I never liked kids much. Perhaps because I was a kid myself, from the ages of, say, 5 to 18, the very idea of holding a baby or watching the little 'uns for a couple of hours filled me with abject terror. It's not that I woke up one day and decided that all children are exactly the same person with exactly the same horrible traits (although it seems many people actually have come to this conclusion, but more on that later). It had more to do with the fact that I'm not 'good with them'. I don't have that selfless motherly instinct. Maybe I would if I were given the opportunity to develop one, but I seem to have missed that opportunity in my upbringing, and thus, teacup humans terrify me.
However. I've noticed lately that I have developed a propensity for defending children - in theory - and I think it's because I'm just that sick of hearing people
Don't get me wrong: I don't care if you don't want to have children. Good. Good on you. I'm happy for you that you've made that decision. I'm not about to question it. If you change your mind later, also good for you. I really couldn't care less, because it is almost meaningless to me at this point whether or not you wish to procreate. That's entirely up to you and I respect your decision.
People who have decided that they don't want to have children often seem to find themselves faced with people who are rude enough to second guess them about it; "You'll change your mind"; "That's what they all say"; "You're too young to have decided a thing like that", etc. I find it stunningly presumptuous and condescending, and it infuriates me just to hear about it. One of the many downsides of the prevalence of this attitude is that deliberately childless people will often feel the need to overcompensate by attacking people who do have, or plan to have, children - or indeed, children themselves.
I'm tired of hearing both sides of the argument, because it is a fundamentally stupid argument. Neither side is wrong. It is a personal choice. It is impossible to be more right in your choice to reproduce (or not) than anyone else is. And honestly, I find it more grating to hear people go on about how they shouldn't have to see children when they go grocery shopping than it is seeing 20-year-old mothers post endless creepy photos of the fruit of their loins on Facebook. You're all nutters. Please find something else to talk about.
Everybody has the right to reproduce/not reproduce and not be judged by it. The world needs people to keep the human race alive, but it also needs people who are all like, "hmm actually, no, I don't want kids..." to stop the human race exploding into the stratosphere.
ReplyDeleteWhen we were little, a family of five young kids, Mum and Dad used to get really upset. They'd take us out to SPECIFICALLY FAMILY RESTUARANTS for special occasions, like a birthday (which was a really really big deal in our household because we lived in the country and never went out because we were far too poor) and they chose family-friendly restuarants because they didn't want to annoy people who were on some sexy date. People would still complain about the kids (although, some would compliment us - we were really well behaved) in a fucking family restuarant. It was insane. Why would you go to a family restuarant (like, Cobb and Co, for example) where you know there's going to be kids if you don't want to be around them???
So, that probably could have been written a lot more eloquently, but I have trouble visualizing the text in this tiny comment box :)
That's craziness to me. Unless the venue is R18, I can't see any reason why you should have any right to bitch about children being present, any more than you should bitch about there being black people or blondes there.Some folks are so divorced from reality they seem to have convinced themselves people only become people when they hit a certain age (which age, I wonder? It must vary a bit. Your humanity is apparently dependent on an arbitrary number of years having passed since your birth.)
ReplyDeleteNo, I don't savour the idea of having spaghetti thrown at me by a screaming toddler while I'm trying to eat, but
a) remember the last time that happened to you? No? Me neither.
b) suck it up. Seriously. Shit happens. I'm afraid it's not actually that big a deal in the grander scheme of things, and you're going to have to get over it and continue with your life.