Bioethics, healthcare policy, and related issues.
No, not me (the “use/mention distinction” is hereby incorporated by reference). One of my students said it the other night, as an explanation for why she wasn’t feeling well and had to leave class.
I never know how to respond to that sort of thing.
The convention, of course, would be “Congratulations!”, or something to that effect – and I do feel congratulatory toward those who want to be pregnant and are genuinely excited about being so. But with something like half of all pregnancies unplanned, and a quarter of them aborted, the odds are not all that great that any particular pregnant woman is really likely to feel celebratory about getting knocked up.
I take it that expressions of congratulations or condolence are social rituals – they are an offering of support and fellowship at important moments, not literally an expression of the speaker’s personal feelings. (If you didn’t think it was a good idea for a certain person to get pregnant, you wouldn’t be expected to tell them so.) But that convention works only if you can reliably predict how that person themselves feels about the event, and how they want it to be handled.
Richard Feynman recounts, in one of his books of stories, that after his first wife died he didn’t want to talk about it with anybody at Los Alamos, where he was working. He indicated that by cutting off all talk about her when they asked what had happened; the word quickly went around, and the only person who then expressed any condolences was one guy who hadn’t been informed he shouldn’t say anything. In other words, the one person who reacted with a conventional expression of support was the one who didn’t really know the right thing to do, while those who knew him better avoided doing the things you would normally be expected to do to show respect for the other person’s situation – which was in fact how Feynman wanted it. Now, Feynman was odd, and nobody would have treated him so coldly if he hadn’t clearly indicated that was what he wanted – but I have always suspected that something similar is at least reasonably likely to be at work in the case of pregnancy. How obvious is it that a woman who says “I’m pregnant” really feels good about it and wants to be congratulated?
In part, of course, I’m just talking about percentages, here. As I noted, there’s a good statistical chance that any given pregnancy is unplanned; on that basis, then, the correct response to “I’m pregnant”, I guess, would be “Oops!” – about half the time, at least. Worse, there is still a good chance that any active pregnancy is not just unplanned but in fact unwanted, even if the woman decides (or is forced) to carry it to term; the correct response to “I”m pregnant”, in a good many cases, then, would be “I’m sorry.” We can discount these probabilities by the likelihood that a woman with an unwanted pregnancy would actually announce it – some would, some wouldn’t, I suspect. But still, it seems inescapable that you’re taking a chance of saying the wrong thing by assuming that a woman who is pregnant is happy about that fact.
Traditionally, pregnancy was not only every woman’s fate but her purpose in life as well. Pregnancy was assumed to be an untrammeled good; only women with “unnatural desires” did not enjoy pregnancy or want to be pregnant, and of course no one could imagine that one more mouth to feed was not an unalloyed blessing no matter what the family’s condition or the other plans its members may have had for their lives. Those assumptions are no longer universal, luckily, but that does rather complicate the question of how to understand any individual pregnancy.
In addition, support for abortion rights requires understanding that not all pregnancies are desired or desirable; support for reproductive freedom and reproductive choice in the broad sense requires understanding childbirth and abortion as equally valid choices in the face of a pregnancy. I do hold these attitudes, and so it seems to me that reflexively congratulating someone simply for being pregnant is premature – you have to know what she intends to do about it first before presuming that the pregnancy itself is something for her to be congratulated upon. You wouldn’t say “congratulations” on hearing that she had chosen an abortion, not because abortion is bad but because it’s a response to an unwanted condition, which is not usually something we congratulate people on. (You don’t say “congratulations” when someone has a mole removed – at most you express sympathy that they had to go through the whole business.) So you only say “congratulations” if you know she is pregnant and wants to be, and intends to continue it – which you cannot know simply from the fact that she is pregnant.
Those remarks concern only the likelihood that your response will match the woman’s mood, however. That’s only part of the story. I realize that another part of my hesitancy in congratulating pregnant women comes from a personal feeling that being pregnant isn’t all that worthy of congratulations. It’s not obvious to me that any given pregnancy is a good thing, even when the parents do want to have a child. Given the tremendous demand on resources caused by increasing population, and the consequences of that demand (even by affluent nations, which expend vast amounts of energy and raw materials to maintain the abundant lifestyles of their increasing populations, thus raising prices for energy and raw materials for the rest of the world), and the obnoxious crowding of most big cities, and the impenetrable density of short, shrieking mobs of grubby hands and mouths in most public venues and the incessant screeching that goes on at all hours of the night in every apartment building I’ve ever lived in in New York, the last thing I want to hear is that someone is bringing another little tyke into my tyke-plagued world. This reaction is highly personal to me, though, and it would be rude to let it color my response to someone else’s choices about their life.
(I am aware of the decline of Western birthrates below the replacement level, but I regard that “problem” as largely one of racist panic and stereotype. There is a question of economic dislocation resulting when an aging larger generation is followed by a smaller younger generation, as is happening with the Baby Boom in the US, but those problems are one-generation deviations that should have been manageable if they had been planned for appropriately [and if the Bush administration hadn't stolen and spent the Social Security surplus]. Short-term variations in a long-term problem are not a reason to continue making the long-term problem worse.)
