5 ms·

There is a massive cultural pressure on women in America (and in many countries) to have children. Its in the movies, magazines, and comes up amazingly often in

by windlep 11y ago

There is a massive cultural pressure on women in America (and in many countries) to have children. Its in the movies, magazines, and comes up amazingly often in casual conversations. Regardless of what people say, it also comes with a social stigma in different cases. The point of this type of attention is to highlight the validity of making this choice in the hope that it might reduce the cultural pressure. I'm sure many men don't care, since the pressure is generally placed on women.

Zikes 11y ago
> I'm sure many men don't care, since the pressure is generally placed on women. As a man with a mother who asks when she'll get grandchildren at every opportunity, I'm going to have to disagree with you there.
- johnlampsont 11y ago
  Why don't you ask her to mind her own business?
- dogma1138 11y ago
  As an almost 30 with my s/o, her parents my parents asking the same, and my male friends who are 30 or over and dating getting fuzzed about kids on their 4th date I can also attest to that. While women have a cultural and physicall biological clock that ticks men aren't really in the clear. Society needs procreation to survive and women still haven't mastered asexual reproduction.
  - Zikes 11y ago
    It's funny how often it's brought up even before marriage. Also, men have a huge legal disincentive to have kids anymore. If the relationship doesn't work out, you're on the hook for ~18 years of child support payments, and that whole system is designed to make men out to be nothing but a paycheck.
    - Vraxx 11y ago
      > It's funny how often it's brought up even before marriage. What do you mean by this? Do you mean that the topic of children should not be brought up before marriage between two people in a relationship? Or do you mean that the topic gets brought up by family members before you're married?
      - Zikes 11y ago
        I mean how often the subject is brought up by friends and family before marriage is. It's more often I get asked about kids than "when are you going to pop the question?" Within a relationship, though, discussing kids and such are definitely something that should be done well before marriage.
        Vraxx 11y ago
        Ah okay, I figured that since the rest of your argument seemed reasonable, but I wanted to verify since it struck me as odd. As for your actual meaning, that is definitely a weird yet amusing trend. I haven't really heard much of either from my family
    - dogma1138 11y ago
      On that I some what agree, men that pay child support should get joint custody / visitation rights unless there is risk of harm to the child, it's pretty bleak that men are still forced to pay child support and the mother can claim that they have no rights to ever see the child. I also believe that child support should be for the child, the mother should not be able to use it for anything which isn't directly related to childcare, and it should be in it's base a flat amount based on living costs rather then a percentage of your income (unless you willingly want to pay more). That said men have very easy way to avoid children and that's to use a condom or to pick a partner who does not want them, if you are both willingly make one or take on the decision to keep it own up to it the child should not suffer because of that. Forcing women to have an abortion will never happen, forcing them to give the child up for adoption will never happen, men and women are not identical and so will never be truly equal in every regard, it's not like women can force sperm out of you without assault or rape. And if there's some extreme case when fraud has actually been committed e.g. she intentionally sabotaged contraception or went "Satisfaction" on you taken your sperm while you were unconscious (which is technically rape) you should be able to sue for a weaver.
