Breaking Out of the Baby Matrix: Busting Common Pronatalist Myths
To celebrate International Women’s Day on March 8th, we interviewed Laura Carroll, internationally recognized expert on pronatalism and the childfree choice, who begins by sharing highlights from her latest book A Special Sisterhood: 100 Fascinating Women From History Who Never had Children. We also unpack her book The Baby Matrix: Why Freeing Our Minds From Outmoded Thinking About Parenthood & Reproduction Will Create a Better World, in which she busts the many pervasively pronatalist assumptions that people have to navigate while deciding whether or not to have children, and the effects of those decisions on people and planet. While laying out each of the assumptions, Laura offers alternative perspectives that elevate reproductive autonomy — such that parenthood and non-parenthood are equally acceptable options, and reproductive responsibility — a consideration of the wellbeing of potential child(ren) and the planet. She also shares important strategies on how to respond to pronatalist pressures from family and friends in as loving a way as possible, while staying grounded in our own knowledge and truth.
MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
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Laura Carroll 0:00
I started in the book with the pronatalist destiny assumption because it seemed appropriate because the assumption is that we're all destined to have children. And within that is that society has come to believe over many generations that we have a biological instinct to want children. And in thorough analysis studies, there is no evidence to support the fact that we have a biological instinct to want children. Now we do have biological capacities as women when we're pregnant, you know, oxytocin fires in the delivery. There's biological processes that do happen, but there is no evidence to support the fact that we're wired to want them.
Alan Ware 0:46
That was Laura Carroll, an internationally recognized expert on pronatalism and the childfree choice. We'll hear more from Laura in this episode of the Overpopulation Podcast about the many pervasively pronatalist assumptions that people have to navigate while deciding whether or not to have children, and the effects of those decisions on people and planet.
Nandita Bajaj 1:14
Welcome to the Overpopulation Podcast where we tirelessly make ecological overshoot and overpopulation common knowledge. That's the first step in right sizing the scale of our human footprint so that it is in balance with life on Earth, enabling all species to thrive. I'm Nandita Bajaj co-host of the podcast and executive director of Population Balance.
Alan Ware 1:36
I'm Alan Ware, co-host of the podcast and researcher with Population Balance, the first and only nonprofit organization globally that draws the connections between pronatalism, human supremacy, and ecological overshoot and offers solutions to address their combined impacts on the planet, people, and animals. And now on to today's guest. In honor of International Women's Day celebrated on March 8, we are excited to talk to Laura Carroll, an internationally recognized expert on pronatalism and the childfree choice. She is the author of A Special Sisterhood: 100 Fascinating Women From History Who Never Had Children; 25 over 10: A Childfree Longitudinal Study; Families of Two: Interviews With Happily Married Couples Without Children by Choice; The Baby Matrix: Why Freeing Our Minds From Outmoded Thinking About Parenthood and Reproduction Will Create a Better World; and co-author of Man Swarm: How Overpopulation is Killing the Wild World. She has contributed to textbooks for over 20 years and has been featured on television and radio and in a wide range of print and digital media, including Women's Health (UK and South Africa), Fortune, the Wall Street Journal and New York Magazine. Learn more about her work at laura carroll.com.
Nandita Bajaj 2:57
Thank you so much for joining us, Laura. You, of course, were one of the first people that former ED Dave Gardner had on the podcast when he first started it in 2016. And we're so happy Laura to have an excuse to bring you back with some of your recent publications since that interview almost eight years ago. Alan and I, while preparing for this interview, were talking about how pivotal your book, The Baby Matrix, was in helping us both comprehend the all-pervasive nature of pronatalism. And your work offers a new perspective on how we can push back against pronatalism and reimagine one of the most significant life choices - whether or not to have children - from a place of liberation and responsibility. So thank you so much for joining us, Laura.
Laura Carroll 3:49
My pleasure. It's great to be back.
Nandita Bajaj 3:51
So we'll start actually with your most recent book that just came out - A Special Sisterhood: 100 Fascinating Women From History Who Never Had Children. So tell us a bit about what inspired you to write this book?
Laura Carroll 4:07
Well, it was several years ago, I was asked to do a presentation at a conference called the NotMom conference. And it was orchestrated and produced by Karen Malone Wright, and in person, women who were childfree, childless and every story in between and was asked to do a presentation on women from history who never had children. And I quickly learned in researching it that there were so many women I could highlight going back I went, oh my goodness, I think I'm onto something bigger than just a presentation at a conference, right? So even that was hard to get it down for the presentation, but it was so well received and I just kept going and then hired a couple of researchers who gave me even more women and information on more women. And the next thing, you know, I thought I can't keep going because I have to get it to a nice number for a book. So it could be a series really. So that's what inspired it because I saw that we learn a lot about women from history but there's one thing we don't often know is whether they became mothers or not. And so all the 100 women in the book are not all childfree. And this is the first time I've never even really gone into the reasons. I've done many books in the past now who analyze that in depth and expansively, widely. This one I just went, you know, let's focus on the lives that these women lived. So in my intro, I say that, like, I'm not going to talk about how they got here, even if I know and sometimes we don't even know they go so far back and there's little written about it. But I want to focus on who they were and why they were so fascinating. And so that's what drove the inspiration. And then I decided to do illustrations which I found a great illustrator. It was the first time I'd done that in a book to where something visually came alive other than text. And it was really fun. So it was an expansive way for me to do my most current book. I really enjoyed it.
