My wife and I are expecting a daughter in June, and it amazes me how much political and spiritual capital people have invested in their own choices when it comes to parenting.

What I love about this book is that it seems to talk more about the fact that we have choices, and to celebrate the fact that they are, just that, choices.

The choices we're making on how to live with a child are so heavily shaped by the particulars of our lives that I would never presume to think other people ought to emulate us.

Although this book won't be 100% relevant to my life for awhile (I'm a college student), I imagined both my mother and I would find it interesting in relation to how she and my father raised me and my brother.
Although my mother and father raised both me and my brother consciously to be feminists, there was still a gendered division of labor. I would say that the reason my mother did most of the housework and my father the repairs, car maintenance, and yard work is that it honestly is what they both prefer, it's very interesting to me whether it was also social conditioning (and I'm sure that played a role). However, in my opinion, the most important thing is raising the kids with feminist values- not necessarily your own division of labor. For me at least, cooking with my mother and fishing with mostly my father (and my brother doing both activities as well) was more important than actually seeing both my parents do both activities.

That was a long comment...

Sounds cool!

Except for Ann trying to decide what to do with other women's bodies.

"We don't want to have to depend on what seem to be wildly expensive, emotionally draining technologies in the way some of our older sisters and aunts have."

OK, great for you, but don't turn that into a judgment on people who do use "expensive,emotionally draining" methods to have a child.

Thank you for posting this. The book is tops on my list of things to read after the semester is over. Well, after a couple of Doctor Who novels.

I commented in another thread that I've really been struggling to find a feminist parenting community that really values parenting as rewarding work. I understand that there needed to be a strong assertion that women might want more/other things than solely parenting, but the result was a kind of undertone that devalues parenting. I can find plenty of feminist support for continuing to work. Finding feminist community for also wanting to put time and energy into raising my daughter has been more challenging.

PS As someone who went through those grueling technologies, I do tend to advise women who can have babies a bit younger than I did to at least think about it. Fertility treatments aren't fun.

irishgirl1983, as much as I have sometimes wanted to bang my head at the way fertility treatments (and adoption) are discussed on this blog and others, I didn't read Ann's remarks that way. I can't imagine anyone watching me go through what I did to conceive and not wanting to avoid that if at all possible. And my experience was far from the worst I know of.

Er, Amy's remarks. Sorry. Having a day.

I can't wait to read Amy Richards's book (yay Barnard grads!) but until then I have a few questions.

Does she address the environmental impact of parenting at all? I am so grateful women have all the choices about parenting and family life that they have today, and I hope our choices become even more accepted in the near future. But really, I wonder where the idea came from that we have a right to have biological children. Why, exactly, is it so important to pump our bodies full of chemicals (in the case of fertility treatments) to have our own baby, when there are so many children already born who need families? Not to mention the fact that the world is already overpopulated.

I really don't mean to insult women (and men) who really want their own child. These are just some things I'm wondering about. How do feminists reconcile their reproductive choices with environmentalism? I hope Richards addresses this, and I'm eager to read and find out.

I've got to agree with Lucy when it comes to fertility treatments. Yes, they're a wonderful advance that changes the options a woman has, but they're also expensive, often painful, and not always effective. And even if they work, they still result in a high-risk pregnancy, which means more medical intervention throughout the pregnancy.

Talking about both sides is part of giving women a fully informed choice.

And, of course, there are government policies like paid family leave and daycare subsidies that could make it easier for young women to choose to have kids without it completely derailing their career ambitions.

"That applies to feminists in lots of interesting ways...if you have one, do you pay your nanny a living wage? Do you send your child to a school that has a diversity of students and mirrors your feminist values? Do you model self care and compassionate communication for your kids on a daily basis?"

I think it's important to keep in mind that having choices is often correlated with having money. I'm about to have a baby and the nanny wage issue will never be part of my reality. I'm also pretty certain that I won't have much choice with respect to where I send my kid to school. I strongly believe in teaching by example (and I very much hope to) but lets not forget that not all feminists have the resources necessary always realize their principles. I think modeling "self care and compassionate communication" on a daily basis is and important goal and that's what I'm going to strive for.

