Lately, it seems that every single television show takes any kind of woman and turns her into a mother. She can be a Playboy vamp, a stripper, an affected teenager, or a surgeon, but at some point in her fictitious or reality TV role as a woman leading a happily single existence while having a lot of sex, she gets the urge to have a baby. Becoming a mother has become vogue — the “in thing.”
Kendra, former Playboy bunny who had sex with Hugh Heffner voluntarily (gagging here), is now settled down and pregnant. Pink (who I adore because she’s such a rebellious punk), is pregnant. The Kardashian sisters are each filing away their sexual escapades and viral sex tapes and preparing for babies.
On a more fictitious level, Kate Walsh’s character in “Private Practice” just gave up a relationship because she wants a baby and he doesn’t, since he’s already been there and done that. In “House,” Lisa Edelstein’s character, after years of service as head of the hospital — a powerhouse of a woman who has to dress sexy in every episode, adopted a baby because she could no longer wait for House or any other man to give her one.
And then there are three mothers presently blossoming at “Grey’s Anatomy.” Callie, (Sara Ramirez) is the eternal Madonna — a straight woman turned gay, who has been wanting her own baby for a long time and almost lost Arizona (Jessica Capshaw) because of it, since the pediatric surgeon never wanted kids for herself. Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) is a new adoptive mom after many failed attempts at having her own baby — and the most realistic one to me, since she’s not sure how good she will be as a mom. And then of course, we have Christina Yang, played by the ever brilliant Sandra Oh, who finds herself pregnant for the second time. And for the second time, she wants to get an abortion.
And there’s nothing wrong with this — except that aside from Christina Yang’s characters, there are few other representations of women. What about the women who don’t want to be mothers? Where are their voices? And why are the voices of mother-want-to-be’s so much louder? It seems that they are everywhere, telling all young women that eventually, they all need to settle down and have babies, especially before their biological clocks start humming, followed by the incessant whine of “what if you’re never a mother?”
I have been thinking about Christina Yang since a few weeks ago. I love her character. Aside from the fact that her writers fell off the track by making her have a nervous breakdown and dance on a bar drunk as a skunk, Sandra Oh’s character is brilliant and so different. She is a surgeon — a die hard, unrelenting, and un-self-sacrificing woman, who hates more than anything to lose herself in a man she loves. She even gave up her lover sot hat she could have a chance to operate and learn from the best in her field. She is single-minded, obtuse, and unapologetic — and I know she’s not just a figment of some writer’s imagination. There are women like her out there. Women who don’t want to have children or be mothers. Women who have no problems saying that they don’t even like kids. And it’s not because the child will interfere with her work or domesticate her. She is just not interested in having kids. Motherhood is not in her nature.
And there is nothing wrong with this. But the world makes us all feel like there is. There is something wrong with you if you’re a woman and don’t want to have any kids. You’re a cold bitch if you choose a career over family. You’re unnatural. Feminism of the seventies told us that we had choices, but the choices always included kids — women had to learn to have children, careers, and dinner at the table by five.
But what if you don’t want to have any? Hugh Heffner has sex with a lot of babies (they may as well be), but you don’t see the world crushing him with self-righteous diatribes because his Playboy mansion is not full of his children running around in their undies — and I am sure he has fathered many. But men are different, right? Rules don’t box them in. They get away with everything — including being in their 80′s and having sex with girls of 18. No gross factor there.
Women are controlled – subtly and and not so subtly. We have been conditioned to define ourselves via our biology. We have the children, therefore, we must have children. Commercials tell us our roles — our defining roles as women: mothers, care givers, cooks, cleaners, carpoolers, wives, volunteers, educators, and self-sacrificing do-gooders. Our neighborhoods define our place in society: mothers, care givers, cooks, cleaners, carpoolers, wives, volunteers, educators, and self-sacrificing do-gooders. Let’s add some negative ones here also, like nags, overweight hags, gossips and trophy wives. Now television shows — reality and non-reality — overwhelm us with maternal figures — no matter where they got their start from. Sex bunnies gone mom. Pop stars gone mom. Infertile women gone mom. High school drop-outs gone mom. And out of all of these, we only have one woman who resists motherhood: Christina Yang.