Nandita Bajaj 6:07
And, of course, you've talked about how the word Sisterhood is really special, because it captures not only the reasons why these women didn't have children, but as you said, that simply the fact that they lived such unique and fulfilling lives regardless. And I think that's really important, because there's so much narrative out there that's always trying to label people into parents, non-parents, and then if they're not parents is that childless or childfree, and what that means about them.
Laura Carroll 6:39
One of the reasons also I selected that word was because it creates this feeling of a bond and the bond, one that's strong is - no matter how we got there, we are all bonded by something we did not do that society expected or expects us to do. And we are judged for that. We're judged differently, say women who cannot have children. Pronatalism has all kinds of assumptions and judgments out there about those women as well as childfree women. So it's not that there's similarity in judgment, it's that we are judged as a collective. So I really wanted to, having focused on the childfree community mostly in this area, I wanted this piece to begin to bond more women together as a collective, knowing that that on a larger level could help the non-moms, if you will, around the world, become a stronger force. And the stronger force we are together, the more it creates potential for social change, which I know we're all about. So there's that element, swimming in the slipstream as well.
Nandita Bajaj 7:50
And you selected some really catchy categories that capture the paths different women pursued - a couple of our favorites were sky and star lovers, fiery informers...
Laura Carroll 8:04
That doesn't surprise me that you guys would like that.
Nandita Bajaj 8:09
And then of course, servers of the public good. So tell us about the process and how you arrived at those catchy titles.
Laura Carroll 8:17
Boy, throughout the development of the book, it honestly started as more of an organic process. So as I was honing in on finally 100, I would literally have index cards and I would get them into thematic clusters physically. And once I had those pretty much in place, I came up with some titles myself, but then I got together with a colleague and a friend of mine, Julia Holladay, who I've worked with on some things over the years. And she's a great wordsmith, very creative, and we brainstorm great together. So for a couple of meetings, we had a really fun time in sparking them up a little bit. So I think she helped me a lot kind and get them to be catchy, and also just give you the thrust of like a main tall tree of the women's lives. So it was, it was a fun process.
Alan Ware 9:06
And this will be a great book, as you mentioned, for Women's History Month, which is March.
Laura Carroll 9:11
Yes, yes. So I'm working on that right now. Yeah, and just planning, some publicity and some strategies to get it out there.
Alan Ware 9:20
Well looking now, drilling down at your 2012 book, The Baby Matrix, which was hugely influential for all of us who wanted to better understand pronatalism. And I might have been introduced to it really through that book, I think, and to help us better challenge its unspoken assumptions. And in the book, you go very thoroughly through seven major assumptions that act as pronatalist pressures on men and women to become parents and we'd love to unpack those assumptions. So the first three we'll kind of lump together - the destiny assumption, the normality assumption and the marriage assumption. They're all quite closely related, though they each carry their own particular sets of pressures. So to start, can you unpack those three? And then maybe throughout it talk about alternative assumptions to each of those assumptions?
Laura Carroll 10:11
Sure, yeah. I'll briefly do those three. Well, I started in the book with the pronatalist destiny assumption because it seemed appropriate, because the assumption is that we're all destined to have children. And within that is that society does come to believe over many generations that we have a biological instinct to want children. And in thorough analysis studies, and scholars agree with me, that there is no evidence to support the fact that we have a biological instinct to want children. Now, we do have biological capacities as women when we're pregnant, you know, oxytocin fires in the delivery. There's biological processes that do happen. But there is no evidence to support the fact that we're wired to want them. That's first of all, I unpack that. That that is a belief that is not something ground in stone, even though we've believed it so long. People think it's the truth, when really, it's not. If it was an instinct, we would all feel it as women. We'd all do it. And we don't. So there's a lot to discuss about it that I think unpacks it well to question, maybe it's not an automatic. And as an alternative assumption, I keep the focus on biological capacity, but more with the point that our biological hardwiring gives us the ability to think and feel and gives us the capacity to choose whether we want to become parents or not. Said another way, our biological capacities allow us to make parenthood a choice. We cognitively can assess, and think and feel about it. So I came from that perspective, because that empowers us to realize it's not automatic. It's a choice we can make, and we have the power and the intellect and the emotional being to make that choice. So that's the upshot of the destiny assumption. And closely related to that is the normality assumption, because the pronatalist assumptions surrounding that are that if you don't want children, there's something wrong with you. You're not normal. So having them and wanting them, pronatalist society tends to think it's a sign that we're psychologically healthy. We're ready to be mature adults. If we have kids, we're somehow no longer selfish human beings. If we choose not to have them, we don't really have a normal sense of identity as a woman with the underneath thing that is, you know, if you don't want them or have them somehow, you know, your femininity is challenged. So it's synonymous with womanhood, challenging all that. So that if we don't go to that place, we don't make that choice, we don't feel normal. And my alternative assumption is no, the choice to have children and to not have children, they are equal in value. It's just as normal to want them as it is to not want them, to hold that as a mindset. Because that too, is a truism. And within that too, marriage - the marriage assumption - is that wanting to get married and marrying is a sign of somehow adult maturity, which we think some of the younger generations are moving past that, actually. They're partnering, but they don't necessarily see the civil things as important. But still the partnering, and the life partnering thing, we're all supposed to do that to be normal adults. But with marriage, when we're in that partnering, we're supposed to have kids. That's why we're together, right? So that goes back to procreation messaging as far back as Augustus, you know, the times way back in the Christian church, and positing that that's what we're supposed to do is to be fruitful and, you know, multiply and you're supposed to do that. And so I challenged that by just saying it's just as normal, first of all, not to want to ever make that kind of social commitment by which you're supposed to reproduce and bring more people into the world. Marriage is one path to happiness in life. It's not the path. It's you know, it's they may marry as a way to bring them fulfillment in life. But that's not the only way. So I definitely go into some discussion about that. So those are the nuggets of those three in particular.
