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Well said, bk_nurse. However, if your quotes were modified slightly, I think they would be non-controversial and non-offensive (or at least less so):
People who have children know what it's like to not have them (because we didn't have them before we did have them), but people who don't have them really don't know what it's like to have them. Therefore, people with children are able to speak to the condition of being child-free better than people who are child-free can speak to the condition of having children. That said, though, there's no excuse for rudeness or superiority complexes from either side.
Not sure I totally agree with the 1st part of that statement. People who have kids wanted them before they had them. I don't think parents can understand wanting to be childless any more than those who don't have kids can totally understand wanting them.
But I do agree about the 'no excuse for rudeness' part.
No kids here, and no regrets.
I really don't see any need for a special day for that tho'. It's just a decision made, not a reason to celebrate.
Apologies to those childless by circumstance, not choice.
Well perhaps a Universal Aunt's day and a Universal Uncle's day? Because childless people do make a contribution to society and should not be treated as inferior. I don't think it's an unreasonable view to take that there are already quite enough children in the world.
I imagine it might be quite irritating for the child-free person to hear parents complaining, given that it is more often than not a choice to have children. I have certainly heard people at work whinge about mothers leaving early to pick up children, but the opposite side of that argument is that workers who work all hours affect the work-life balance of families.
We do need a certain number of children to continue the existence of the human race and to keep the economy going.
Love your idea about a Universal Aunt's day and a Universal Uncle's day, but how 'bout this: Since we (child-free) already have International Child-free Day, which is celebrated on August 1st of each year, rather than creating another child-free day – like your suggestion or mine (Child-free Women's Day and Child-free Men's Day) – child-free people who do want to celebrate International Child-free Day can do so (this is just a friendly recommendation, not a direct order or demand) by visiting child-free blogs and forums (where there's no hostility when discussing child-free issues because most if not all of the members are child-free) and wishing other child-free people a very Happy International Child-free Day, and then they can post ideas and recommendations for how to celebrate.
For example:
1. Play hooky from work (sometimes August 1st falls on a weekday – this year it falls on a Saturday).
2. Collect money from your co-workers and donate it to foster care (Ways to Help - AdoptUSKids). Has a co-worker with kids ever asked you to buy raffle tickets, candy bars, cans of popcorn, Girl Scout cookies, etc. for their kids – yes or no? It's time to repay the favor .
3. Donate money to an organization that empowers young girls, such as Girls Inc (Girls Inc. |).
4. Buy a 20-lb bag of dog food or cat food and drop it off at your local animal shelter.
5. Buy yourself a red velvet cupcake and tip the shop $20.
As stated earlier by Aztecgoddess, the possibilities are endless. So if you are child-free and you are interested in celebrating International Child-free Day by sharing your ideas and recommendations, here are a few child-free blogs and forums where you can post those ideas and recommendations:
i vote yes if i could get some child free at the super market, maybe couple hour mid week. i dont care i settle for 10 pm on a wendsday. now that would be no kids under 21 inside the store at all. even check out people. just peace and quiet. give me some peace, I be quiet
OP what are all these breeders doin on our thread?! I say YES. Being child-free is HARD WORK. We need like 3 holidays.
You are terrible !
Quote:
Originally Posted by Minervah
[QUOTEMy stepmother used to say to me, "You didn't have children; was that on purpose?" She said it in an incredulous tone that implied that she could scarcely believe any woman would choose that. She might as well have said "Are you insane?" Every time she saw me, she would ask the same question. Every time, I patiently replied that yes, it was my choice, and she'd look at me as though I were an alien from some other planet.
]
LOL! I have gotten that all the time in my life. That's pretty darn personal. I have learned to laugh it off. If I have have been feeling a bit devilish that day I might retort with "You HAD kids? ON PURPOSE?"
It wasn't that I was trying to be mean or rude. I was just trying to show the more persistent ones A. How it felt and B. They were crossing a line. I mean, why some people feel they have the right to comment about what a woman does with her uterus or a man with his sperm is beyond me.
People with this attitude have a sort of sense of entitlement they don't even realize they are displaying when they feel they have the right to inquire about so personal a subject. I think the decision, and it should be a decision, as to whether or not to raise children is a very serious one not to be taken lightly. I really do not believe anyone should assume everyone is capable of taking on the task just because they have the anatomy to do so. Better people's decision not to have kids should be accepted without question or criticism than to have them do it just to go with the flow and create unhappy families. That way there would be fewer unhappy families and fewer abuse kids.
I love cats. I like dogs. I could say you don't know what you are missing if you haven't experienced the fun of having a cat or dog but it's your choice so fine. But I wouldn't expect to see you on the City Data Cat or Dog Forum.
The OP's question and I will re-state verbatim in case you have forgotten. "Child-Free Men and Women: Should We Establish and Start Celebrating Child-Free Women's Day and Child-Free Men's Day?"
This inquiry was unequivocally directed at child-free people. But parents chimed making it all about their kids. Everyone of course is entitled to their opinion about the subject but that wasn't the subject. Seeing the title, why would parents be interested in child free issues in the first place? What is compelling need for them to change the subject?
I wonder how many CF people contribute to the parenting board; not many I would imagine. Maybe those who are helping to raise other people's kids will contribute. And yet every time a CF issue comes up, any place not only on CD but on the Internet, FB, or anyplace there is a childfree discussion, a large number of parents are certain to join in.
