There is one thing our society teaches women: they will never do anything greater than have children. Everywhere there is discussion of reproduction. From the highest level of our government with the President signing bills concerning whether or not a woman has the right to choose if she gives birth all the way to the insistent allusions to ticking biological clocks from strangers in passing, the issue of child bearing is a hot topic. Children are glamorized in every aspect of our Society. They are the future that the people must preserve our planet for, the hopes of tomorrow that carry on our legacy, and the icons to be better humans. The desire for children is broadcast for every family unit: heterosexual, homosexual, single or any variation in between.
Every media outlet is sure to let women know their job in life: to produce babies. Every middle class mother on television, in books, on the movie screen is shown telling their daughters, friends, husbands, doctors, and whoever will listen that having a baby is the single most important thing they will ever do in their life. It is all they want, it is the only thing to make life complete. Years ago it was marriage which held this sort of esteem, though only because it lead to baby making. Now that a woman no longer needs to be married, or even have sex with a man, in order to have children the nuptials are no longer important. And it is not enough for a woman just to rear children, to love them, to help them form as individuals. No. A woman must /birth/ a child. Only if a child is a biological match is it truly accepted, loved, and seen as the holy grail. Then the list of acceptable alternative methods declines from there. If a woman cannot physically give birth, she should find a surrogate to implant her egg in, or have the egg implanted with sperm by the doctor and then harvested into her uterus. On the bottom rung of the childbirth pool is adoption. It is only acceptable as a last resort.
With these messages running hard, fast, and furious through our society I am not surprised that girls are becoming pregnant sooner and sooner. I have read articles that attribute this to early puberty, the increase in sexuality in the media, the lack of proper sex education, and the dominance of men in our culture. While I do not doubt these things play a part in the rise of teenage pregnancies, I do not think that part is as large as we are being asked to believe. I believe teenage girls are taking this message of only being as worthy as the children they produce to heart.
There are countless studies showing the lack of self-worth in the majority of teenage girls. As women we understand the feelings of oppression that we face every day. We know what it is like to be forced to adhere to gender roles and society standards in order to survive. It was not long ago that we weren’t even allowed to vote, much less live our lives without being attached to a man. While the options a woman has has greatly increased, sometimes the future looks bleak. Especially for the girl who doesn’t know what she wants to do with her life. The girl who feels left behind and left out. The girl who struggles to know herself or find a way in this world that is hers. A girl who is told she will never be able to be more than a waitress at a restaurant, or a rich man’s wife.
And when these messages of being worthless, unimportant, and lackluster are at their boiling point, when a teenage girl is so confused and frustrated with life and is at the whims of hormones and sorting our her own thoughts, there are the constant reassurances that babies make life better. There is no better feeling than holding one’s child in one’s arms. No one will ever love a woman the way her child does. If the child does well, then the mother is to thank, the mother has proven herself worthwhile. There is nothing in life that can ever compare to having a baby.
It doesn’t surprise me that our girls don’t listen to us when we tell them to wait to have sex and when we warn them about pregnancy and STDs. They don’t care, because even if they do have a baby, it will be the most beautiful, wonderful thing to ever happen. We tell our girls to go to college, to get a job, to travel the world and then have babies. We tell them not to ruin their lives so early on, not to get tied down to childcare and mortgage payments. That is like a whisper amongst the shouting of millions. Why should they waste so much time in college, in a career even, when their entire life will boil down to having a child? Why do we expect our young girls to heed our advice when we still put so much emphasis on them creating life?
No, I am not surprised that teenage pregnancy is on the rise, and I am not surprised that so many young girls are trying to get pregnant in order to fill something inside of them. It’s what our world is encouraging them to do, and until we begin to change that message, things will not change.