Alan Ware 14:42
Yeah, I think on marriage, it's interesting in your blog, where you're mentioning that there's a weakening of the link between marriage and parenthood - 65% in 1990 saying children were important to a successful marriage is now down to 41% in 2007. And then I saw 2022 Pew survey, I don't know if that was in your blog, but 46% of parents saying that getting married or having children are not at all important for their children to do.
Laura Carroll 15:11
So that can be good signs. But then when you're first married, what's the first thing that people ask you? Right? So that's the social convention's still very strong versus what people say, is true, or what's important to them if they want to put themselves in that situation. So I love seeing those trends. But we need to see more of it. And for people that maybe are already married, not that are to be married. But yeah, there's some good signs of that. And honestly, some of those good signs really started with, I think, the advent of birth control, the pill, the women's movement, because it really allowed women to see themselves separate than just a wife in a property relationship. And so it gave them power to not only decide when they were going to reproduce, but how they wanted to orchestrate their reproductive lives. So you know, that's, I think, two or three, four generations ago, we're building on that as we go. And I think, like I said, the younger generations, I think, are, are separating themselves more from the marriage assumption, but yet the main thrust of 'you have to hook up with someone for life and when you do you should have kids' still is all too common.
Alan Ware 16:25
Yeah, your research is focused on the US and developed countries. So it's a whole other world and cultures that are more governed by traditional and religious norms, right, in sub-Saharan Africa or parts of Asia, where in the expectation is immediate children,
Laura Carroll 16:42
Much tougher culturally, socially. Yep. And if you don't, you get penalized or really ostracized from society.
Alan Ware 16:49
Yeah, we interviewed Angela Saini, about her book about patriarchy recently. And she talked about patrilocality, especially in Indian villages where the young bride moves to the husband's household. And that bride has really no power until she has a child. And then that is her power base, becomes that child. So that's a very limiting form of binding marriage and children.
Nandita Bajaj 17:18
And it also reminds me that Angela also spoke about the thing you speak about in your book is that a key feature of patriarchy has been to grow populations for institutional power. And so it's not just that the pronatalist myths just kind of came out of nowhere. They were very much planted by those in power, who wanted to make the act of childbirth and motherhood attractive to women, just as they had to make the act of fighting and war attractive and honorable for men.
Alan Ware 17:59
In that the destiny assumption that you had mentioned with birth control, and all of the options for women have increasingly been able to have, the number of children they want to have, which seems to be fewer and fewer, once they're empowered to do so. We also do have some history that we heard about with Bob Engelman of midwives and women healers and abortifacients, and all kinds of plants, that women had been trying to control that destiny for forever, right? And that childbirth itself was possible death.
Laura Carroll 18:34
Yes, it did not come without danger, which is why it needed to be put up on a pedestal as something that's magical, and that we have to do it, it's going to be so great. So it was that goes back a long way to and even today, you know, our there's a lot of complications in pregnancy. You know, it's not something you go into lightly at all.
Nandita Bajaj 18:54
And then of course, another assumption that you unpack, which is closely tied or feeds into this narrative is, if I don't do X, Y, and Zed I won't be happy, called the fulfillment assumption. What are some falsehoods related to that?
Laura Carroll 19:10
A pronatalist assumption I point is just that we tend to think that the ultimate path to fulfillment, meaning, purpose in life, is to have children and to experience parenthood. There might be other things that we get fulfilled by and get meaning from, but the ultimate, the way is to have children. So I challenge that. You know, it's founded on the idea that we're supposed to, that's why we're here, we're destined to, etcetera. But the alternative assumption that I believe is more real is that there are many ways to experience fulfillment in life and parenthood can be just one of them. So it's not that it is, but it can be. So to me that opens up a wide expanse of trying to look at what does purpose and meaning mean to me. It allows for that opportunity. And sure parenthood could itself become part of that picture, but it doesn't have to be. So that's the opening of what I tried to do with the alternative mindset that I do think is very real. It takes us beyond this limited thinking that it's all about kids, so those of us who, you know, who don't have them, we see it, we experience it. There are many ways that we experience purpose and meaning in life. So that's where I go with that.
Nandita Bajaj 20:29
And you introduced a really interesting and helpful concept here of core curiosities. And how many of us who are trying to figure out what paths to pursue in life? That's a really helpful concept. Can you unpack that?