I agree: parenting has not been recognized for the work that it is. A feminist woman I knew once commented to me that she didn't understand how women could waste their minds and their degrees by staying home with kids.
Parenting, particularly feminist parenting, is like any other job: you can use all your education, mind and creativity to do the best job you can, or you can kick back and coast. Trouble is, there's no recognition at the end because in our society we really don't value parenting.
For those women who list how awful and thankless the work of parenting is, I am working now and my husband is at home and as an employee, I do work everyday that I don't want to do, paperwork that I don't enjoy, I have to write notices my boss wants me to that I wouldn't choose, where I work I have no paid sick days, so we all come to work when we are sick and too tired to read whats on our computer screen. The reality is most women aren't in wonderful, flexible, supportive jobs: so work can suck too, although as in parenting, there are rewarding aspects, financial rewards not the least of them.
The issue is one of respect for the work at home and one of being able to balance home life, to give the stay-at-home mother time to get away from the 24-hour-a-day job that can swallow the rest of her life because we don't recognize she should have any other life.
Ironically, the couples in the situation in which I am in, where the father stays home with the kids at least for a bit, are the most respectful of the stay at home role. I have noticed that stay at home moms get very little opportunity to have extra-curricular activities, while the stay at home dads are given a lot of opportunity because the working moms are more anxious/willing to take over the kids when they get home and the stay at home dads get more respect that their work was hard and they deserve a break...

irishgirl1983, I don't think anyone is trying to decide how other women use their bodies. I thought the sentence you're referring to was pretty clearly presented at the opinions that Courtney and her friends hold: "I've been thinking and talking about this a lot with my friends in their late 20s." The word "we" here refers to Courtney and her friends, not all women.

newyorkred, I can only say this:

1. At one child, my spouse and I did not even replace ourselves. I therefore cannot get too worked up about any contribution I might have made to overpopulation. Some degree of replacement population is needed for a society to continue to function. And while the stories of couples having many children through fertility treatments make big news, they're not the norm.

2. I assume you're advocating adoption, and as an adoptee, I am all for it. However, I have to say that there is something a bit unfair about advocating that in the same communities where adoption is often critiqued as exploitation (particularly of women of color) and colonialism. I'm not saying these critiques don't have some basis. However, there's a fair amount of talking out of both sides of our mouths that goes on in any discussion of infertility.

But really, I wonder where the idea came from that we have a right to have biological children. Why, exactly, is it so important to pump our bodies full of chemicals (in the case of fertility treatments) to have our own baby, when there are so many children already born who need families? Not to mention the fact that the world is already overpopulated.

I see this question a *lot*. I'm beginning to think there's actually a difference between the people who ask it and the people who just know the answer, similar to the difference between people who are straight and gay.

I mean, I understand you mean no malice, and you're just trying to understand. But *every* time I hear "Why do people really need to have their *own* children? Why can't they just adopt?" it sounds just like "But why do people really need to have sex with their own gender? Why can't they just fall in love with a nice person of the opposite sex?"

The desire to have children is a biological drive. It is pretty basic in that it's hardwired into humans at a very deep level, but it does not exist in all humans -- just as the desire to have sex does not exist in all humans, although most humans consider it a fundamental need. And you cannot explain to a person who doesn't have the need *why* you have the need. try explaining what's so great about sex to an asexual. Try explaining what's so great about men's bodies and penises to a lesbian. Or, if you're a lesbian, try explaining what's so wonderful about women's bodies and vaginas and clitorises to a straight woman. You can wax eloquent but while they might come to understand intellectually they'll never really "get" it.

So I'm not going to wax eloquent. The reason people need to have their own biological children if they possibly can is that they need it. I mean, that's what it boils down to. They may be able to partially fill the need with an adopted child, and there have been gay women who managed to fall in love with men, but their lives would still have been better if they'd had a gay woman to love. if you want your own child, then that's what you want.

And given that anyone who takes on the raising of a child is taking on an enormous, gigantic burden which can be soul-crushing for those who didn't choose it, WHY DOES ANYONE HAVE THE RIGHT TO QUESTION THIS? I'm sorry. I don't mean to go off on you. But *everyone* asks this question, and really, I want to know, why is it different from the Nice Guy(tm) question, "Why do you women always fall in love with guys who aren't me? I'm a nice guy! Don't I deserve love?" I mean, we all acknowledge that that's a bullshit question, right? You love who you love. No one is entitled to love, not even cute babies whose parents died. So why are you suggesting that people who want children should love the children you think deserve it, rather than the children they want to love?

