Following article is located at: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/julyweb-only/128-42.0.html
SOULWORK
We Are Not Pregnant
The glory of men and women lies in their unbridgeable differences.
Mark Galli | posted 7/12/2007 08:55AM
A male friend, married to a lovely women, comes up to me beaming and says, "We're pregnant!"
"Wow!" I reply, with inappropriate sarcasm. "When I was a young man, only women could get pregnant."
I've heard this phrase—"We're pregnant"—too much recently, but it's time to move beyond sarcasm. The intent is as understandable as the execution is absurd. It arises out of the noble desire of men (and future fathers) to participate fully in the childrearing. And I understand that for many men, it simply means, "My wife and I are expecting a baby."
But the first dictionary meaning of pregnant remains, "Carrying developing offspring within the body." Whenever a word is misused, it means the speaker is unaware of the word's meaning, or that the cultural meaning of a word is shifting, or that some ideology is demanding obeisance. Probably all three are in play, but it's the last reality that we should pay attention to. It is not an accident that this phrase, "We're pregnant," has arisen in a culture that in many quarters is ponderously egalitarian and tries to deny the fundamental differences of men and women.
This phrase is most unfortunate after conception because it is an inadvertent co-opting of women by men—men using language to suggest that they share equally in the burdens and joys of pregnancy. Instead, pregnancy is one time women should flaunt their womanhood, and one time men should acknowledge the superiority of women. Men may be able to run the mile in less than four minutes and open stuck pickle jars with a twist of the wrist, but for all our physical prowess, we cannot carry new life within us and bring it into the world. To suggest that we do is a slap in the face of women.
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Exactly, this author has it exactly right.
The really unfortunately thing is that women went along with this kick in our teeth so easily and, as usual, had to wait for a man to bring it to our attention.
The only point of disagreement with the author I have is that he's too easy on other men. As I don't agree for a moment that men did this due to 'noble desires'. In fact, it's just what it would appear to be if anyone else was doing it, an attempt to usurp womens' more significant role in the creation of life and for men to try and claim it as their own.
The male role in this area is minimal and this 'we're pregnant' business is another of their long-running, age-old, jealousy attempts to deny this reality.