Laura Carroll 20:46
Yes, I developed that earlier in my career, very early actually, when I was working with people who got laid off from their jobs. And they were confronted with waking up in the morning and not having anywhere to go and really question what the purpose was to their lives. And so my work evolved over time to help them find more inward answers, which turned into a book that's been used in this field, or was some years ago now and was also used even in life planning courses called Finding Fulfillment From the Inside Out. So what I devised, in short, was just to begin to ask ourselves, what are things that not only that we're curious about, but that we have a deep relationship that really moves us when we're doing it? What are we passionate about, things that we really love? What fascinates me, fills me with awe, not just things I'm interested in, but things that I got to have in my life. It's the doing of things. And once you know what those are, you have a list of those to go even deeper, and ask yourself, well, what is it about that doing or the experience I have while doing it, that creates this feeling of fullness? So what is the experience you're getting out of doing that thing? Because when you get that nugget, it does very often mean that you don't have to do just that thing in order to get that experience. So I'll use just parenthood as a simple example, where would-be parents think that they want to become parents, for example, because they want to experience you know, deep emotional love. They want to experience a deep bonding. They want to be of service, could be a whole number of things of the emotional experience that they're looking for. Now, if you just look at those emotional experiences, is parenthood the only way you can get that experience? And many of us would say, No, we can do many other things that give us that same inward fulfilling experience. So that's the gist of it. It's so, it's not, it goes beyond looking at what's external first, and then finding what feels good about that. It's going deeper, and what is it about that doing so that I know what emotional experiences I'm looking for in my life and then choosing where do I get them. And that can change over the course of a lifetime. But those themes of core curiosities remain the same. So that really helped a lot of people in my work. And it's helped people in the Baby Matrix to think beyond, what if I don't want parenthood, then what? You know parenthood can be an easy way to go. That's the way everybody does it. And because you know, these kinds of questions I'm talking about, this inward deep stuff, it can be very challenging, very hard self-reflective work. And many people just go, Well, what's everybody else doing? What does society tell me I'm going to do? And then they rely on the outward experience and do that and, you know, hope for the best. And hopefully, a lot of times it does end up working out, but it doesn't always, as we know. So this is asking yourself beforehand, what do I want in a deeper inward way? And then what are the things I can do in my life that give me that? And I think in the end, you get a more deep sense of purpose, and you can become more of a full human being as you experience life. So that's where it came from. And still people that write me all the time and they're thinking about these things, I bring it up a lot and just say you got to dig deeper into what really moves you and start there. And even parents, for that matter. Parents - to do this work before they have kids - allows them the opportunity to figure out their core curiosities and how parenthood can fit into that picture. It's not the picture, but it is part of the picture. And that helps a lot of parents throughout different chapters of their own parental experience.
Alan Ware 24:43
I think it would be great to bring in what you were doing with unemployed workers and starting it in 9th, 10th grade and continuing through college.
Laura Carroll 24:52
Right? I know, get kids thinking about that. Yeah, very early.
Alan Ware 24:56
Yeah, their interests, abilities, core curiosities, what will bring them deep fulfillment.
Laura Carroll 25:01
Sometimes it shows up when they're little kids too. You know, they're just drawn to something. And it, that thing could be it. But what is it within that it, that kid can't stop doing it. When they get older then they can ask themselves that question. So it's super-helpful to get beyond that it's only parenthood. The bandwidth is so much wider on how we can inwardly experience purpose and meaning. So we want to invite that process.
Nandita Bajaj 25:28
This idea of core curiosity reminds me also, when you said, you know, a lot of children from a young age might express those core curiosities. But I do recall in my own experience as an educator, where I've seen what happens to children whose core curiosities were nourished by parents and those that were snubbed - in order for them to pursue a different goal than what they might have wanted to, what the parents had expected them to do, and career path and who they marry, when they marry, whether or not they have children. All of those things kind of fit into your work about core curiosities, because, as you said, for so many young girls especially, their imagination at a very young age is kind of snubbed by the belief that when they grow up, they must have motherhood as one of the paths. Therefore, I don't know if they can even think too expansively about the wild career paths that they might want to take, because of the limitations that parenthood might place on them.
Laura Carroll 26:41
Parental expectation really can be quite powerful. The kids, they feel it, they know it. They do what they think their parents want them to do and end up doing things that really doesn't reflect who they really are more fully. And so that too can be parenting, the parenting style that was used. And I would say that, in many instances, it can be an example of being selfish about how you want your kid to grow up and how you want your kid to be. And you have them so it's their duty to give that to you. So that is a mind trip, that is all too often gets kids off their own track, and what's their own brilliance and what's their own inner spirit really liking, and the parents nourishing that as opposed to nourishing what they want them to be. So that's still very common.
Alan Ware 27:32
Another aspect you touch on in the book, which is often missed in other critiques of pronatalism, is the concept of reproductive responsibility. And you capture that in the right to reproduce and the offspring assumptions. Can you talk about the impact those two pronatalist assumptions have on both the wellbeing of the children and the planet as a whole?
