Changing the Conversation
September 25, 2024
The more that I consider the issue of fertility and effects upon women of African descent, the more I believe that there needs to be a shift within the conversation when having children is being discussed. Many of us who were raised in the 80’s and 90’s were taught to avoid pregnancy in lieu of education, freedom, and travel. The message that was imparted was to wait until college graduation and then marriage to have children because that is when everything in your life will be “in order”.
The fear associated with having children too soon was that a person would be relegated to lifelong poverty because you will be unable to get a college degree and that your children will be delinquent to the point of being imprisoned. Although, I do agree that teen pregnancy is not the best situation for mother, father, and child and that young people should pursue education, employment, and hobbies, I believe that the other side of the coin should be taught as well.
Mainstream media floods our timelines and televisions with highly sexualized images that leads us to believe that the act of sex is solely for pleasure.
There are various advertisements for tablets and chewables that promise stamina, endurance, and increased pleasure for women. These medications can be purchased at reduced prices, online, and with a subscription. They are accessible with little time and effort. It is noteworthy that some of these sexual enhancement commercials do not even feature men within the advertisement. Many of these commercials just feature young, attractive women.
The connation then becomes that since sexual acts are for pleasure, the acceptable way to ensure that it remains that way is to glorify the use of birth control in the form of condoms, the pill, IUDs, and pregnancy tests that will alert a woman of pregnancy before a missed period. Many of these commercials feature young, Black women with no husband by her side.
The American public is (being) conditioned to covet sexual pleasure for the benefit of personal satisfaction without the hope of pregnancy. If pregnancy does happen then you remember that you have been encouraged to terminate the pregnancy. This is due in part to the supposed distraction that a pregnancy and the act of childrearing may incur. If a woman continues with the pregnancy, her priorities change from pleasure seeking to that of responsibility.
Most often in media presentations, the people around the expectant mother are burdened by her hormonal fluctuations, inconvenienced by medical visits, and saddled by the expense of bringing a child into the world. The conditioning is to seek out and pursue sex as a means of pleasure and deny it as an act of reproduction. Media representations, in some cases, see the event of an unexpected pregnancy as troublesome, an anxiety laden occurrence that is akin to being diagnosed with a terminal illness. Why would a woman want to be saddled with such a hard tenure of pregnancy. The hope is that women would choose differently.
The conversation should be directed towards raising children with Black culture, African history, a foundation of faith, dignified relationships, marriage, and that to see having children is a blessing.
The conversation should be directed towards children of African heritage being raised with values, morals, and a respect for self and human life by both married mother and father being within the home. The ultimate goal should be for parents to be a living legacy to their children and that future generations will follow and uphold. The glorification of nonmarital sex and sexual deviancy should be repudiated. We have seen various celebrities and elite figures fall from grace due to participating in criminal sexual acts. It is up to us to warn children of the dangers of pursing lust, elicit sex, and multiple sexual partners.
Included within this new conversation is that of the discussion of avoiding abortions for the benefit of convenience, fertility issues that are unknown to young, Black women, raising children with skills that they can use to earn a living wage and provide for a family, and the ability to step up and pitch to help take care of elderly family members and provide supervision and guidance to younger family members.
Fertility issues can happen to any man or woman without any warning. Black girls and women are never warned that they may have uterine fibroids, endometriosis, low ovarian reserve, and other reproductive issues that can make pregnancy difficult even if a woman is healthy. We only find out about these issues if it happens to us and when the doctor prescribes a hysterectomy.
The conversation needs to be directed towards providing men and women with the facts about the possibility of needing to utilize assistive reproductive technology, a woman freezing her eggs while she is young, family members becoming gestational carriers for women who are unable to carry a child, and for Black couples to adopt Black children that are in the foster care system. We also need to discuss talking to college presidents and faculty to ensure that young pregnant women can stay in college while keeping her scholarship.
Instead of focusing all of the supposed pitfalls that a pregnancy and childrearing can bring, let us redirect the conversation to Black Americans getting back to family values and being educated on raising healthy children and families.
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