No Kidding in NZ: selfish

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10 January, 2022

Monday miscellany: No Kidding version

There are lots of articles/blogs/columns about the Pope's comment that people who have pets instead of children are selfish. I'm not going to go into detail here as others have responded to this far more eloquently than I could. There was a particularly good response here, and I have read others too. Lots of comments about the hypocrisy of a church that requires its priests and nuns to remain celibate and childless, whilst berating those without children. I am just frustrated that such a view continues to be repeated - it is at least the second time he has made the "selfish" comment about people without children.

I was at a gathering on New Year's Day. Meeting a new couple, and along with the hosts, we chatted about all sorts of interesting things. It wasn't until another couple joined us - who knew the first couple through school kids - that the question of children came up. The guy asked it, not to my surprise. I often find that men ask this question. Perhaps they think they're trying to bring the women into the conversation (though my feminist sensibilities bristle at this idea), or perhaps his well of conversational topics was running dry (though he didn't seem to be someone who would ever be lost for words). Anyway, I digress. What was interesting, I thought, was the response of his wife, who turned to me and said that she felt she was moving into a different stage of life, as her children are about to leave home. The implication was that she could relate to me more, and she was being kind to include me in that, even though the two states (empty nest and childless) are very different (as I have written before). I appreciated her sensitivity.

Finally, another snippet of a conversation with my BIL. He was talking about his adult daughter (from his first wife), who apparently has decided to "stop contraception and see what happens." I said that I wished her luck, but that at her age (late 30s), "seeing what happens" is not always the wisest idea and that he should ensure she knows that if she has been actively trying for six months without conception, it might be worth getting checked out. "I'm sure that won't be necessary," he said. "Look at (my sister) and I. We did that, and everything worked out." "Yes," I said. "And so did (DH) and I. It's not always that simple." I was so frustrated. He could say that to me, of all people! But more importantly, I didn't want his daughter to delay seeking help out of a false sense of security. So I gave him some info - statistics related to age, related to infertility in the wider population, etc. His daughter was visiting a day or two later. I wonder if he broached the topic. But I did what I could. I'm pleased about that. For her sake, I tried.

02 August, 2021

Microblog Monday Miscellany

I read some comments on Fbk this morning, and thought, "that's what I'm going to post about." Now I either cannot find the post or when I read it, completely failed to get the inspiration that came to me about 12 hours ago! Sorry.

I've seen that in the last week it has been International Auntie's Day, International Childfree Day, and International Friendship Day. Pick one or all of those, and celebrate yourself, and everyone here. Yay, you! Aunties are awesome, coming to acceptance of a No Kidding or childfree life is awesome, and friendship is what keeps us all going. I thank you for that.

Yesterday, one of NZ's athletes won her fourth consecutive Olympic medal in her event in her fourth or maybe fifth Olympics. I was thrilled for her. But between the Rio Olympics and now Tokyo, she has had two children. And she's been away from them training. So of course, everything she spoke about was about her kids. She then mentioned though that her bronze medal was so much more special than either of her two golds or her silver from previous Olympics. Personally, I doubt she'd have preferred a bronze if she hadn't already had two golds (and a silver!). I understand that the effort required to get back to international standards, whilst raising two children, would have been huge. Enormous. I know that. And even when she said that before she had children, she was 100% selfish, I knew that she probably meant that she had been single-minded on her sport. That's how she won her golds. But I really wish she'd used the phrase "single-minded" rather than "totally selfish." Because her use of "selfish" just criticises or demeans all those athletes who aren't parents. More than half her Olympic team-mates. And really, aren't all high-achieving athletes single-minded? They have to be to reach their very high standards. It is what the rest of us expect of them. So it's not a negative thing. It is something we praise - at least during the Olympics. I just really wish people wouldn't fall back on the old trope that not having children means you must be selfish. It's lazy, it's unkind, and it doesn't tell the full story. Grrrr.

On the bright side, another team of NZ women won a gold medal, and delighted everyone by not only their skill and hard work, but their sincerity, their humour, and their camaraderie. They showed the very best of a group of women working together, they loved each other and each other's families (with children and without), they and reminded everyone that women don't have to be on one side or the other of the "mother divide." That made me smile.

30 October, 2015

A valued life

I’ve been thinking about value a lot lately. In marketing, and especially in marketing services (though not just services), value is an important concept. What has value to one person doesn’t have value to another. Understanding what constitutes value is important in being able to appeal to a particular client, and to understand what aspects of our services we need to promote. I love teaching value to my marketing training clients, because so many have never thought of themselves or their skills that way. Sometimes it can be a shock for them to learn that who they are doesn’t have intrinsic value to the client. Rather, it is what they do for that client that has value. Though of course, who they are contributes to that.