Laura Carroll 27:55
Boy, those two assumptions, I got a lot of, let's just say feedback over the years. And I'm like, readers read it, and they go, Wow, you really went out there. And I don't think I did. So let me just be brief. But the right to reproduce assumption really starts with, we all have the right to have children. And the truth is, I guess, at least in my country, and many others, the laws in one way or another say you do. My country, it can fall under you have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and the right to have a family and build that family is within that context. So I acknowledge that. You can say technically, that is the law; however, then we need to unpack what the costs of that law are. And they're huge. So, gosh, where do we start? By parents just having the right to do it whenever they want, however they want, creates a lot of parents. They have kids when they're not ready to have kids. They're not, for whatever reason, financially, they don't have the skills. They're not emotionally ready. So we just say, hey, when you know, they have them whenever they have them and the result of unfit parents, no matter what that looks like, these kids suffer, right? There's sexual abuse. They're neglected. Sometimes they end up in foster care. The cost of all those social arenas in our societies is just huge. But beyond that, it's the cost that it creates with those kids, the lives that the kids end up living. So that, I think, is the even bigger cost that we really have to look at deeply. And why do we allow this to happen to the children that are brought into the world? And I think that's the reason we need to question it. So what I say in that chapter is what if we adopted the mindset that parenthood is a privileged right? What if we had social mechanisms that helped parents prepare to be parents before they're parents, even better help people prepare to even figure out whether that's the best thing for them or not - and if it isn't, to assess where are my levels of competency low. Is it going to be when they're babies, and I'm more apt to be better with them when they're teenagers, to really look at it and treat it like a set of competencies. I think that that would help this ripple effect of, if parents are more ready, and they know they want to be parents, the child will probably be raised better, and the cost to those children and society would be much lower. So it goes back to that baseline assumption, hey, when we have them we just learn on the fly. We're humans, we're kind of made to do this, so once the baby's here, we'll get it. That's not true. So it's having that whole conversation - how do we construct societies such that the kids are less harmed? That's in there, big. Then the offspring assumption is that we not only have the right to have kids, but we have the right to have as many children as we want. But I think it's worth trying on a mindset that speaks to, what if we made decisions about having children that put our obligation to the planet first? Because what we're doing there is we are making the planet a better place to bring those children into. So I go into that conversation that it's really in a way, it's like a meta-parenthood mindset where we have to put our needs sometimes, if we want kids and say many of them, we could have a mindset that puts the status of the planet first - puts ourselves second, the planet first. But the end result is so that those people's kids would have a better life. So in all that is debunking myths on having only children, so when you have fewer kids, you choose to, Oh those kids are going to be emotionally screwed up, and they're not going to have social skills. You know, so there's a lot of debunking of that. Once people know that it's normal, they're more apt to go, Whew, okay, maybe I'll have one, sort of thing. So that's the offspring assumption, is challenging people to think bigger about what's truly the humanitarian act here. It is to look at what we have in our world first, and then how the humans sustainably fit into it.
Alan Ware 32:23
Right, the effects on nonhumans of course, as we talk about plenty on the species and the carbon legacy, which we've talked about. And I think the more we learn about trauma, which has become quite popular and researched, it almost has a kind of genetic power in the sense that if you've been exposed to that trauma, it's very hard to rewire your brain from those intense environmental circumstances. So yeah, paying much more attention to quality of human life than quantity, and then helping quality and quantity of nonhuman life. And I liked, as far as only children, you mentioned there are 115 studies of only children that found they weren't measurably different on adjustment, character, sociability, achievement, and intelligence. So there's just so many myths about only children.
Laura Carroll 33:18
Yep, still, I still see it online all the time. And I just shake my head, I go, I can't believe people are still talking about it this way. So.
Nandita Bajaj 33:25
And another thing I really like about this reproductive responsibility piece of the alternative assumption that you present, is what would it mean for us to place the health of our planet first. I think a common misconception for a lot of people who think, Oh, you're environmentally minded when it comes to reproductive decisions; therefore, it means that somehow you prioritize the health of the planet over the wellbeing of your own species. And it's like a really bizarre worldview to unpack because the assumption is that somehow we are separate from nature, doing something for the benefit of the planet somehow makes us like misanthropic or not that caring towards our own species, as if we were not completely intertwined and 100% dependent on our planet. So I also just like the fact that we are part of nature, what you said about bringing children into a world where we can ensure that their home, Earth, is in good shape, and all the other cousins that we have, the more-than-human species, their rights and wellbeing are also prioritized. And it doesn't make us any less human. It makes us more human to prioritize the wellbeing of our home. And then yeah, like you said, the bonus benefits that come when you've thought so deeply about procreation as from a privileged right perspective, is the kids that you bring up are so much more well adjusted and loved and cared for from a physiological, material, psychological place. You know, another thing I wanted to piggyback on the last couple that you talked about, like the fulfillment assumptions, and the destiny assumption is, we've been noticing a lot more is pushback about declining fertility. And there is this real elevation and amplification of the role that the fertility industry is able to play in not only curbing the declining fertility rates, but also presenting themselves as like helping people achieve their biological destiny. Can you speak to the really exploitative nature of the fertility industry?
Laura Carroll 36:01
Boy, it sure survives on hammering the pronatalist assumption that in order to have the best life, the most fulfilling life, is you have to have a baby. Not just a baby, it has to be your biological offspring. And as a woman, that is the way to prove you're a woman. And the messaging is so persuasive that women will do just about anything sometimes to achieve that goal that they think is required for themselves. And I also think in there, it's still stuck in the destiny assumption, that that's why we're here. But that business is big business. And you're right, it's very manipulative. But on one hand, you know, there are times where I say one pro is that it can, for people that know they want kids, it can give them some control over when they have kids or try to have kids, you know, egg freezing and things. And now the odds aren't good, but you know, it gives them that opportunity if they want to do it. But the bigger picture, the mindset is that it creates this pressure on the fertility industry's market of people creating the pressure that they feel they have to do anything to have a biological child. Thank you for pointing it out. Because there's not enough talked about that challenges it and then, for that matter, surrogacy, that business is surging too. It's still their biological child, but they don't even have to carry it. Some other woman carries it. And that's a whole international business. So in the end it's all making babies a big business, one big business anyway. Don't get me started.
