Remarking on that once-famous childfree cover story in TIME magazine’s Aug. 2013 issue — When Having It All Means Not Having Children — Yahoo! Shine writer (and mother) Beth Greenfield writes,
What does “having it all” mean? Not having kids, according to the latest sure-to-be-controversial issue of Time magazine.
I’m not sure why it was “sure-to-be-controversial,” since it’s not as if childfree people want to bite parents as part of their childfree lifestyle, but one person’s decision to not have children raised “controversy” hackles in others(?) ten years ago as it still does today:
I'm still having trouble understanding what these people have to be proud of here. They're DINKs (Dual Income No Kids) which means they're forever college kids with no responsibilities whatsoever — well, besides the dog; the dog can be very tough to care for. …
I do hope that these kids will eventually come around. Life is quite boring without children, and as they say, "Idle hands are the Devil's playthings." —Not the Bee, Dec. 2023
In a decade-old Yahoo chat session between Greenfield and Yahoo! Shine Senior Writer Sarah B. Weir (Greenfield recorded the chat), Weir — with no apparent fear of being tacky — expresses sentiments in her negative perception of childfree people (women, really) that persist even now, beginning with her description of the couple on the front cover as “lazy yuppies” (“What's the difference between these and the Yuppies from the 80s?” someone on X said of DINKS.)
The lazy TIME magazine yuppies, who I believe ended up having a child just over a year later:
Weir’s commentary is so passionately anti-childfree that I felt compelled to join the conversation. Who knows more about being childfree than someone who’s childfree?
In the following faux transcript, I respond to Weir’s original remarks, which were copied directly from her Yahoo piece, “Is Being Childfree Selfish?”
Sarah B. Weir, Shine Senior Writer: (commenting on the TIME cover photo of a couple without children lying innocently in the sand) Alright, they look like lazy yuppies to me.
ME, who was able to go to Jamaica with my husband and sit in the sand a few years before the article published thanks to the extra cash: Why “lazy yuppies?” Is it the smiles? The sand? Their age?
Do you have that reaction when you see anyone lying happily on the beach, or is it reserved for people who don’t have children?
Weir: The matching swimsuits reek of self-satisfied, in-your-face DINKS.
ME, a DINK: My husband and I never wear matching clothes. But we do see a lot of parents dressing themselves and their kids in matching clothes for pictures. Should we assume they’re smug, too, and trying to be in-our-faces about their happiness? We hate happy people.
Weir: As a working mom myself, … I wonder why I, feminist that I purport to be, have a knee-jerk reaction when I hear that women (and also men, but less so) don’t want to have kids.
The other day, my husband said that one of his colleagues, in her early 30s, definitely doesn’t want to have kids. I immediately went to “selfish, narcissistic.” What is that about?
ME, in my late 40s and definitely not wanting kids: Beth Greenfield asked you this in your conversation: “Do you think it could be partially that you are envious of her gall?”
I second that. But delete the “gall” part, because there’s very little that’s particularly bold about not wanting kids — or even (heaven forbid) admitting it out loud. So, just the first part, about you possibly being envious.
Weir: I wouldn’t ever give up the experience of being a mom. I think it’s that, somewhere back in my primitive brain, I see it as “natural” to have kids, and weird not to have that desire. Of course there are many reasons — economic, environmental — that might make it extremely reasonable not to have kids.
ME, a perfectly natural woman: Thanks, I guess, for allowing that there are “reasonable” reasons to not have kids, but we don’t need any reasons. Although some certainly have layers of reasons — financial, environmental, mental health-al, etc. —others, like me, just. don’t. want. them.
Like you (but on the other end of the spectrum), I would never give up the experience of not having children, and I think my life experience of never having wanted children often makes me wonder why anyone would choose to have them. But, even while I wonder, I also understand that not everyone is like me, so I tend not to characterize people who make different choices as “unnatural.”
Weir: I have two stepkids and one daughter, but sometimes I feel somewhat selfish — and lazy — for only having one biological kid. Like, you aren’t a “real mom” unless you have four! At the same time that birthrates are dropping, I’m seeing a trend in rich parents and celebs (like Heidi Klum or Reese Witherspoon) popping out three or four. In a way, in our culture, being a “real mom” is equated with being a “real woman.”
ME, a real woman: The selfishness angle is one people frequently use to attack the childfree as well as those who have “only” one child.
If you’re able to explain what is selfish about not producing and then parenting a child, please do. Many, many childfree minds want to know.
Weir: That’s a good point. We sometimes project our decisions onto others as the right or only way to go. There’s so much underlying pressure to have kids though. I’m sure it’s hard to be childless in a society that still promotes the nuclear family as the absolute norm. And European countries are actively promoting higher birthrates. Did you see that British fertility campaign photo of the old-looking pregnant TV presenter saying she wished she’d have kids earlier? Scare tactics.
ME, a woman who’s been pressured to have kids: Well, you’re sure doing your part! It’s reactions like yours to the TIME cover that add to the pressure society heaps on women to procreate. Could that maybe (I’m being sincere) be why you feel like you’re not a “real” mother unless you continue to have more kids? Everyone else’s pressure? The brainwashing?
This brings me back to the envy Beth mentioned earlier. Could it be you sneer at us because we didn’t cave under the pressure and instead live the lives we want to? (And that, worse, we’re enjoying it?)
Weir: I do wonder if some women who are adamant about not having kids will have a late change of heart, which can be so traumatic.
Another thought about this whole topic is that the dialogue for women in our age bracket has been so motherhood-focused — the mommy wars, working moms, stay at home moms, etc. Maybe now the dialogue is going to shift from that to “Why have kids at all?”
ME, who has always wondered “Why have kids at all?”: Oh, don’t worry about childfree women changing their minds later. Or is that the polite thing to do? Should we also start questioning whether people who say they want kids will change their minds later, thereby putting themselves at risk of experiencing the horrifying trauma of being regretful parents?
Weir: I’d like to hear more from those who chose not to have kids.
ME, a woman who chose not to have kids: Happy to talk. What else do you want to know?
Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed this post’s subject matter, you might also enjoy my novel The Age of the Child: When a pro-life amendment leads to life sentences for abortion and police investigations of “suspicious” miscarriages, politicians start finding babies abandoned on their doorsteps. That’s just the beginning.
“You will most definitely get a rise out of your book club.” — Amazon reader
“This book lingered with me long after reading it, and I’m going to read it again.” — Amazon reader
“Hilarious and twisted jabs at society.” — Goodreads reader
“The Handmaid’s Tale and The Farm, to name a couple, have opened the dystopian genre to questions about reproduction; however, The Age of the Child is one of the first I’ve read to really consider the issue of reproductive rights and attitudes so deeply.” — Rebecca Maye Holiday, author of The Beaches
“Scathing social commentary.” — Goodreads Review