I think that this is the same in real life, and especially life after infertility. Our perspectives determine what we define as success, and what we define as value. I look at some people I know. They’re worked hard all their lives, risen in the corporate world, but have they actually done anything of value?

Single-minded pursuit of success can be an incredibly selfish thing, and can leave a lot of bodies in a person’s wake. Though not always. Still, maybe their corporation has an important product, or maybe by climbing the corporate ladder they’ve been able to mentor others, or provide their families and others with financial support. The value to me isn’t that they’ve become <insert title here>, but what they’ve done as they’ve reached those heady heights. I admire Bill Gates, not for establishing a hugely successful company and becoming a billionaire, but for what he is doing now, his approach towards eliminating malaria and other diseases, his humanity in action.

I watched Survivor the other night. (Confession: I drafted this months ago!) I thought about Jeff whatshisname. He’s spent 20 years of his life overseeing egotistical people fighting for money, and selling that to the world. Some would say he’s successful. He's certainly rich. But would I want to spend my life that way? Has he provided value to the world doing that? You could argue he has provided entertainment for millions. But if he hadn’t, someone else would have filled the void. Maybe, by being a calm and sensible voice, he has role modelled appropriate behaviour. Maybe he’s used his wealth to make the world a better place. Or maybe not. My point is that his prominence and wealth don't on their own make him valuable. I guess it comes down to how we define success.

In the same way, we can look at other people who are parents. When we are so often feeling less than, simply because we haven’t brought another being into the world, or raised another being when their parents couldn’t, I find it can be useful to think about life this way. I’m not trying to diminish the role of parents, simply put it in perspective. Now, some people will assume that if you’re a parent, by creating another person you are contributing enormously to the world. Others would say that it’s not simply a numbers game, positive or negative. But is being a parent inherently valuable? It depends on a huge range of factors.

Whilst I try not to judge, I think to an extent it is inevitable. We respect some people, and not others. That's human nature, even if we're trying not to be judgemental. In doing this, though, I wish our societies assigned value based on how much better a person will leave the world. On who they’ve helped. On whether they have been selfish, or not. On whether they’ve been kind. On their values. Not just on whether they have been a parent. Or not.

07 September, 2015

Unselfish, unconditional love

Last week I visited my elderly mother. She needed to attend a medical appointment two hours away, and my sister who lives close to her was away. Last night, we visited my parents-in-law for Father's Day. We took them a meal they like but don't normally buy for themselves, and I baked a chocolate cake. (Twice, actually, but you don't really need to know that I threw the first one on the floor, as it slipped out of my hands getting it out of the oven!) My mother-in-law commented that we are "the only people they have." Practically, she is correct, as her other three sons and daughters-in-law, and seven grandchildren, all live overseas.

Don't ever tell me that the childless are selfish, when so many of us nurture and care for those who need it, without question, with love and support and generosity and thought.

22 March, 2011

Let me be

There is little that makes me angrier, that I take as a bigger insult, than the stereotype that if someone doesn’t have children, they are selfish. I know that I don’t have (and have never had) someone 100% dependent on me 24 hours a day. But that doesn’t mean I am selfish. Circumstance means that I can choose how I want to spend my day, when a mother can’t. But circumstance doesn’t make me selfish. Circumstance doesn't mean that a mother is unselfish. This is such a complete logical miscalculation that it makes me want to scream. (Steam is coming out of my ears, and my laptop screen is misting up as I type this.)

Recently, this topic has arisen in two conversations. The first was when a friend noted that her mother used to assume people without children were selfish. “She knows different now, though,” said my friend. “She knows about my friends who are unable to have children.” But this statement still assumes that women and men who choose not to have children are selfish. And I dispute that.

The second conversation was when a friend spoke about a man who has been single all his life (although he is a father) and who has, she said, “lived a selfish life.” I stopped her. “He doesn’t sound selfish to me,” I said. “He sounds like a caring person, a good friend, a good father to his son, a decent human being, thoughtful of others. That’s not selfish.” She nodded, but I could tell she wasn’t convinced, despite the fact that we both knew another man who had been married with children for 20 years, who lives and has lived a most extraordinarily selfish life, to the detriment of a great many people. The stereotype though wins out for her, even in the face of evidence to the contrary. She wants to define herself as unselfish, because of all she does for her own children, and so by contrast seems to feel the need to define others who don't do this (including me, her friend, sitting across the table from her) as selfish.

