What a Recent USA Today Article about the Childfree Did Wrong
How positive intentions can still have negative impact
Last night, my aunt sent me a link to the recent USA Today article, “What is a childfree relationship? And how you might be misunderstanding it.” She has two children; I have none (by choice). Whenever she comes across a piece like this, she sends me a link with her thoughts.
Her thoughts on this one were, “Pretty basic — but nice tone for the unconvinced.”
I was stuck for a few minutes on what she meant by “the unconvinced” (who were they? what exactly were they not convinced about? in what way?), but I decided to settle on “the unconvinced” being people who simply don’t understand the choice to not have kids.
So, then I thought, “Oh, good — a piece that presents childfree relationships in a way that will, once and for all, communicate to ‘the unconvinced’ that we’re quite happy and don’t need your pity, thank you.”
Then I read it.
I replied to my aunt, “I disagree with the tone” (followed by an “eek” face emoji).
Here’s why:
The intent
Writer Sara Kuburic’s intent, I thought, was absolutely wonderful. Not only does she write this
many prefer the term childfree as it has a more positive connotation than childless.
and encourage people to never, ever ask others about their reproductive plans (nunya), but she also offers advice I think is critical to anyone who’s in a relationship that will lead to a conversation about having kids. In short:
talk about it
make sure you’re on the same page
make sure you understand what having a child could mean for your relationship and the rest of your life
…oh, wait.
I just realized something.
The above advice doesn’t pertain to whether to have children and what having a child could mean for the couple; instead, the subheading is, “Is a childfree relationship right for you?”
And this adds to what I found objectionable about the piece.
The problem number 1
As with many articles and essays exploring the childfree choice or perspective, this one by Kuburic commits the logical fallacy of taking for granted that a thing or position is true: in this case, that parenting is the baseline standard of happiness and fulfillment, in a relationship or otherwise.
That leads to wording like this:
Voluntary childlessness is often considered selfish or irresponsible, but many childfree couples are far from selfish and very happy — even as they age!
Many childfree couples are far from selfish?
Thank you…?
Better would have been to acknowledge that a person’s selfishness scale exists as part of their personality long before they don’t, or do, have kids, and that having or not having children isn’t a determining factor when establishing a person’s level of selfishness.
There are selfish people who have kids; there are selfish people who don’t have kids. There are unselfish people who have kids; there are unselfish people who don’t have kids.
One has nothing to do with the other (and, in fact, if you take a look around, you’ll see arguments that choosing to have kids is often a selfish act when you consider 1. how many do it without thinking first about the child’s potential life; 2. how many do it for reasons that will benefit them personally by somehow getting them something else they want — a partner, an inheritance, perceived status, friends, what have you; 3. how many do it because they expect something of their offspring, such as love they’re craving or a guarantee of a future caretaker; etc.).
The language used in the above quoted sentence accepts as fact that parents are by definition unselfish, then kindly offers that, “some childfree people are also unselfish!”
As for the happiness factor, it’s also not true that children mean happiness. Unless you want them, of course (and even then, there’s no guarantee of happiness). So, yes, people who choose not to have children are quite happy without them.
Even as we age.
Because we don’t want them.
But it’s subtle, suggestive language like the above quote that continues to fuel negative perceptions of the childfree and unjustified pedestaling of parenthood while also needlessly instilling a fear in people that without children, they might have a harder time being happy — a statement that makes sense only when applied to those who desperately want children (and in that case, why would anyone say this? To make them feel even worse if they can’t have them)?
And wording like this:
Childfree relationships are often equally fulfilling.
Written with the words that are missing from the sentence (but that are still quietly and powerfully implied), she’s saying, “Childfree relationships are often just as fulfilling as parenting relationships.”
This is presenting as an accepted fact that parenting relationships are naturally, automatically, and unquestionably fulfilling, and that “other types of relationships can also be just as good!”
Consider this wording:
“Couples who have children can often be just as happy together as those who choose not to have kids.”
See how the framing presents one as a given, and the other as “why, sure, you can try!”
I don’t think that was her intention. I think she, like many, is simply a product of our brainwashed/learned way of thinking about what constitutes reproductive norms.
It’s safe to say, however, that parenting doesn’t automatically equal a happy relationship. Everyone knows this. That particular utopian vision must be allowed to die.
And wording like this:
Is a childfree relationship right for you?
A childfree relationship is easy. Everyone is already doing it before they have kids. There’s hardly anything to think about besides, “Do we like this? Check ‘Yes’ or ‘No.’”
The wording of her question should instead be, “Is a parenting relationship right for us?”
