The Power of Regret and Cultural Conditioning
The Patriarchy's strategy of control and its influence on parenthood
If you haven’t caught up with Part 1 of this essay, please check out this post:
To recap, these are three ways in which The Patriarchy (TP, if you will🤭) rigs the game against its subjects (aka, us):
Our cultural norms, especially the ones centering “traditional values”
Regret: the r-word that parents aren’t allowed to express
Media portrayal
Since point #1 is already fleshed out in Part 1, here’s how regret plays out in TP’s manipulation strategy.
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Regret
Another catalyst for this theory that childfree people hate kids comes from our cultural conditioning that everyone is supposed to be a parent. Again, a cultural norm. And if you don’t, you will regret it!
The concept of regret is a huge bingo childfree people are smacked with constantly. We’re told that we will absolutely regret not having kids when we grow old and there’s no one to take care of us (a dangerously antiquated and toxic idea).
People love to crow about this one. Like they’re going to win the greatest game of “I told you so.” But regret flows both ways.
For the people who bought into the idea that they had to have kids, that they had to follow this predefined life script for the ultimate prize of happiness and then realized that it’s nothing like what they were promised…that’s got to hurt.
I’d imagine there’s not just a little bit of betrayal mixed in with their regret. Buyer’s remorse is a real thing. But unlike something you buy at a store, you can’t return kids for a full refund (or even store credit).
Kids aren’t accessories. They’re human beings.
We all know 98% of what’s posted online is absolute fake caca 💩and yet we still fall for the heavily edited made-to-look flawless imagery. And for parents who see a constant loop of people with their perfect kids living perfect lives, oof!
To have this be the standard against which parents (who know their world doesn’t look like that) think they’re fighting for, then see the carefree lives we all seem to be living without kids, regret might start bubbling up (right alongside jealousy and FOMO). I mean, we’re human.
But also, there’s a cultural norm against allowing parents to voice their regret. Which then further perpetuates the lies around parenthood.
On the YouTube episode, my mom-guest Deanna mentions that she doesn’t feel like she’s allowed to complain, that it makes her feel like a bad mom. Why does she feel that way?
Because The Patriarchy has socialized us to believe that only bad parents complain about the job they signed up for.1 If they don’t suck it up and just deal with it (preferably silently), then they’re bad people.
How many messages are you peppered with daily that talk about resiliency, grinding, and suffering for the greater good? I constantly remind you to rest because I’m trying to help you cut through the bullshit messaging urging you to sacrifice yourself to The Patriarchy—TP!—without complaining.
Because complaints pierce the veil that’s hiding all the other secrets about how difficult TP wants your life to be.
That’s some Wizard of Oz behind-the-curtain kind of shit.
Speaking of patriarchal bullshit, you’re probably aware of the abuse and mistreatment that Judy Garland endured during filming of The Wizard of Oz. But did you know the entire production was a hellscape? Here are two articles to bring you up to speed:
If you want to rewatch the movie through new eyes, get a copy of The Wizard of Oz.
So why aren’t parents allowed to complain? If I had kids I’d be super unhappy about it! I’d be fucking miserable. So I can only imagine how it must be, even for someone that wanted it.
In the episode on this topic, I compared this to my love for wine and cheese. It’s my favorite Friday night meal. But I can only have so much wine or cheese before I get sick and regret my choices.
We all know what a hangover is. Too much of a good thing can lead to regret. That doesn’t mean the thing wasn’t good (or even great!) to begin with. Especially if that thing was a delicious dry red paired with a truly excellent Iberian cheese.
That said, I’d much rather regret NOT having kids than make the mistake of having them and then regret that instead.
Regretting having kids can be a real thing that parents are afraid to admit. I wish they weren’t. I wish we allowed people to speak up about how hard it really is and maybe fewer people would be duped by The Patriarchy.
My guest Breanna, whose guested on the audio podcast and the YouTube episode, mentioned that it could also be an offshoot of fear. That maybe parents are afraid to admit they’re overwhelmed or it isn’t working out how they imagined it, and now they feel stuck.
And that can make a person angry. With anger comes defensiveness.
Yes, it makes sense that someone in that situation would lash out and reduce our choice to remain childfree (for whatever reason) to something easy to grasp at: like hating kids.
It doesn’t make it right and it doesn't make it okay. Because childfree people aren’t the enemy. We are all subjects of the patriarchy. THAT’s the real problem we should all be fighting against, not one another.
In Part 1, I promised to answer the question of what TP actually wins by pitting us against each other. The long answer is threaded through this 3-part essay.
The short answer is: it keeps everyone grinding away in service to The Patriarchy, believing that they’re competing with everyone else for the most happiness.
Next time we’ll explore how the media is complicit in perpetuating these lies The Patriarchy feeds us to keep us trapped in servitude—and fighting against each other.
In the meantime, listen to the episode through the links below, get some rest, and that’s a burrito.🌯🌯🌯
Listen on Apple:
Listen on Spotify:
Even “watch” on YouTube:
One of my least favorite sayings is that someone knew what they were signing up for. As if that’s relinquishes one’s right to complain. It doesn’t. Complaining is a part of life. Not doing anything about the situation you complain about is a different story, though.