It’s time for my annual childfree trending post! I am calling this year’s theme, ‘sprouting’. Why? We’ve seen some sprouting of good and bad trends this year. Let’s start with the bad.
Problematic Sprouting
The sprouting of pronatalist discussion grew a bit from last year, but not in productive ways, thanks to voices like Elon Musk and others. Among pronatalist beliefs that affect all people, they also include negative attitudes towards those who do not have children, particularly when it is a conscious choice. This year it is more clear that they want attention to scarily germinate a white, tech, eugenic, Silicon Valley limb on a very ancient pronatalist tree. Wrongly freaked out by declining birthrates, as a Mercator article relates, they tend to “promote, in practice if not in speech, a selective pronatalism: more babies of a certain kind.”
The voices of Malcom and Simone Collins came on the scene last year, and we’ve seen more of them on their own podcast, as guests on a few others, and getting more digital ink as ‘premier pronatalists’. Titles coming out like this one in The Guardian send such a damaging message: “America’s top pronatalists on having ‘tons of kids’ to save the world.” The last thing we need to be doing is doubling down on old pronatalist messaging to keep the economic Ponzi scheme of growth going at all costs.
And often it has been falsely talked about like pronatalism as a new ‘trend’, or something ‘on the rise’. The truth is it’s been baked into the engine of society for so long. What we are seeing is just another twist in the same old pronatalist playbook.
However, while not enough, the good news is some media have called out this misinformation, like Sarah Jones in New York Magazine, “There’s Nothing New About Pronatalism.” Emily Klancher Merchant from University of California, Davis and Win Brown, of University of Washington, discuss the Ponzi scheme truths in “Pronatalism won’t solve our social, economic problems.” Yes! We need to see a lot more of this.
Positive Sprouting
Two sprouts of note are political in nature. In the run up to the election, the Alliance of Childfree Voters was started by Shannon Coulter (who also heads the organization, Grab Your Wallet) and is described as “a nonpartisan grassroots coalition of individuals and organizations fighting for the rights and voices of childfree and childless voters worldwide.” This is an example of what I discuss in my 2022 Childfree Trending piece regarding efforts that move toward the Coalescence stage of movement building.
Similarly, how can I not mention the Vance ‘childless cat lady’ comment that spurred big waves of discourse not only about and from childfree people, but from the wider demographic of those who have no children for whatever reason. It is a sign that given the right conditions, childfree, childless and all in between who have no children can join as one voice, which I contend is a necessary step for the no-children collective to progress as a movement to its Coalescence stage.
Other Notes of Interest
Algorithmic Mischief
Along the lines of promoting this new pronatalist propaganda twist, I have seen more algorithmic mischief on sites like Musk’s X. For example, search for #childfree, one commonly sees very little that is current, and way more tweets that are old. On Facebook, algorithms continue to push pronatalist results in feeds. Case in point, my Families of Two: Childfree and Beyond feed has seen a huge rise in posts having to do with families, birth, pregnancy, and on and on.
Childfree YouTube Videos
Now there has been a growing number of videos on YouTube for some time, but this last year I observed a tick upwards by people from more countries. This sure helps the childfree conversation reach more audiences globally. Podcasts are migrating to videos as well, which I hope in turn will bring more faces to podcast hosts taking on a wide range of childfree-related topics.
Global Discussions Leveled
In past annual childfree trending pieces I have highlighted discussions on childfree topics globally. This year I have seen a little leveling off of this, with the exception of pieces out of Malaysia, and Indonesia.
Childfree-Related Terms
Also in the past annual childfree trending pieces I have lamented about the continued unclear use of terms related to those who have no children by choice. In 2024, I have especially noticed more use of ‘childfree by choice’ and ‘child-free’ than ‘childfree’. I still contend that given the origination of ‘childfree’ in textbooks back in the 70s to mean those with no children by choice, to use ‘childfree by choice’ is redundant. You also still see the use of ‘child-free’ and ‘childfree’ out there to mean not having children right now. No matter the intended usage, it continues to reflect algorithmic strategy – the use of specific terms and phrases to get clicks despite unclearness or inaccuracy. Me, I just use childfree when I am referring to those who have no children by choice. You will always know what I mean!
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I want to close with a call to action. In the coming year, when you see the white, eugenic techs on their pronatalist podium, we need to call out their agenda and its purpose, and defend reproductive freedom and ethics. In 2025, please join me in supporting important advocacy work dedicated to this cause and more!