But why when it has nothing to do with the topics usually put forward such as on this thread. Yet it happens time and time again. If it is a debate about Parenting vs Childfree, fine bring it. But it always happens when someone asks a questions like the one the OP has asked which had nothing to do with the pros a and cons of parenting or being childfree.
Still they feel compelled to state how happy they are with their kids and how they feel childfree people are selfish while they are so giving. They always paint the Childfree as having tons of time and money. In short, Society's pariahs. Just one old worn out cliche after another. I have seen it time and time again.
So we circle back to a harmless debate asked by someone geared towards a specific group once again being taken and changed into a debate it wasn't meant to be. I have asked this question time and time again both in my own personal life and on the Internet when people get so bent out of shape on threads like these when it comes to the child free person and the parent anguishing over him or her.
I am not a Face Book member but it was brought to my attention by a friend who is that two long ongoing Child Free Internet websites where CF people went to post about their lives as Child Free people were maliciously hacked and shut down by others who couldn't handle their life choices. That's not cool.
Having said all this, I have to ask the question I have been asking all my adult life of the parents who cannot wrap their heads around the idea of people choosing to be child free. Why oh why is it a problem for you? You have your kids, be happy. I have my cat. I'm happy. I am not comparing cats to kids. I am comparing what makes me happy to what makes you happy. As long as we are both happy, who cares what gets us there?
And I have to add, to the person who gave me the nasty message in the rep, you should know that's not the purpose of reps, and I know who you are. The way you express yourself in writing is very obvious. Grow up![/quote]
Oprah Winfrey – Media guru
Dolly Parton – Actress, singer-songwriter
Betty White – Actress
Janeane Garofalo – Comedian, actress and political activist
Eva Mendes – Actress
Tallulah Bankhead – Actress of the stage and screen
Paulette Goddard – Actress and Broadway performer
Stockard Channing – Actress
Sarah Brightman – English classical soprano, actress, songwriter and dancer
Shirley Manson – Scottish singer and actress, lead singer of rock band Garbage
Claudette Colbert – French-born American-based actress
Lauren Hutton – American model and actress
Mary Chapin Carpenter – American folk and country musician and winner of five Grammy Awards
Mary Pickford – Actress, co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Daphne Zuniga – Actress
Ginger Rogers – Actress, dancer, and singer
Cameron Diaz – Actress, model
Kathy Griffin – Comedian, actress “It seems like kids don’t have the rights they need. For example a prison sentence for a child molester is so so incredibly low and yet in a way, kids are running the world (in many ways) it revolves around these kids but I don’t feel like we’re really protecting them. I want to really protect kids. I want to give them rights they need, I don’t want to give them the right to annoy me in a restaurant, I want to give them the right not to get molested.”
Caitlin Moran – British TV Personality “No one has ever claimed for a moment that childless men have missed out on a vital aspect of their existence, and were the poorer, and crippled by it.”
Christine McVie – Singer Fleetwood Mac
Nanci Griffith – Singer, guitarist and songwriter
Bo Derek – Actress, model and animal welfare activist
Bonnie Raitt – American blues singer-songwriter
Jean Arthur – Actress and major film star during the 1930s-40s
Julie Christie – Actress and Academy Award winner, starred in Doctor Zhivago
Lily Tomlin – Actress, comedian and writer
Jaqueline Bisset – Actress
Lara Flint Boyle – Actress
Mae West – Actress and sex symbol
Jean Harlow – Actress and sex symbol
Helen Mirren – Award-winning actress
Marisa Tomei – Actress
Dusty Springfield – British pop singer
Janet Jackson – Singer, songwriter and actress
Billie Holiday – American jazz singer and songwriter
Katharine Hepburn – Actress and winner of four academy awards
Marilyn Monroe – Icon, actress, singer and model
Liza Minnelli – Actress and singer
Janis Joplin – Singer and songwriter
Stevie Nicks – Singer, member of Fleetwood Mac
Portia de Rossi – Actress
Bessie Smith – Blues singer of the 1920s and 30s
Debbie Harry – lead singer of Blondie
Pam Grier – Actress
Gloria Gaynor – Singer
Mary Pickford – Actress and co-founder of the film studio United Artists and one of the original 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
Bettie Page – Pin-up girl
Ashley Judd – Actress, women’s rights activist “Patriarchy is not men. Patriarchy is a system in which both women and men participate. It privileges, inter alia, the interests of boys and men over the bodily integrity, autonomy, and dignity of girls and women. It is subtle, insidious, and never more dangerous than when women passionately deny that they themselves are engaging in it.”
Zooey Deschanel – On kids from a Marie Claire interview: “Don’t hold your breath waiting for Deschanel to announce a pregnancy, either. “That’s never been my focus,” she said of having children. “I like kids, and I like being around kids, but it was never an ambition, something, like, I need. I like working. That’s what I like doing. I like to work.”
Ava Gardner – Actress
Greta Garbo – Actress
Ellen Degeneres – Television host, actress and stand-up comedian
Margaret Cho – Actress, comedian, women’s rights activist and LGBT rights activist
Maria Callas – Soprano opera singer
Leah Dunham – Writer, director, actress
Kim Cattrall – Actress
Jo Frost – British nanny and television personality, better known as Supernanny
Julia Child – American chef, tv personality and author.
Rachel Ray – TV Chef
do we need to have a talk about the birds and bees and where babies come from?
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(sometimes August 1st falls on a weekday – this year it falls on a Saturday).
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