To think the language of ‘choice’ is not always helpful

[AmericasfavoritefightingFrenchman]

Of course access to contraception and reproductive health services is a Very Good Thing and is linked in clear and obvious ways to improvements in health and economic outcomes for women globally.

But there is an interesting side effect of the language of ‘choice’ that comes as a result of this access. In previous generations pregnancy and raising children was more or less inevitable for women, but now for a couple of generations we’ve been able to get used to the idea that it is a choice whether or not to try to become pregnant and whether or not to keep a pregnancy and raise a family.

The way we talk about this ‘choice’ effects those women who struggle the most with pregnancy, childbirth and parenting.

When a woman in a stable relationship chooses to try to become pregnant, succeeds in a reasonable timeframe, has a healthy and more or less comfortable pregnancy, survives childbirth with minimal scarring and goes on to raise healthy, able-bodied, neuro-typical children, we celebrate her choice, even though most of those elements are down to luck more than judgement.

When a woman actively chooses not to have children, succeeds in avoiding pregnancy, and continues to feel she made the right choice by the time she is menopausal, we celebrate her choice. This is perhaps more sensible as most of the elements here are at least within the woman’s control!

When a woman chooses to become pregnant outside of a stable relationship, or outside of a very comfortable standard of living, and decides to keep the baby, we question her choice- it may be foolish or naive- and use this as a reason to withhold support.

When a woman suffers illness or injury during pregnancy, such as HG or SPD or gestational diabetes, or is simply too tired and achey and indegestion-y and hormonal to make it through the day, we remind her that pregnancy is a choice she made and so withhold sympathy and support.

When a woman suffers terrible birth injuries we remind her that pregnancy was her choice, and she should have accounted for these possibilities in making her choice.

When a child is not healthy, able-bodied or neuro-typical we remind the mother that no one obliged her to carry her children to term, that it is reasonable to abort if you feel unable to cope with caring for a disabled child (though not everyone has this ‘opportunity’) and that it is highly unfair to expect society to pick up the burden created by one woman’s reproductive choices. We use this as an excuse to withhold support and empathy.

So Aibu to think the language of ‘choice’ is not always helpful to women.

People who are inclined to attack women will do so anyway, no matter the words they use to do so

Firstly, this. Women can’t win so let’s try not to obfuscate existing language to try to avoid that because some women rely on that language and it has an important history behind it.
So in situations of contraception, abortion and fertility (reproductive) ‘choice’ is useful and is clearly-understood language.
Anyone who misapplies ‘choice’ to blame women or parents for difficult outcomes later down the track is a dick. And even if women, or children’s parents did make poor choices or they had few actual choices to make, then as fellow humans it’s on everybody else to do what we can to help or at very least try not to make things worse.

This just seems another attempt to characterise women as individuals with no agency who mustn’t be held responsible for anything they do. One post even talks about the language of victim blaming FFS. Women as a group are not simply individuals without agency. The things you talk about are choices and the idea that adult either men or women shouldn’t be held responsible for their choices because it’s mean is just ridiculous.

Yes women are viewed as passive bystanders on here, with everything they do or say the act of a sinister male puppet master who is pulling their strings.

For example women who let men abuse their kids. I absolutely blame them, as well as the man of course, and I won’t listen to any nonsense about how they’re ‘also victims’.

I feel the opposite - I see a lot of posters saying that they had unplanned pregnancies in bad situations and completely not acknowledging that they did have the option to have an abortion but chose not to. Very passive language often like "I fell pregnant".

Of course some women don't want to have abortions and that's their business but it's a choice and I don't see a lot of mention of that.

I also agree with this. It’s a choice. As a man, on here, if you have sex and in some way your sperm makes its way to the egg (contraception failure, withdrawal, or just carelessness) then that’s it - no say in anything, 18 years of child support and responsibility. As it should be.

If you’re a woman, you have complete choice over whether the pregnancy continues, and the state will even finance you if you’re not working or in any financial position to have the baby.

The narrative of ‘he shouldn’t have had unprotected sex’ versus ‘your body your choice, and if you choose yes, the taxpayer will cough up for you and nobody is allowed to criticise that’ is stark.

I think you have seriously over thought this and have applied the behaviour of a minority as a sweeping generalisation for all of society

While it's true that I COULD have ended my debilitating and horribly traumatic (planned) pregnancy through abortion, that was my very last resort. I undoubtedly in my mind would have found losing my baby harder than HG.

