Kirstie Allsopp, classism, and a distinct lack of choice

It was obvious what was going to happen yesterday when the media started putting its own spin on Kirstie Allsopp's comments made in an interview with Bryony Gordon for the Telegraph, coming up with headlines such as "Kirstie Allsopp tells young women: ditch university and have a baby at 27". As everyone who bothered to read the original article knows, that's not the extent of what she said - but why let that get in the way of calling her stupid, accusing her of wanting to take women back to the 1950s, and telling her where to stick her overprivileged expectations about home ownership and marriage?

According to the law of how women talk about lifestyle choices and how it's played out in the media, Allsopp has, of course, been positioned as some sort of spokesperson for womankind, judging everyone who doesn't want to live their life the way she thinks they should. And in their reactions to her comments, many of those who don't agree with her have fallen into the trap that's so obviously laid for us all, every single time some vaguely high-profile woman has something to say about women's lives. Yesterday's 'debate' became a defence of education and careers (and why not? No-one's going to deny that they're important things to defend), against the spectre of smug, twee, wealthy motherhood and financial dependency on men.

No-one likes to feel patronised, especially by someone they perceive to be out of touch with what most women think and want. I don't think it's correct to say that women are unaware of fertility issues, or that they are never talked about. There's enough discussion of it about for us to know roughly at what point conceiving a child does begin to become much more of a struggle - if, indeed, we were all that fertile to begin with. But the fact is, even as most women know what they'd do about becoming a mother, in an ideal world, and even as they laugh at scaremongering headlines about 'career women leaving it too late', the years pass by quickly - years of trying to find a suitable partner, trying to save money, trying to get a job, or a better job, or a job you actually like.

What Allsopp did touch on - which I believe is important here - is the pressure on middle-class women to have the various aspects of their lives sorted out and adhering to an ideal before children get factored in. The degree, the wedding, the 'life experiences', the career, the foot on the property ladder. It was noticeable yesterday just how many people I witnessed saying "But NO-ONE can afford to buy a house/have a baby in their 20s!" And it's certainly true that for many people, saving up for a house deposit is a terrifying thought. Wondering how to pay the bills while on maternity leave or afford to pay childcare is a terrifying thought. But it's also true that many, many people become parents in their 20s (and earlier). Many, many people who aren't privileged and whose parents haven't bought them a flat somehow manage to become parents and just get on with it. Yesterday's 'debate' had a particularly narrowly-focused and classist side to it - one that needs to look beyond non-debates over the 'right time' to have children or go to university or get married and question instead the way UK society places expectation on women about the 'right' way to live their lives in a country that makes it so difficult for them to do so, sneering at both those who choose not to go along with it and those who are happy about having achieved it.

Let's leave aside, for a moment, the fact that becoming a mother at a young age so often gets you labelled as a 'scrounger', a 'waste of potential', or a statistic for the right to sneer at, and the fact that being a relatively young middle-class stay at home mother gets you labelled as 'smug' and 'irritating', and being a childfree woman in your 30s gets you labelled as 'sad' or 'selfish' - because these things are important, but they're not the most difficult things.

Not when a particular 'route' of university followed by the career ladder followed by 'settling down' when you're financially secure and have 'really lived your life' is the 'desired' one. Not when the cost of attending university has skyrocketed and the housing market in London and the south-east is ridiculous and there's so much competition for jobs that people despair of ever getting the job they want or feeling financially secure at all. Not when maternity discrimination is rife, maternity leave difficult to imagine for those in difficult financial circumstances, and childcare here is the second most expensive in Europe. Not when the burden of care and everything child-related is still seen as a woman's domain. Not when the voices of women who have had children at a young age, and working class women who have never had the luxury of expecting to get all their ducks in a row before making big decisions about their lives go unheard, as feminists who are quick to sneer at the idea of having children in their 20s without thinking how that looks to their sisters who already have children and are doing just fine. For all the cries of "Shut up Kirstie, can't you see it's all about choice?!" it's evident that most of the time, it's really, emphatically, not.

