ALTERNATIVES TO MARRIAGE PROJECT

PHILANTHROPY NEWS DIGEST: ALTERNATIVES TO MARRIAGE PROJECTS 

Excerpt:  Founded 1998

Mission: The Alternatives to Marriage Project is a national nonprofit organization advocating for equality and fairness for unmarried people, including people who chose not to marry, cannot marry, or live together before marriage.  While ATMP opposes marital status discrimination it is  not anti-marriage...  Essentially, it believes that everyone should have the option of choosing to marry or not...

VICIOUS SENIORS TARGET CHILDLESS BUT WIDOWED EX WOMAN EXECUTIVE - SHUN HER

VICIOUS SENIORS TARGET CHILDLESS BUT WIDOWED EX WOMAN EXECUTIVE - SHUN HER

Vicious?

I have a bad memory of visiting many times at an "exclusive" senior living building where the new resident was a ex woman executive from New York City, who had married late in life and then been widowed. 
The senior I was visiting was male and NMNK.  He was pitied.

The other women - her generational peers - were very mean spirited to this childless woman.  When their children and grandchildren came to visit this ex-executive was friendly and talkative with them.   She was trying to fit in and acknowledge their families.  After all, they all sat in the common area with the fancy decor much of the day.

The traditional stay at home mother senior citizens who were living there would accuse her of jealousy and resent her friendliness to their "loved ones."  I spoke to this woman several times before she moved elsewhere.  I HAD TO WONDER HOW MEAN THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN IF SHE HAD ALSO NEVER MARRIED.  WOULD THEY HAVE ASSUMED SHE WAS QUEER?

She was very proud of her career and had career advice for me.  She dressed very well compared to these other women, who were also coming from wealth, in that she still suited up every day.  Criticism of what she wore and pretty much anything she did was so prevalent, I doubt there was anything she could do right.  They despised her - her type - right away and it went downhill from there.
She had money, money she earned and put aside, as well as money from her husband's estate, enough to live elsewhere and she made that choice, and I felt sad for her that these other women were so unfair to her and hoped the next exclusive senior building she went to had kinder people.  She struck me as the most intelligent woman among them.

I also learned during my visits there that a lot of these women were still supporting some or all of their children and that many of them had been generous to their children but rarely got visits...  That reinforced for me that no person should be motivated to have children based on the idea that these children will "take care" of them in old age.

I WONDER IF THE RESENTMENT THAT TRADITIONAL STAY AT HOME MOTHERS OF THAT GENERATION FEEL IS WORSE than generations following when women overall have had more choices.

(First published October 13, 2012)

 

ARE FAMILY MEMBERS USING YOUR NMNK LIFE AS A CAUTIONARY TALE TO YOUNGER FAMILY MEMBERS?

 ARE FAMILY MEMBERS USING YOUR NMNK LIFE AS A CAUTIONARY TALE TO YOUNGER FAMILY MEMBERS?

Have you ever had the experience of overhearing or otherwise finding out that certain family members are using you and your NMNK lifestyle as an example to others - maybe their children - of what not to be?

I've had this experience.  While I want to respect that other people choose marriage and/or children, I have never had the same respect - mutual respect - and that can make me feel defensive.

I HAVE BEEN SHOCKED BY THE WAY CERTAIN WOMEN DEMAND THEIR CHILDREN GIVE THEM GRANDCHILDREN!

(First posted October 20, 2012)

Note:  When the family you are related to through genetics does not approve of you simply because you are not marriage prone or have no children, sometimes it's best to separate from them and have a Family of Friends or a Family of Choice instead.

NEVER MARRIED WOMEN FACE SOCIAL STIGMA STILL

  NEVER MARRIED WOMEN FACE SOCIAL STIGMA STILL

"In 2009, approximately 40 percent of adults were single, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In a new study, "I'm a Loser, I'm Not Married, Let's Just All Look at Me," a University of Missouri researcher examined the familial and societal messages given to women who are not married by their mid-30's. Although the number of single women has increased, the stigma associated with being single at that age has not diminished, according to the women in this study. "We found that never-married women's social environments are characterized by pressure to conform to the conventional life pathway," said Larry Ganong, co-chair of Human Development and Family Studies in the College of Human Environmental Sciences." LINK to the article by clicking on the title of this post!

