The Problem With Self-Absorbed Singleness

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Every American, whether Republican or Democrat, gets an image in their heads when they hear the phrase “childless cat lady.” The ornery, wild-haired crone. The dilapidated house and overgrown weeds. The outdated, peeling wallpaper and dusty cookbooks. Boxes of broken and mismatched bric-a-brac, their existence long since forgotten until a naïve caretaker suggests she throw it out, at which time she furiously declares it a priceless treasure. 

And cats. Everywhere, cats. Pampered cats and emaciated cats. Purchased cats and stray cats, vaccinated cats and feral cats, live cats and dead cats. And cat hair. And opened cans of cat food. And cat waste. On the carpet. On the furniture. On the bed. On the countertops.

Such is the fantasy of code enforcement officers the nation over. But when the media dug up an old clip of J.D. Vance criticizing “childless cat ladies,” the Left collapsed into its usual, predictable hysterics. USA Today chummed the waters and found plenty of grievance studies professors and abortion activists who claimed Vance is “absolutely terrified of the power of American women” and intends to “keep women barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen with no human rights.” 

His comment was intentionally misrepresented as an attack on women (and couples) unable to have kids, who adopt kids, or who can’t afford kids. But anyone who listened to his complete sentence would not have derived any of this. He also criticized corporate oligarchs, but the Left wasn’t going to let that get in the way of a good ol’ edited soundbite.

Vance’s criticism of “childless cat ladies” was that people who willingly choose to not have children for selfish reasons are detrimental to the advancement and continuation of our society. And he’s right, for two reasons.

First, you know all those economically illiterate entitlement programs you progressives assume as your birthrights? Social Security and Medicare and Obamacare and all that? Well, guess what we need to keep those programs afloat: future taxpayers.

Progressives approach this conundrum the way they always have. Shift the burden to someone else. YOUR kids will one day pay for MY entitlements. But if you dare suggest they help to sustain the population necessary for their entitlements, they howl and shriek about kitchens and aprons and bare feet. But their sanctification of “choice” doesn’t extend to other people or other people’s kids. Our kids will be forced to pay for their entitlements. Our kids don’t get a “choice” about it.

Unlike your student debt relief, this is something that cannot be pawned off on others in perpetuity. Taxpayers need to be born. It won’t work if only conservatives are doing it. The current birth rate is 1.7 children per woman, which is below the 2.1 figure needed to sustain the current population as is. We simply don’t have the numbers we need. There’s no way around it. No children means no revenue for entitlements.

Vance’s second point is that people, both men and women, who prioritize their careers, their money, their wine tastings, and their charcuterie boards above having children are, indeed, detrimental to society. Yes, it’s your “choice” to do so. Calm down. Nobody is taking away your precious “choice.” But be honest about it. The choices you make are done with the intention of making the least amount of sacrifice possible in the perpetuation of a privileged and sheltered life.

On a certain level, it’s hard for those of us with nobler priorities to disagree with your choice. Selfish people make horrible parents. Seth Rogen, that Frankensteinian assemblage of beta male, man-child, and quintessential gym ad “Before” picture, said the quiet part out loud last year. The actor relished that, without kids, he and his wife “get to do whatever we want.” And that’s all it is. That’s what the “choice” is really about. That’s what lies beneath the virtue-signaling platitudes about community, about global responsibility, about sustainability and all the other rhetorical diversions. You get to do whatever you want.

So I guess — yeah, I guess I agree with Rogen that he shouldn’t have kids. He would fail his kids the same way his parents failed him. Seth and his wife have a dog instead, which is fine. They have so far managed to exert enough responsibility to care for a living creature other than themselves to the point of at least keeping it alive.

But pets are meant to accentuate human relationships, not replace them. The image of “childless cat ladies” is misleading precisely because it conjures up the image of that old, hunched crone in her hoarder house on a dead-end street. But there exists a depressingly large amount of pet owners today who aren’t elderly hermits but are our atomized, isolated youth.

Nowadays, they prefer dogs to cats (as would I), and the pet owners are largely female. There are many single male dog owners as well, but their motives for pet ownership differ. Many male dog owners use their dogs as a “chick magnet” (cue eye roll) and take them on walks as a ruse to strike up a conversation with female passers-by. Now, how successful these endeavors are varies from male to male. But the point is that they are trying to attract mates, not repel them.

On the other hand, there seems to be a depressingly large amount of single female dog owners who use their pets not to attract mates (and future families), but to replace them. You can tell these people by how they identify themselves as pet owners. “Oh, nice dog!” you say upon meeting. To which they immediately delve (without prompting or asking – this is a tell) into why they’ve shacked up with an animal instead of a human being.

“Life is just so much easier…”

“I can do what I want, no strings attached…”

“I don’t have to answer to anybody…”

“I’m not gonna be domesticated…”

Rarely will you get such a defensive reply to such a benign statement. “I’m happy, damn it!” they insist through gritted teeth. With their assertions, you wonder if they’re trying to convince you they aren’t lonely, or if they’re trying to convince themselves.

They dislike being judged by society’s “arbitrary standards,” but are the first to judge couples with children (or even couples in general) as if they are uneducated simpletons from a bygone era. This is classic projection. The single-life utopia they were promised by celebrities and activists was simply a mirage in the desert of social necessity. We weren’t meant to be alone, and an overwhelming part of them knows they’re missing out on something better.

Far be it from me to give relationship advice, as my early 20s was a textbook example of precisely what not to do. But I will say this. I didn’t fix the problem by hiding behind an animal and blaming the opposite gender for my inability to sustain successful relationships or to attract partners who weren’t Cameron Diaz in “Vanilla Sky” insane. I fixed the problem by fixing myself, by making myself a more interesting partner, and, yes, by being less selfish.

And it was amazing what relationships I was able to forge when it was no longer about Me Me Me 24/7.

But not everybody is willing to take that hard look in the mirror. So they dig in, and out of pride, they prolong their misery. They lash out at people like Vance. And they cling to bizarre theories, like this doozy peddled by NPR, that cat-lady tropes are a relic of medieval times when single women with cats were feared to be witches. And in this painful process of denialism, they rob themselves of years, even decades, of spousal companionship and the irreplicable joys of having children.

And then they vote their emotions. They vote from loneliness, from envy, from bitterness, and from resentment. There was no Joy™ whatsoever in their vote.

And we see how they reacted when they lost.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can say or do that’s going to change their minds. Like alcoholics, they have to come to the realization and acknowledgment of the problem all on their own before they can make meaningful changes. Loneliness has a way of refusing to be ignored. I sincerely hope, without snark or smugness or pride, that these people are able to find the happiness and meaning embedded in building human relationships and creating human life.

It’s just sad to watch.