Yesterday wasn't the first time in the last couple of years that I've been reminded of this piece on women in Iceland that appeared in the Guardian in 2011. I remember being struck at the time by the idea that being a young mum at university could be seen as totally normal, rather than a 'challenge' or something worthy of a newspaper feature as it might be in the UK. Writes Kira Cochrane:

"Parents here talk strongly of community support, of collective care for children, and there is no sense that motherhood precludes work or study, which effectively changes the whole structure of women's lives."

One woman, who we're told had her first child at the age of 19, is quoted saying: "You are not forced to organise your life in the 'college-work-maybe children later' way". Another woman explains how couples in Iceland don't tend to think of parenthood in 'How many children can we afford?' terms. And with full-time childcare, at the time of publication, costing single mothers £70 and couples £118 a month (as opposed to an average cost of more than £700 a month for full-time working couples in the UK - much higher in London), you can see why. Feminists do enough shouting about the perceived egalitarian joys of Scandinavia and I'm aware that no country is perfect. The fact remains that women in the UK find themselves supposedly liberated yet also restricted by what we've constructed as the 'right' way to do things, the 'right' way to live the capitalist dream and the 'right' way to experience life. For many, it's a bind and an enormous source of anxiety. For many more, it's unattainable and unrealistic, and by doing things their way they end up being derided and devalued by Kirstie Allsopp's cheerleaders and detractors alike.

What you should have read recently

Ann Lovett: Silence that will never be broken - Caroline O’Doherty 

"Everyone wanted to know how a girl from a family of nine siblings in a town of barely a 1,000 people could have carried a baby to term without anyone finding out, if indeed her pregnancy was the secret the community claimed it to be.

Questions were asked about what kind of society made a bright girl feel unable to ask for help or undeserving of support at what must have been the most frightening time of her life."

The politics of black hair - Emma Dabiri  

"It can feel pretty frustrating that white supremacy has bequeathed a legacy in which, for many black women, simply wearing our hair in its own natural state can become a complex and politicised act. At the same time - despite the connection between said supremacy and the relationship that many black women have to our hair - most white people demonstrate absolutely no idea about the everyday maintenance of Afro hair, let alone its politics."

Woman-hating by any other name - Meghan Murphy

"There’s an air of superiority from those who busily seek to ruin and silence other feminists: “We’re doing it right; she’s doing it wrong.” By pointing our fingers elsewhere we keep ourselves safe from attack. It seems pretty clear, though, which white feminists are using valuable ideas like intersectionality to advance their own careers and gain popularity, without an ounce of interest in movements towards ending oppression and with little understanding of structural inequality."

5 black women in history every egalitarian should know - Gail Wallace

"In a recent study of Black women’s leadership Ngunjiri, Gramby-Sobukwe, and Williams-Gegner note that “early preaching Black women were radical in their commitment to consistent egalitarianism and social justice within the Black church and community as well as society at large” and refer to them as “tempered radicals”... "

What is subversivism? - Julia Serano

"Subversivism is the practice of extolling certain gender and sexual expressions and identities simply because they are unconventional or nonconforming. In the parlance of subversivism, these atypical genders and sexualities are “good” because they “transgress” or “subvert” oppressive binary gender norms. The justification for the practice of subversivism has evolved out of a particular reading (although some would call it a misreading) of the work of various influential queer theorists over the last decade and a half."

No-one leaves or stays in church for the perfect reasons - Ed Cyzewski

"I also needed to read Introverts in the Church and Quiet as a way of explaining my discomfort in church. So much of my church experience had been shaped by the expectations and standards set by extroverts. We were always doing more stuff, meeting more people, attending more events, speaking in front of more people. The introvert in me just couldn’t keep up. Church felt like hard work, sucking the life out of me rather than renewing, strengthening, and, the favorite word of extrovert church leaders, “equipping” me."

Are you being TOO sex-positive? - Be Young & Shut Up

"Sex positivity is well-meaning, and a lot of its practices have helped to make people more comfortable with their sexuality. But its execution is flawed. Many are excluded or harmed by the community’s practices of the philosophy, and even the pure philosophy itself. Its monolithic identity means that if you take issue with sex positivity, you’re the stuffy patriarch enemy. The problems are such that sex-negative feminism has become a legitimate movement that, while it has its own serious problems, is just about as respectful of people’s sexual choices as sex positivity is."

