Kamala Harris

How Will It Be for the Childless Under President Trump?

Sue Fagalde Lick abortion and childlessness, childfree, childless, childless not by choice , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It has been a week since the man who said childless cat ladies were miserable and didn’t have a stake in the future of the country and the man who helped shut down abortion access to millions of American women were elected as our incoming vice president and president.

I don’t usually talk politics here, and I will delete comments debating what’s good or bad about Donald Trump or Kamala Harris or dissing me because I voted blue or anyone else for voting red, but I am worried about what this means for all of us.

As Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz said about abortion, IVF, and other reproductive concerns, “it’s nobody’s damn business.” I agree. It’s between a woman and her partner.

Since the US Supreme Court voted down the national right to abortion in the Dobbs decision in 2022, numerous states have outlawed the procedure, forcing pregnant women to travel long distances or do without the care they needed. As is frequently testified in the liberal press, these are not all women who simply don’t want to have a baby. They are victims of rape or incest or have medical issues that require ending much-desired pregnancies.

While Trump has said he won’t outlaw IVF or birth control, his administration could make it more difficult to access reproductive assistance. It might limit insurance coverage for contraception. Will it be more difficult to get a vasectomy or a hysterectomy? I hope not.

It’s possible we’re crying “the sky is falling” when nothing will actually change from the way it is right now, at least not legally.

But attitudes seem to have changed. We hear more people insisting that those of us without children are defying the laws of God and nature. They don’t understand that most of us didn’t choose not to have children. For many different reasons, the parenting path was not open to us, and it breaks our hearts. To have to defend ourselves on top of that painful loss against people who just don’t get it does not seem fair.

Then again, is that any different than it was before?

I have been watching “The Golden Bachelorette” on TV. The finale was last night. I won’t spoil it for you if you haven’t watched it yet. At last week’s “Men Tell All” episode, every single “bachelor” had his children in the audience. Joan, the 61-year-old bachelorette, is very vocal about her devotion to her children and grandchildren. And that’s great, but I wonder if childless applicants were intentionally screened out of being on the show?

If I were on the “Bachelorette,” I wouldn’t have any offspring in the audience. I probably wouldn’t have anyone. They wouldn’t choose a chubby old writer like me, and I wouldn’t do it anyway, but still, the lack of childless people is noticeable.

We can second-guess the election results. Maybe Harris talked too much about abortion and not enough about the economy. Maybe she just didn’t have enough time after President Biden withdrew from the race. Maybe our country is still not ready for a woman president, especially one who is a stepmother but never gave birth to her own children. Maybe voters just like Trump better. Maybe Americans really do want to go back to a more traditional time. I don’t know.

I don’t want to talk about who voted for what, but I do want to ask: How are you? Are you worried about being childless in this new America? Did your childlessness have anything to do with how you voted? Did the US election spark fights between you and your partner or others close to you? Let’s talk about it, lovingly please.

Photo by Nesrin u00d6ztu00fcrk on Pexels.com–She looks happy!

Further reading:

“People around the world are appalled by Trump’s win, but women have been gripped by a visceral horror” | Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett | The Guardian

“What Trump has said about birth control, and what he could do as president” – Good Morning America

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Enough with the ‘Childless Cat Lady’ craziness!

Sue Fagalde Lick childless women, women without children, women without grandchildren , , , , , , , , , , , ,

My Google alerts about childlessness are all about one thing these days: what Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance said three years ago, how the country is going to hell because it’s being run by miserable childless cat ladies. That isn’t even true. It’s mostly being run by white men with wives and kids they show off at election time.

In 2021, Vance also talked about how the childless should pay more taxes. But in the U.S, those of us without children already do pay more. Parents subtract a personal deduction for each child, along with deductions for childcare and other expenses. So enough of all that.

Vance’s wife Usha has been trying to soften the blow from her husband’s comments. He was joking, she says. Vance himself says he was simply saying “American families are good and the government should be more pro-family.” He blames the media for blowing up a sarcastic remark he made before he even ran for Senate.