  - scott_s 11y ago
    Asking potential partners if they want to have children is a normal part of dating, and not at all the same as a pestering relative asking "when, when, when?" (I am over 30, single and dating, and I expect it to come up naturally after you've spent enough time talking. Fourth date sounds reasonable.)
    - dogma1138 11y ago
      I'm not saying it shouldn't I'm just saying there isn't some magical barrier that protects men against pressure to have children. Both men and women have a biological clock, women start to produce less eggs and those that are produced are of lesser quality, same thing happens with sperm. There is direct correlation between health problems, IQ and various other factors to the age of both parents not just the woman. At least as far as Europe goes from my personal experience having kids trumps marriage here, you'll see far more unmarried couples in a long term committed relationship (2-3+ years) with kids that are not married than in the US.
      - scott_s 11y ago
        You make a valid point, but I don't think the example I responded to falls under an example of unfair pressure.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- tptacek 11y ago
  Men and women get some pressure to have kids, but women get more of it, for pretty obvious reasons.
rayiner 11y ago
Is that pressure illegitimate? People "opting out" of having kids aren't opting out of social instruments that presuppose other peoples' investment into raising kids. Not just the obvious stuff like Social Security, either. Facebook stock would be worth a lot less if every tweenager that will ever live had already been born. The only unfortunate part is that the pressure falls disproportionately on women.
- LanceH 11y ago
  I think it falls on men and women differently. Women have a clock with regards to children, so it is more visible like that. Men are definitely pressured to be successful so they can provide for the presumptive family.
- auvrw 11y ago
  > Is that pressure illegitimate? imo, yes. saying there are "social instruments" just adds another ring around the kernel. more economically developed countries tend to have lower birth rates. could be causal? funny this was posted around thanksgiving when many people in the united states -- both male and female, albeit in different forms and degrees -- will be feeling it.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    If it's causal, it's a problem with the system of economic development, because outside of Logan's Run, economically developed countries need to replace their populations in order to fund retirements --- not to mention drug discovery, ever-increasing Internet bandwidth, and new PS4 games. Pretty much the whole of western civilization is organized around and dependent on families having kids.
    - idlewords 11y ago
      Drug discovery is an unfortunate example, as we've gotten steadily worse at it as our population has grown. It's odd that everyone believes we have developed a lot of miracle drugs in the last 30 years.
nsxwolf 11y ago
And to that I say, so what? Grow a thicker skin. We need to write articles because someone's being needled by their mother into having children?
- coldtea 11y ago
  Oh, the irony. You're asking him to "grow a thicker skin" about close relatives bickering him (and the related social pressure), when you can't even hold from expressing your annoyance about mere ARTICLES that you don't have to read and can simply skip.
  - nsxwolf 11y ago
    I'm not starting a movement. Or a subreddit.
- lordCarbonFiber 11y ago
  Did you not read the article? The issues described here were one anecdote about one woman fighting to be allowed to have her tubes tied at 30 and another talking about the various cultural pressures involved by being a childless woman in Iran. It's obviously more systemic than someone's needling mother, and the fact that systemic pressure exists is interesting enough to write articles on.