I can absolutely guarantee that many people would have told me 'well it was your CHOICE so no sympathy' to abort if I had taken that route too.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I was backed into a miserable corner where no matter what I "chose", I would be going through the worst time of my life.

Similarly any woman who gets pregnant in a fraught relationship or financial situation is just hoping for some compassion when faced with 2 difficult choices. Either way is a difficult road.

Being constantly told 'you had/have a CHOICE' is useless and also extremely hurtful.

I agree with a pp that some use of language around pregnancy e.g. "I fell pregnant" is passive. "We thought we'd see what happened". Many women won't consider termination once accidentally pregnant and that is of course up to them. But it is a choice women have as is contraception, thankfully.

That said, I agree that people can be randomly hostile to pregnant women or women with babies for no apparent reason and I have been on the surprised receiving end of this.

And I agree that generally speaking people massively lack empathy on the internet.

Pregnancy is a choice and so is continuing the pregnancy. If you can't cope during the pregnancy you have options, the same as if you can't afford to raise the child you had a choice. I have issues due to the way my son was delivered, I don't expect sympathy I just get on with it even if I could sit and cry with the pain some days.

Also being pregnant isn't a right, people who want better treatment just because they are pregnant are at best annoying at worst causing discrimination to those not.

We stopped at one as that's what we could afford when DS was little, now he's older we are strong net contributors. So yes I get annoyed with the amount of tax we pay to support people who choose to continue pregnancies they can't afford.

Your whole post seems to suggest that all of these events s somehow happened to you rather than you having any actual active part in them and then you are upset when anybody points it out and you accuse them of being mean.

HG is the absolute pits. I have every sympathy for you 💐

It does seem counterintuitive and damaging to promote the idea that women are helpless victims of fate/society/biology, lacking in our own agency and incapable of becoming realized persons.

That definitely seems like a shit message to give to girls and society as a whole. It’s not like paternalism is known for being great for women. If anything the ‘choice’ message should be reinforced imo.

Similarly any woman who gets pregnant in a fraught relationship or financial situation is just hoping for some compassion when faced with 2 difficult choices. Either way is a difficult road.

I see a lot of posts which don't think of it as 2 difficult choices but basically imply that having the baby is the only choice. Anyone who even gently suggests abortion as an option is often shouted down - it feels very taboo.

I agree @AmericasfavoritefightingFrenchman - and I thank you for an interesting post.

I'm sure many readers will recall a time in Britain when "choice" was not really a concept. You had, or didn't. You went to your nearest school, you saw one GP, beans were always Heinz and baked.

Then under thatcher iirc the concept
Of choice was introduced to reduce accountability of providers, to justify reduction in quality, and absolutely to promote and implement the Tory concept of self-management and small state. 40 years on we have forgotten the outcry of the use of "giving you choice" as the smokescreen for more shit and less provider-based accountability.

Yes women have always been vilified and blamed for what happens to them in terms of reproduction. I think the point is, they still are, DESPITE the apparent "choice" we now have around sex and reproduction. But people feel justified and holier than thou, in blaming women for making poor choices- it let's people off the hook in terms of any consideration of society, inequality, mens responsibilities, compassion and care. This is not new. But the use of "choice" absolutely hides many of the shitty options crap services useless medical options etc that remain

I kind of feel there's two levels to this:

On one hand, a woman who choses to get pregnant but then suffers an unexpected/unlikely complication did not choose to have that complication, and to say they should have considered and accepted every unlikely outcome when making their choice is silly and those difficulties are deserving of sympathy and support.

On the other hand, there are plenty of women who chose to get pregnant and go through with it and then want sympathy/support for perfectly forseeable outcomes that they clearly should have factored into their choice. Like yeah you have a baby and now you have to do night feeds and arrange childcare, those things were obviously going to happen and you choose it, so no I'm not going to be falling over myself with sympathy and going out of my way to help.

I agree with this.

Screeching about how you're pregnant and no one is allowed to come anywhere near you and someone has to give you a seat is not the way to get what you want. I doubt the woman was suffering from HG as apart from the fact that it only affects between 0.5 and 2% of pregnancies, I doubt she'd be stood on a tram on a very busy day if she had it. I knew someone with HG and she spent most of her time in hospital because it's very serious and debilitating as you know.

