How Expecting One-Way Support From Women Without Kids to Mothers Is Anti-Village
Remember, to have a village, we must be a villager
A quick note before we begin. If you view Life Without Children from your desktop, there are now clickable links cataloguing stories by the following topics: “childless”, “childfree”, and “creative prompt”. I thought long and hard about adding these in, as while I don’t want to add to the divide among people without kids, I recognise we are all in different spaces and places when it comes to not having kids, and, as such, we may need certain stories over others.
I hope this helps.
I’ve written before about how women supporting women often defaults to mothers supporting mothers. I can understand why this happens, to an extent, but the problem is that it builds false hierarchies among women and essentially does the patriarchy’s bidding.
When did you last hear of the worth of a man without children being dependent on the support he gives to fathers and children?
A woman’s worth is not dictated by her reproductive history or status as a mother, nor by what she gives to someone who has reproduced or is a mother. Yes, I agree that being of service to others is a critical component of our humanity. But this can manifest in many different ways.
A few months ago, I read a note on Substack which said.
The women without children who support women with children make the world a better place for women and children and deserve all the love in the world.
And while I don’t necessarily disagree with the message I think (hope) the poster was trying to convey, there were a few things that bothered me. It felt incomplete and one-directional. It’s not only women with children who need support. For society to flourish, we all need a village, which means we all need to be villagers. We give what we can, when we can, into the big melting pot of community, allowing us to also withdraw what we need.
I pondered the intended definition of support. And honestly, I bristled at the suggestion that women without children only deserve love when they support mothers. So, to put this in clearer terms, does the poster believe that for a woman to be deserving of love, she either needs to have had children or support those who have?
There is a lot to unpack.
I replied to this note, but I didn’t quite say what I wanted to say. Still, I think my point struck a chord, as it’s had a lot of love. I said:
