Writer's Block: Go it alone

[eumelia]

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Yes.

Very obvious and self-explanatory question.

If you don't have children you're not a "real woman".
You have to be a "real woman" in order to be a Mother.
If you're single, you're a failure anyway.

Being child-free is a kind of scarlet letter on your social standing - you're refusing to contribute to the human race, refusing to be a responsible adult and all that junk.

*sigh*

The answer to all those questions (thought the holiday part is ambiguous) is "Yes".

Comments

[mao4269.livejournal.com]

And at the same time, if someone is a Mother (or even has the genitalia and gender expression associated with one) she can't be a Good Worker. I'm preaching to the choir, and really just said that to be able to give you a link to a new blog (http://newmodelmommy.blogspot.com/2009/12/blog-is-born.html) on the subject. Despite that topic, it might've been more relevant to your previous gender-related post...The author is moved to Israel, volunteered for the army, got assigned as a secretary (she had a bachelor's from University of Chicago, which clearly meant that her talents were based used as a secretary for a higher-ranked man), nearly poisoned her C.O. with awful coffee in order to get reassigned (prison would've been a reassignment, too...), wound up as a combat medic., and said that the hardest part of that job was getting the soldiers with whom she worked not to see her as a Woman [in need of protection] but as a fellow [male] Soldier.

I think the holiday part of the Writers' Block prompt assumes that the people answering are middle class U.S.ians, for whom Family Time tends to be almost entirely at holidays. In the Israeli context where the bulk of Friday nights are Family Time "the holidays" has different connotations.

[brewsternorth.livejournal.com]

I think the holiday part of the Writers' Block prompt assumes that the people answering are middle class U.S.ians

Most Writer's Block questions have seemed to assume the interlocutor is a middle-class US American. That's why I seriously dislike that feature on LJ.

And so much agreement with the OP.

[db-en.livejournal.com]

For the record, I disagree.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

You would.

[db-en.livejournal.com]

Society puts too much pressure on people to have children.
Society puts too much pressure on people to loop pretty.
Society puts too much pressure on people to be smart.
Society puts too much pressure on people to get out of bed in the morning.
Society puts too much pressure on people to go to school.
Society puts too much pressure on people to sleep on mattresses.
Society puts too much pressure on people to use toilet paper.

If only it didn't, we'd all be happy.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Society's pressures are a wee bit too much for someone m'thinks.

Maybe you need a holiday in an old age home where you can sleep on a stiff board with Depends.

That'll surely make you happy.

[db-en.livejournal.com]

Depends, I know. On what you study in university.

[51stcenturyfox.livejournal.com]

I only feel slightly bad about being childfree because I'm an only child, and my mother has no grandchildren.

But she buys the dogs SWEATERS. So I think her affections have found an outlet.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Being the Aunt of four... I feel no qualms about eventually ending up with no children.

I'm still unsure as to whether I want to have kids or not.

[caledonius72.livejournal.com]

Hell yes. There's something seriously wrong with you if you don't want to marry and have children. ARGHHHH!

I'm 37 and have been in a committed relationship with another man for 10 years. I made up my mind and my peace about not having kids years ago. My sister, who is 4 years younger, is just divorcing her husband, no kids for her either and I doubt for a while yet. I think she wants to have children, but on her terms, not just to suit others.

My parents have never ever mentioned grandkids. I think they'd like them, but it's a can of worms they don't want to open. A veritable pandora's box.

My life is full of children, but none of them are my own, I just borrow them from time to time and try to keep their eyes open to different ways to be, rather than the heteronormative.

And the writer's block is kinda western-christian, but sometimes it does prompt on stuff that makes you think.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

My life is full of children, but none of them are my own, I just borrow them from time to time and try to keep their eyes open to different ways to be, rather than the heteronormative.

My life as the "Cool" auntie, right there :)

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

I was thinking about this just today, because I am one of those middle class U.S.-ians who will be spending time with the extended family during the holidays (which for me is actually a rare event). To wit, I was wondering whether the fact that my younger sister has a boyfriend, and that my oldest female cousin (she's 1.5 years older than I am) just had her first kid after getting married 1.5 years ago (all of which, seriously, just makes me wonder how we can actually be related), will distract my relatives from the fact that I am single. And that I am going to graduate school, which is another thing I'm not looking forward to explaining myself on. So yes, the amorphous but real social pressure will be briefly incarnated in my relatives.

I'm still on the fence about whether I even want children. I might actually say that to my relatives just to see what they say.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Is going to Graduate school considered a no-no without being an established relationship?

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

My relatives take a very...not dim, but instrumentalized, view of education. My grandfather said to me, when I mentioned that I was arms-deep in applications, that I'd already gone to school, why did I want to go back? They think I should have tried to get a corporate-type job somewhere.

ETA: And they seem to think I'm a bit weird for being single and not desperate to be in a relationship. They thought the same about my sister when she was single, too. This is all partly geographic in nature--my extended family are from the Midwest, while my nuclear family are from the East Coast, and our attitudes about a lot of things cleave along those lines.