This assumption - that having children means you are not selfish, and not having them means you are - infuriates me, simply because the sheer act of choosing to have children is a selfish one. In fact, I think I would be safe in saying that all of us who have decided to become parents (whether or not we managed it is irrelevant) did it because WE wanted to, because we saw a benefit to it. Yes, we thought we had something to give a child, but ultimately, the decision was for us. This was no more or less a selfish decision than those who decide they don't want to have children.

But many of the reasons parents give for having children are selfish. They often make the following arguments:

I don’t want to be lonely in my old age
I want to see my name/genes live on
I want to experience unconditional love
I want a mini-me

These arguments are all about them.

Parents decide to have children when they know they cannot afford them, bringing children into the world where they are going to struggle financially, where they may not be able to afford to feed the child, to get them medical care, give them good housing or an education, or even spend time with them. They have children when they know they’re in a bad, sometimes dangerous relationship – exposing children to physical or (probably more frequently) emotional danger. They have children simply because they don’t want to/forget to/are too stupid/drunk/high to use contraception.

But they’re parents. So they can’t be selfish, can they? By definition.

Parents want their children to fulfil their own unfulfilled dreams –stage/sports parents are a classic example. I’ve seen children being told what their career options are going to be before they’ve reached puberty; children who are berated for not living up to their parents' expectations, rather than encouraged and praised for trying hard. Parents seek to be proud of their children, whether or not these achievements are the best for their children or not. But surely such pride could not possibly be selfish? Or could it?

Parents use the phrase “as a parent” to imply that they have compassion for all children, compassion I (as a nonparent) couldn’t possible possess. But these parents don’t act on this compassion – they spend money on their children, and their children alone, or they focus on what they want their children to do, rather than what the child wants, or what is in the best interests of the child. I don't see a lot of compassion or unselfishness there.

Of course it goes without saying (though I feel I must say it) that I accept and encourage the protection of children, a stable family life that will nurture a child in the best possible way, on supportive, loving and attentive parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, neighbours, etc. But I feel sometimes that this focus on the nuclear family has gone too far; it has become becoming a form of selfishness entirely accepted and promoted by our society. I don't think that is a positive thing.

But who am I to comment? I can’t judge parents, because I’m not one. I’m just a selfish childless person who can sleep in on Sunday mornings. (Saturdays too, let's face it, ha ha ha!)

I know that the life of parents with children isn’t easy, and requires sacrifices. I’m not discounting that. I know that women with children feel that they have to put themselves last, after children, then work, then husband/partner, and that often there's nothing left for them. In comparison, the life of people without children, those of us who don’t always have to consider others before we make a decision, must seem very free.

But I object to the assumption that this freedom (childlessness) equals selfishness. Perhaps this assumption helps those with children feel better, more noble, about their lifestyle. By labelling themselves as “unselfish” because they have to make sacrifices in terms of time, money and freedom, they feel better about these choices. That’s understandable. But then they seem to have to label people who don’t have to do these things as “selfish.” That is simply unfair, and untrue.

It of course ignores the fact that people without children make sacrifices too. We pay taxes for schools, healthcare, and welfare programmes (in New Zealand there is one called Working for Families that assists families with incomes up to $100,000) that we will never have need to access. This doesn’t bother me too much (apart from the Working for Families threshold), because a) I can afford to pay a little extra, and b) I like to live in a society that looks after its children and its poorest. But it's a burden for people without children who struggle financially. Those of us without children find it more difficult to get annual leave or time off work during school holidays, as parents’ needs take precedence. People without children know that when their friends have children, they slip way down the priority list, below even the "parents of their children's friends" who have so much more in common with the parents than their loyal, old friends without children. At work, people without children work longer hours because parents have to leave to collect children from school, or can't come in on the weekend. People without children are often the ones who end up looking after elderly neighbours or family members. My husband’s three brothers all have children, and all live overseas, pursuing higher salaries and greater career opportunities, whilst my husband and I are now faced with the decision to stay here to care for his aging parents.

So remind me again, why are we the selfish ones?

I could go on and on. I won’t. (I’ve ranted enough).

My point is that no-one deserves to be stereotyped. I am not selfish. I know that. I know people with children who are incredibly selfish and do nothing for anyone but themselves, and I know generous, loving people with children who reach out well beyond their nuclear family. I know people without children who focus on themselves, and I know people without children who give a huge amount to community and family and friends, who are the nicest and most unselfish people in the world. Let’s not define people by some false stereotype. Let’s let people show who they are – selfish or unselfish – by their words, thoughts and actions.