bird -badly -but I will sing never the less as I push my pram -proudly and very smugly -through the town like I have won the LOTTERY.
Haven’t you noticed that those moms that have tried and tried and tried and tried are truly radiant when they finally have one? (technically some have won the lottery, at least the fertility lottery).
it’s those women that say they want kids and then (most horribly and annoyingly) have them like the drop of a hat – popping them out all over the place – carelessly – and without a thought or a struggle (I absolutely can’t stand it, of course I’m jealous) These women that didn’t have to try are then left …..disillusioned. Oh, diddums…boo-hoo..they think, this is……. HARD WORK!!!.
No it isn’t. Hard work is not being left alone in the house with a baby all day (and I’ve done it so I know)
Hard work is wanting a child and trying for one and having and losing….
SO. My advice would be this. if you want a child and you have one, you are LUCKY. ENJOY!!! What a BLESSING!!! Don’t be angry with Fed-Ex packages and happy neighbors with lives of their own and freedom and bliss. They made their choice. You made yours. it’s a choice. You made it. Live with it – but do so much more then live with it -LOVE it.
Now maybe I should apply this to myself and be happy with what I have which, when I think of it, is a lot.
When I first met my partner he just assumed what I really wanted out of life was to be a full-time, stay at home mum, because it’s “what all women want”. I don’t think he has any idea why this wouldn’t be someone’s idea of a great life. Because it doesn’t involve “going out to work” it must be dead easy.
It made me angry that he looked at me like I had two heads when I told him it wasn’t a life I wanted.
It’s not all about bad, ungrateful women who dupe poor, unsuspecting men into fatherhood and then moan like hell about it.
Honestly… I accidently stumbled upon this article, and decided to read it… I’m not a “free” person as you guys are expressing it, but I can see where this comes from. Women can (and usually do) turn into atrocious monsters after childbirth…
But this article really is horrible. Probably the worst piece of written material I’ve ever seen. Of course raising a kid isn’t rainbows and teddy bears all the damn time, but you do get the reward of seeing a smily little face looking at you in appreciation just because you made some silly noise they found appealing. What I don’t get, is how its always the man thats being wronged in this situation. Did you people ever stop to think (for one second) that maybe the girl didn’t want to get knocked up, but is dealing with it as best she can? And not only that, but perhaps the other half , which is usually so set in their ways of the bachelor, isn’t really adjusting to the new life? You sat and wrote about women whining about their counterparts not being “up to par”… but that had the be the biggest cry-fest I have ever seen, from the male perspective, about women and children.
I think the saddest part… for all of you people that choose not to have children, will be that you’re going to be all alone later, with no one to care for you. The circle of life goes this way: your parents had you, raised you, they get old, you take care of them, they die, and the cycle repeats with you. Except it also ends with you… with nothing, and with no one to share all those things you worked so hard at getting while you were “childfree”. That seems like such a wasted, selfish existance. No one will even remember you… or miss you for that matter.
Senior homes around the world are full of lonely old people who never get visitors. Most of them have families. Looks like reproducing isn’t so much of a guarantee of a merry old age after all.
Furthermore, having children in the misplaced hope of being able to guilt-trip them into caring for you in your dotage doesn’t sound a particularly altruistic act. Hmm, who is being selfish here, I wonder?
Let those who truly want children have them, and let those who don’t want them abstain, but please, don’t try to maintain the image that having children is a selfless act. Those children didn’t come into the world by magic. You decided to bring them into the world for your own reasons. And when you do, sorry, you waive the right to moan about how difficult it is.
Oh dear, another HONEST, accidental, circle-of-life stumbler. I’d give a nickle to know what you entered into the search engine to wind up here.
Since the article written by BritGirl was simple a commentary in response to another article in the NYTimes that had excerpted actual complaints from unhappy parents, I’m not sure what your point is? Are you one of those angry mom’s whose husband isn’t quite father material? That seems to have struck a nerve. No one gets “knocked up” unless they want to. There are so many different types of birth control available, it would really take a special kind of denial or ignorance not to be able to get your hands on one form or another.
It’s clear that since you had a child so it could smile at you and take care of you in old age and miss you when you are gone, that not unlike so many others your motivations in being a parent were completely self-serving. Are you really under the impression that people without children have no one in their lives? No partner, no family, no friends, no community? Where does that idea come from? Or is that what you tell yourself to provide comfort when you try to justify/rationalize why you had a child? Yawn–yawn–yawn.
@Lee – I think I love you
I was wondering what her point was as well – I still don’t quite get what she was on about, except the “you people” Got to love those who say “you people…” not.
Back at you BritGirl!