"The world is overpopulated" is a strawman. It is, but the reason it is overpopulated is that women all over the world are denied the right to control their own reproduction and the right to do anything with their lives that isn't make babies. If we waved our magic feminist wand today and gave all women in the world the rights we have in the US -- which, we all know, are far from perfect equality either -- the Earth's population would stabilize *overnight*. The *entire* reason for overpopulation is the devaluation of girl children, the use of women as breeding machines for men and nothing else, the lack of women's power, rights, equality, our very *humanity* as individuals instead of property. When a culture gives women the choice to do something with their lives that isn't have kids, the *aggregate* choice of all women in that culture put together is to have zero population growth. The one middle-aged woman who wants to spend a ton of money on fertility treatments so she can have one baby is balanced out by a childfree person; the Earth mamma hippie who has five or six kids is balanced out by five or six women who each choose to have only one kid; and the *average* works out to be slightly negative, most of the time.

The very fact that *feminists* are *constantly* questioning why anyone really desperately wants to have her own kids, and why does she have to spend all that money, and isn't the world overpopulated enough, and aren't there plenty of children with no parents who deserve love... I would get it if this was always coming from male liberals who are clueless about feminism, but it comes so often from feminists. Why do you think you have the right to single out a particular group of women and demand they explain their life choices to you? I mean, you're certainly not as bad as the anti-abortion assholes, because none of you are trying to *ban* fertility treatments, but... ask yourself, if it's so great to adopt a baby, why don't you want to do it? "Because I don't want kids?" Okay, great. Now why do you think that "my own biological kids" is synonymous with "children who don't look like me, have a health and genetic history I know nothing about, may have suffered abuse I know nothing about, and could possibly be taken away from me should the birth parents pop up and change their minds?" If I want "my own biological kids", why do you think "not my own biological kids" would suffice if there was an alternative?

Let me be clear, I do not oppose adoption. I think adoption is a fantastic option for children whose parents cannot or should not raise them (by should not I mean "they are abusive", not "they are teenage girls omg!") I have two children who are not biologically mine, and two children who are. I love all my children equally. I feel incredibly honored and loved that my stepchildren (who I don't call that unless I *have* to distinguish between them and the biokids, like in this post -- normally they are "my kids") have adopted *me*, that they have embraced me as their mother and they love me. They didn't have to. They have a biological mother -- admittedly one who forgets they exist every few years, but they have one. They chose to love me, they chose to call me "Mom." I feel so full of love and pride for them. But every so often I look at my biokids, after five years of raising kids who weren't biologically mine, and go, "Oh, that's right! You *do* have my genes! I *am* biologically related to you!" And I melt inside because I feel like I belong to them, I'm part of them. I'm connected genetically, not just emotionally, to the next generation. it is not a *greater* love, but it is to some extent a *different* love. Or no. I should say, the love is no different, but the attendant emotions that are not the love are; I don't feel honored that my babies chose me for their mom, because *they* didn't get a choice. But I do feel a sense of connection to them that I don't feel to my older children. It's more like the difference between loving your brother and loving your husband, although without any sexual element. You love your husband because of *who* he is; you love your brother because of *what* he is. I fell in love with my older children; the younger two, I had no choice. They were there, I made them, boom I loved them.

So I am in a position to really know and understand why the desire for your biological children cannot be fully fulfilled by adoptive children. If you just want *children* and you really don't care about the bio-connection, then adoption would be a great decision, particularly because PREGNANCY IS HELL and if a woman doesn't strongly want a biological connection with her child I highly advise her to NEVER EVER GET PREGNANT. But at the same time, adoption is kind of dependent on someone else's misery. Someone has to have a kid she doesn't want, or have a tragedy occur where she can't raise the child she wanted to have, or turn out to be a bad parent who makes her kid miserable, or she has to die... *something* unhappy happened. No one gives up a baby out of altruism except to their best friends and sisters. So *given* that a tragedy occurred, adoption is often the best way to resolve the tragedy, but at the same time isn't it a little uncomfortable putting people in a position where to fulfill their great dream they must depend on someone else being unhappy? I mean it's kind of like needing an organ donated. Except, of course, that organs "wasted" and not donated don't suffer, they just die with the body; children who aren't adopted in situations where they should be *do* suffer. So I do support adoption, I do think it's a good choice for people who either cannot have their own biokids, or who don't feel compelled to try, but who do want children. But I'd like to work toward living in the world where almost no children are ever available for adoption because born children are always wanted and wanted children can almost always be safely raised by their parents.