by windlep 11y ago

Zikes 11y ago

> I'm sure many men don't care, since the pressure is generally placed on women. As a man with a mother who asks when she'll get grandchildren at every opportunity, I'm going to have to disagree with you there.

johnlampsont 11y ago
Why don't you ask her to mind her own business?
dogma1138 11y ago
As an almost 30 with my s/o, her parents my parents asking the same, and my male friends who are 30 or over and dating getting fuzzed about kids on their 4th date I can also attest to that. While women have a cultural and physicall biological clock that ticks men aren't really in the clear. Society needs procreation to survive and women still haven't mastered asexual reproduction.
- Zikes 11y ago
  It's funny how often it's brought up even before marriage. Also, men have a huge legal disincentive to have kids anymore. If the relationship doesn't work out, you're on the hook for ~18 years of child support payments, and that whole system is designed to make men out to be nothing but a paycheck.
  - Vraxx 11y ago
    > It's funny how often it's brought up even before marriage. What do you mean by this? Do you mean that the topic of children should not be brought up before marriage between two people in a relationship? Or do you mean that the topic gets brought up by family members before you're married?
    - Zikes 11y ago
      I mean how often the subject is brought up by friends and family before marriage is. It's more often I get asked about kids than "when are you going to pop the question?" Within a relationship, though, discussing kids and such are definitely something that should be done well before marriage.
      - Vraxx 11y ago
        Ah okay, I figured that since the rest of your argument seemed reasonable, but I wanted to verify since it struck me as odd. As for your actual meaning, that is definitely a weird yet amusing trend. I haven't really heard much of either from my family
  - dogma1138 11y ago
    On that I some what agree, men that pay child support should get joint custody / visitation rights unless there is risk of harm to the child, it's pretty bleak that men are still forced to pay child support and the mother can claim that they have no rights to ever see the child. I also believe that child support should be for the child, the mother should not be able to use it for anything which isn't directly related to childcare, and it should be in it's base a flat amount based on living costs rather then a percentage of your income (unless you willingly want to pay more). That said men have very easy way to avoid children and that's to use a condom or to pick a partner who does not want them, if you are both willingly make one or take on the decision to keep it own up to it the child should not suffer because of that. Forcing women to have an abortion will never happen, forcing them to give the child up for adoption will never happen, men and women are not identical and so will never be truly equal in every regard, it's not like women can force sperm out of you without assault or rape. And if there's some extreme case when fraud has actually been committed e.g. she intentionally sabotaged contraception or went "Satisfaction" on you taken your sperm while you were unconscious (which is technically rape) you should be able to sue for a weaver.
- scott_s 11y ago
  Asking potential partners if they want to have children is a normal part of dating, and not at all the same as a pestering relative asking "when, when, when?" (I am over 30, single and dating, and I expect it to come up naturally after you've spent enough time talking. Fourth date sounds reasonable.)
  - dogma1138 11y ago
    I'm not saying it shouldn't I'm just saying there isn't some magical barrier that protects men against pressure to have children. Both men and women have a biological clock, women start to produce less eggs and those that are produced are of lesser quality, same thing happens with sperm. There is direct correlation between health problems, IQ and various other factors to the age of both parents not just the woman. At least as far as Europe goes from my personal experience having kids trumps marriage here, you'll see far more unmarried couples in a long term committed relationship (2-3+ years) with kids that are not married than in the US.
    - scott_s 11y ago
      You make a valid point, but I don't think the example I responded to falls under an example of unfair pressure.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
tptacek 11y ago
Men and women get some pressure to have kids, but women get more of it, for pretty obvious reasons.

rayiner 11y ago

Is that pressure illegitimate? People "opting out" of having kids aren't opting out of social instruments that presuppose other peoples' investment into raising kids. Not just the obvious stuff like Social Security, either. Facebook stock would be worth a lot less if every tweenager that will ever live had already been born. The only unfortunate part is that the pressure falls disproportionately on women.

LanceH 11y ago
I think it falls on men and women differently. Women have a clock with regards to children, so it is more visible like that. Men are definitely pressured to be successful so they can provide for the presumptive family.
auvrw 11y ago
> Is that pressure illegitimate? imo, yes. saying there are "social instruments" just adds another ring around the kernel. more economically developed countries tend to have lower birth rates. could be causal? funny this was posted around thanksgiving when many people in the united states -- both male and female, albeit in different forms and degrees -- will be feeling it.
- tptacek 11y ago
  If it's causal, it's a problem with the system of economic development, because outside of Logan's Run, economically developed countries need to replace their populations in order to fund retirements --- not to mention drug discovery, ever-increasing Internet bandwidth, and new PS4 games. Pretty much the whole of western civilization is organized around and dependent on families having kids.
  - idlewords 11y ago
    Drug discovery is an unfortunate example, as we've gotten steadily worse at it as our population has grown. It's odd that everyone believes we have developed a lot of miracle drugs in the last 30 years.

nsxwolf 11y ago

And to that I say, so what? Grow a thicker skin. We need to write articles because someone's being needled by their mother into having children?

coldtea 11y ago
Oh, the irony. You're asking him to "grow a thicker skin" about close relatives bickering him (and the related social pressure), when you can't even hold from expressing your annoyance about mere ARTICLES that you don't have to read and can simply skip.
- nsxwolf 11y ago
  I'm not starting a movement. Or a subreddit.
lordCarbonFiber 11y ago
Did you not read the article? The issues described here were one anecdote about one woman fighting to be allowed to have her tubes tied at 30 and another talking about the various cultural pressures involved by being a childless woman in Iran. It's obviously more systemic than someone's needling mother, and the fact that systemic pressure exists is interesting enough to write articles on.