Where are all the others? Where are their voices? I want to see more representations of Yang’s character everywhere, because these women do exist. Although I got married and have two kids, I am the daughter of a woman who resisted conventional roles of women. I watched my mother growing up, keenly, as if I were observing a rare stone that never belonged to our region. She was as unique as they come. And even though she chose motherhood by adopting me — it was more for companionship than it was for a desire to show maternal affection — she had none — or at least she withheld it out of self-preservation. But I am reminded of her when I come face to screen with Christina Yang — and I wish young girls had more of her uniqueness with which to identify. I have learned so much from my mom — I learned that all women are different, and we can choose different paths in life than the ones we are told are especially pink-lined for us.
Just because women can have babies doesn’t always mean they should have them. We are not all made of the same cloth — we are not all designed to mother — even if biologically, we can.
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2011 Marina DelVecchio
That is an excellent point, Marina. Women do not need to be pigeon-holed into mothers. Yes, I enjoy my children, and we have grown up together, really, but “mother” is not the only word that defines me. Sounds like you and many others of us are the same way.
And I detest the color pink. :)
Down with Pink, Karen. Thanks for being such a loyal reader. And one of the fiercest fights I have with my hubs is that motherhood does not define my existence. I am so much more than my biology — and our biology seems to stifle and limit us. In the past and as much today, I find.
This is a wonderful post. I struggled for years to have my daughter, and she’s everything, but I have the utmost respect for a woman who doesn’t want kids. There are so many unwanted children out there – there’s no reason to bring more into the world simply because society thinks it’s necessary.
My best friend in one of these people. She’s got a great career and life, and she’s happy. Not missing a thing. And that’s perfectly fine.
Hi Stacy! Thanks for commenting and visiting. And yes, we don’t want any more abandoned children. There are so many already.
So I was going to suggest that you hope over to ezine because of the current theme that is running until I saw you picture, and thought…. I know this name and the face is familiar, but how could that be I wondered. My ahha moment, I read about you yesterday on ezine.. small world. I have something appearing on ezine as well. And here I thought the blogoshere was vast.. Great post, btw.
HI Brenda, yes. I am actually writing for Her Circle Ezine now weekly. It’s fun. If you ever want to contribute to InContext, I’m one of the two coordinators. I’m looking for guest bloggers — writing about feminist texts and applying them to life of women. It’s all good.
Hi, Marina!
I found your blog through your comment at Feministe, and am just now reading through the entries.
I’ve noticed this about Female Characters of a Certain Age, too — sooner or later, they all go baby-crazy! Regardless of what kind of character they’ve been until the Baby Arc! It’s very annoying, from a character-development standpoint as well as from a “Where are the women who *DON’T* want children?” standpoint.
(Another example: “Glee,” in whatever season has the blonde cheerleader Quinn getting pregnant, and Rachel finding her birth mother, and Rachel’s birth mother adopting Quinn’s baby. That’s actually an example of two annoying tropes, All Women Over 35 Desperately Want to Have a Baby Right Effing Now, and also Nobody Ever Has an Abortion.)
I remember some discussion of the ’80s analogues of these narratives in Backlash …
Hi Lindsay. Followed you to your blog and it is wonderful — brilliant, really. Thanks for bringing up such great points.
I’m glad you like it!
I’d be happy to participate in your e-zine, too — I can submit/adapt my Gilman/French entry, and I was also incubating an idea for a post on the Millennium trilogy, comparing/constrasting it with a similarly-themed book — about a woman on the margins of society fighting back against male aggression — by the Egyptian feminist writer Nawal El Saadawi.
Did I read you are looking for guest bloggers? I am definitely interested. What kind of material do you need? If you would like, send me an email at Karen@karenberner.com, and I will send you my resume and/ or background so you can see if I am qualified for what you are looking for.
Thanks.
Yes, Karen. I’m looking for guest bloggers to contribute discussions on feminist texts for my new position as coordinator in Her Circle Ezine, a blog for Magnolia,a literary journal for women. Here’s the link if interested:http://www.hercircleezine.com/2011/06/08/the-yellow-wallpaper-and-female-illnesses/ This is something I wrote, but also what they’re looking for. You take a literary text (feminist/women oriented) and discuss it by applying it to women and so forth. Check out the site and let me know if you want it.