Odd..Most of the moms I know have done a total 180 in the healthy direction when they became moms. I'm more like a 90 degree turn.

As someone who does blog about the intersection of motherhood & feminism on a regular basis, I'd love to connect with more feminist moms online and off.

It's also quite fun to see my husband's feminism blossom as our daughter encounters more and more of the patriarchy.

As for when to have kids...as a 33yo with an almost 5yo, have 'em young if you can. It's tiring!!

I don't know what I'm advocating... I'm just thinking out loud, I guess. It occurred to me, what if all the Western women who really want babies but for whatever reason can't have one, adopted all the unwanted babies from everywhere in the world, thereby saving them from hunger and exploitation and imposing their ideals and education on them? Population stability! Reduced crisis! Triumph of the West!

....No.

I don't think "population replacement" should be a goal, though, as the population may already be environmentally unsustainable as it is. I guess the answer is the same old one, of improving public health all over the world, educating people about their bodies, providing contraception, etc. And in this way, choice is still a central part of the process.

But for now, it does seem a little irresponsible to keep reproducing. I mean, if every American couple who had only one child, adopted instead (colonial implications aside), that would make a pretty big difference, I think.
But I think the onus should be on corporations who bear the brunt of the responsibility for environment trashing, and also on education so we don't consume so much and yet can still make the choices we want to have happy family lives (which I do think everyone has a right to).

I don't in any way want to reduce anyone's reproductive choice. I guess I'm trying to figure out how to get them, on a global level, to choose "better"... gah, there are so many problems with this whole thing.

It's also quite fun to see my husband's feminism blossom as our daughter encounters more and more of the patriarchy.

Isn't that awesome? Sadly, I've found that this only really happens if the guy pretty much leaned that way in the first place, but it's great to see.

It's all about knowing what you're getting into, owning your choices, being able to trust in an agreement.

"It's ALL about knowing"...? I think that sounds like a lot of wishful thinking.

It seems to imply that women who find themselves in impossible situations just didn't think it out, or just don't own their choices or all sorts of bootstrap nonsense that makes it easy to separate yourself from the mommy's with problems and contributes to this mommy wars nonsense.

As someone who once believed as you do let me say, it's about accepting that you can never completely "know" what you're getting into, that your choices will be greatly limited and impact more than just you and that even if you had clear agreements made in good faith that life may present unforeseen situations and challenges that will undermine those agreements and lead to new (and less optimal agreements) being made.

You swear you'll do one thing and then you start to visit daycares and see infants spending their days in a row of cribs, you cling to your job but for the second time in two months you miss four days in a row because your child has strep throat and there's no one else to care for them and your boss and coworkers start to turn on you, you swear you're going back after a nice home birth and six weeks leave but instead you get gestational diabetes (despite you excellent health) or premature rupture of membranes and end up with a hospital birth and stitches that are still healing after six weeks of agony, or your husband swears it'll be 50/50 but soon he's asked to travel or lose his job or his boss tells him in a not so subtle way that there are plenty of single guys willing to work harder if he wants to step aside. These are all things that happened to myself or friends who thought we had this shit under control only to have to face tough choices that couldn't be planned for.

AlaraJRogers, thank you for writing that post. You said a lot of things that I've wanted to express but didn't know how or didn't have the perspective you have. Thanks.

Thanks for responding so thoroughly, Alara. I really don't know what I think and you made a lot of really thought-provoking points that are helping me in this dialogue with myself.

I do not think reproduction is parallel to sexuality. I have a biological desire to eat, too, but that does *not* mean I have the right to eat delicious quarter pound steak imported from Australia every day. The resources this would use are astounding, and even if I were "balanced out" by a couple of vegetarians and a vegan, this does not mean I somehow "have the right." Even if the steak fulfills some deep desire within me.

Sexuality, on the other hand, does not entail the using of resources in the same way, and is thus a more private matter.

I can understand your frustration with feminists who are asking the question I did, though. Thanks for helping me clarify that. It's like we are getting angry with you, who have just made your own choices in the best way you could, rather than getting angry at the systems and history which have made the world unsustainable and which have robbed women of choice everywhere.

I do think it is important to question every aspect of our existence, though, including "why exactly is it that I want kids?" whether they be biological or adoptive or in the form of a cute spaniel puppy. Even if the answer is simply a need to have someone to love.