We all say stupid stuff we want to forget about. On the Megyn Kelly show, Vance said, “It’s not a criticism of people who don’t have children. I explicitly said in my remarks … this is not about criticizing people who for various reasons don’t have kids. This is about criticizing the Democratic Party for becoming anti-family and anti-child.”

So, okay. Democrats are as family-oriented as anyone else, except that they push for women’s right to choose and are more open to non-traditional partnerships. In politics, people exaggerate for effect. It’s happening on both sides.

Maybe things will calm down now that Democrat Kamala Harris has chosen Tim Walz, a married man with two children, for her running mate.

But Vance’s comments bring up the age-old cliche of the “career gal,” the woman too busy with her work to have children. That term makes me wince. How about you? We see it in movies, read about it in books. This woman is always hard-hearted, cold, mean even. She has no time for love, family, or sentiment. She is not a hugger.

She is also not real. Many of us love our work and want to give it as much of our time as possible. But that does not mean we don’t also treasure family. It doesn’t mean we don’t long for the children and grandchildren we may never have. It doesn’t mean stepchildren can’t be as precious as kids to whom we give birth.

Families come in all shapes. Some are like the big families I see coming into church with a mother, father, and five or more children. Some are a man, woman, and kids from a former partnership. Some are a combination of foster and adopted kids. Some are just a man and a woman, two women or two men, or just a woman or man and cat or dog. Let’s support all sorts of families, including yours and mine.

Do we want to live in a country where we can’t run for president or any other office unless we have a “Leave It to Beaver” family with a loving spouse and children? I don’t.

And please, let’s stop talking about Vance and “childless cat ladies.” The cat owners I know are very fine people, and they vote.

What do you think about all this? Please, no ugly fights over Trump/Vance vs. Harris/Walz. But let’s talk about it. And then let’s get back to more important issues that have nothing to do with politics.

Photo by Sam Lion on Pexels.com

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How do we respond to complaints about “childless cat ladies” running for office?

Sue Fagalde Lick childless world leaders, legacy , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Politics is something I usually avoid here. One would think having or not having children has nothing to do with all that mess happening on the news these days. But things have been said that cannot be ignored.

Once again, as has happened in so many other countries, people are questioning whether U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris should run for president when she has no children of her own. Like many of us, she has stepchildren, but has not given birth.  

Harris is not the first to receive this kind of criticism. A few years back, I wrote about childless women leaders in other countries who faced criticism because they didn’t have children. Among them were British Prime Minister Theresa May, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian, former Australia Prime Minister Julia Gillard, and the first woman premier in Tasmania, Lara Giddings. How could these childless “career women” possibly understand the needs of families, people argued.

There will always be voters who ignore all the amazing things these women have accomplished and focus on their lack of children. Their intelligence, skill, and heart don’t matter if they can’t lead a beautiful family onto the stage for photo ops.

In a 2021 interview now going viral, Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance called Harris one of the “miserable childless cat ladies.” She and others like her have no direct stake in the US since they are not mothers, he said.

He has even implied that those without children should not be allowed to vote.

Say what?????

What about all those people who would love to have children but can’t for physical or circumstantial reasons? What about people who choose to devote their lives to other things? Are they less valuable human beings? Of course not.

I don’t know which side of the political spectrum you favor, but this is not a blue or red issue. It’s all the colors. As older politicians give way to younger ones, more and more will not fit the traditional family mold. The birth rate is going down. The traditional picture of two heterosexual parents, two kids, a dog, and a house with a white picket fence is fading away.

I just finished watching the TV series “The Good Wife.” In it, our heroine Alicia and her politician husband Peter pose with their kids for the cameras as if they were a happy family when in fact they aren’t even together. Everyone believes Peter would lose the election if people know his marriage was a sham. In fiction as in real life, the implication is you can’t win unless you have that traditional family. If I were running for office, I would be standing up there alone. Would that disqualify me? Would it make me a “miserable cat lady”?

