29 Comments
Jul 26Liked by Phoebe Maltz Bovy

I feel like people mean a couple different things by "not liking kids" and one is just "all things being equal, I prefer the company of other adults and I like having spaces that are adults-only." But there is probably a pithy way to express that without sounding like you post on r/childfree!

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I think that's just how most people feel, including (maybe especially!) most with little kids of their own, and seems different from disliking kids, more like, not being someone with the temperament to teach daycare. But (maybe?) it's expected of men and seen as an aberration or unnatural in women.

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I do think that's what is meant though, and the reason people might say it in the context of having to justify to others who demand a reason for their not having kids is to get across the idea that you do not enjoy being around them and therefore it would be a terrible idea for you to have one living in your house every day for two decades. The point is actually to get across that it would be bad for the kid bc you wouldn't want them there. That may strike you as odd but it's because so many people refuse to believe anyone truly doesn't want kids so it's something they say in exasperation almost...like hey I don't like kids, which would mean it would really suck for a kid to have to grow up living in a house with me if I don't want them there, right?

I know lots of people who "don't like kids" in that they prefer to not be around them and will seek out circumstances without kids and avoid ones with them. Yet those same people are very, very nice to kids when they ARE around them. Weirdly, they are often some of kids' favorite people, perhaps bc they treat them kind of differently and more like an adult or something, I'm not sure. I think they treat them as just slightly less precious and that ends up somehow coming off as the fun, cool adult. At least I always thought my one aunt/uncle couple who didn't have kids were the coolest, when I was a kid...they were the funny ones and acted different from the other adults.

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"I know lots of people who "don't like kids" in that they prefer to not be around them and will seek out circumstances without kids and avoid ones with them. Yet those same people are very, very nice to kids when they ARE around them."

Came here to say something similar. This describes me, for sure. I don't like being around little kids for various reasons, most of which *are* inherent to being a little kid, unfortunately, like how randomly loud they can be, how sticky everything mysteriously is in their presence, how they need constant care I don't know how or want to provide should the need arise, how I should censor my language around the ones who can understand me, etc.

But yeah, the important thing about me having those general feelings (and I don't think I consciously choose to have them) is that I don't treat small children like they annoy me when I'm around them. I don't go out and announce that "I don't like kids!" I guess I think it actually *is* okay to "not like kids." It's just NOT okay to go around announcing it, like the kind of person who makes sure to tell everyone that they aren't attracted to Arab men or trans women or something. It's just a really unnecessary thing to do that hurts people's feelings and makes them angry for no reason. You just have to live with and tolerate the existence of all kinds of people, by virtue of being one, yourself.

Related story: a couple years ago, my husband and I, who love camping, had the worst luck every single time we went to our favorite state park that summer, and ended up, every damn time, literally surrounded by young Boy Scouts who got up at the asscrack of dawn and made all sorts of annoying boy-child noises way tf too early for what I was interested in during that experience. But I kept reminding myself how happy I was to have so many memories of camping with my mom and grandparents as a kid, and I keep my annoyance to myself (or to my husband in the tent, quietly) because I know that not only is it going to be a great thing for these kids, and maybe I was the annoying kid at some campground more than once to adults who just wanted to chill in nature for a bit, but also kids just do need to be able to learn how to be humans in society and they should definitely probably get outside more.

I was probably a lot more annoying about the "announcing" part when I was younger, though, lol. Oops.

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Word. I don’t particularly care if somebody doesn’t want kids — parenting is a hard job, and not one everyone is cut out for. But general dislike of children never sits right with me. First, I thought we had agreed that it’s rude to dislike people based on a characteristic they can’t change. Second, everybody on earth was a child once. The biggest anti-natalist in the world was once that 3-year-old loudly melting down in the middle of the aisle at Safeway.

I do judge parents who don’t at least try to keep their kids under control in public — but that’s the fault of the parents, not the children.

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Most anti-kid people who I have met will say that they hated kids when they WERE a kid, too. Which...fine, okay, I didn't always get along with my peers at ANY stage of life. But I think there's a difference between saying "childhood can be a restrictive, annoying time and kids can be dicks to each other" and "the entire group of people between ages 0 and 18 are terrible."

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I hate that explanation from child haters. I mean, I didn't get along with other kids when I was a kid because I was a strange, prickly child who didn't know how to properly socialize, but I love kids as an adult (which is good because I have one and she was very social during her childhood, so for a single child household, we had a lot of kids in the house).

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Oh, same and same. My feelings on kids as a childless-mostly-by-choice adult is one of occasional amusement and a general feeling of wanting them to be happy, even if occasionally one or two of them are slightly irritating throughout the day.

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Yeah, I’ve heard the “I hated kids when I was a kid” thing too. I just wish that the common experience caused a more compassionate outlook. It’s possible the 6-year-old kicking your seat on the plane hates being a kid just as much as you did. But they can’t do anything about it, any more than you could.

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And most of the time, any problem on a plane is going to be the fault of the airline/plane, not the fault of the other passenger.