If she had gone up to anyone and quietly said 'I'm pregnant and feeling very sick' (although it wasn't even clear that she was feeling sick, but giving her the benefit of the doubt) then I reckon anyone would have given their seat up for her. People had no time for her because it just seemed like she was very entitled, at no point did she mention feeling in any way ill. Most people can carry on pretty much as normal even when heavily pregnant, as I said on that thread I was swimming 60 lengths of a pool twice a week at 9 months pregnant. If she had HG then obviously that would be completely different but there was absolutely no indication that she was feeling in any way unwell.

I am also a mother of a child with ASD and have never had anyone say anything about 'well it was your choice' or whatever - it would be very strange if they did because I didn't even know he had ASD until he was 10! Who is with holding support from me because it was my choice to get pregnant? I have no idea. Your post is just frankly bizarre.

Now why would you assume I’m American and not French? I just said I was America’s favourite. Actually I’m British and I’m not a man either. So 🤷‍♀️

@dollymixtured please explain what active part a woman plays to cause HG? I don’t understand. If you mean simply choosing to attempt a pregnancy in the first instance, it is a fallacy to conflate that initial choice with the bad luck of HG later in a particular pregnancy.

If you mean the choice to struggle through to term rather than seek an abortion, Pineaple is right that those are two horrid ‘choices’ and either route is likely to be miserable and require lots of support and compassion. Pineapple and others in her situation are absolutely not to blame- they didn’t bring it on themselves no matter their initial ‘choice’ or lack of choice regarding contraception.

Thanks @anythinginapinch that’s really kind. I’m glad you found it interesting.

I think you make a really good point about ‘choice’ as a smokescreen for the poor options we are offered. I also think you put it really well about feeling justified to vilify poor ‘choices’. Thank you!

It’s clear you understand perfectly well, you just don’t agree. That’s fine, I don’t need you to agree with me. You have quite clearly identified in your post all the choices that were made, you don’t want to characterise them as such but many others including me do class them as choices.

Women can’t win so let’s try not to obfuscate existing language to try to avoid that because some women rely on that language and it has an important history behind it.
So in situations of contraception, abortion and fertility (reproductive) ‘choice’ is useful and is clearly-understood language.
Anyone who misapplies ‘choice’ to blame women or parents for difficult outcomes later down the track is a dick. And even if women, or children’s parents did make poor choices or they had few actual choices to make, then as fellow humans it’s on everybody else to do what we can to help or at very least try not to make things worse.
This

I'll be honest (and put my hard hat on), I read threads on here sometimes where a woman is in a relationship with a useless man, who is often described as a great dad in a thread where it's obvious he does nothing around the house and thinks it's all wimmens work, and posts about him not helping round the house. I do generally find it silly that when a man shows exactly who he is, his partner would to have another child with him and defend him being a great dad. But posting asking why she decided to get pregnant would be a dick thing to say. It's not like she can send the baby back at 6 months pregnant. At least when posters encourage her to raise the bar of what she expects from a partner she might realise she deserves better in time.

I really don’t think I do understand @dollymixtured I said contraception and abortion are or can be choices in a woman’s journey through pregnancy. I don’t understand how either of those could constitute ‘playing an active role in causing HG’ or why they remove any need for compassion or care? I don’t understand why it is valid to say to a woman frankly at risk of dying (ref the Brontë family, HG can be fatal) that she made her choice so hard luck.

If you see choices that I’m not naming I’m interested to know what they are.

But beyond that, I think our obsession as a society with choice and agency and thus culpability in all matters is both interesting and pretty depressing. I don’t think it makes us nice people as a population to think that way.

No, they haven't. Butchering women has always been possible, but it is glib and dangerous to act as if the only problem with abortion prior to legalisation was that it was illegal. People have done all sorts of things to try to procure abortion for millennia, yes. Mostly unsuccessfully, for the very good reason that abortion is extremely difficult to achieve without doing serious damage to the woman in question.

There are many contexts in which people didn't - or don't - widely attempt abortion, precisely because abortion is so risky. People abandon babies or resort to infanticide, which are both less likely to result in dead women. Sorry to state unpleasant facts, but I think they're quite important.

This is the part of the opening post I was initially replying to:

“In previous generations pregnancy and raising children was more or less inevitable for women, but now for a couple of generations we’ve been able to get used to the idea that it is a choice whether or not to try to become pregnant and whether or not to keep a pregnancy and raise a family.”

Which imo brushes over what women actually went through, and what they did in order to assert agency that was denied them. I’m very aware of what happened, and indeed happens, to women. I wasn’t intending to be glib, and my point was to illustrate why recognizing and enabling choice is extremely important, rather than characterizing women as creatures that just ‘do’ according to biology.