Instead of women being seen as beings with the amazing power to carry and nurture another human being, pregnancy is construed as being condemned to be a walking womb carrying a worthless clump of cells. And women have colluded in this so that smug men can continue to see themselves as the ideal.
… What a wonderful way to reinforce patriarchy. Men can never become pregnant, so women have to imitate their limitation by becoming un-pregnant when they wish. They have gained nothing except the reclassification of one of women’s unique abilities as a crippling disadvantage. (And no, I don’t think becoming pregnant is the point of women’s existence. Try to read what I am actually saying instead of what you think I am saying.)
Feminists could have said, “Women get pregnant. Get over it. Change society so that it is never a nightmare.” But many chose instead to use dehumanising language to stigmatise the developing child as a mere clump of cells….
Human rights depend on one thing only – common humanity. Once you make being human conditional on being wanted, you rip up the very basis of all such rights.
“Every child a chosen child” is a slogan that undermines not only human solidarity and unconditional love but also helps reinforce a patriarchal system where women are valued to the extent that they resemble men.
~ Breda O’Brien, The Irish Times, October 2, 2016
