The older I get, the more sick of women and their womb culture I become. I simply fail to identify with any of it. I barely understand it and what I do understand horrifies me.
What am I on about? Let me explain it. For some reason that I can't honestly define, the majority of women I know or notice seem utterly obsessed with their wombs. They seem to define themselves and measure their worth and esteem in large part by what goes into and comes out of their wombs. This is only rivaled by how much crap they've accumulated by paid dollar amounts and how much their chosen mates have accrued.
Come on, ladies. We're better than that. Or we should be. I could have sworn that we now live in an era and a society where female humans can do better than simply acting as life support systems for sexual organs and standing in the shadows of men. Now before you decide I'm one of those rabid, frothing feminazi creatures, realize that I think female superiority is as ridiculous as male superiority. Gender doesn't dictate real worth or potential. It's an accident of chromosomes that determines if your 'nads are innies or outies. That's it. Nothing more. All it does is dictates which side of the reproductive equation you're doomed to, should you choose to breed.
But let's get back to that whole culture of the womb thing that's irritating me.
Someone recently remarked that they thought that it was a real shame I opted out of the whole breeding thing. I still get gentle rebukes about it, as if I've committed some social crime by not burdening the world with yet another kid. I'm vaguely horrified at the frequency of which I hear breeders say that they don't think a woman can be happy or fulfilled unless she's carried at least one uncomfortable, demanding lump of larval human around for three quarters of a year and then had the pleasure of looking after them for the rest of her life. And if you go for one, you have to take seconds or your first won't turn out so well... I thought we'd left this female gender identity measured solely by how many heirs you could provide back in the 18th century along with slavery and flat-earth theory.
I'm a lot more than a life support system for a vagina and uterus. My destiny is not limited to breeding babies and I can choose whether or not, how and how often I'm going to have sex. I'm not defined by who I'm doing it with and my worth has nothing to do with my breeding potential or choices about it. I'm happy and quite fulfilled as a woman without children. I had other things to do with my life. I still have them. I really think a lot of these condescending, disapproving motherhood cultists should have chosen the childless path along with me, as more than a few of them are not very good at that whole motherhood thing they're so in love with.
Sorry, ladies, I don't want to be on your mailing list. I don't want to hear about how beautiful your babies are (when I've seen them and find them, like most other babies, to be ugly, lumpy-looking and more than a little smelly). I don't want to pat you on the back and tell you how full of awesome you are for getting yourself full of a baby. Any female can do that by mistake if she's healthy. It's not worth praise or rewards no matter how special you think it makes you. No, I really -don't- want to hold it, touch it or make noises at it. It's a baby. Yours. And babies are a lot like religion and politics in that you really shouldn't insist on sharing them with anyone you aren't absolutely sure wants to opt in on them with you. No, that's not everyone. Really, I'm sure.
And no, once the fruit of your wombs has become ambulatory, you shouldn't assume that everyone you know wants you to bring them when you go to visit. There ARE women out there who don't want the invasion along with the huge imposition and peril of social awkwardness when your toddlers range free over territory that isn't their own. What IS it with women, especially the mothers of very young children that they honestly can't fathom that their kids aren't welcome (especially the ones who aren't capable of keeping their hands to themselves -- which in my experience is the majority) everywhere they go?
All part of that womb cult thing. The womb, and everything that comes out of it must be held sacred and elevated to stupid heights.
I just don't get it.
Even Mormons will stop pushing their religion on you if you very clearly, politely and firmly explain to them that you're not interested in it. And they're nice about the rejection too. So why not mothers and the rest of the womb-worshipers?
Just something to think about, ladies.