I’m also looking for guest bloggers here, Hint, hint!
Hi Marina!
It’s been awhile since I have visited and I have been so busy working. This post is very interesting. I think that the rise of a maternal figure in media — so long as she is able to maintain her career, interests, power — is a very positive thing. I think you are rightly conveying that pivot of, “okay, now it’s time to forget all the efforts we made, an make the kids and fade into motherhood’s oblivion, powerlessness and boredom”. We all know that is the way it is because of the set up as a whole. The world penalizes women far more for becoming mothers than for avoiding the job altogether (it leads to poverty, career-ends, dependency, etc.). I see it as a time to reinvent motherhood — an it’s authority– in a way that redefines humanity as a whole. I’m glad to hear these women are making motherhood part of their lives, but I am more interested in how they are presented after the baby is born.
As always, great stuff Marina!
hi where does the time go? anyway, My dad used to tell my sister and i NOT to have kids…have a life. did we listen? no. do I love my son to pieces .yes would I change anythiing NO. but i only had one child. part was due to the stemming of world poplualtion ( remember radios for vasectomies in India?) and the other was my selfishness. i needed time to be me in my life. I am so happy for all he time I got to be me that i would not have had if i was busy with a basket full of children. Ask someone why they want to have kids and they can not tell you. really, does anyone say its so it will bind us together as a couple. Great how selfish is that? because i love kids… then why are you a chemist instead of a kindergarten teacher. cause i want someone to love me as much as i need to be loved…… i have yet to hear a good answer. cause I just do says my co worker on # 3 and 29 years old.
Is it really a bioloigical driven need rather than an intellectual choice.
d
I don’t think it’s an intellectual choice, Doreen, or a biological one. I think it’s a choice of need, and we also live in a world that tells us this is what everyone does — we get married, have kids, raise a family and so on. I don’t think most people think about these things prior to having kids. No one really prepares women or men for the freedom they lose when having kids — but sometimes, kids are worth it. When both partners in a relationship give one another space to grow, to breathe, to have that needed time away from the kids, having a family works out well for everyone involved. It’s very complicated… thanks for keeping in touch, Doreen.
Pingback: Juliana Oliveira
Pingback: TV: Grey’s Anatomy Final Asks “When Does Life Begin?” « The Early Bird Catches the Worm
Pingback: TV: Cristina Yang as Feminist. « The Early Bird Catches the Worm
Pingback: 12 Posts of Christmas: Cristina Yang as Feminist. « The Early Bird Catches the Worm
The problem with the “controlled by our biology” logic is that, well, our biology sometimes controls us. There is a reason that the vast majority of women want kids. Because we have a biological drive to have them. If we did not, the species would have probably died out long ago.
There is also nothing wrong with being one of the few who does NOT want to have children, but here is a little insight on that point. When you are married, and you get pregnant…your husband is just as much a parent to the child inside you as you are. It’s very hard to make the case that “biology is meaningless” and then use biology to defend the point that women get to make all decisions regarding unborn children.
Now, I’m not some pro-lifer. I’m pro-choice, provided it’s done within a reasonable time-frame. I hope for fewer abortions because they are not ideal and they are detrimental to many woman’s mental health. Moreover, it’s much better to avoid an unwanted pregnancy rather than terminating one. However, I recognize a woman’s right to choose. But why does a man not have the same right? Why is someone like Christina Yang supposed to be praised for aborting her child when her husband was willing to bend over backward to be the primary care-giver? And by this logic, would a man be allowed to force his wife to get an abortion if he didn’t want a child? These are interesting questions that no pro-choice movements seem to want to answer. I know that if I were a man and my wife got pregnant and then dictated to me that she WAS getting rid of the baby because it’s HER body and HER choice, I’d be more than annoyed. It would be MY child too, would it not? And if I were willing to raise it, then she’d have no reason to deny my right to have the child with the exception of her being “inconvenienced” for 9 months. That’s callous.