Elisabeth Badinter is variously described as a philosopher, an elite professor, “a doyenne of French intellectual thought”, and an archaeo-feminist (whatever that means). She’s sure to be called a lot worse as her new book, Conflit, is translated and sold around the world.
Badinter is a French woman who argues the following points:
- That women are losing the freedom they have gained in recent decades because of the pressure to be a perfect mother – because they are now enslaved to their “tyrant” children.
- That home births and breastfeeding and other natural processes are mistakenly portrayed as a wiser and more authentic way of mothering.
- That the ecological movement is part of the problem, because its disdain for disposable nappies, pre-packaged food, and other modern marvels are forcing women to again be chained to the house once they have children.
She says, in short, that babies have become “the best ally of masculine domination.”
She does sound a little like a delightfully bitter old bint hoping to palm off more copies of her book by intentionally outraging the masses.
But she makes quite a few good points.
We all know people who are slaves to their children. God knows there are far too many parents who insist their obnoxious youngster is an angel, their dullard son is a genius, their poo-finger-painting daughter is a budding artiste. Who give up all their adult pleasures to make little Johnny happy.
And of course there are sanctimonious and judgemental folk out there who take pride in the amount of pain they suffer during childbirth, who relish cooking everything from biodynamic, organic scratch, and who relentlessly deride those who choose to take a few shortcuts.
But there have always been and will always be parents and children who are pains in the proverbial. All the rest of us can do is avoid them at all costs….
... only that’s not really possible.
Because the moral righteousness is infectious. It has spread through society like a virus, little guilt molecules that you cannot help but inhale.
I’m not a clucky sort of person. At all, as it happens. But I am now of a certain age where people who barely know me suggest I should get moving and get pregnant (a suggestion I promise to respond to one day with a tragic face and the retort that, unfortunately, I lost my womb in a bizarre fishing accident).
So every now and then I think about what it would be like to have a kid. And the feeling that swiftly follows that thought is a warm flood of gratitude for the contraceptive pill.
Because I couldn’t do it the “right” way.
I’d probably sneak a couple of glasses of wine while preggo.
I would want epidurals (can you get a general anaesthetic?), and an elective caesarean. I would want a nanny and whatever nappies are easiest. If I couldn’t get a babysitter I would take the kid to parties and leave it in the host’s bedroom where its cries could not be heard.
As for co-sleeping – it’s dangerous and that’s a good enough reason for me to take the selfish route and say ‘never!’.
I’d refuse to pay for gadgets and widgets (or expensive hand-crafted toys), and the kid (once I weaned it off the formula bottle) would have to make do with whatever I was making for dinner. Maybe I’d go a bit easy on the chilli.
I’m sure (or rather, I’m assured) that if you just have a kid you’ll love it. Love is not the issue. Elevating a child to godlike status is the issue.
So. I couldn’t be a good mother, in fact I’d be a bad mother. And in that case, I’d rather not be a mother at all.
Just as well I’m not even clucky.
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