(First published August 11, 2011) 

Note that if you put I'm a Loser, I'm Not Married, Let's Just All Look at Me into a search engines, a number of academic/research abstracts re this article will come up.)

THE SINGLE KILLER - A TRAGIC COMEDY

SINGLE?  Then you must be SUSPECT!

MAJOR GROCERY STORE VONS DISCRIMATES AGAINST THE TRADITIONAL SHOPPER - WHY WOULD I ORDER A DELIVERY WHEN I SHOP FOR SMALL AMOUNTS OF FOOD AS NEEDED?

 A while back, though I hated to do it, I signed up for Von's online deals.  The idea here is that the store is watching what you buy and so has a link between your grocery purchases, your Von's card that is your phone number and an e-mail address.  Yes I hate all that.  I THINK IT IS THE LAW THAT ALL CUSTOMERS ARE TO RECIEVE THE LOWEST ADVERTISED PRICE but like anyone else, I don't feel like calling a manager to check out of tangling with a cashier whose fault it is not.

But I did it and it seemed amazing to me that some of the thing I purchased in the past were significantly lower in price just because I went into the store website and clicked on those items.  Of course expiration dates, as with traditional paper coupons, give you the feeling that you have to hurry into the store where you are likely to purchase other items as well. 

However, I recently realized that there were MORE PRODUCTS WITH DISCOUNTS THAT WERE NOT INCLUDED FOR IN PERSON SHOPPERS if you ordered in advance to be picked up or delivered.  I guess the store is following in the steps of the Big Box stores and this might significantly change the situation with employees - specifically Union Employees.

I'm one of those people WHO REFUSES TO DO THE LABOR OF AN Employee.  People do it without realizing they are helping to eliminate jobs.  The job of a cashier is a hard one, ongoing movement, standing on one's feet for hours, and dealing with hundreds of people each day, some who are not nice and who change their mind about what they want to purchase.  However, UNION JOBS are the jobs that people can keep all their lives, as they age, and gain a decent retirement.  With this drive to have someone at the store pull items from shelves and deliver or send to pick up, I'm wondering what the future of cashiering will be.

Like many people who EAT FOR ONE, I'm a person who does not like to stock up.  I usually do not need gallons of ice cream or yogurt, I don't buy for a family and I don't want coupons that are for buying more than one of anything or bulk purchases.  To eat a variety of foods and small meals I cook for myself, I will buy what I need very close to when I need it.

Another aspect of this whole delivery system is the ASSUMPTION THAT SOMEONE IS HOME and not working or at play when boxes of food arrive. I have ordered on line only 3 times in my life and one of those times was a library book I was replacing because I lost the original and the other two times were during Covid lock downs when it was not advisable to go out.  NMNK people are usually active people into their senior years. but I suppose this is convenient for some.

It irked me as I stood in line knowing that if I were not shopping in person, my overall grocery bill would be less.  

In my area only the rich seem to avoid stores that used to be "Dollar" stores to buy grocery basics - some of which is imported from China.  Due to the economic conditions of the world which currently include dozens of ships containing imports from China waiting docking and unloading, there is word of shortages all along the line.  I do worry about food shortages.

Economics makes people search for deals on food, but I say, if you are an NMNK, protest the discrimination when it comes to stores with the deals that don't seem to include a model for the NMNK buyer.

C 2021 Never Married No Kids BlogSpot, 

JENNIFER ANISTON - BRAD PITT - and ANGELINA JOLIE and ALL THOSE CHILDREN

Though JENNIFER ANISTON, the actress, does not qualify as NMNK since she has been married twice, she has gone through hell as a woman who has never had children, and for that I can relate.  Though the years her childlessness has been used against her, not only in attacks on her character (when she has conducted herself as a lady throughout!), but as the reason hunky BRAD PITT left her for the snarky ANGELINA JOLIE, or as the excuse for cheating on her.  (Jolie had done her first adoption before the two met.)  IT HAS BEEN ASSUMED THAT PITT's DESIRE FOR CHILDREN and ANISTON's RELUCTANCE (blamed on selfishly wanting her career as an actress more) or INABILITY, made her defective.  TABLOIDS have had a go on all of them for years, and now all those children are being dragged through a divorce and the question of who has custody, who gets to visit, how often, and when.


