Redneck Mother’s “Not a baby-machine”

I came across an ad recently that startled me. I was only able to appreciate why because of an essay written by a feminist blogger.

The ad is for John Muir Birth Center, which I came across while flipping through Diablo Magazine.

Advertisement for John Muir Birth Center, Diablo Magazine, November 2005.

This ad shows a pregnant woman’s belly, with a small child leaning in to kiss it. The pregnant woman’s face is cut out of the picture; she is just this huge pregnant belly. A giant PC mouse pointer hovers over her belly and seems poised to “click.” Afterall, that's the main action we use our pc mice for everyday. There is a very strong association between the icon and that action.

So the mouse pointer will click, and… do what, exactly? Produce a baby? The mouse pointer certainly seems to promise that, with the latest medical equipment and staff, giving birth can be as easy and simple as a mouse click.

An alternative reading is that the text next to the pointer indicates what the mouse pointer is about to do: nurture. So the mouse click may be actioning an act usually ascribed to animals. The mouse can be seen as controlling the child, who is leaning forward to kiss the belly of the pregnant woman, an act of nurturance (oddly from child to adult, rather than the traditional flow from adult to child).

If the mouse is controlling the child, who is controlling the mouse? The medical institution in the advertisement? God? Some sort of Jolly Green Giant of prenatal care?

As far as I know a machine like a pc or medical equipment can nurture only in some ways, and only if the emotional connotations of that word are missing. (See the definition for ‘nurturance’: the providing of loving care and attention.) Even then a human is needed to tell the machine to nurture the other human (in this case a pregnant woman).

The importance of networking for feminists

If Redneck Mother hadn’t already articulated it, I’m not sure this ad would’ve snapped to my attention in quite the way that it did. As Nina Turns 40 so vividly put it in her contribution to Blog Against Racism Day (“I confess”):

I’m just like a fish who isn’t aware of the water—racism is all around me, and I’m stuck in it, breathing it, part of it, whether I like it or not.

As with racism, so too with sexism and misogyny, which is as common as the air we breathe. But unlike air it is culturally produced, and it doesn’t have to be this way.

This is why it’s so important to read feminist publications, participate in feminist communities and events, and generally do what men do so well: network. Feminism and feminist actions (like blogging) help fight against the constant assault women live under. Even when—or especially when—you are not consciously aware of it. Even for those who say, “I’m not offended by that. I don’t feel oppressed. And I’m a woman.”

Even for those people.

Related Links:

Redneck Mother: “Not a baby-machine.”
Muse and fury: “Midwifery in Ontario”