Anyway, now that I have asked the question, I won't ask it again. And I do plan on adopting, not just seemingly criticizing women who want biological babies :) Or at least on trying to improve public health structures, and like you said, work toward a world where children are wanted and can be raised in a safe, environmentally healthy way (and where parents' jobs are acknowledged as being just as important as "regular" jobs!).

OOps. Extra ' in mommys...bad edit.

K: yes, maternity means losing control, and anything can happen.

Although it's so much better to have your children young, sometimes waiting a little means having more money - and that _does_ help! You can pay a nanny a living wage, and send your child to a decent daycare center. Of course not everybody can get a reasonably paid job that they like (or even one they don't like) but I had a chance and used it, delaying maternity to my early thirties. This way (so was my planning) I could try for a couple of years and then adopt if it didn't work : my pain threshold is too low for artificial techniques.

I was lucky, so far: I got pregnant fast, had easy pregnancies, and my kids have until now been reasonably healthy.

Maybe any parenting book should start with a big statement "Do your best, and be as lucky as possible."

newyorkred, I take the onus on myself to make the best choices I can, but I think part of granting other people sovereignty is recognizing that other people will make different choices. The best we can do is expose them to more information so their choices are informed. But I don't think you're going to get people to stop reproducing. The process is too much fun, for one thing, and accidents happen.

Veronica brings up an interesting point about fathers of daughters becoming more feminist (I know it's happening to me). I think that also happens sometimes with parents and environmentalism. The future of this planet is much more concrete to my wife and I now that she's pregnant, and that's reflected in the environmental choices we're making now that she's pregnant.

As far as owning your choices, I think you have to do that while also admitting how little control we have over so much of our lives. If I choose to take a route home from work that lands me in a car accident, my choice led to that outcome, but it isn't entirely my "fault", either. My wife chose not to go back on birth control after she was diagnosed infertile, but that doesn't mean we chose to get pregnant (although we're ecstatic). Sometimes the only choice we have is the choice of how to react.

Oh, and I have to get in a plug for gdiapers as an option for environmentally conscious parents.

I actually got an advanced copy and I tore through it in 2 days. A great and thought provoking read. I highly recommend it, but not lending my copy out, because I'm going to re-read it.

But I felt compelled to comment on some things I saw here in this comment list. Four years ago, my partner and I decided to start "trying". The ensuing struggle with infertility left me a reborn feminist. I saw firsthand how the reproductive rights pendulum swung the other way. I actually had a doctor tell me that I had no right to have my own child and it was my body's way of letting me know not to contribute to the world's overpopulation. I was castigated for being a selfish person. On the flip side, I had doctors prescribing me medications without taking any bloodwork first. I never took them. And how old was I going through all of this? 27-29. Prime time in the world of fertility. The experience made me own my medical and reproductive reality in a way I hadn't before. Just so you know there's a happy ending, I was finally properly diagnosed with polycystic ovaries and after taking 2 months of Metformin, a diabetes drug, I conceived my ridiculously healthy son. (And to the commenter who said that pregnancy is hell-I had a fantastic pregnancy. I never felt better. And I found delivery to be a fulfilling and yes-even fun experience. And that's coming from someone who had minimal drug/painkiller intervention. I'm not saying it didn't hurt at times, but it was all a great experience.) And if my infertility made me a new feminist, well, motherhood has now put me on a tear. If we are really going to back reproductive rights, we need to support women who make the decision to undergo fertility treatments. It's not only about having a choice to have a baby or not, it's also about having a choice about how you have a baby. And yes, a lot of that is caught up in who has money to have those choices.... which is why I'm passionate about helping people get greater access to fertility treatments and working towards insurance companies covering treatments.

"...But *everyone* asks this question, and really, I want to know, why is it different from the Nice Guy(tm) question, 'Why do you women always fall in love with guys who aren't me? I'm a nice guy! Don't I deserve love?' I mean, we all acknowledge that that's a bullshit question, right?"

Very apt comparison - and it can apply to *both* sides. She who doesn't want to date him can say "You love you who love," and he who she doesn't want to date can say "I have a biological drive and a fundamental need."

"'The world is overpopulated' is a strawman. It is, but the reason it is overpopulated is that women all over the world are denied the right to control their own reproduction and the right to do anything with their lives that isn't make babies."

Exactly!