ANISTON seems to have left town for New York to be out of the way as much as possible through this latest divorce with children debacle, and I'm feeling sorry for BRAD, who probably has gotten angry with a spoiled brat child and lost his temper at least once.


(FRIENDS OF MINE WHOSE PARENTS WERE VERBALLY ABUSIVE TELL ME THAT WHEN THEY HAD CHILDREN THEY FORGAVE THEIR PARENTS AND UNDERSTOOD WHAT IT IS TO HAVE A CHILD YOU WORK  YOUR TAIL OFF TO SUPPORT BEING A SASSY ASS OF A KID!)


With the vast wealth of both JOLIE and PITT,  there is really no reason why their children need to be seen out in public, looking depressed, as all this goes on.  And if the couple were not world famous, it is unlikely the FBI, which has better things to do, like work against terrorist cells in the United States, would spend five minutes interrogating the apparently blind sided Pitt, who no doubt is probably SICK over the prospect of being separated at all from his brood.


I FULLY EXPECT, in the future, that all six children will write TELL ALL BOOKS ABOUT THEIR PARENTS, and how hard it was to grow up as they have.


It's not fair, what do I know?  I think the children should live with BRAD!


JOLIE IS WRONG that children do not need structure or discipline.  Discipline is possible without ABUSE.  I know this because I know of people who have well behaved and respectful children who have never been verbally or physically or otherwise abused.  AND IF I HAD CHILDREN, those are the CHILDREN mine would be allowed to play with!


Let me focus though on JENNIFER ANISTON.  Here is a beautiful and accomplished woman who has worked hard to have and keep a career, and she has had so much projected on her.  The day the news of the pending divorce came out, speculation became gossip became "truth" as she supposedly said, to an unnamed "friend," that Brad was getting his KARMA.  I suspect she has long ago moved on and into her new marriage and doesn't much have Brad on her mind at all.  Additionally, the poor woman cannot gain a pound and the pregnancy speculation begins...


IT WILL BE OK IF JENNIFER ANISTON DOES NOT HAVE CHILDREN, NOT ONE, NOT EVER!


ABC NEWS ENTERTAINMENT ANISTON AND KIDS


Sister

CEMETERY DISCRIMINATION : FROM NMNK ARCHIVES

Are you aware that some cemeteries bury "single" people in rows with each other, separate from the double headed tombstones of the married? Now, I first realized this when I was in Santa Cruz, California and doing a tombstone inventory of an old cemetery there. They also had a separate (but close in) area for Chinese and war veterans, and of course this is a lesson in history and the development of a town with ethnic immigration of a few minorities.

I wonder if this has anything to do with beliefs about the resurrection of the dead in the end times/judgement.

Tombstones are often tributes to the best in people but we all know of couples who were horribly married but in death rest aside each other till eternity - or the worms! Walking along in the cemetery you can imagine that they are in eternal life happily with each other, and maybe this notion satisfies their children, but you know better. Besides what ever happened to that marriage vow "Till death?"

I think cemeteries are set up for the married people. But you can pop a spinster or confirmed bachelor down in with the parents' graves too.

REPORT HERE ANY CEMETERIES YOU KNOW THAT WILL NOT PUT SINGLE PEOPLE IN NEAR THE MARRIEDS!

HAVE YOU CHOSEN TO BE CREAMATED SO AS TO NOT DEAL WITH THE FAMILY CEMETERY?
FROM JANUARY 2008

MS MAGAZINE : SINGLED OUT : BLACK WOMEN

Ms magazine has an article called SINGLED OUT. It's about why the media is obsessed with single black women. The question of INDEPENDENCE is part of this. The article itself doesn't have a link but there is the MS BLOG. Watch the video and read the article!

"Sexism is real for all women. But the combination of femaleness and blackness is particularly devalued, sadly, too often among even black men."