In the end, then, I wind up bewildered over what should be a fairly straightforward social encounter. Given the complex interconnection of uncertainty over the woman’s true feelings and her likelihood of having revealed them, the sexism inherent in the assumption that a woman’s pregnancy is inevitably a good thing, the questionable wisdom of anyone’s even being pregnant given the current state of the world, and the necessity of being at all times Sound on Abortion Rights, it seems to be quite a puzzler how to react to the news that someone has a bun in the oven.
But I wonder – does anyone else have these problems? Is it really yet another dreary liberal burden to pretend not to be happy when someone tells you she’s pregnant, in order to signal that you support her right to end it if she chooses? Or should we assume that anyone who is planning an abortion wouldn’t tell people about it (but why not? – we know there’s nothing to be ashamed of, so why not create the world we want to live in by assuming that “I’m pregnant” is, at least a quarter of the time, a prelude to “. . . and I’m terminating it soon !”)?
In the event, I reacted neutrally when the student told me she was pregnant, waiting for a sign how I should react. Getting no sign, but feeling that I should say something, after a few minutes I tentatively congratulated the student, and she beamed happily and thanked me. I then encouraged her to have an abortion and gave her some information about inequitable resource allocation and global warming. (OK, I didn’t. But I thought about it.) What should I have done?
29 Responses to ““I’m Pregnant””
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October 15th, 2006 at 11:20 AM
Nice to see you back! I’ve been waiting, stalker-like, for a new KTK post.
So, my approach with (iffy) pregnancy announcements is ALWAYS a tentative congratulations followed by a gentle question “How are you feeling about it?” The already proffered “congratulations” is easily retracted and comfort/sympathy/practical assistance offered in its stead. I was pregnant at 16, made a decision not to abort, and everyone I told was (perhaps understandably) less than enthusiastic for me. It still stings 18 years later, that absolutely no-one congratulated me. Anyway, glad you’re back and on form! Cheers, Pippa.
October 15th, 2006 at 5:45 PM
Most of the time when a woman I don’t know well tells me she’s pregnant, I assume she wants it or she wouldn’t tell me, so I congratulate her. Your case is a little weird, though, because she told you that to explain why she didn’t feel well. In these cases, I tend to be like, “Ah okay,” and leave it at that.
October 15th, 2006 at 9:28 PM
I have stalkers? I didn’t know I had readers.
I hate neglecting the blog, but I truly am swamped with life-critical stuff these days, and really need to give myself the attention I owe myself. Thanks to you both for your support, though. I’m flattered to have you here.
Thanks for the input, too. I think what you’ve both said makes sense. I just tend to get so wrapped up in the complexities and counter-complexities of things that sometimes I can’t make a decison what to do.
October 16th, 2006 at 9:29 AM
I think in your situation I’d be inclined to say something like “Oh, wow — how’s it going?”, with an interested-and-supportive tone of voice. Ask in a way that invites more information.
I think even though she told you to explain why she wasn’t feeling well, though, she could easily have left the information out. If she was planning on having an abortion, she probably wouldn’t have said it the way she did.
And if she’s keeping the kid, even if it was unwanted, a pro-forma “congratulations” is likely to be welcome.
(One other thought, as a fellow middle-class white guy prof. A failure to congratulate might be taken by some students as a suggestion that you disapprove of her pregnancy. Better to be enthusiastic and risk being thought insensitive than to be subdued and risk being thought a disapproving racist/classist/elitist. Maybe.)
October 17th, 2006 at 3:43 PM
Perhaps you should become a member of VHEMT.
October 17th, 2006 at 4:07 PM
Perhaps you should become a member of VHEMT.
Hardly necessary. My complete inability to get a date pretty much obviates any danger of my contribution to overpopulation.
October 18th, 2006 at 12:08 AM
Ketih, you handled it perfectly. Not sure why you can’t get a date (I hear it is tough in NY). Perhaps i need to fix you up with my sister.
October 18th, 2006 at 12:10 AM
oop, typing too quickly. Meant Kevin, not Ketih. ugh, not more blogging after 10pm.
October 18th, 2006 at 11:12 AM
Thanks, Kathryn!
All suggestions gratefully received! (And yours sounds better than tgirsch’s!)
Thanks for the input, all.
October 20th, 2006 at 11:06 AM
Fix him up with your sister? Is it not obvious that he’s a closeted, self-loathing gay man?
October 20th, 2006 at 11:07 PM
Wow, Dana, that is a really uncalled for comment. Here’s what I know about Kevin: he has posted some incredibly insightful comments on a wide range of bioethical issues on his own blog as well as the Women’s Bioethics Project blog. I appreciate his devotion to civil discourse. Not sure what prompted your hostility towards him.