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Jul 26Liked by Phoebe Maltz Bovy

100%. not okay to say you don't like old people, not okay to say you don't like kids

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Jul 26·edited Jul 26

Right, and this insight touches on a related phenomenon that I find kind of flabbergasting: the idea that it's acceptable for adults to exclude kids from routine social events for no better reason than "it'll be more fun if they're not there." Weddings are the obvious example, but I've also come across people trying to arrange events like "child-free 4th of July barbecue" or "child-free Thanksgiving" (of all holidays). And my initial reaction always is: wait, why does this principle apply only to children? Can you tell your sister that she's welcome to come to your wedding, but she needs to leave her husband Bob at home, lest he bore his entire table with his stupid golf stories? Can you invite everyone to Thanksgiving dinner but grandma, because frankly she reminds you of the inevitability of death, and you don't need that on a holiday? The implicit idea that children have a uniquely weak claim for being treated as members of society drives me nuts.

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That adults-only social events exist isn't new though. When I was a kid I was regularly left with a babysitter so my parents could go to dinner parties. Wedding invitations were to couples, not necessarily their kids as well. (Your example of a child-free Thanksgiving sounds a bit weird though, unless everyone invited is childless).

What I notice now is people being *outraged* that they are invited to things that don't include their kids. (That this is happening at the same time we hear about an epidemic of adult loneliness I don't think is a coincidence. Adults, including those with children, need some non-kid time to relate to other adults. Probably even more so if they work from home).

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Liked solely for the two hilarious analogies.

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People say that don't like older people all the time, the just cloth it in words about the politics or activities of Boomers.

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Childlessness is always women’s fault, have you noticed that? Just as it’s always women’s fault if they have too many children, or don’t get married, or work, or don’t work.

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Jul 26Liked by Phoebe Maltz Bovy

Once again you’re being too nice. Yes you DO have to stifle yourself if you don’t like kids because VERY BAD THINGS happen to societies that stop having kids. This is just part of the deal if you want to live in civilization- you recognize and support the thing that people are doing to keep civilization going.

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I think we mostly agree on this though! I'm saying no one is thought-policing anyone, but that you need to be reasonable towards children and their caregivers. Someone with an ideological opposition to population growth *still* needs to recognize people of all ages as the existing human beings they are. If 'the children are our future' motivates someone to be nicer to them, great, but even an anti-natalist isn't excused for being rude to the babies who do exist.

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Jul 26Liked by Phoebe Maltz Bovy

In the spirit of Feminine Chaos it was an enthusiastic “Yes And!”

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As someone who doesn't have kids, I'm rather repelled by the viciousness of the anti-child sentiments I sometimes see (calling kids "crotch fruit" etc). I'm happy for my friends who have children.

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lol. Dave is a miserable midwit. Ignore him

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Yeah, I blocked Roberts years ago despite the fact that we likely agree on 80% of issues. He's a jerk, and this sort of "my bigotry is okay" argument is evidence of that.

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I very much enjoy children, often even in the situations most people don't, but I don't think Roberts is really giving anyone license not to like them. Note that he says it's nobody's else's business - I believe that *unkindness* to children IS other people's business, so that Roberts is really drawing a distinction between internal thoughts and external actions, and one shouldn't take the flippancy of the remark for granted in that regard. I wouldn't feel licensed to be mean to anybody based on what he said.

I do, on the other hand, think children should be cherished, and made to feel cherished, at all times. He obviously didn't say that, but I'm not sure, based on this comment, that he'd disagree. I note, too, that he neither said he didn't like kids nor that it was okay for other people to say that. (Saying being another one of those external actions that makes things other people's business.)

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Knew Roberts from the Resistance Twitter of the 2010s, still the same sneering argument (and it gets weird in the thread).

Sad that men like him and Vance ignore that women and children are what communities about.

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Yeah, DR has been insufferable since he joined Twitter. I used to like his explainer articles on environmental/energy transition topics, but I can't read him any more, just the thought of his dumb username makes me want to smack him.

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I guess I don’t agree that many people who say they don’t want kids are lying. However the reasons given depress me. Not having kids to focus on their careers 🤮

If you’re like a Nobel scientist okay but most jobs just aren’t that cool and certainly aren’t going to be there for their employees long term

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How else are you gonna demonstrate how cosmopolitan you are then loudly proclaiming you hate everyone under 18 🙄

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When Vance made these comments in 2021, the don’t like children crowd was all in on Covid lockdowns, school closures, and making toddlers wear masks all day. Covid sucked for everyone, but it really sucked for children.

I do think it’s completely legitimate to criticize childless people (often phoning it in on zoom while ordering in on Uber eats) supporting such horrible policies for children.

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I used to really like David Roberts’ climate tech reporting and some of his media criticism during the first Trump administration. But he’s really gone off the rails — this “not liking kids thing” is (ahem) weird, and he’s been going off on X about how “the media” is determined to sink Harris’s campaign.

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