RALPHS GROCERY DISCOUNT CARDS CHEAT THE SINGLE : SISTER SPEAKS

I was shopping at my local grocer the other day, Ralphs, one of the Kroger companies, when they actually told me I had lost 5 points, one a plastic bag, because they had bagged my groceries in these plastic bags, even though I had brought along one of my own shopping bags! (The clerk had not noticed by bag and told me I had not shown her I had one in enough time... yeesh!)

You see I live in California where there has been legislation to reduce the number of plastic shopping bags due to ecological concerns by charging for them in some way. Consumers are overall not impressed. Nobody wants to leave a store with purchases unbagged but no one wants to carry around stinky wrinkled old bags either.

WHAT I SEE IS THAT WE ARE NOW PURCHASING BAGS AT A DOLLAR OR MORE EACH and these bags are MADE IN CHINA and do not look biodegradable to me! (Though some of them may be made of some recycled materials.)

Beyond an argument for ecology here, is the fact that I CANNOT BUY GROCERIES AT THE BEST DISCOUNT AT MANY STORES WITHOUT USING ONE OF THEIR ACCOUNT CARDS. THESE CARDS PROVIDE SO CALLED REWARDS FOR HIGH GROCERY BILLS PER ACCOUNT : they reward FAMILIES.

It was this account card that was being zapped five points and the clerk (that twerp!) was admonishing me.

So I said (and her face turned red when I did). "You know, as a single person I HAVE NEVER ONCE PURCHASED ENOUGH TO GET ANY RALPHS REWARD. I believe that every person who walks in here should be eligible for the lowest price without these stupid cards! I see no reason whatsoever that your company should be collecting information on what I purchase here! It's enough to shop elsewhere!

The truth is that ever since the strike a few years back when Ralphs got caught by the IRS having some employees work using OTHER PEOPLE'S SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS and got a fine of a million or two, prices have been up into sticker shock zone. While I feel for dedicated employees and I see the trick the company used to try and break the unions, I'VE BEEN TAKING MOST OF MY GROCERY SHOPPING ELSEWHERE.

The other day I learned that Ralphs has closed about 50 stores since that strike and that people are now buying good at places like TARGET and WALLMART as well as Trader Joes which provide competition (and no union workers).

Trader Joes is my favorite for high quality basic items (I can't afford their fancy stuff) AND FOR PAYING THEIR EMPLOYEES WELL!

As the SINGLE (and unmarried) who are self supporting and have a household of ONE, WE ARE OFTEN NOT TREATED WELL AS CONSUMERS. But really, why does Ralphs or any other company need to know your name, address, phone number, demographic information, and that you do or do not buy... sanitary napkins, beer, canned chili, People magazine, or anything else!? in order to offer their lowest prices? Once in a while a coupon spits out of the register for something I bought or they want me to buy. I've gotten those intelligent coupons elsewhere without such a card.

NMNK need to speak up as consumers and on the spot.

IS RACISM WITHIN THE BLACK COMMUNITY THE REASON WHY SO MANY AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMEN ARE NEVER MARRIED?

This is just what a friend of mine suggests.  She says that African American men are going for White or Lighter Skinned African American women.  She says this leaves few good men for African American women who are darker skinned.  Just when I was going to reject this idea,  a male friend of mine said about the same thing.  He said as a result of fewer good African American men, African-American women had to share men, and had taken single motherhood in stride; after all don't most women want a child?

I thought about HIGH SCHOOL.  OK... In my high school some of the best athletes were Black.  Is that a stereotype?  I can only say it was true.  And most of these men did seem to reject the women of their own race and date White, European-Americans.  There was a catch.  These same White, European-American women were then shunned by White men!  Yes! The town was kind of small.  And I feel that everyone got along pretty well otherwise.

I had one friend in school who was of African-American and Native American heritage and she wore braids.  I was there when a man (a boy actually) crossed the HIGH SCHOOL cafeteria and told her that she was not Black.  Not Black due to her hair style, and for associating with a group of White women (girls really.)

I don't know how this would play in today's high school generation.  To me it seems there is far less prejudice.  Am I wrong?  Maybe I don't just get it?

Let me know!

