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It's a "big deal" when you're at a new job, and the girls in the lunch room are chit-chatting about their families, and they ask you how old your kids are. And you tell them you don't have any. And they stare at you like you have two heads, and one of them tells you, in a scolding tone, "but it's your christian duty as a woman to have children."
And then, you walk out on your job, because that is the only "christian" thing your Jewish American Princess self can think of to do about the situation and still maintain a sense of dignity, and leave the items on the lunch table intact.
Yeah, I'm going to have kids I don't want just so I can make small talk with people at work...
It's a "big deal" when you're at a new job, and the girls in the lunch room are chit-chatting about their families, and they ask you how old your kids are. And you tell them you don't have any. And they stare at you like you have two heads, and one of them tells you, in a scolding tone, "but it's your christian duty as a woman to have children."
And then, you walk out on your job, because that is the only "christian" thing your Jewish American Princess self can think of to do about the situation and still maintain a sense of dignity, and leave the items on the lunch table intact.
Sounds like a made-up scenario to me. Christian girls telling a "Jewish princess" that she should be a good Christian woman.
It doesn't mean people don't judge anymore - of course they do, often times worse than it was done in the past. It just means that people today have mastered the art of PC and hypocrisy. Nobody just comes out to you and tells you straightforwardly that you should be doing X instead of Y and that they find your ways or lifestyle like an affront to theirs.
We were all taught to keep personal opinions to ourselves and to abstain from advocating a certain lifestyle over another. "Just make your own choices" - that's the contemporary mantra.
And because most people are not terribly bright...it is now widely believed we have all become bastions of kindness, empathy and kumbaya-based understanding towards others. In reality, it simply means we learned to keep our distance from those we perceive to be "different" from us and to to just "tolerate" them. It doesn't mean we have all come to embrace "diversity". This is, in fact, a virtually impossible thing to do as people can only connect emotionally with those largely like themselves - at least in SOME important aspects.
As an example, my sister and I are extremely close. I have children, she is single and childless. Most of the times we DO NOT spend time talking about children as she simply doesn't go through the parenting experience. We do talk about the child-related world as long as the conversation has some intellectual dimension to it (how parenting imperatives have changed compared to our parents' days, how the educational system has changed, what kind of future this young generation is facing etc); but I would never burden her with self-obsessing kind of details like "my child loves cheerios, her ballet class was awesome, I found some really cute bows on sale for my kid). I know I start screaming inside when I hear this kind of talk among mothers...which probably explains why I am not close to ANY mothers; so if I hate it so much, I can only imagine how a childless person would feel about such conversations. My sister and I, however, are extremely similar in other respects as we share an entire worldview and family history - and that's what binds us together. You've GOT TO be very similar in some respects.
That being said, I really do believe that you must be a dim-wit as a parent NOT to understand that the childless-by-choice, while living a lifestyle very different from yours, have done you and your children a big favor by not adding yet another competitor for your child in this already infernal race. Given that such people generally tend to be rather well educated and socially aware, had they taken THEIR turn with parenting, their children would have probably displaced yours.
Regarding childfree v. childless, I wasn't meaning to pick at grammar. Yes, some of us are a bit sticky about the term, since there hasn't *been* a term for those of us who choose not to have children (including adoption, etc.). Childfree is certainly a clunky word, but childless implies something is missing, and for those of us who don't want to be parents, nothing is missing. People who become parents at some point were not childfree because there was apparently something missing, since they chose to become parents.
I realize it might sound like a silly grammatical or political point, but it does matter, as much as language and naming matters. Whenever anyone thought I was childless, or if I used that word, it's as if there was this invisible child who I was without- something missing. I know childfree implies something noxious that is not present (like drug-free and disease-free) and I know there are some people who agree that children are noxious. I point this out only because I recognize the clunk of the word childfree but don't know how how else to describe it in one word. "Non-a-parent-by-choice" is quite a mouthful.
There are millions of different perspectives in the childfree, I'm just one of them. If you want to play the game of group representation, your statement are exactly what I do not like about the "with child" group.
