Bad Mothers: roundup

my favorite things from the week

It’s been an epic week for childless cat and dog ladies, which, as we well know, are actually great mothers to their pets but branded bad mothers and women by JD Vance.

The social media response to Vance’s ridiculous claims that parents should get more votes than childless people and that “childless cat ladies” have no stake in America’s future have been, in a word, amazing.

clockwise from top left: @helen_stickler, @janewiedlin,@photofeline, @deirene06

This is an occasion where social media is a heartwarming and encouraging place to be. I’ve never seen such an outpouring of support for people who don’t have kids!

Speaking of people who don’t or can’t have kids, author Gina Rushton’s new podcast, The Dilemma, features interviews with loads of experts on a variety of topics that are all part of this conversation. There’s an episode on the effectiveness of government programs to incentivize having kids, egg-freezing, and the sense of obligation to “make up” for not having kids (which of course we need to overcome). Gina explores it all on her podcast, and in her book, The Parenthood Dilemma.

There’s another great piece from Moira Donegan in The Guardian: The Republican Party’s Obsession with Family Has Taken a Fanatical Turn. Just a snippet of her summary of the right’s platform:

They don’t want you to be able to get a divorce if your marriage turns unhappy or even abusive. They don’t want your daughter to be able to get birth control if her father doesn’t approve of it; they don’t want your other daughter to be able to get the hormone treatment she needs to thrive as her truest self. They want to inspect your kids’ genitals before they let them play on the high school softball team. They want to ban books, and decide what your kids can and can’t read.

I sighed over this tired piece from The New York Times, which entirely overlooks the fact that the main reason people who aren’t having kids say they won’t is because they simply don’t want to.

As I said on Instagram yesterday, I fully support any policies that make it easier for people who want kids to have them — like dealing with climate change (!), or offering an actual social safety net — but we need to acknowledge the fact that for many people it is simply a matter choice. We didn’t have much choice before; we do now. It’s not a difficult thing to understand.

And finally, a moment for Simone Biles. I watched her in yesterday’s all-around gymnastics competition and saw the moment she learned she’d won the gold. Exaltation. I can’t imagine the stress of competing in that environment, but all of the women managed it so well. I was amazed at the camaraderie and kindness they showed each other. But this was just icing on the cake:

Don’t forget, anyone who purchases an annual subscription (now 20% off) by August 7 will be in the running for three great books.