The (possibly incoherent) ramblings of a guilty mum - Littlee & Bean

"Since going back to work I’ve learnt that sometimes I have to let go. I’ve learnt that sometimes it’s enough just to do my best. I’ve learnt that tending to my happiness and sanity is important. And I’ve learnt that immersing myself in the world that exists beyond the periphery of my motherhood experience, is key to my family’s happiness. I’m grateful that most of the time work keeps me sane."

A quick and dirty intro to black British feminism - Vimbai Dzimwasha

"However, after watching that amazing conversation between bell hooks and Melissa Harris Perry, I realised I desperately needed to find a feminism that reflected my specific experiences of being a black woman in Britain and navigating through issues of ‘black identity’, ‘black womanhood’, dual cultural identity among other issues. Black British Feminism."

What you should have read this week

I'm reviving my weekly-ish round-up of things worth reading!

 

Black Women and The 41st Anniversary of Roe v. Wade: Thoughts About Reproductive Justice - Gradient Lair

"While some women are fighting not to conceive children—which matters—others are fighting to able to, to not be sterilized, to not be shamed and abused during pregnancy, to not live in poverty with that child and to not worry about State interference and oppression no matter what the choice may be. Whether Black women need abortion or need support for entering motherhood, both choices are valid and both need deliverance from the impact of White supremacist capitalist patriarchy on Black womanhood and Black motherhood."

I didn't fully understand what it means to be pro-choice ... until I decided not to have an abortion - Sarah Ditum

"I thought about the decision that was mine to make. And surprisingly, solidly, I realised what I would do: I would have this baby. At the time, I didn't know that there is a critical difference between unplanned and unwanted. At the time, I would barely have described myself as “wanting” children. I had never felt that cooing hunger which teenage girls called "broodiness", the longing to put their arms around a baby – even when small, I preferred reading to playing with dolls. And I will never feel the ravenous grief that older women call broodiness, either, the anguish of love with no object. But I did want a child, and specifically I wanted a child with the man I was with. It was ten years premature, but this was that child."

Not caring isn’t caring more: Lord Rennard, Michael White and feminist priorities - Glosswatch

"In the meantime, though, we feminists are stuck with this endless list of reminders from those far cleverer than us. Just in case you’ve forgotten, you shouldn’t worry about banknotes because you should be worrying about Page Three. You shouldn’t worry about Page Three because you should be worrying about every other page of the Sun. You shouldn’t be worrying about the Sun because you should be worrying about the representation of women across the whole of the media. You shouldn’t be worrying about women in the media because you should be worrying about violence against women. You shouldn’t be worrying about violence against women because you should be worrying about FGM."

The glitter and gloss of the faith of my youth - Nish Weiseth

"After I got married and we left Boulder, a deep-seeded cynicism set in, and every little thing about that former church were all things I despised about Christianity. I mean, really, WHO NEEDS A FOG MACHINE AND LASER LIGHTS? But now, working through that cynicism and suspicion, I've come to have a tender place for churches like that. The glossy evangelical megachurch is a part of my story, just as much as the more gritty, hipster, urban church we're in now.

But, more than missing the worship service and the big-church feel, I miss having an answer for everything and having a checklist to live by. I miss the Christianity of my younger years. I miss that chapter of my story, and in some ways, I truly long for it. Being naive was so much easier."

She's All That : 15 years and 5,000 words - Bim Adewunmi

"I first watched She’s All That back in 1999, at the Stratford Picturehouse some weekend after school. I remember loving it, because it hit all the spots it was supposed to: boy and girl got to have each other at the end, and bad guy kind of got his comeuppance, which is as it should be in real life. The 90s – especially in the mid-to-late period – was a significant time for teen movies. It was a golden period, during which the industry enjoyed a purple patch starting around 1995 with Clueless, continuing into 1996 with The Craft, and exploding in a high point of acne, prom and hormone-fug in 1999, which saw the release of 10 Things I Hate About You, Cruel Intentions, Never Been Kissed, Election, American Pie and of course, She’s All That."

