Today on the Michael Eric Dyson show, bloggers Christelyn Karazin and Jamilah Lemieux talked about the "No Wedding, No Womb" campaign. Karazin, who is spearheading the effort, started it to "raise awareness" about high rates of out-of-wedlock births among black women. Lemieux, who blogs as Sister Toldja at The Beautiful Struggler, agreed with my take: However noble the intentions behind "No Wedding, No Womb" are, it's just slut shaming in the guise of empowering women.
Lemieux quoted a part of my piece that talked about how, for lower-income women, educational attainment and a good career are so out of reach that it makes no sense to talk about delaying motherhood, because there's little to take its place. Lemieux boiled that down by saying, "In a nutshell, it’s unreasonable and unproductive to force middle-class values on people who don’t have middle-class access." She repeated the word "values" on the show. While her overall point is right, I wish she hadn't used the word "values." Unfortunately, this prompted a backlash from Karazin and some of her supporters on Twitter, who said caring about families wasn't an exclusively middle-class "value." But they're misunderstanding the word in this context -- like people often misunderstand the word "culture." "Values" as we commonly use the word mean things that can be adopted at will, but what Lemieux means is something more like "social expectations," which reflect community mores deeply affected by what's possible for the community members.
Speaking of expectations, Karazin makes clear that part of what motivated her campaign was that she was pregnant and unwed in college, despite being from a two-parent, middle-class home, and felt great shame in her community. When Lemieux pushed back on the idea that the shame Karazin felt was a good thing, Dyson asked Lemieux if, maybe, shame can do good if it curbs behavior that ultimately destroys women's lives. But that question shows he missed the point Lemieux was working to make: Becoming a single-mother actually doesn't destroy the lives of many women. It's not as though low-income women across the country would be going to college in droves but for the children they're having: The chances of them going to college, and finishing, are low. It's not as though being a clerk at a fast-food restaurant was going to turn into a stellar career but for the children that they're having: Low-paying jobs now often remain low-paying jobs in the future. You get the point: The expectations and experiences middle-class women have in their lives don't do much to inform them about the choices lower-income women make, because the expectations and experiences are entirely different.
In the interview, Karazin also made it clear that she was most concerned about getting attention for "the problem." Now, she says she wants her critics to bring "solutions." It's funny that her effort seems entirely unaware of the conversations people have been having, conversations that no longer blame women for single-motherhood, recognize gender inequity in parenting expectations, and hold men just as responsible for birth control and fatherhood. It's all gimmick and no substance, yet she seems surprised that a reductive title like "No Wedding, No Womb," would bring out misogynists and critics alike.
I'd have a bit more sympathy if "No Wedding, No Womb" was the unfortunate title of a volunteer group taking condoms to community centers and volunteering to teach sex-ed classes.
-- Monica Potts