Impossible. I’m allergic to cats. And I’m not miserable.

The United States has never had a woman president. Harris will have to fight plenty of discrimination for being female and non-white. Her childless status adds another layer.  Honestly, if she had children, she would probably be accused of neglecting them for her work. That’s not an issue with male candidates because it’s assumed their wives are taking care of the kids.

Despite our lack of children, you and I do have a stake in the future. We contribute in so many ways beyond giving birth to baby humans. We work, create, teach, organize, and provide care. We love and live, and yes, we do contribute. We do leave a legacy. We are fully human and capable. In a world where the birth rate is going down, where marriage and parenting are no longer assumed, we can no longer require parenthood as a qualification for office.

Let’s talk about this. We don’t need to rant about Trump or Biden here. Keep the focus on childlessness. Can a candidate without children run successfully for office? Why do some people think they can’t? How can we convince them we’re as qualified as anyone? Is it different for men than it is for women? What do you see as our contributions to the future?

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No Kids? She Says, ‘Hit the Road, Jack!’

Sue Fagalde Lick childless aunts, childless stepmothers, Leaving a childless marriage, men who don't want children , , , , , ,

I received this comment from Amanda yesterday on a post published here in July. It’s so powerful I’m sharing it here so you don’t miss it. I welcome your responses here or at the original post.

Amanda wrote:

I asked my partner if he was on the path to marriage and children. He was my partner of 2 years. I was nearly 31.

He said no and, though I loved him dearly dearly dearly, I ended it instantly. “It’s done,” I said. He vomited and cried. He did not ask to have my back though.

I was one of those women who had an excruciating yearning for a child. At the very innermost place. I cried tens of thousands of tears over the years when friends, sisters and celebrities were pregnant or had small kids. I was green with envy.

I knew I would rather have a sperm donor than a husband if it came down to it.

I then threw myself into dating and talked about having children very very early in dating. Cut, cut, cut if they didn’t want kids.

My now husband ‘sort of’ wanted kids ‘eventually’. I told him there’d be no second DATE if there’d be no kids eventually.

I’m not going to hurt anyone by mentioning if/how many kids we have. Just to say–speak about it frankly and early. Please don’t waste your time “not talking about it” for several months into dating.

Make it a non-negotiable EARLY if it’s THAT important to you.

And really live it. Don’t be swayed into dating ANYONE who says they won’t have kids (if it’s that important to you).

Hope my post wasn’t offensive. Please please have the guts to call time on a relationship if you have that innermost painful yearning for a child.

What do you think? I welcome your comments

*****

Saturday night, with most of America, I watched U.S. President-Elect Joe Biden and Vice-President-Elect Kamala Harris give their victory speeches before a crowd watching from their cars due to the pandemic. Then their families joined them on stage as fireworks filled the air. Watching them hug each other, I felt that giant emptiness again. Why didn’t I have kids???

But wait. I just did some research. Kamala—I should call her Vice President Harris–has not given birth to her own children. She has two young adult stepchildren, Ella and Cole, offspring of her husband Doug. The other kids were her niece and grand-nieces, whom she obviously adores. So . . . in some ways, she’s one of us.

If you check her out on Wikipedia, the list of her achievements–senator, California Attorney General, criminal prosecutor, activist, children’s book author–is crazy long. She did not marry until six years ago, when she was in her late 40s, so the opportunity to have children slipped away. Harris clearly adores her stepkids, who call her “Momala,” as well as her sister’s children and grandchildren. We all know how difficult stepparenting can be, but she seems to be making it work.

Whatever your political views, you’ve got to give a shout-out for Kamala as the first female VP and for what a childless woman can accomplish.

Interesting reading: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2020/11/09/doug-emhoff-kamala-harris-marriage/

Comment, comment, comment. It’s too quiet out here.