Inside Nigeria's ruthless human trafficking mafia - Tobore Ovuorie

"It is on the windy Sunday evening of October 6 that I make my first contact with the outer ring of this mafia. A big party with VIPs is on the cards; the kind of party an ordinary girl, or rather ‘product’, as we are called by traffickers, is not usually invited to. But I am currently on a fortune ride: Oghogho’s favourite. Additionally, I have been classified as ‘Special Forces’, or ‘Forza Speciale’ as my new contacts say, borrowing the Italian term.  It’s a rule of thumb, I understand, that a syndicate subjects girls to classification through a check on their nude bodies and I, too – in the company of some male and female judges, headed by a trafficker called Auntie Precious – had been checked. I had received the highest classification. “This means that you don’t have to walk the streets. You can be an escort for important clients,” Auntie Precious had told me in a soft, congratulatory tone. The ones of ‘lesser’ classification were referred to as Forza Strada, the Road Force."

And finally...

- This week I finished Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americanah. Get on it, if you haven't already.

- C. Jane Kendrick is back on the blogging wagon. Hurrah!

- Sunday 26 January is World Leprosy Day (work-related plug alert). If you don't know much about leprosy now's your chance to find out how it's very much a 21st century disease. Watch the video!

- At the Christian Feminist Network we're organising a day conference that's being held on Saturday 1 March in Manchester. The conference will include presentations, workshops and discussion as well as the chance to network with other Christian feminists. Find out more and sign up.

The breastapo, gobby women, and freaks of nature: breastfeeding as a feminist issue

It's National Breastfeeding Awareness Week and the debates it was supposed to ignite are in full swing. New research has shown that fewer women are initiating breastfeeding, and that in 2012-13, 327,048 mothers were not breastfeeding at all by the time their babies were six to eight weeks old. The Royal College of Midwives has voiced concerns over the lack of government support for what is undoubtedly a public health issue, highlighting the national shortage of midwives, cuts to breastfeeding support services, and England's lack of a national feeding strategy.

"Areas with high breastfeeding initiation and continuation rates tend to have strong Sure Start Centres, breastfeeding drop-in clinics, good peer support and community midwifery networks, where the midwife is the first point of contact for the mother and where there are good role models.

Research has shown that other factors, such as the availability and expert knowledge from midwives, especially community midwives and health visitors, who play integral roles in helping and guiding women about breastfeeding, are important," said Louise Silverton, writing for the Observer.

One particular area of concern is the regional variations in breastfeeding statistics that are indicative not only of varying levels of support offered, but also of links to affluence and class.

"In areas with high levels of social deprivation – such as Knowsley, Hartlepool and North East Lincolnshire – four in five mothers are not breastfeeding at all some six to eight weeks after their child's birth. By contrast, in Kensington, west London, 87% of mothers said they were partially or totally breastfeeding at the same stage," we were told in another story appearing in Sunday's Observer.

Here we go, you're probably thinking. She's talking about motherhood again. She who had no intention of becoming a Mummy Blogger. Next she's going to start talking about her personal experience of breastfeeding.

Here's the thing: breastfeeding is, absolutely, a feminist issue. It's guaranteed to bring out both the misogynists and talk of sisterhood. It's one of the issues that is guaranteed to get women talking. Four out of five women will at some point give birth and have to deal with conflicting information being thrown at them from all sides as well as prejudices and judgmental attitudes about every action they take during their pregnancy and while giving birth. They will see that you can't go out in public without seeing breasts in advertising, in newspapers and magazines as an important part of what being a woman is all about. And then they'll hear that women get asked to leave cafes because they've breastfed in public, that people deem it "unpleasant" and "gross", sneering asides that women who breastfeed around others are "just doing it to prove a point".

They will discover that breastfeeding is difficult, that it is a learned skill, and that most women really do need support to master it in the early days. They will discover that those early days and weeks involve near-constant attachment to a newborn, that it is time-consuming and can be physically draining. They'll hear about mastitis and blocked ducts and cracked nipples. That exclusively breastfeeding involves getting used to expressing when you need to spend time away from your baby and that this is also a learned skill that can be frustrating and stressful.