Sister

HAVE YOU BEEN TREATED DIFFERENTLY IN YOUR PARENTS WILL BECAUSE YOU NEVER MARRIED

Some of the old spinsters got the family farm... Some got ignored because the husband they never had was supposed to "take care" of them... and you?

RALPHS (KROGER COMPANY) POINTS SYSTEM DESCRIMINATED AGAINST NMNK

You shop at Ralphs, which is owned by the Kroger company, and you use those RALPHS REWARDS cards for the advertised discounts, which really should be for everyone right? But no discount without the card, which no doubt is keeping track of what you buy and is a marketing tactic. You need to buy LOTS OF FOOD to get enough points $5 reward for the first 500. As a single person it's near impossible to get a reward at all. I HAVE NEVER, and I do eat! Now I suppose if I threw expensive bottles of wine in (but I barely drink), and maybe some expensive cuts of meat for a dinner party, maybe then I'd get 500 points.... YOU KNOW WHAT I THINK?

THIS POINTS SYSTEM is POINTLESS!

Sister

KIDFREE AND LOVIN IT!

Thank you for linking to my website, but please either correct the spelling to "Kidfree Kaye" (with an "e"), or change it to the real name of the site: "Kidfree & Lovin' It!"

DONE KIDFREE KAYE!

Keep us posted on how your book is going!

(Friends, you can go to the Kidfree Kaye link and take her survey!)

HATEFUL ANNONYMOUS BLOGGER CLAIMS DR. LAURA HAS NEVER SAID ...

MARRIED PEOPLE OUGHT TO DUMP THEIR SINGLE FRIENDS...

Sister is really smelling the baby diapers here!

Sister recently received a very anonymous violently hateful comment which she REJECTED because of the fact that the person claimed to know Dr. Laura personally! (But of course wants to remain unknown like the coward he or she is.) This person went on, attacking me personally rather than my message or posing any INTELLIGENT COMMENTARY.

Shall we switch to open ID instead so that attacks can't come from just anywhere!?

It's OK if you don't agree with our stance here. If you can be respectful about it. But don't expect respect here if you don't earn it!

99.9 percent of the word is going to tell you you're abnormal if you don't BREED! Not feminine or masculine. Not a "real" man or "real" woman. So when Sister gets hate mail it is NOT SURPRISING.

I have read a few of Dr. Laura's books which is saying a lot since most people who are not her fans don't bother to get her drift by using their time to read her. I also have mutual friends through the radio business who suggest that a certain broadcaster who "helped" her career and wrote his own memoir/bio openly talks about how this Neo Conservative Dr. Laura opened her legs to him for her own career when she was young; something she would advise you never do. That's right. She slept around.

She stayed home and raised her child? Are you sure? Or is it that she worked part time ambitiously and was willing to sabotage at least one of her fellow female broadcasters in the process, greedy and hell bent to succeed at any cost?

And she really is NOT entitled to use the Dr. in front of her name, since in our society that means you became a doctor- physician or are a professor at a university and she has never practiced medicine or been a college level professor. Did she earn a PHD? Yes. But not in a subject that academically qualifies her for being a counselor. She has as much background in social work as a gypsy fortune teller!

Maybe Dr. Laura did not say "dump your friends who are single now that you are married as soon as you get off the phone with me" in those exact words. But she has told married people that they should be associating with other married couples - ie that they no longer have anything in common with their left behind single friends. And she has said things that give the impression that once married your single friends can only be bad influences that will lead you to cheat. And the day I heard this comment on the radio - which was some years ago - I WAS SO ANGRY I HAD TO TAKE A FIVE MILE WALK.

IT WAS THE SAME crapola so many of us who Wisely Chose NOT To Marry or Have Children have put up for eons... Those of us who are only acceptable in our families if all those who Did Marry and Live Their Lives Around Their Children and HATE IT, can dump the kids off on us for free babysitting and vacations... Somehow we are supposed to redeem our solitude and sanity by taking care of their kids and being an honorary auntie or uncle...

At any rate, I dare my readers to phone up Dr. Laura and flat out ask her what she thinks circa 2008 and report back to this blog. On your report you must state what station you heard the broadcast, what city, what time you called, what your question was to Dr. Laura and what her answer was.