Nandita Bajaj 37:48
No, and that's where the class relations really come into play. It's like, who are the people who are paying the price in terms of, you know, the whole neoliberal kind of feminism aspect is well, often wealthy people who have a lot of privilege can think that well, by any means possible, they can have any number of children they want, because A, someone else will be there to take care of them, usually women of lower socio-economic status and women of color, who end up becoming nannies. And then of course, the surrogacy market. Same thing, very much thrives on classism. But yes, that's for another day.
Laura Carroll 38:32
That's a whole episode.
Alan Ware 38:35
The last assumption you tackle in the book is the elderhood assumption, a belief that we're obligated to be there for our parents when they're old. What are the outdated notions related to that assumption in your view?
Laura Carroll 38:47
Some of the discussion I have in The Baby Matrix has to do with the idea that challenging, Are your adult children really going to be there for you when you're old? What does research tell us? What are the numbers tell us? And the answer is often they're not. Even if they want to be they can't be. Maybe they don't have the money. So to go into having kids thinking that they are going to take care of you when you're old, it's wise to question if that's really going to happen realistically. Even further sometimes it can turn out that do the adult children really even want to be there for them. You know, a lot of times these days families don't live in the same areas. It's a great cost to try to take care of them from afar. And also it's wise to think thoroughly about, is it really wise to expect that of my adult children? So I unpack those that with an alternate reality that what if as we got older you know, we approached it, or even way before we got older, we approach it that it's up to each of us to develop our own support structure for our elder years. And we need to assume that it doesn't automatically come from our blood relatives. So what would that look like? And how do I take responsibility for that earlier in my life? Some of the things I discussed is to, part of that support structure, perhaps try to find intergenerational support or relationships that you have, some people your age, some people younger. The main point, though, is and often it means starting to save money. So one thing that tells us that people who are older that feel the greatest sense of well being, they do have their partner with them, or a significant person, could even be a very close companion. They have that close support there. And it's not so much their kids, they're not first, but throughout, they have financial stability. So it's being very mindful to make sure you have some financial means as you get older. That's a part of the whole larger plan of taking responsibility and not assuming your kids are going to help you. And I find that this whole concept, even though there are people in social work and community development people, they're out there talking about it, largely, we don't still see that messaging out there. What I all too commonly see is that the elderly are a burden we have to carry and, to do so, to get more services and money, what do we need to do? People need to bring more people into the world. So when the birth rates go down, we're supposed to not only be afraid, you know that the elderly will suffer, but somehow the entire society is going to somehow crash. The whole ponzi scheme is going to just be destroyed. So the answer ending up with, you know, hey, that must be in that we have to continue to procreate to support these elders, it's just pronatalism again, just resurfacing its head this time only with older people. So it needs a lot of reinforcement earlier for people to get past their assumptions about what their kids are supposed to do for them and take responsibility for their own elder years.
Nandita Bajaj 42:11
And what are your thoughts on this kind of reactionary pronatalism?
Laura Carroll 42:16
Oh, it's such a deep, heavy sigh. Because I just get very in touch with how it reflects how deep and how old - and I mean with a capital O old - pronatalism is because these countries are doing exactly what Augustus did in the Roman times, what the Christian church was doing so many years. So it's just, we're still stuck in a model that its growth at all costs so the powers that be can stay in power. That's to me what I see. The only silver sort of lining in there is even the incentives don't really seem to work. Breaks and cash, it doesn't really seem to change the trajectory that all of a sudden these families are having all these babies. That's at least what I continue to see. There may be more current research about that. But I silently go, yes, you know, just women are still making the decision very, probably very responsibly. Yeah, I could have three or four for you, Mr. Government, but I can't afford to do that. It's plain and simple. So they're being responsible in the end, but in the end as well it's just such an old behemoth to continue to try to move, but we keep at it, keep at it.
Alan Ware 43:36
Yeah, that is very encouraging that despite all of these incentives, I think Hungary was spending a few percent of their GDP on birth incentives, and it really hasn't done much. It's been incredibly expensive. So women, just will not. I don't know how they're going to try to forcibly raise that birth rate, maybe banning abortion everywhere. You would certainly have plenty of a Ceausescu type of orphanage system of hundreds of thousands.
Laura Carroll 44:05
Yeah, there we go back to the cost to children conversation.
Nandita Bajaj 44:11
Actually, just today, there was a story in CNN saying nearly 65,000 pregnancies from rape have occurred in the US - just rape - because of abortion bans. And then you think of well, you know, rape is one aspect and then there's all sorts of other reasons that people end up becoming pregnant - unintended, unwanted, contraceptive not working, etcetera. And we did, we have seen a spike, and I hope pronatalists everywhere are not listening to this, because abortion bans to me are the form of course of pronatalism. That's the path they're willing to go down to increase birth rates is to take all sorts of reproductive autonomy and rights away. And to your point, Laura, imagine the cost to children. What is the state of the mother that is being forced to carry a child she may have chosen not to most likely, and the child being born under these circumstances? And what is the government going to do once a child is born? They're not going to take responsibility. To them it's just growth in numbers, strength in numbers. And it's just very heavy stuff with the cost of pronatalism on obviously, people, but also just on the planet.
Laura Carroll 45:37
That's why we need to keep talking about it this way, in as many venues as possible. Because I think once people see this and understand it, it does go a long way, which, you know, is in part why I even called it The Baby Matrix. And you know, it's a riff off the movie, but it's like, once you see it, you can't unsee it. That's what I want more people to - on all these assumptions and more - to be more awake to not only what they're thinking and believing in can, is it worthy of change and moving past it, to what's real, today, true today to more societal concerns, and trying to do something about that.
