Where are the articles asking why men don't want to have children?
childfree sexism statistics · 7 comments · 800 words · read ~1,875 times.
Truly, men have the worse of everything…⸮
But, there's something we blokes can be grateful for. No matter what grief the world throws at us, it'll always be the women's fault that there aren't enough babies!
The other day, I saw this headline:
The Business Insider article - in the "Economy" section - focussed solely on the lady-folk. Why do those pesky dames refuse to procreate? About half-way through, the journalist linked to the original study. Did it put the blame squarely on the female of the species?
Among parents and non-parents alike, men and women are equally likely to say they will probably not have kids (or more kids) in the future.
Ah.
It turns out, it isn't just the fault of the chicks. Us dudes (assuming you are one) are also equally to blame. Not that you'd know it from the media!
Here's a selection of recent headlines. I've deliberately selected fairly mainstream Anglosphere publications rather than, say, single-interest magazines.
And on and on it goes!
Try to find articles in those same publications - or anywhere else - which ask "Why are young men not becoming fathers?" Or "10 reasons why men aren't choosing fatherhood - you'll never guess number 7!!" Or "Gen-Z Blokes Back-off Baby-making".
Where's the article entitled "I don't want to be a dad… ever!"?
At best, you find the occasional article like this: 
But that's really about men who want kids, but haven't got around to it.
Or this: 
Which quite reasonably says:
Why, oh why, does nobody ever ask about the men?
Statistics
OK, so no one is asking men why they don't want kids. What about the statistics?
I've previously ranted about the way the UK's Office for National Statistics talks about childfree intentions. By law, the ONS has to gather data about live births. In its latest statistical bullitein, it says:
The total fertility rate (TFR) reached a record low in 2020, decreasing to 1.58 children per woman.
OK, but how many children were there per man? Is this one hyper-fertile chap running around impregnating everyone?
And what's the fertility rate of the father? Are young-bucks opting out? Are older daddies now the norm?
On the one hand, it is easier to gather data from the mother - there's reasonably solid evidence that the baby is hers. People can and do lie about who the sperm-donator are. But that seems to me like a weak reason to not attempt to gather the data.
Well, the good news is - the data are gathered! The ONS query builder shows age of father. Here are the age of fathers & mothers in 2019:
(Ew at the number of geriatric skeeves perving on teenagers!)
The full dataset only has 2017-2020 - and looks like this for the age of fathers over time: 
Now, this doesn't talk about how many kids each man has fathered. But it is pretty clear that younger guys are dropping out of fatherhood at a higher rate than older ones. And, eyeballing it, at about the same rate as women.
Why is this presented as a woman-only problem?
Sexism.
Sorry, were you expecting a more detailed explanation? OK. Lots of sexism.
There is a stereotypical perception that men generally don't want kids. That's not true - I know loads of mates who were desperate to become fathers.
And there is an equal and opposite presumption that all women want to breed. But it is only that stereotype which seems to be the target. Men simply don't get an equal amount of grief in the media.
As people get better access to education and jobs - they see the structural advantages to the way (some) child-free people live their lives. And they see the misery inflicted on (some) people by having kids. This affects men and women equally.
As people take a rational look at both the economy and the health of the planet - they realise the monumental unfairness of bringing life into the world. Again, both men and women take a long-term rational view of their lives and the lives of potential children.
You can't escape the fact that you need a womb in order to give birth. But, as the old song goes, it takes two to tango. "Blame" for the lack of babies needs to be shared equally.
Where are the articles asking why men don't want to have children? Link: shkspr.mobi/blog/2022/04/w… Comments: news.ycombinator.com/item?id=312155…
With perfect timing... yet another article talking about this almost entirely as a women's issue. Interesting towards the end of the piece how she expresses frustration how her husband's views were edited out of a broadcast. theguardian.com/society/2022/a…
DinoNerd says:
At a guess, the people wringing their hands about the problem are older. Perhaps old enough that their expectation is that the female parent is (and should be) the stuckee for all the work and all the sacrifices involved in child rearing, or at least most of them. So their question might be "why aren't young women doing their duty and sacrificing their personal aspirations for the greater good". Except that they generally know better than to say that explicitly.
There's another problem here, too: where are all the articles praising those of us who choose not to have children?
The world is an overcrowded place, and increasingly so, and so many of its problems would be dramatically reduced by a significant reduction in population. Climate change particularly so.
I appreciate that some people are worried by the prospects of supporting an ageing population with a small number of young people, but that is a temporary problem -- admittedly, perhaps a century-long temporary problem, so not a very useful immediate solution to climate problems! -- but once the big bubble of elderly people (us) has passed, I like to think the world will think kindly of those who started to reduce the world's population to a more manageable and sustainable level. 🙂
So if the fertility rate is all about women, then let's give them the praise they deserve!
Congratulations to my friend @edent for being on page one of Google results for my search: ‘why don't people ask men if they're having children’ shkspr.mobi/blog/2022/04/w…
@Edent That's such a good article! Thanks for sharing.
I'm really tired of seeing stuff online about how women are "leaving it too late" with no mention of the men!
Simon Farnsworth says:
I would note that in meat and dairy farming, the typical ratio is about 1 breeding male to 25 breeding females to maintain a healthy herd/flock without running into genetic problems.
If you're letting the idea of people as a "flock" have excessive influence on your thinking, then you don't particularly care about men not wanting children - as long as at least 1 in 25 men wants children, you've got "enough" men to ensure that all women have children.
And yes, this is a rather gross way to think about people; but I suspect that some people in power do think about the masses in that sort of way.