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Black and childfree. Two words more blasphemous than cursing in church on Sunday morning. If you Google “childfree” you’ll find tons of articles written by women boasting about their childfreedom. Yet, one voice is amiss in this ever-growing community of the voluntarily barren; Black women.

It’s no surprise that Black women are missing from this admittedly feminist narrative. Feminism lacks blackness in general, but clinging to this as the cause would be shortsighted. There’s nothing more revered in “black-land” more than the Black Mother; she’s a god-like figure populating the earth with Black children to spite the white man that seeks our extermination. In her article, Being a Black Woman Who Doesn’t Want Kids Means Twice the Judgement, Char Adams talks about the unique criticism “black and childfree” attitudes garners, “…but one that is particular to Black women who opt out of motherhood is something I heard from one of my brothers: ‘That’s just what the white man wants… I’ve heard that white supremacists have brainwashed you with feminism and made you not want children in order to promote white superiority and wipe out’ the Black race.”

To be black and childfree is seen as the ultimate betrayal. Your mama and aunties, and especially the men, will batter you with how you’re too young to know what you really want and “What if your husband wants kids?”. Horrible sexist comments like this tells women they’re indecisive and are only here to please others. Similar to Char Adam’s stance on being a black woman who is child free, motherhood has never appealed to me either. My decision to not have children hasn’t been influenced by white supremacist but rather my right, as a woman, to say ‘no’ to what many black women have come to perceive as the standard norm.

As a child, I never really played with baby dolls; my Barbie’s got mohawk haircuts, marker tattoos and went on ass-kicking adventures. Instead of playing house, I swung from furniture like Indiana Jones. I’m now in my thirties and have never heard the ticking sound of the fictitious biological clock. Even four years ago when I had a hysterectomy, I never felt the need to bear children.

SEE ALSO: The Power of a Black Woman

Many women still believe there’s a link between childbearing and relationships. I’ve received insensitive comments about my choice to not to have children, such as “No man is ever gonna marry you if they know that children are off the table”, “You’ll regret this later when you’re all alone”. “What B***” is always the first response that comes to mind when I hear these remarks, but I remind myself that there’s a lot of security in chains, even if they’re wrapped around your neck. If the next guy I date wants kids, then he’s not the one for me.

There’s been research into the societal consequences of ever increasing childfreedom, mainly economic, but few studies have focused on the reasons for the stigma of being childfree. Leslie Ashburn-Nardo, author and psychology researcher, performed a study on why people have such disdain for the child free. What she found was that couples without kids were seen as “less mentally content, and conjured moral outrage.” At the end of the study, she gave the concluding statement, “In other words, not having children is seen not only as atypical but also as wrong.”

This isn’t surprising, but it is infuriating that despite women’s efforts to rid of sexist attitudes, we’ve done little to change societal ideals of sex roles. I suppose this is the reason that proud childfree women curtail to society by claiming “motherhood of another kind”. Spouting their joy at being the “cool aunt”, how much they love their friends’ kids, or how they’re adoring “pet parents” to their “fur babies”. Even the famously black and childfree Oprah has to say, “I’m a mother of the world’s children”.

The typing of motherhood to womanhood is completely ridiculous. Woman doesn’t equal womb. My friends from college have kids and I’ve never met them. I’ll meet them when their old enough to be my designated driver. I have pets but they aren’t my “fur babies” and I’m not their “pet mom.” I’m certainly not a “mother of the world’s children” either.

Sociologist and Criminologist, Kimya N. Dennis gave a study on the experiences of childfree black women. In particular, she states, “Women of the African diaspora face a range of assumptions, stereotypes, and can be treated with shock and mistrust if they are not mothers… despite world changes in women’s liberation, women’s reproductive rights, and civil rights for racial and ethnic minorities, there remain pressures and stigmatization of liberation and reproduction for women, in general, and Black women in particular.” It just goes to show how fearful society is of a woman who can break free of her reproductive chains, especially a black woman.

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