The Baby Boon

I just recently finished reading "The Baby Boon: How Family-Friendly America Cheats the Childless" by Elinor Burkett.  How can I describe this book aside from "I really, really liked it"?  This book perfectly describes the discrimination faced by the childless and childfree and how the U.S.  Burkett goes into how society slowly changed to accomodate the "needs" - and I do use that term loosely - of upper middle class parents and how companies sought to become more "family-friendly" by accomodating working parents - nay, working mothers - so they can juggle both work and family.  She points out how mainstream feminism neglected those who have chosen to not have children by focusing primarily on working mothers and using the terms "women" and "mothers" interchangeably.  They are NOT the same thing!  Not all women are mothers or want to be mothers.  One thing that I loved about this book is that Burkett pointed out that these tax credits and tax cuts only aid upper middle class families and not families that truly need it: the poor.  As someone who lives in the third poorest region in the United States, tax cuts for the poor is a major issue for me and my loved ones and it pisses me off that the government is giving all these tax breaks to people who don't really need it (no, yuppie parents, you DON'T need that 4,000 sq. ft. house or that brand new lexus.  You'll do just fine in a smaller home and driving a used vehicle).  There was something in this book that really stood out to me and that was what Pat Schroeder had said about pregnancy being a voluntary disability that I found ridiculous.  She said that pregnancy is like a sports injury or a venereal disease - it's voluntary.  I found the comparison completely ridiculous.  Nobody chooses to get a venereal disease and athletes don't choose to get a sports injury.  Incidentally, not everybody chooses to get pregnant.  Pregnancy is only a voluntary disability if the person actually wants to be pregnant.  It is in no way comparable to VD or an injury.  Those are things NOBODY wants.  Burkett closes the book detailing all the things that every CFer is already familiar with: bingoes, preferential treatment shown to parents, and the reactions the CF receive when they make their frustrations known.

The Childless Revolution

I've started reading more and more books on childfreedom and decided to start with Madelyn Cain's "The Childless Revolution: What it Means to be Childless Today".  I thought it was a pretty interesting book that outlined the three types of childless women: childless by chance (those who are unable to have children), childless by choice (AKA childfree) and childless by environment (those who wanted kids but never had the opportunity).  I admit I found it hard to relate to some of these women.  I got the CFers but I didn't really get some of the women who wanted to have kids but couldn't for one reason or another.  All I kept thinking was "those are the kodak moments you're seeing.  That's not the reality".  I noticed that only one of these women was told the truth: that parenting is hard work and not all sunshine and rainbows.  This book also made me realize just how ingrained the idea "it's different when it's your own!" is in our society. We really need to do away with it.  Just because a person gives birth doesn't mean that they'll develop this ~*magical bond*~ with their child or...heck, even if the kid loves the parent doesn't mean it's gonna stay that way forever (when I was a kid I absolutely loved my mom and thought she was the greatest ever and now...I definitely don't think that).  Hell, I'm willing to wager that this kind of thinking is partly why so many kids are stuck in the foster system*.  With that said, I would recommend the book.  Next CF book I'm reading: "The Baby Boon: How Family-Friendly America Cheats the Childless" by Elinor Burkett.


*There are a bunch of reasons why this is, mainly having to do with race and sex.