A lot to consider there:
Will our relationship survive a child?
Do we have the money for a child?
Do we understand the time we’ll have to devote to a child?
Will we have to move?
Will one of us have to quit work?
Do we have the same ideas about how much each of us will contribute to the childrearing/household/etc.?
Will we have to put off, or permanently put aside, other goals, and are we okay with that?
Are we prepared to accept that while we might be envisioning one kind of child, our child could be someone else entirely, someone we don’t understand or like or who doesn’t like us, or, even, someone who doesn’t emerge into the world as a perfect medical specimen but as someone who will require hospital stays and full time care?
Etc.
The problem number 2
This:
these [childfree] couples often do need to be more proactive about their retirement plans and about building community, resources and meaning in their life.
I…I…
Okay.
“Need to be more proactive about retirement plans”
This isn’t necessarily untrue. There are many older people who benefit from having children who will either take them into their own homes or put them into someone else’s.
However.
This makes the assumption (or presents as a universally accepted fact) that having children is a fairly secure retirement plan. Which leads to questions like this being lobbed at the childfree: “Who will take care of you when you get old?” and which, and this is far worse, also leads to people choosing to have kids *because* they want someone to take care of them when they get old. (Never mind the intervening years between the child’s birth and her parent’s old age and what that’ll mean for everyone involved — at least there will MAYBE be a child willing to give cash or time or space to an elderly parent. Maybe.)
It’s irresponsible language, first.
Second, all it takes to plan for retirement is saving. And as I understand it, children are expensive, so that just means more money to put in savings that might otherwise be spent on a child. A good idea would be to figure out the annual cost of raising a child and just stick that money in an interest bearing account.
2. “…need to be more proactive about…building meaning in their life.
The message: a child brings automatic meaning to one’s life.
This is probably the most harmful idea to come out of the pronatalist movement.
People get very, very anxious about possibly not having meaning in their life. They freak out about not knowing what the meaning of life is. We live on a planet in outer space — it’s hard to know the why of things, and it’s scary and overwhelming and GAH WHY AM I HERE WHAT IS MY ROLE!?
Then they see, “Oh! Kids! Kids are meaning! Very well. I shall create my meaning.”
So they have a child, not thinking about the fact that having a child also means turning into a parent every minute of every day forever and ever and ever. Instead, they’re wringing their hands, hoping for that “meaning.”
Which that child may not provide, and which will then have the hapless parent flailing and hair-tearing her way into a midlife crisis and wishing she could go back and change it all, becoming yet another “I really love my kid, but…” regretter.
The “meaning” claim should have been edited out the article. It’s not merely a linguistic framing issue, but an untruth. A life’s meaning is wholly unique to the individual. A child provides a life with meaning only if a person believes their life has no meaning without a child to raise. Other people find meaning in things that interest them and that have nothing to do with parenting, whether it’s their work, their activism, their art, exploration, education…
And (lastly) this
A child gives an ongoing goal for the couple, while a couple without kids may have to be more intentional about finding a mutual goal or a way to bond as time goes on.
In short, a couple not relying on an external force to hold them together will have to be together because they want to be, and not because something else compels them.
This, again dangerously (because, poor kid), offers up a child as a tool to use in a relationship for shackled, rather than free will, security.
Presenting a child as this kind of tool leads to people getting pregnant to hold onto a partner or fix an unhappy marriage, which is simply and absolutely bad (dare I say selfish?) behavior.
It also suggests that having a genuine, romantic bond over individual and shared interests and continued mutual growth is somehow subordinate to having a child (and possibly little else) in common. One would hope a couple with children would work just as hard at finding other mutual goals or ways to bond, or they’re going to be fooked as soon as that child moves out.
In closing
There were a lot of relevant and helpful suggestions in Kuburic’s piece, but there’s so much subtle pronatalist prodding (that she may not even be aware of) that it was important to point it out — and it is always important to point it out if there’s hope of it ever changing.
*This post originally appeared on Medium.
If you enjoyed this post, you might enjoy my novel THE AGE OF THE CHILD: An overturn of Roe v. Wade has a lasting impact on a woman who never wanted children — and on the country that is ultimately changed by that woman’s unwanted child.
“Something interesting and endlessly thought-provoking that The Age of the Child captures are the multiple sides of pregnancy — wanting to be pregnant, not wanting to be pregnant, and what right the government has in controlling pregnancy. This isn’t the first piece of dystopian fiction to consider these questions. 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.” — Goodreads Review
“This is like no other book out there. Very poignant in 2022 (sadly) and still a unique story.” — Amazon Review
“Scathing social commentary.” — Goodreads Review