The official Childfree on MN bingo card

[ItsNotRocketSalad]

We have 24 squares to fill. What lines get trotted out on every thread that discusses the child free?

My suggestions:

1. You'll need my children to be your carers when you're old
2. Only parents understand real love
3. Childfree people shouldn't take annual leave in school holidays

But even then people will show up with their usual mutterings of "why are you on here?". The best way forward would be ask @mnhq to not show the childfree threads in 'Active'.

I don't think MNHQ cares. They've done nothing to stop white people posting ridiculous shite on the Black MNers board. We'll have to do what we can to dissuade the shitposters and learn to ignore them.

That's probably a good idea, actually. I'd second that.

I like the idea of responding "why are you here? This is the childfree board."

😂

You're likely right. The neurodiverse board probably has the same issue as the black mumsnetters. Perhaps because this sort of discord generates lots of traffic, while people happily talking amongst themselves with like-minded people does nothing for their business plan. I also suspect that that is why the name changed from "MumsNOT" to the less inclusive "Childfree Mumsnetters" and not the arguably more inclusive "Childfree and Childless Mumsnetters".

Bingo!

Presumably this one was another card suggestion?

With the Trending thing it shouldn't be too difficult to include the Board name surely?

I had to restrain myself a couple of times today from saying just that.

I'm childless rather than child free. I didn't appreciate idiots above berating childfree women in my behalf, in the mistaken belief I am traumatised by childfree women.

Was that the same idiot who said non-mums don't get stressed?

I was told by a noted feminist that I'm not a real feminist if I don't have babies. And by a sanctimommy on another site that I'm not a proper adult.

Oh god, I have a child now but thought I was infertile for decades. I was told by another feminist that I was a defective woman because I couldn't get pregnant.

I remember a thread where someone suggested childfree people should pay more tax because they won't be producing the 'contributors' of the future 😁

It doesn't matter if you're exhausted from nursing a dying parent or suffering from a chronic pain-filled illness that keeps you awake at night, it is NOTHING compared to the tiredness of having children.

I've done all 3 and I can tell you with absolute certainty which is the more tiring

But you won't like the answer

“I was childfree until I had my first child.”

Nope.

Something I’ve come across a few times since the whole controversy around whether CF MNers should be allowed a board, said by posters who smugly think going through your whole life without having children is exactly the same as being a 20- or 30-something pre-kids and they therefore understand both sides.

They don’t. I never wanted kids, but it wasn’t until I got older and realised the choice was no longer mine to make that shit got real. I had a friend who was far more vehemently anti-parenting than me, but changed her mind. Our lives are very different now. She doesn’t know what it’s like to go on into the rest of your life without children any more than I can fathom what it is to be a mother.

(Contrary to what it might sound like, I’m not at all gloomy about not being a parent! It’s very much freely chosen for me, but I do think both paths have profound impacts.)

That was a suggestion by an academic in some think tank or other, last summer IIRC. Not sure how taxing me (pushing 70) is going to help, frankly. Fortunately it appears to have disappeared without trace.

Is there a prize for getting it right or are you just going to tell us? given that we won't like the answer I'm guessing it's tiredness from having children that trumps any tiredness ever known to humankind, amirite?

I would have thought at a population level women without children are bigger net contributors from a tax perspective than women with children anyway (appreciate individual experiences will vary). No need for maternity leave, child benefit, help with nursery fees etc.

(Not that I begrudge parents any of the help they get, before anyone pulls me up on that. Just thinking from a purely financial perspective.)

I don’t think it’s necessarily the case that all the bingos aren’t true or true for the speaker (although some are absolute bollocks), it’s more a case of why say it to someone without kids?

I have an acquaintance who without fail tells me it would be worse if I had kids if I moan about anything. Didn’t get a promotion? Would be worse if you had kids and needed the money for them. House sale fell through? Would be worse if you had kids and needed to move for more space. Hard time at work? Would be worse if you were also struggling with kids. All of which are undoubtedly true, but going on as if I’m some sort of pampered princess compared to parents is why that person is now an acquaintance and not a friend.

I was told by a noted feminist that I'm not a real feminist if I don't have babies.

Was that Posie Parker? She isn’t a feminist, she’s a biologist essentialist.

I don't understand people with children posting on a board which is clearly for child free people.

I haven't seen anyone on here actively hating them

I had children in the end, but I was on the receiving end of such comments for many years & it still pisses me off whenever I hear anyone commenting on someone else's reproductive choices. It's none of your damn business. Gems from my mum when I said that we didn't want children (in a futile attempt to stop her nagging at me to have children)

You HAVE to have children you're married!

But who will collect your body when you die?!! (I don't care! I'll be dead!)

You'll disappoint your in laws!

Who will you give your money to when you die, you don't want the government to have it!

& of course the old smug and insulting chestnut of if you don't have children, you're selfish. Load of bollocks, all of it. As an aside, I asked DH if anyone had ever asked/commented on whether he planned/wanted children &/or told him that he should etc etc & the answer was no.

Yeah, my DH got asked for the first time the other day why he didn't have children. He's 53....

@thejadefish the who will collect your body when you die is a whole new one to me, talk about scapping the barrel😂
I don't know if it's usual but the most common remarks came from other women but by far and away the nastiest ones came from men, one guy at work on hearing I would not be having children exclaimed "What's the point of you then"