NYMPHE: Childless, Childfree, Parent, Stepmom.

PAID FAMILY LEAVE: COMPASSIONATE OR DISCRIMINATORY?

if you want to have a baby, you should be able to take three months off work to have a baby.

if you want to write a book of poetry, you should be able to take three months off work to write a book of poetry.

i recently joined in a conversation on Oregonlive.com, the online companion to our local newspaper, The Oregonian. (the above bits are from my responses.) In an Op-Ed piece, Elizabeth Hovde argued against a proposal for a paid family leave law in Oregon. As Hovde put it, "While granting paid leave for important life events sounds like a nice idea, it's odd to charge all employees—regardless of their means or income—so other employees can take several weeks off work."

WHEN IS BLOOD A MISCARRIAGE?

Alicia Shvarts caused a veritable shytestorm at Yale with a performance art piece that dealt with repeated, self-induced, so-called miscarriages.

The Associated Press reports that the work was an intentional hoax here. The Yale newspaper published the artist's explanation here.

A quote from Shvarts: "...it is a myth that ovaries and a uterus are “meant” to birth a child. When considering my own bodily form, I recognize its potential as extending beyond its ability to participate in a normative function. While my organs are capable of engaging with the narrative of reproduction — the time-based linkage of discrete events from conception to birth — the realm of capability extends beyond the bounds of that specific narrative chain."

MADELYN CAIN: THE CHILDLESS REVOLUTION

If you're looking for the standard-issue indignant stance on childfree living, you won't find it here. Nor will you find the sorrow of infertility slowly beaten like a dead horse, surrounded by solemn images of blurry, gauzy women. It's not an upbeat, feel-good book about how cool we childfree women are, replete with comics and putdowns of moms. Nor is it a staunch defense of parenting and childrearing.

from my review of Madelyn Cain's "The Childless Revolution" on Amazon, a book which generated a flurry of surprisingly harsh comments.

BABIES IN COLLEGE: LETTING THOSE WHO PREFER A CHILDFREE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT MAKE THE CHOICE.

I attend an MFA program at Goddard College, which follows a unique vision of community, progressive self-directed education, responsibility to social change, and low-residency learning. This means we come together for 8 days, twice a year, for an intense, 12-hour daily schedule of workshops, faculty advising groups, graduate seminars, and the like. Then we return to our home communities and practice art there; we read books and write papers and send in documentation of our artwork.

I recently became aware that official policy allows babies in the entire learning environment, including classes. While I question the wisdom of that decision for many reasons, I'm willing to go along with it. What I'd like to see is a strong statement about the policy in all the recruitment and marketing materials for this program. People who choose not to study in the company of babies should have the right to do so, and it shouldn't be buried in the fine print.

I recently sent a version of the letter below to our student affairs coordinator, and posted it to the online community for the program I attend (MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts at Centrum/Port Townsend, Washington).

BREEDERS vs. CHILDFREE PEOPLE: CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG?

I'm troubled by this bullshit idea that the world consists solely of Happy Selfish Breeders and Happily Self-Righteous Childfree By Choice people, and they must fight to the bitter end.

I say this as someone who spent most of her life happily childfree by choice, who wrote articles about child-free/childless living for books and magazines, and who took some flak for it. I also say this as someone who now understands a *little* more about parenting...

To K. on myspace...

a woman i'll call "K" posted to a myspace support group about whether it gets any better with time. this was my response:

my experience is that the whole experience of childless living has many phases. some are cyclical. some parts noticeably "get better."

that's my observation from...

HYPER-BALKANIZED INTERNET FIEFDOMS AND SUCH

not much point to this post, except that i'm saving a lot of childless/childfree related writings in one spot here on Nymphe.

i went to check out the Selfish Heathens website for childfree agnostics and atheists, did a little intro, admitted i didn't fit the site's rigid participation guidelines (after signing up, i realised that stepparents don't fit their definition), and asked for other site suggestions. i got a bunch of flames in return, and when i went back to address some of the issues that had arisen and to say my final ciao, i discovered that they had disabled my account from being able to post. sooooo... despite the hilarious name, Selfish Heathens is perhaps not the bastion of thoughtful dialogue i was seeking. hee hee. anyway, the thing i'd attempted to post in response is here.