October 20th, 2006 at 11:24 PM
Well, you’re one for three, Dana!
Kathryn, thanks, as ever, for your kind words.
It’s easy to say things on the Web one wouldn’t say in person. I’ve done it myself too many times. As for me, I can usually take what comes, but . . . play nicely, everyone.
October 23rd, 2006 at 1:37 PM
Am I wrong? You are indeed gay, are you not?
October 23rd, 2006 at 4:42 PM
That’s not necessarily the “one” I was referring to!
October 23rd, 2006 at 5:36 PM
Hey there Kevin,
Hope the work is going well. I’ve been busting my own trying to get the final draft of the diss done. I stopped allowing abortion debates in classes years ago after a student condemned pro-choicers as baby killers and friends of satan, and then after class had a student come to my office ready to puke because she had sat through that rant a week after having made the choice. Uhg, I couldn’t put anybody else through that, so it is not a “topic” for class debates, thought we do occaisionally raise it in unstructured discussion where I have a bit more control.
Again, hope all is well,
Talk soon,
Worthington
October 24th, 2006 at 4:58 PM
I appreciate his devotion to civil discourse.
Unless the topic is “Republicans.”
*ducks*
October 24th, 2006 at 4:58 PM
Besides, would a gay man sell these? >:)
October 25th, 2006 at 9:46 AM
Tom . . . you’re not helping.
October 25th, 2006 at 6:34 PM
I have been in much the same situation a few times. (No, not pregnant. The other one. Talking to someone who says they’re pregnant.) I have found myself asking almost without thinking “Is that good news or bad news?” It’s certainly a bit glib and prying — probably too much pryiing for the situation KTK describes — but no one has seemed offended yet. And I’ve gotten answers in both directions, and some in between.
October 25th, 2006 at 8:56 PM
By the way, you have at least one more reader who’s not stalking you (I’ve not checked for an update in about a month.).
I’m in a co-ed (Surely, there’s a better word for this? Bisexual? No. Pangendered?) fraternity and one of our Brothers got pregnant and most people’s responses were not “congratulations”, but something closer to “Well, that was pretty stupid.”.
Fortunately, none of us felt any need to be polite to her.
November 12th, 2006 at 2:37 AM
My role model for unexpected pregnancy news is an OB nurse. Her advice was to say something like: “Wow! How’s it going?”
This only works if you can summon genuine warmth and interest towards the person, which I’m sure is not a problem for KTK, or most people who are entrusted with such sensitive personal. info.
January 17th, 2007 at 11:47 AM
1. It’s a bogus burden. She mentioned it as an explanation. Your expression of concern isn’t what this conversation is about. Your reaction should have been the same as if she’d said she missed the bus. Sorry to be all cold and aristocratic, but not every fact about someone else requires a confession of feeling. Some things are private, or should remain behind the shallow mask of manners.
2. I vote for closeted, self liking straight man.
January 18th, 2007 at 11:24 AM
Well, you’re one for three, staghounds!
February 3rd, 2007 at 7:34 AM
Kevin. Your comments defending Amanda Marcotte’s vile, slanderous views on the Duke rape hoax have just earned you a ticket to blog hell.
April 1st, 2007 at 5:51 PM
Alot of young people are probably just scared by pregnany. I am 33 and the thought of having a kid scars me. But I suppose people should be more careful.
November 17th, 2009 at 10:07 AM
My father in-law made a joke that the baby better be a boy or not to bother telling him. I was so hurt! How do you even respond to comments like this?
November 17th, 2009 at 12:17 PM
Hi, Willy – thanks for posting.
I really don’t know how to handle that one, either. You can (1) just pass it off as an obnoxious and chauvinistic attempt at humor (and reluctantly put up with it like we do a lot of obnoxious chauvinists), (2) sternly respond that you’ll be happy either way (and prepare yourself for the defensive argument that might result), or (3) read him the riot act about patriarchy, the status of women, and passing judgment on women’s reproductive functions. Which way you incline depends, I guess, on your impression of your FiL’s true feelings, your own degree of sensitivity to the issue, and how much conflict you’re willing to have in your relationship with him. You deserve to stand up for yourself, but you also don’t have to make yourself a martyr within your own family – everyone finds their own balance with these things.
One other question is: is your spouse dealing with this issue at all? They are on firmer ground in confronting the in-law, and they ought to be on your side – have you expressed your feelings about such remarks?
December 12th, 2009 at 5:20 PM
I can share a lot of these instances with you. People can be so rude, I just don’t think they get it.
April 8th, 2010 at 4:46 AM
A plea for you to consider the ethics of purchasing maternity clothes. Really, if people are going to bring a child on this planet, you’d better make sure the planet remains a good one! So please try and consider, for example, the materials the clothes are manufactured from, the conditions of the factories where they’re manufactured and the ethics of the clothes retailer. And endeavour to pass on, instead of discarding. Thanks!!!!