They will hear about the health benefits for themselves and their baby, about how rewarding it can be, about how amazing breastmilk is, about how it has ensured the continuation of civilisation through the centuries. It's likely that they'll want to breastfeed, but when the overriding message is how hard it is and little support is on offer, things might not go to plan. And if things do go to plan (as they did for me, thanks to good information and support), they'll still get people presenting formula as the solution to many a problem (Sleepless nights? That baby needs a bottle. Baby feeding a lot? Your milk might not be enough - try formula!) and expressing horror once they find out they're "still" breastfeeding their older baby (especially once said older baby gets teeth).

Depending on where you look, the big problem when it comes to attitudes about breastfeeding is the "breastapo", the militant lactivists who bully mothers into feeling guilty for giving up breastfeeding (or not starting it in the first place), or else the "gobby" anti-breastfeeding brigade who supposedly prize freedom, consumerism, and personal choice over breastmilk. I truly believe that the breastfeeding debate is the most toxic of all the "Mummy Wars", ticking all the boxes of playing on women's insecurities about their bodies' natural processes, their appearance, social class, their baby's intelligence, and the fear that somewhere, someone might be judging their parenting abilities and devotion to their children.

In reality, as is usually the case, members of these two camps are less common than the papers would have you believe. It's true that I deleted myself from a "breastfeeding support" community on Facebook because of the unpleasant direction the discussions started to take. Women don't need to be told in a patronising manner that breastfeeding probably would have worked out for them if they'd "just been more informed about the facts". They don't need to be told that formula is "poison". The final straw was the responses to a woman who wanted tips on expressing because she was going to be spending a day away from her four-month-old for the first time. "Why do you feel the need to give the baby a bottle?" - "Four months is much too young for a bottle! It will cause nipple confusion!" - "Don't do it!".

It's also true that on any given day you can search Twitter and find scores of people getting extremely disgusted by the fact they've spotted a woman breastfeeding in their vicinity. "No offence but does she need to do that in full view of everyone?" - "AWKWARD" - "No-one wants to see you feeding your baby!" Images of women breastfeeding are constantly deleted from Facebook and Instagram as they're deemed to be violating policy, while pages dedicated to grim misogyny abound. It was suggested in the Daily Telegraph this week that we "need" the Duchess of Cambridge to breastfeed and go public about it so she can be a role model for other young mothers. In the event of such a thing happening you can guarantee the buzz online would be more about the state of the royal tits - and Kate's desirability as a result - than anything else.

In light of all this, you can understand why it all gets too much. Lack of a national feeding strategy and recognition of breastfeeding as a health issue, with adequate support for new mothers and local networks providing advice and friendship will only mean that the misinformation, the judgmental attitudes, and the manufactured "cat fights" discourage more and more women from achieving their breastfeeding goals. It will continue to pit them against each other and encourage suspicion and shame. And who needs that when they've just gone through the rigours of pregnancy and birth?

Get Britain Fertile: another pregnancy-related guilt trip?

Kate Garraway is 'encouraging women to think about their fertility earlier in life after struggling to conceive at 45', and has been photographed made up to look like a pregnant 70-year-old to 'provoke debate' about what we think about when we think of 'older mothers'. She's an ambassador for Get Britain Fertile, a new campaign set to launch next month with a tour of the country, all 'powered by' First Response, the makers of pregnancy tests who, according to their website, 'want to be the first to advise you on getting fertility fit'.

This isn't the first time that some debate we're supposed to be having has turned out to be sponsored by some company with a product to sell. There's been a poll, of course. It's found that seven in ten women feel that having a baby in your 40s is 'too old'. Why the need, then, to have Garraway fronting the whole thing pretending to be a pregnant 70-year-old? As is generally the way, it's done the trick, and I've spotted people from student websites to various feminist blogs and, predictably, Mumsnet, discussing whether or not women need to be told to think about having children at a younger age.

Last year it was reported that the average woman in the UK gives birth to her first child at the age of 30. I’m not sure that there is, as some people seem to think, widespread ignorance about fertility. For every person who hasn’t really thought about the fact that fertility in women declines with age, there are many more that worry about it more with every passing year - even, as readers of these articles about Get Britain Fertile might be surprised to hear - women in their 20s. It seems patronising to assume that 'today's woman' doesn't give a thought to what her ovaries might be up to until it's 'too late'. For many women, I expect that everything else just gets in the way. Time passes by incredibly quickly when you're navigating our way through life's ups and downs. Being 'child-free by circumstance' is a Thing.