Alan Ware 46:14
And as you mentioned in The Baby Matrix, many of the assumptions can be felt as emotional pressures by someone who's making the choice of whether or not to have a child. And could you describe what you see as some of those pressures? And how would you recommend people push back against those or deal with those pressures?
Laura Carroll 46:33
I go into it a little bit in length. I'll be, I'll be brief. But there's a few different types of pressures I've noticed over the years. One I call relational pressure. And that gets at the idea that you know, parents or friends that have kids, they may put pressure on others to say, oh, have one, you'll love it. We'll be closer. It's more of a bonding thing. And that can be quite attractive, because you do want to be closer to your loved ones. And so that can feel like pressure and come up against what you think you really want to do. And that can take also forms that I call guilt-driven - by making people feel that they're disappointing their parents or by not doing something it's negatively impacting their loved ones and/or friends. And then there's invasive pressure, where people just get in it, they become very nosy about, well, why not? And when when are you going off the pill? And I mean, I'm not joking, this still happens. So there's a four step strategy I go into in the book, but I'll just cut to the one that I think is one of the most important points is to communicate clearly on why you decided not to have children. But almost more importantly, is to seek what I call mutual understanding - so that those that are pressuring you, you need to help them understand why they are pressuring us, what's in it for them. Why do they want me to have a grandchild or have a child so that I can do more with them, be close with them? So have an open conversation about that. And once they see more clearly their own motivations I think it helps them then go, Oh, I think I understand yours better. And that helps take some of the juice out of that pressures, and if not, most, or all of it, if you can get to that place. So you kind of have to, as people discussing it, turn the table a little and focus on the pressurer. Not being on a defense about being pressured. And I think if it's done effectively, couples anyway I've talked to the most about this, if it's done effectively, that pressure can go away. So I think listening to this podcast, if you understand like the destiny assumption, normality,fulfillment assumptions, educate others about these mindsets. I'm like, Why do you think like that, because actually, it's not really true. So educate people to see beyond these pronatalist assumptions in that we were helping others along the way on that score to in the bigger picture.
Nandita Bajaj 49:03
Yeah, I found them really helpful because they resonated quite a bit with my own personal experience. And I, I came to your book, you know, after my husband and I had made the decision not to have children, but we were very private about the decision. And even with our both sets of parents, we kind of kept pushing it off to just not let the subject take center stage when we would gather for family gatherings. But I really did feel very much more equipped after reading these. It did help me have those more adult conversations with family and friends and kind of like you said, put the emphasis back on the pressurer. You know, I had great conversations with both my parents and they came around so quickly. I mean, I know I'm unique in that because not everybody's experience, especially within my culture, is like that. People have kind of disownment, estrangement from families, etcetera. But the one thing I found now that it's been, you know, 10, 15 years since we made the decision is how much closer I am with my parents, how much more time I have for them that is undistracted, unconditional. It's just kind of a pure connection that we can hang out as adults and have meaningful conversations and do fun things together. And that's it. And I, you know, I know it's not possible for everyone, because I know how sensitive tradition and family pressures are. I would love for people to practice that and exercise those strategies within their own friends and family networks. And it helps you build confidence in your own decision and how you communicate that.
Laura Carroll 50:50
I see with younger generations, too, there's some progress where even in some cultures that it's very difficult they have now been exposed to the fact that parenthood is a choice, and they're flirting with that decision, as it were. And they're more willing to talk to their families earlier, before they're married. And you know, even though their parents might say, Oh, you're going to change your mind when you get married, at least they're broaching it. So that when they do bring it up later, it won't be this cold first conversation. So I do see that I think it's going to get better with each generation. But I think that the point still remains is to take the focus off of us, the decision maker, to the person who's judging us or has a hard time with our choices to the point to try to come together in as loving way as possible. And I agree, I was very close to my parents too. And I know it would have been anyway if I'd had chosen to have kids, but I think on the pressuring point, my mom never pressured me. But I know that when I went to do my first book on being childfree, I looked at couples, and I told her what I was up to, and she got very upset. She said, I can't tell my friends what you're doing, like your latest book project. I can't share that with, I can't tell anybody. And I said well why not? So where we got to was that she wondered whether she made mistakes in how she parented me such that I wanted to grow up and do something that she didn't do. And I said, Mom, you did everything, right. You raised me to believe I could create the life that I want. And that just...
Nandita Bajaj 52:34
That's beautiful.
Laura Carroll 52:35
The sea went calm and we were tight and after that, she would call me and say, Oh, I just got off the phone with so and so and all they could do is talk about their grandkids. So we bonded in all these different ways, you know, so it's like, that's what I mean is you get to this point of Whoa, that's my truth as the elder parent, once they feel it and get it, the relationship can move forward. So some of that means taking your own responsibility as the elder parents. And so that can be a challenge, and it may not happen in one conversation. Boy, we were so close and had so many good years together that they learned, I think, that to have a close bond with their adult children can look a myriad of different ways. And we found our own, and it was really lovely. Neither one are with me anymore, but by I had so many great years with them. And so I have really good memories.