BTW, I could give less of a damn what you think about me or my "childfree posse". I'm going to live my life regardless and spend my paycheck Thursday on myself since I'm happy not to have kids to think about. I'm also going to probably party and pour it up this weekend. That is what makes ME happy not caring for a child. If you are happy raising kids all weekend, that is fine for you, not for me. For sake, lets leave it that way, dammit.
You're going to "party and pour it up?"
That's great. Maybe crash a couple of college keggers? Hit the bong perhaps? Fun times.
AnonChick, I've seen you on these forums enough to know you wouldn't make something like that up, but with 34 years in the workforce, I cannot imagine such a scene ever actually happening in real life. Are you kidding me?
There's no way in hell this would EVER happen where I work. Or, I don't think, where I live in general.
It sounds like something out of a bad movie.
I've posted this in the past, awhile back. It happened. It was bizarre, unexpected, and just WAY out in left field. It was also a temp job, so there wasn't anything I -could- do about it other than just walk away. I told my boss at the agency why I was discontinuing the assignment, and apparently she had heard *hints* of similar situations at this particular company. Apparently most of the employees attended the same church and while not evangelical, they were pretty hard-core old-fashioned "women must have children, that is their main function and the #1 reason to get married" crowd.
Thankfully, there aren't many of those around here. I -did- have another job, a long term permanent position, where the co-workers in a new department I'd transferred to left religious tracts on my desk and tried to convert me and make me hear their testimony. When I went to complain to my manager, I learned she was one of them too. I left that company after 3.5 years. That's off-topic though and has nothing to do with kids.
When I hear someone say, "I don't ever want kids, because I want to party and puke on my shoes," I admit to thinking that person might change his/her mind (or at least the reasons for not wanting kids). Remember, not all young people drink and smoke and use "party" as a verb.
I never did and didn't want children going back to my own childhood. I used to tell people I was going to marry the family dog and have puppies. Sorta clear on the concept, not clear on the details.
Turning 60 this year and never a moment of looking back and wondering or wishing about it. I hear we are called "Early Articulators." I sure was.
I've posted this in the past, awhile back. It happened. It was bizarre, unexpected, and just WAY out in left field. It was also a temp job, so there wasn't anything I -could- do about it other than just walk away. I told my boss at the agency why I was discontinuing the assignment, and apparently she had heard *hints* of similar situations at this particular company. Apparently most of the employees attended the same church and while not evangelical, they were pretty hard-core old-fashioned "women must have children, that is their main function and the #1 reason to get married" crowd.
Thankfully, there aren't many of those around here. I -did- have another job, a long term permanent position, where the co-workers in a new department I'd transferred to left religious tracts on my desk and tried to convert me and make me hear their testimony. When I went to complain to my manager, I learned she was one of them too. I left that company after 3.5 years. That's off-topic though and has nothing to do with kids.
Creepy. My niece in MA experienced some ignorant comments from other women where she worked, in MA. Not religion-related, but "why are you going back to school when you are just going to get married and have kids anyway?". She left the job after she got her Construction Management degree and her boss told her flat-out to look somewhere else because the company didn't promote women. It sounded bizarre to me, but perhaps some smaller firms just have that type of culture.
I work for a public agency. That crap would get you sued.
My office is supposedly a "Christian" office. I know, that kind of stuff would not fly in a public agency, as I have worked in several. However, they're out there.
Regarding not having children, here's what I posted just now on P&OC:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana
I agree with those who say if you don't want kids, don't have them. That said, I can see why people argue the point. It's not really about money, not all that much about freedom, rarely really about a concern for the environment.
I know some couples who intentionally planned to not have kids who found themselves pregnant, one couple after 15 years of marriage. (It was a young marriage.) They decided to have the kids, and became the most doting, in some cases over-involved parents. Parenting is enjoyable, and that's why some parents try to convince non-parents to do it.
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sake, lets leave it that way, dammit.
