Welcome!

Welcome.

Allow me to introduce myself.

I am twenty-two years old. I am not married. I do not have any children.

I will never have any children, because I don't want them.

I am a member of the on-the-rise "Child-Free By Choice" movement. I am of the school of thought that children are unnecessary, if not detrimental, to people. Numerous studies have proven that having children is directly related to marital dissatisfaction, with almost irreversible damage to one's psychological health (particularly women). Having children is a massive responsibility. Having a child entails tremendous sacrifices: financial, emotional, personal sacrifices. Children hurt your body, your wallet, and your psyche. And probably your furniture and walls as well, as I remember from my childhood.

If you disagree, you have children or you want children, and you hate me and/or the rest of the Child-Free population, I really don't care. You do not have to read this blog. Please click out of the page and have a nice day.

But I did not start this blog to discuss the merits of being child-free. (Please see the links section for resources regarding this topic.) I came here to discuss something much more specific. You see, I'm a graduate student. And graduate school means tuition. And tuition means I need to have a job. And I do, indeed, have a job. I work at a very prominent bookstore chain that unfortunately has a very large children's section.

Being Child-Free, I have begun to shake off this brain-washing image that society loves to feed us about children being "magical, innocent, special" creatures, and now see them for what they are: humans. That's all they are. They have rights, just like everybody else, absolutely. But they're not special. They're not magical. They're humans. They're tiny humans. Our society loves to give special concessions to children: it's okay for them to scream, it's okay for them to lie, it's okay for them to steal. They're children. It's okay for them to make messes. They're children. It's okay for parents to slack off and abandon their work responsibilities for their children, because they're children, and children are the most important thing in the world.

Well, fuck that.

This blog started as a collection of stories, in another blog of sorts. A collection of the tales of idiot parents who want me to make concessions for their children. (Essentially, this blog isn't so much "anti-children" as it is "anti-stupid-parent.") I've come to realize that working at a retail establishment is one of the most unpleasant (although entertaining) venues in which to be proudly and happily child-free: here we are, making the conscious decision not to pollute our lives with these little resource-sucking bastards, and yet their consequences are being forced upon us anyway. True, it is more or less my own fault: I don't have to work at a retail establishment with a children's section. I don't even have to work retail at all. So I fully, fully admit that this is mostly my own doing. Despite all of this, I enjoy everything else about my job so I've decided to stick with it and turn my grievances into amusements.

After sharing so many of my Child-Free in Retail moments, I realized there's a pretty large community of us out there, who don't want children, who don't enjoy being around children, who work (particularly in retail!) and have many a stupid-parent tale to tell. This blog is for that community of people. Welcome to the Child-Free At Work Blog.

Whether you're decidedly Child-Free or just someone who works in retail, this is the place for you to vent your frustrations.

Interested in writing for Child-Free At Work? Drop me a comment! I'd love to have more writers!