I recently read two articles, one at NPR, which said the percentage of black children born out of wedlock in 2013 was 70%. Another in The Atlantic, attempted to explain. Written by Ta-Nehisi Coastes, a man, it was called "Understanding Out of Wedlock Births in Black America." (Please understand that white children are also being born out of wedlock in unprecedented numbers and what I have to say here is not focused on just black people.)
THE ATLANTIC ARCHIVE
I carefully read the language of this second article, and the first issue I had with it was the apology that black women are CHOOSING NOT TO MARRY. The Black women I've known through the years were not being asked to marry even when they got pregnant. If a relationship was not a committed one with the potential to become marriage before the pregnancy occurred, then forget this idea of choice completely. (And yes I know one white woman who told everyone that her sperm donor had asked her to marry him but that she had decided it wasn't a relationship to make a life out of and had said no. It was a lie. It turned out he was married.)
What the article should have said is WOMEN ARE CHOOSING TO HAVE SEX WITHOUT PROPER CONTRACEPTION or are unwilling to use it, or are unwilling to have abortions or have a baby and put it up for adoption IN RECORD NUMBERS. It may now be a rite of passage into adulthood that a woman gets pregnant and becomes a single mom, which is often a struggling, stressed out, mom who can't give her children the things they need and is dependent on Social Services.
I know contraception is not perfect, in particular because people are not perfect.
Believe it or not, I've always been Pro-Choice, but I couldn't tell someone they have to have an abortion. What worries me is that so many women are living life not by CHOOSING but by NOT CHOOSING. Everything in life "just happens" to them, or is their fate, or is God's will.
I'm also willing to go anthropologist on this and say that maybe black American culture is basically matriarchal and there isn't much expected of men in the first place, that it's a culture where the women do the child begetting and birthing and raising without the idea that a man should be involved too. But women, what has happened to your desire to, if you really want children, date with the idea that finding a husband first? I'm sorry but some of you just lack self esteem and are letting men off easy as they betray you. You also have more options for contraception than ever before in the history of this planet, but don't use it. And if you're so religious that you don't believe in contraception or abortion, what are you doing having sex without being married first then?
When a woman has, through luck, inheritance, or (most often) hard and long work, becoming educated, establishing a career, and is making very good money, and she wants to have a child on her own, if she has several persons in her life committed to helping her parent, especially if she is getting older and may soon no longer be fertile, that is a CHOOSING. There is maturity involved and rationality and I understand it. Some of our famous actresses, such as say Sandra Bullock, who have millions in the bank, have adopted children because they are in the position to have a trust fund in place for their child so that if they die the child will still be supported. That's not most people. Elton John and his partner having children using a surrogate are not most people. They are famous and rich. They are not to be imitated.
Going out, partying, sleeping with whomever (maybe because you think a man is owed sex in exchange for taking you out), remaining unqualified to make decent money, being poor and without resources, and just going ahead with having a baby because you say "Well I want one" or "Everyone else is doing it" is just not good enough.
How do I know?
Well, I meet these single mothers who regard men as not much more than sperm donors (Why aren't men protesting?) and who are raising children with the help of their mothers (who really ought to be retiring to something other than childcare after having done their own child-raising bit) everywhere. They are in my neighborhood working, rushing back and forth to drop their child off here, there, and everywhere, but especially Day Care, looking like they are about to drop, aged ten years in five. Some of them are bitter. Most of them are in ongoing arguments with the sperm donor daddy, begging him to spend some time with their child. Children are supposed to have more than one role model in their lives, and someone admirable.
Maybe another person will come into these women's lives, love them truly - and their child, provide financial support, become a real husband or partner and a real co-parent, but when the rates of no dad births go all the way up to 70% tell me, where are the Good Guys? Or are you just making a life with a man who is not the father to your child but the father to some other women's child? I've even met (in passing) two men who had five children each, each child with a different woman. What a tangled web of a family tree and relationships that is! (One by the way was an ex gang member of Hispanic roots. The other Black. They were bragging.)
I do think it is better to be NM than in a bad marriage. But I'm NMNK. Through my life I've made countless CHOICES to not get pregnant including celibacy, not continuing relationships that weren't going well, and using contraception. No contraception isn't perfect. I've met women who got pregnant using just about every contraception there is, even an IUD. One woman even claimed a third pregnancy after having her tubes tied. I've met married women who didn't want another child who got pregnant anyway. Still, statistics like these are not all about broken rubbers, forgotten pills, and misplaced diaphragms. These stats are much higher than contraceptive failure rates. Some women can even have a once in three year implant that will prevent pregnancy but if you read the ads it's mentioned THIS DOES NOT PREVENT STD's.
What does?
Using rubbers so you don't get STD's is a must unless you are PLANNING TO HAVE A BABY! What does using rubbers entail, besides being able to afford them? A MAN WHO USES THEM!
When a woman has a child before she is "ready" and that means relationship-wise and financially too, she puts her own future in jeopardy.
OFF THE SOAP BOX NOW!
THINK!
Sister
