The New Mom Rationalization Engine
Which one is more selfish: new moms or child-less women, pray tell? It's not always the category you think.
Because everything in modern American culture needs to be ideological or consume a 48-hour news cycle in some way, one new thing we have is how Kamala Harris is unfit to be President because she’s never carried a baby to term. Lot of confusion around that, since we’ve had 46 Presidents who have never carried a baby to term and here we are, but OK. I get it. There is a very big, very common argument around childless women that they must be “selfish” in some way, and/or “cat ladies” who “hate themselves.” This completely ignores a bunch of other factors, including:
Miscarriages
Infertility
PCOS
Timing
Never found the right partner
Career-focused
Concerned about the world
Concerned about their finances
Etc.
It’s kinda repugnant to put all childless women in one boat when you don’t know the story of each woman you’re putting into that boat. For example, my wife wants children biologically, but we haven’t gotten there yet — and may never. That’s not about her being “selfish” or “hating herself.” It’s about biology. So, let’s just clear that up immediately.
But I do find this “selfish” argument interesting. Have you ever met a pregnant woman or a new-ish mom? They are some of the most incredibly selfish people on the planet. Pregnant women frequently demand to be feted, down to the idea of a “sprinkle,” which is ostensibly a repeat shower, often for the same gender. (Just pass down the clothes and toys, Molly.) They boss people around and often treat women who aren’t in the club like shit. I’ve seen my wife deal with this for years now. Pregnant women are utterly selfish.
Now, you can easily take that and say “They’re creating life, they deserve the right to be selfish.” That might be true, replete with a side of Instagram “cooking it!” captions. But ideally, if you’re about to be a mom — whether you’re six weeks away, six months away, etc. — shouldn’t that be the most empathetic time of your life, gearing up for that? Knowing the journey that lies ahead? I would reasonably think so, but I’ve seen any number of baby showers and other incidents where a pregnant woman just snaps at her friend of 20 years, i.e. “I wanted it THIS way!”
Then you come to new moms. The common argument on why new moms are selfish, or maybe insular/ignore their friends (which I agree with them doing) is that they are “keeping this young thing alive.” I somewhat agree with that, although I think that semantic language is left over from cavemen times. In reality, what keeps a newborn alive is not so much the parents — especially since one or both parents often have to rush back to work because of late-stage capitalism — but the community (neighbors and grandparents) and, honestly, the first-world supply chain. Jeff Bezos has kept a lot of newborns alive and swaddled. But it’s easier for us to claim the mom does that, because it keeps in line with maternal branding.
I personally do think new moms should be selfish and insular, because they should focus on bonding with their kid and figuring out their cadence with their husband. When I see new moms immediately bouncing into the social realm, that’s always weird. I suppose, unfortunately, you can criticize a woman for anything, usually without reason.
It’s just comical to me that we automatically deign a childless woman as “selfish,” when in fact many childless women are fine — they made that decision, or biology and economics made that decision for them — and often the Queen Bee Bitches of the Ball are pregnant women and new moms.
I had a friend of a friend get pregnant recently. For context on this woman, she designed a PowerPoint for her husband on how to propose to her. I think you get the general drift from that anecdote. As soon as she got pregnant, it was what I can only assume is how her bridesmaid situation unfolded: she basically turned her friends into various battalion pieces, i.e. “Serve me in this way.” At her shower, she dressed down her friend because the tabletops for people to mill about at were not the right height or placed in the right area.
That’s selfish as shit to me.
Again, we justify that shit by saying “She’s baking a baby.” I get it, but aren’t you a little bit sad for that baby as a result? I would be.
Meanwhile, I know tons of women who have had 2–3+ miscarriages or can’t conceive, and while they’re sad and it’s hard for them, they don’t behave like that.
So maybe the “selfish narrative” needs to go the other way?
As one of those childless women who is frequently the target of bile about what a selfish/lazy/overly-ambitious/narcissistic/lonely/loser/whore/frigid/choose-whatever-insult-you want-by-men-mad-I-didn't-have-any-babies bitch I am, I'm not going to argue with you here.
But I'd point out that 1. Pregnant women and new moms did not always act like this...it seems like a new thing from the social media era, 2. Not all of them act like this, and 3. I don't think even most of them do. But yes, some of them do. And are seemingly some of the most self-centered people possible, though they won't see it that way because the baby isn't them, even though it kind of is.
I think likely these are women who have ALWAYS been attention and power loving women who enjoy bossing people around. They just finally got the perfect excuse to let those impulses run wild at full bore. The self-designated Devoted Dad Of the Year types do the same thing, they just usually wait til the kid is a toddler and can tell him how great he is. They're just people who finally have the perfect excuse to let their ego flag fly, in a socially acceptable (somewhat) way. It's not the parenthood. If they could get away with ordering people around and demanding that everyone defer to and admire them for other reasons, they'd do that too.
Birthing a child is but one star in the constellation of those difficult personal experiences that exposes to the world someone’s true character.
A person who acts selfishly in ways writ large also acts that way in the small daily interactions of life (e.g. jumping straight back into social media).
Behavior you describe should not be excused as a bout of temporary insanity. That is a person worth avoiding 100% of the time. I kind of pity the man who put her in the family way.