To think the term 'childfree' is as bad as 'childless'

Op - not up to you to say what someone can call themselves. I am childless and have friends who prefer the term childfree. Completely up to them.

Non parent suggests we should all be parents.

It means exactly what it is though. I think people can say they're childfree if they choose without anyone needing to be offended by it. It's not thoughtless, it's fact. You don't have to let it bother you.

Always considered myself childfree, a human who does not have children. If someone asks me why I don't have children, I say, why do you want to know?

You’re really overthinking this. Children is completely fine.

Ah so it was being used as a slur. Sadly not unusual.

Men don’t have to deal with any of this. How are we supposed to have equality if even women can’t let this go.

Not engaging with any of the replies eh, @JemimaWithTheStripeyTights ?

The -free seems to imply liberation from the idea of children, as if that's some obligation or burden, or as if they're something to be escaped from at all cost

This is exactly how I feel. It's a perfect term. "Free" is the key bit.

She was being nasty. My childless colleague was much younger her than me and nasty colleague didn’t realise she was childless, she assumed as young colleague was young and had only married three months ago that she would be having children soon so she didn’t realise she wasn’t being nasty to/about me but in trying to be was actually being nasty to the young colleague. She hated me because I didn’t have children or pets and called me ‘pathetic’ because I don’t have plants…

Well I couldn’t have children. But now at 63 children are certainly not desired by me at this point in my life.

I’m trying to understand why the first colleague needed to describe your reproductive status to another person in any terms other than “doesn’t have children’.

I think "childless" means that children would be desired, but for some reason they aren't present.
"Child free" means children are definitely not desired in one's life, when that person refers to themselves.

I identify as “footloose and childfree”.

Not sure I agree. Clothes-free sounds like a nudist who doesn't like clothes and car free like a person who doesn't like cars. Dairy free implies that dairy causes problems...

I agree. I personally don’t use childfree as short hand to say I’m ’skipping ahead’ and certainly don’t see mothers as ‘lumbering behind’.

I say I’m childfree because a colleague described me as ‘childless’ to another colleague, that colleague then approached me in private sobbing and sharing her personal grief at being childless and asking more about my ‘infertility’, she was then embarrassed when I had to explain I’m not infertile or anything I just don’t want children. She had seen me as ‘like her’ and someone she could share with and then found out I wasn’t after showing her emotions to a colleague. I felt awful for her because she may not have wanted to share that with someone who didn’t have the same experiences and I definitely got the impression that she wouldn’t have said anything if she knew I was childfree rather than childless.

It also cuts down on people telling me I can adopt and their cousins best friends neighbours IVF journey and their brothers girlfriends sisters mums best friends daughter who ‘just went on holiday and relaxed and she got pregnant’ which every childless person I know has to put up with.

Adult?
Do we always have to define women by their reproductive choices? Then if the conversation comes up, people state what they want how they want.

So what can/should we say?

Also not accurate!

I think I only describe myself as childfree on MN. IRL I usually say happily ‘I don’t have kids’ and if pushed say ‘I prefer cats.’

On MN, it’s much harder to make it instantly obvious how someone feels about not having kids. So it’s easier to have childfree (positive & happy choice) & childless (not by choice) although of course it’s not that simple for everyone.

I know that kids would absolutely be a burden for me, so it’s one I’ve chosen to free myself from. But at the times when I haven’t had a cat I’ve absolutely been catless.

The alternative is 'carefree' - probably worse! :)

But people who don't have children are moving through life unencumbered by children...

It's just a fact. If I didn't have kids I'd have had a very different life, which would have looked very unencumbered and very unburdened, but I don't feel offended at the imaginary though that someone might have that I'm lumbering behind while they skip ahead.

I don't spend time taking inferences about my position from people that aren't in it. I'm just making the most of it. There are positives and negatives to every thing. That's just how it is.

Having children is the biological default position. It's a fact, not something to argue with or be offended by.
If a person has no children for whatever reason, whether they are childless or child free depends on their personal feelings IMO. I would not presume to apply the terms to anyone and certainly not to the large and diverse group of people who do not have children.
I know women who are joyfully and deliberately child free, and other women who have been through multiple losses and rounds of IVF without a living child to show for it who are utterly devastated. It's definitely not the same thing.

I feel 'childfree' can make some people uncomfortable because, I know it sounds patronising to say it, but a lot of people just have kids and never really thought it through. And hearing 'childfree' really makes them confront the idea that they actually, could have chosens another life.

Many parents are unfortunately, regretful parents. Statistically, more parents regret (maybe that's an unfair word choice, more, 'wouldn't choose it again if they could go back') having children than childfree people regret not having children.

It's an uncomfortable word for some, especially at points in their life where they are maybe exhausted with young kids or lamenting having had to give up a career etc... life with kids can be tough and someone childfree can seem to be saying 'hey, you could have - not'. It can make people confront their own insecurities and 'what if' thoughts. Like holding up a mirror to you and saying 'you could have chosen different'.

I think if it makes you feel uncomfortable. It's worth looking at your own life and considering if you would have chosen the same path again, if you could go back. And if not, that's OK, but sometimes we have to say 'yes I gave up this, and it's OK to feel sad about it, it doesn't diminish my love for my kids'.

Sometimes when we are uncomfortable with people describing a certain freedom...it's because feep down it's one we wish we had had for ourselves.

I am child free, childless, got no kids. None of these descriptions worry or cause me angst in any way shape or form. Happy to say why as well if anyone bothers to ask, but don’t care if they don’t.

as if that's some obligation or burden
But having children does come with obligations and you are burdened with a huge responsibility for them. If you don't feel that responsibility or obligation to your children then you are a terrible parent.