Alan Ware 53:27
Well, that's encouraging. I was going to ask you about those pressures of, generationally, we can expect them to lessen as more women become mothers who put less pressure, maybe on their daughters and sons and their peers, don't all feel they have to have babies at the same time or something. So generally, just social pressure will ease I'm hoping and it sounds like there's some reason to hope. So you were one of the first researchers of the childfree choice. And you've been elemental in promoting greater social acceptance of it, especially amongst women. And you brought back International Childfree Day in 2013 after a long hiatus of that. And you organized it and led it for 10 years. So since the publication of that first book in 2000, Families of Two, what is some of the most encouraging evidence you've seen about the child free choice and has it become much more normalized and socially acceptable?
Laura Carroll 54:28
I think it's seen great strides and over the last two decades in terms of society knowing about the choice, being educated about the choice, understanding people a bit better who make the choice, people who've made the choice finding others to connect with. And we have just the digital world to thank for that - because really, when I was researching in the late 90s there wasn't the internet like it is today at all. And these childfree couples that I was trying to find which I had no problem, by the way, but I found through newspapers, magazines, etcetera, they were very consistent in expressing, oh my gosh, people want to finally talk to us. And they didn't know other people like them. So they felt like kind of rare birds. So the internet, and everything associated with its exponential growth, I think has helped this whole, not only the child free community to flourish, but the understanding of more people to get that it is a lifestyle choice. Now, there's a ways to go for sure. And there are areas even in my country, the United States, where I know it's harder to make that choice than others. But on the arc of societal change, I think it's just been really, really positive in just the last 20 years. So I'm very optimistic. So that's been a gift. On the other side of the digital world, as I see more often in the last, I don't know, few years in particular, that social media and how it can exaggerate certain stereotypes of those of us who've made this choice doesn't always serve this progress. As an example, I find that often the people who are saying, Hey, I've made this choice, and look, I'm traveling the world and, you know, I don't really care about, you know, settling down, there's like a feeling of it's reinforcing that 'I don't want to grow up' kind of person, when that's not the case at all. There are super responsible people who make this choice, who pay their bills, pay their mortgages. There are people who don't have disposable cash to travel around. So some of what I feel is the messaging doesn't always work with the total movement forward. It's like a reinforcement of stereotypes that I don't think is as productive as it can be. So it's the nature of TikTok, and YouTube and things like that. So it's all in a stew together.
Nandita Bajaj 57:01
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. We certainly are seeing more kind of public proclamations that people are saying, you know, I'm not going to have children because of the climate crisis. And, though it's very helpful to see those kinds of responses online, sometimes I still notice that there are a lot of pronatalist assumptions within those - saying that I really wanted to have children, and it was my destiny, I knew from a young age that I wanted to have kids - kind of feeding into some of the narrative and then saying, and I'm making this huge sacrifice by not having them. And though it can be very true that maybe people really have done all of the work in evaluating the reasons why they wanted to have children. But from the way certain papers or articles are worded, to me, it still comes across as, this was my destiny, it was going to bring me fulfillment, it was a normal thing to do. And until and unless the government's fix the planet and do something, I'm not going to bring the child to this world as a sacrificial position rather than as an empowerment position - rather than as a position of putting the needs of the planet first. And also understanding that fulfillment and destiny and all those things, as you've so articulately described, are not tied to that one action. You know, you can have fulfilling lives without necessarily making it a sacrificial position. So I would like to see more narratives out there where people kind of making a public statement, that they're choosing not to have kids because they care deeply about the potential children that will inherit this planet, because they care deeply about the planet, and the state of all the other more-than-human world, and that they can still be happy. It's a statement of empowerment and choice rather than somebody twisted their arm, whether it's through the climate crisis, or whether it's through the pandemic, etcetera. Either way, I'm still happy that more and more people are making decisions about this choice rather than automatically doing it because you're supposed to.
Laura Carroll 59:22
It's a sign of progress for sure. So I agree with you that I'd like to see more the narrative not start with this unspoken assumption that I've changed my mind and I'm doing it for the planet now. Talk to me to that person when she's 35. How did she feel then? She's still living from that, as you say, a pronatalist mindset, so people can get past the mindsets and choose more openly and freely. I think the long term decision will remain that.
Alan Ware 59:53
Well, thanks for this discussion. Thanks for your time and all your writing that woke us up to pronatalism in a big way. And thanks for being a leader in this field for 22 years, this whole the century, you've been key.
Nandita Bajaj 1:00:09
And of course, you know, as we've spoken at length today, you know, what's really admirable about your work on pronatalism is that, you know, while you place so much importance on reproductive autonomy and reproductive rights, you also go beyond that aspect to include the need for reproductive responsibility and care for the planet, the more-than-human world and potential children in a way that, you know, not all critiques of pronatalism do. I think a lot of them are just about a woman's decision, which we're all about, but then we need to also go further than that, which you do. And you know, we really admire that. So thank you so much, Laura.
Laura Carroll 1:00:47
Appreciate it. Appreciate you both as well, love the work that you're doing. Keep it up.
Alan Ware 1:00:53
That's all for this edition of the Overpopulation Podcast visit population balance.org to learn more. To share feedback or guest recommendations, write to us using the contact form on our site, or by emailing us at podcast@ populationbalance.org. And if you enjoyed this podcast, please rate us on your favorite podcast platform and share it widely. We couldn't do this work without the support of listeners like you and we hope that you will consider a one-time or recurring donation.
Nandita Bajaj 1:01:22
Until next time, I'm Nandita Bajaj, thanking you for your interest in our work and for your efforts in helping us all shrink toward abundance.