Judging from the reactions to the upcoming campaign it looks like encouraging women to have children when at their peak fertility is not the main issue to be addressed – this is backed up by the survey results, which indicated that women put pregnancy on hold due to their financial situation, or because they want to find the right partner. Many women would like to have children in their 20s, but are all too aware of the other pressures they face: finding a job that pays enough or an employer that will be supportive enough if they choose to have a child, for example. Affording childcare (the most expensive childcare in Europe, no less); support from family; actually being in a relationship, or achieving certain relationship milestones – living together, getting married, getting over financial hurdles. If these things stop women from having children when they want them, what are we doing to address it all?

I waited to try for a baby until I felt 'ready'. Yet there were other factors involved too - earning enough money to pay for childcare, and the fact I was keen to get a decent amount of experience in the workplace and off the bottom rung of the career ladder before I contemplated maternity leave. I had The Fear, that without being in the right sort of job first I would be expendable, disrespected, stuck in an unfulfilling job for years. The recession compounded that fear. Just before we made the decision to start trying to conceive, I remember sitting in a pub with Luke, 'calming' large glass of wine in one hand, reeling off a list of baby-related worries as long as my arm. Most of them involved money.

As women, all these ‘problems’ are highlighted to us over and over by the very same newspapers that warn us not to 'leave it too late'. As several women discussing it on Mumsnet posted, as younger women of the 1980s and 1990s, it was impressed upon them that getting pregnant 'young' was to be avoided at all costs – it would tie them down and ruin their lives as well as their careers. No, the ideal as they were sold it was to have everything else in place first: job, house, a good man, life experience, travel. As a teenager and in my early twenties I was the same and it remains a concern for a lot of women I know. By all means have children, we're told, but certain things must be achieved beforehand, the reasoning being that having a baby means you won’t be able to do these things any more.

This may be where we’re going wrong. It’s widely acknowledged that in the UK and the US we have this ‘total motherhood’ approach to parenting that makes women feel guilty and pressured from the moment they get a positive pregnancy test. Everyone who has given birth remembers the knowing remarks of other mothers, telling you that once your child has arrived you won’t have time to do anything any more, you won’t have time to relax, you won’t have time to have fun.

Women are made to feel guilty about sitting reading a magazine while their baby plays independently in the same room, or leaving them to cry for three minutes while they make a sandwich. The message is clear: children mean that life as you’ve known it is over – and that means hobbies, relaxation, and enjoyment. Children mean that you give your all to your child, and if you don’t you’d better feel bad about it. If you don’t want to go back to work you’d better feel bad about giving up on your career or inconveniencing your employer – but if you do, you’d best start beating yourself up about not being there for your child 24/7. Children will put strain on your relationship, your sex life, and your body. They’ll use up all your cash. It's a miserable state of affairs and one that, I think, has been exaggerated to the point that we need to step back and see it for what it is: that yes, children will bring enormous changes to your life and new responsibilities and pressures, but they won't ruin your life.

Is it any wonder that some people feel in a permanent state of not being ‘ready’ for a baby? For those of us who do feel ‘ready’, we have to be careful that we’re the right sort of potential mother. Teenagers, working class women, the poor and women of colour get criticised on a regular basis, while hands are wrung every time a middle class woman is interviewed about having ‘left it too late’. Particularly young women can't possibly feel ready to have children, some people say - yet at the same age they're also told they can't possibly have decided that they definitely don't want children either.

Zita West, pregnancy guru to the stars and another ambassador for Get Britain Fertile, is quoted saying "Women need support at all ages before they conceive", suggesting that the campaign has more of a focus on women preparing their bodies for pregnancy. It's support that should be the overarching theme here. Support, a better deal for women, an end to patronising nonsense that insinuates we don't know our own minds, an outlook on 'starting a family' that actually focuses on men and the part they have to play rather than blaming women at every turn for whatever their newest supposed 'problem' is. Making people feel judged for valid choices they've made about the age at which to have children - or not have children - will never do any good at all.

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