"But every so often I look at my biokids, after five years of raising kids who weren't biologically mine, and go, 'Oh, that's right! You *do* have my genes! I *am* biologically related to you!'"

That reaction is so much better than going "Oh, that's right! I need to wax you and put you on a diet and sign you up for plastic surgery!" when one see the traits one passed on. Don't you wish everyone else was as reasonable?

"So *given* that a tragedy occurred, adoption is often the best way to resolve the tragedy...But I'd like to work toward living in the world where almost no children are ever available for adoption because born children are always wanted and wanted children can almost always be safely raised by their parents."

Right on!

It's also quite fun to see my husband's feminism blossom as our daughter encounters more and more of the patriarchy.

Isn't that awesome? Sadly, I've found that this only really happens if the guy pretty much leaned that way in the first place, but it's great to see.

One of the challenges that many of us find in imparting feminist values is how the little buggers pick up counter values outside our influence. My wife was well on her successful path as a lawyer when she pointed out to our 5 or 6 year old daughter the airplane flying overhead, telling her that she could fly one of those one day. "Oh mommy, girls can't be pilots!" Arrrgh! We still tease our now 25 year old about that one.

Er, having children is not a biological drive; it is driven by emotion: fear of death, love of small cute things, ego need to replace yourself and thought: do I want to bring a child into this world, can I afford it, how will I raise it. Those are higher brain functions rather than biological drive.

The questions about the environement are not unapplicable here. What do you mean when you claim that overpopulationg is a strawman? How? What model are you using? I understand that Malthusian models no longer work, but where are you coming from?

Why is that decision (having children) off the table for discussion when we keep most others on? No-one is advocating a law against procreation (that I can tell), but merely asking for some answers and self-evaluation. We all do that all the time as feminists. Don't we?

I agree that pregnancy is hell. After I had my son, I told everyone that my next child (if ever) will come ALREADY MADE! My pregnancy was covered by medicaid, no questions asked. But my research into adoption shows that I have to have all aspects of my life scrutanized by an social worker, just to adopt an child, even if the state would cover most costs (in the case of a "special needs" child, which is anything other than a healthy white infant). I find it sad that I could irresponsibly pop one out at any time, and no one would bat an eye, but if I try to adopt a "special needs" child (i.e. older, colored, or with siblings) I have to "prove" I deserve one. That "proof", among other things, includes my biological ability to reproduce! That's right: if I have the ability to pop out another kid, I'm pushed down the waiting list! I don't think my ability to have a child should make my willingness to open my heart to another worth any less.

And to all you non-mothers out there considering preganancy, be warned: you will never get 8 consecutive hours of sleep again, from the moment you first feel the baby move inside you.

That being said, I'm glad I have my son. I'm glad I have a husband who will stay home and take care of him, so that I can work. I wouldn't take it back for anything.

mirm, exactly how well do you think it would go over if I came into a feminist community and said, "Well, I'm not suggesting we outlaw abortion or birth control, but I don't think it's really responsible of women to use abortion as a method of birth control, and I wish more of them would think about the environmental issues of using artificial hormones"? Should be put a woman's reasons for not having children "on the table?"

Because I, personally, don't think we should, but it sure sounds like you do.

Mirm, the discussion is not off the table, but your post is a very good example of what Alara was writing so well about. Since you lack that biological drive, either now or for always, you assume it doesn't exist and must be a mental construct.

You just don't get it (but it's probably not your fault).

Actually, those [questioning not to have children] are always already on the table. Funny how the decision that affects no one but you is on the table, and the one that affects everyone around you is off. I understand that you feel strongly about this issue, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't talk about it.

I only brought up outlawing because Alara's first response to newyorkred was so over-the-top in comparing those questions in a comment thread to gay people and their trials (there are actual laws involved for them).

It makes me feel better to think people might use higher brain function to decide about a child, because you need them to raise one. Don't take away my delusion and persuade me that parents are all mindless drones. Please.

Little kids are such gender cops. When my nephew, whose mom is an engineer, was six, he said he didn't want to become an engineer because "That's what girls do!"

Oh, and it isn't about ME and my biological drives or lack thereof for goodness sake. Newyorked's question was about what is best for ethical living in a feminist context (I thought).

Actually, those [questioning not to have children] are always already on the table.

Yes, but last time I checked, feminism was arguing that they shouldn't be. Do you think they should?