Anti-bodies

Commenting on misogynist and ableist political speech

Robert Frank. Nude (Marie) with Cat, 1950. Source.

We’re in the thick of it… Election season, that is, and every election year, I moan and gripe about all the political coverage and the debates and the non-stop news cycle scraping every little thing that every candidate is up to or has ever done, and I tell myself, “Ugh! I hate politics!” But that’s not entirely true. Election night itself is one of my favorite events, and the fact that I’m actively keeping up on all of that aforementioned political coverage betrays the fact that I actually really like politics. I like the exchange of ideas. I like that we must collectively state what our values are, whether they’ve changed, and what we think makes a good leader. I like that it forces many of us to dredge up and reconsider our views and opinions on a great many topics, for better or for worse, and I like that we each have the opportunity to have our priorities taken into account.

I will spare you my partisan views and candidate preferences here, but all this dredging up of long-forgotten views and talking points has placed front and center one topic that I did not expect to see but that, as a naturist, I am finding deeply troubling. Troubling not just because of its direct implications but because of its wider implications, what it says about our comfort with passing judgment on others’ bodies, their biological struggles, and their personal choices.

“The childless are the ones that are destroying the country. You can be good without children, but if you’re bad you probably don’t have children.”

-Charlie Kirk

To be very clear, the above quote from Charlie Kirk, right-wing political activist and internet personality, is very fringe and is not a perspective I have heard coming from a mainstream political candidate from either party until this past week. It is, however, a view that I have seen gain pretty rapid traction, with similar comments coming from Vice Presidential candidate JD Vance, whose comments (and public spat with Jennifer Aniston) about “childless cat ladies” being “miserable” and wishing to make the rest of the country miserable along with them have only expounded upon this concept that childless women—or childless people in general—are a scourge on us all.

The line of thought asserts that childless people contribute less to society than childbearing people, that they do not have a real stake in the future of the country, and that they, therefore, should not have an equal voice in America. In a nation of people who survive and thrive in all different ways, where we celebrate that every one of us is free to pursue our own happiness, this kind of assertion feels backward and foreign.

The Simpsons’ character Eleanor Abernathy represents the crazy cat lady stereotype, a scourge on society.

I may be a man, and I may not have a uterus, but I do know plenty of women personally who have struggled to get pregnant, who have miscarried, who have been deeply pained by their struggles with conception and birth, who have gone to extraordinary lengths to be able to conceive at all, or who have lost their infant children after birth. And you do, too. Whether the women in your life have disclosed that to you or not, I guarantee you that many of them have struggled with these issues, often quietly and with very little support. The idea that their contributions to society are any less because of the biological barriers and struggles they face is incredibly offensive and heartless.

To assert that any of us have more or less value to society or to one another based on our biological abilities is to wade into dangerous, eugenicist waters, and it opens us up to all kinds of “justifiable” discrimination. What should we do, then, with these women who struggle to conceive? Or with impotent men, for that matter? Or with same-sex couples? Or elderly couples? Basing our valuation of one another on our ability to carry children cruelly erases the myriad other contributions that we each make to our respective communities.

Beyond biological ability, a person’s choice to have or not have children is nobody’s business but their own, just like any other choice they make in their own life. I know plenty of strong, intelligent, hard-working, and community-oriented women (and men, for that matter) who have either chosen not to have children or who have not had the opportunity, and the value of their contributions to society is not one iota less than the contributions of others who made a different choice. And that’s why I feel this line of thought is dangerous to more than just childrearing: We are all getting far too flirtatious with the concept of judging one another based on the choices that we make for our own lives and the situations we find ourselves in.

Accepting the idea that the choice to not have children is a valid reason to, say, deny someone a voice in society or belittle their role in the democratic process is a dangerous threat to the personal liberties we all enjoy. It threatens any lifestyle or choice that deviates from traditional behavior. How many hops, skips, or jumps does it take for this same logic to apply to people who choose non-traditional family structures, who choose non-traditional careers, who choose communities that deviate from the norm… or, I don’t know, who like to run around naked? And how long until this biological litmus test turns on people with physical or developmental disabilities, or people who struggle with mental illness? I cannot stress enough how this line of thinking and judgment of our neighbors, of their bodies, of their abilities, and of their choices is harmful to everyone, regardless of how we choose to live.

As a naturist, I strive not only to appreciate every body for what it is capable of achieving but also to enjoy seeing how we each choose to put our bodies to use. As a naturist, I value the philosophy of acceptance and tolerance, of understanding that every body is different, has different strengths and different weaknesses. As a naturist, I value the connection we make with one another regardless of the lives we live or the people we love or the choices we make. As both a naturist and an American, I find this anti-woman, anti-body, anti-autonomy rhetoric incredibly troubling.

I do not mean to tell any of you how to vote or whom to support, but I do hope that all of us, regardless of political affiliation, can be careful to identify and rebuke political discourse that deprecates our freedom to live life as we wish, that encourages us to see each other as less-than, or that elevates certain bodies over others, certain people over others. There has to be room in society for all of us, and we have to start acting like we understand and believe that.

It’s rough, I know. Election season is an important part of civic engagement, but it can be wearying. Take care of yourselves, take care of each other, and we’ll make it through! 🪐

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Check out Timothy’s personal blog, Almostwild, for more thoughtful meditations on social nudism and nakedness, inclusivity, social progress, and environmentalism.