Mariah Sixkiller claims she is a birth feminist.
Birth feminists simply believe in a woman’s right to make empowered choices about her birth experience. We believe a Mom should have evidence-based information about all her birth options, which all too often does not happen. We believe a Mom should be supported through her decision-making process and into the birth experience itself, which all too often does not happen. And we believe every Mom is entitled to her own choice, without judgment, whatever it may be, which all too often does not happen.
Natural childbirth advocates have hijacked “feminism” in the same way that political conservatives have hijacked the flag, and homophobes have hijacked “family.” None of them believe in choices; they believe in one correct choice. None of them believe in evidence; they misuse the term to promote a predetermined agenda. And none of them refrain from judging those who make anything other than pre-approved, officially sanctioned choices.
But I’m an actual feminist. That’s how I know that natural childbirth has nothing to do with feminism.
Sixkiller writes about her vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC):
[pullquote align=”right” color=”#da0c0c”]I’m an actual feminist. That’s how I know that natural childbirth has nothing to do with feminism.[/pullquote]
When the time came, in February 2012, I labored for four days with no medicine. I have never worked harder or experienced a more unbelievable thrill than meeting my son that day. I felt relief, pride, strength, and elation. I felt empowered by the birth, and it changed my life for the better. My post-partum experience was amazingly positive—a sharp contrast with my first post-partum experience. And to this day, I look at my middle child with wonder and appreciation for the experience we had together—the time I gave him his life, and he gave me mine back.
I’m a feminist and that’s not feminism. That’s narcissism.
Sixkiller’s piece in The Daily Beast is publicity for Ricki Lake’s latest venture in promoting the subjugation of women to their biology, Mama Sherpas: Midwives Across America It’s yet another effort to extol the virtues of women’s pain, suffering, and ignorance of science.
As I wrote recently for Time.com regarding Lake’s effort to demonize the birth control pill:
She’s part of a natural parenting movement that is anti-hospital birth, anti-epidural and anti-formula — technological innovations that have made the legal, political and especially the economic liberation of women possible. Opposition to the Pill is the next logical step of that philosophy…
The technology of the 20th Century — hospital birth, epidurals, infant formula and especially the Pill — freed women from being slaves to their biology.
Opposition to the birth control pill is opposition to women’s emancipation.
I’m a feminist and I can tell you opposition to women’s emancipation is not, and can never be, feminist.
I’m a feminist. That’s why I spent years becoming an OB-GYN, so I could understand every aspect of childbirth and provide women with safe, satisfying births.
I’m a feminist. That’s why I object to the insistence of natural childbirth advocates to reducing birth to the ways that a mother uses her vagina, uterus and breasts.
For most of human history, women were reduced to only 3 body parts: vaginas, uteri and breasts. How they used them represented the sum total of their value to men. In contemporary natural childbirth advocacy, how women use their vaginas, uteri and breasts represent the sum total of their value as mothers.
I’m a feminist. That’s why I support the use of pain relief for the excruciating pain of childbirth.
I’m a feminist. That’s why I encourage women to get their medical information from medical experts, not from washed up talk show hosts.
I’m a feminist. That’s why I recognize that how you give birth to your child (or even IF you give birth to your child) has nothing to do with your love for that child.
I’m a proud, committed, enthusiastic feminist.
That’s why I recognize that natural childbirth has nothing to do with feminism … and everything to do with manipulating women into accepting the profoundly misogynistic notion that women’s worth is determined by their vaginas, uteri, and breasts, instead of their intellect or the content of their character.
