From Slate: http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/roiphe/2012/04/childlessness_remains_a_taboo_.html
Or is childlessness still a taboo?
By Katie Roiphe
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Rationally, of course,
we know that not everyone should have kids, and that not everyone wants
to have kids, and that life without kids is an entirely plausible and
even pleasant possibility; and yet, do many of us secretly feel sorry
for or condescend to or fail to understand women who don’t have
children? Do we assume they are bravely harboring some deep
disappointment, do we think they can’t possibly be happy with things as
they are, that there is some brittleness, some emptiness at the center?
This is the argument of the French feminist, Elisabeth Badinter, and I think she is probably right.
A recent Pew Poll
found that one in five women in her early 40s has not had a child. So
the decision, or the situation, is not exactly exotic, and yet to many, a
woman without a child is still a tragic or at least disappointed
figure.
Taboo is a strong and unsubtle
word, probably, for how we feel about childlessness; it might be more
precise to say that the shrewder, wilier form that taboo takes is
probably something closer to pity, as if the childless woman has somehow
not pulled it together, as if she is damaged or thwarted. Especially if
that childless woman conforms to our clichéd narrative, and say has a
dog or cat, or a dog and a cat, or multiple dogs or cats: the general
interpretation is that she is sad, not that she is doing a different
thing.
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