I guess I must not really possess a troll soul, because I just can’t bring myself to comment on a site where the content is in direct opposition to my world view. To what end?! I would never dream that I could convince (nor would I want to convince) a person who was happy being a parent that they shouldn’t be happy or have no reason to be happy. Yet, time and again, these parental paragons of all that is right, assume they know better than I do what makes me happy, how my life is, who I share it with and how I’ll end up in old age. Just like they assume that because they had a child, their entire blissful future is mapped out for them with 100% certainty. I hate to beat a whipped horse, but I think the article that has generated these comments, provides evidence to the contrary. Conversely, I am still waiting to meet one person who is childfree by choice who complains about their life or worries about living childfree in the future. Not one!
I’ll let you spend your nickle… I was trying to figure out if teething makes kids whine. And… lo and behold, the words “whine” and “baby” brought me to this …
The only thing that struck a nerve in that article, was the concept of men being victimized by women, when it takes TWO to have a baby. Anyone ever heard of postpartum or baby blues? LOTS of women end up throwing giant gripefests just because their brains make them. (Granted, this long term whining/griping cannot be blamed on that in all cases). A lot of women have a seriously debilitating problem, that needs MEDICAL treatment. Shouldn’t be overlooked as a woman just being a whiny pain in the butt.
In answer to your integrity questions, no, the guy I am with does really good with the baby, in fact… he’s better at it than I am most of the time, AND I did agree that women turn into nasty monsters. (I myself can be one of them at times, as I was also one of your kind before) My defense of other women complaining doesn’t necessarily mean, that I am dealing with the same situation. I just felt a need to defend them because their thoughts are getting bashed about like that. Its saddening to see how many posts on here just went to town tearing those women apart… making themselves just as guilty.
And yes… people can get “knocked up” without soliciting it. BC is only 98% effective, if you had read the statistics you would know that. That leaves 2% WIDE OPEN. You do the math.
“And yes… people can get “knocked up” without soliciting it. BC is only 98% effective, if you had read the statistics you would know that. That leaves 2% WIDE OPEN. You do the math.”
Er…It seems we will have to, since you clearly can’t.
Two is a very small number when compared to the number of people who have children and then complain about it!
Shantilly,
Might I suggest that if you’re looking for advice on how to deal with a baby that’s whining because it’s teething you enter “teething advice” in Google, I just did and there are hundreds of relevant websites. “Whining” and “baby” don’t seem very apt or, dare I say it, intelligent terms if your current parenthood problems stem from TEETHING. (Hint: “Teething” is the critical term here, all kids go through it, all parents experience their children going through it, there’s stacks of good advice out there).
As for you once being ‘one of our type’, the very fact that you’re now a parent means that you most likely never were like any of us here. You are what “people like us” call a “fence-sitter”. I can only speak for myself here but I’ve done absolutely everything in my power to avoid parenthood and am hoping to get vasectomised soon, as a man we have far fewer options when it comes to birth control and if, God forbid, an unwanted pregnancy occurs, we have no right or capacity to terminate it.
Please take your pointless trolling elsewhere, you’ll only get shot down in flames here or, since you evidently have a teething child who probably needs your support more than we need your misguided opinions, might I suggest you actually cease and desist being a troll altogether and go and be a good parent instead? Or is trolling more rewarding than being a good parent?
May I suggest that if you feel the “need” to respond to everything you randomly come across on the internet that you don’t like or agree with, you’ll be a very busy person indeed. I’m sure there are many sites out there that I would find abhorrent, I just don’t go to them or if I do “stumble” across something objectionable, I hit that trusty red X in the upper right hand corner.
For the record, you didn’t just defend mothers, though why you think they need to be defended on a CHILDFREE site is puzzling, (not many mothers here) you took the time to attack a specific group of people on a site specifically created to support that group in a shared life choice.
I don’t believe anyone here went to the original source of the article content with the express purpose of ridiculing the unhappy parents posting there or telling them that they had sad, pathetic lives. Or to share the prediction that they would end up alone and not cared for in old age because they were most likely lousy parents who didn’t enjoy parenting. To do that would be purely antagonistic and rather pointless. Don’t you agree? As I said before, Britgirl was simply commenting on a Blog in a major international newspaper (not a CHILDFREE site, mind you) that had already racked up hundreds of comments, many about the downside of parenting, from parents. If you want to take a poke at some of your “kind”, I’m sure there is plenty of fodder there for you.
Also, I didn’t read all of the whining/angry mom comments, since there were so many, but I didn’t come across any that had to do with the topic of Post-Partum Depression. The article dealt specifically with anger women felt towards their husbands not sharing in child care.
As for the extremely rare cases when a women is using birth control and ends up pregnant, of course there are other options besides giving birth, which I assume said woman wouldn’t object to on religious grounds given that she uses birth control. If you want to have sex and you have any doubts about birth control efficacy you can use the morning after pill which is readily available at Planned Parenthood in the U.S. If you end up “knocked up”, in any case, you can opt to terminate the pregnancy as is your right. If you decide not to exercise one of those options, I don’t really see how choosing to be a martyr around parenting serves anyone, especially the child.