The Demonization of Young Pregnant Women on the Internet

People, including women, claim they are not misogynistic, but the ultimate way to find out their feelings about women is through their reactions towards young women (or even girls, in the worst-case scenario) who regret their (accidental) pregnancies, especially when they regret who the father is. 

I have seen an abundance of videos of young women explaining their situations on social media platforms like TikTok, and the comment sections are the same every single time. In one TikTok about a woman in a toxic relationship with the father of her children, I saw comments such as “Well isn’t it the consequences of our own actions,”  *unamused face emoji*,” “and you kept it?,” “This is why we wait for marriage” and so many more unempathetic comments. Even in a relationship where it feels like you know your partner from their favorite color to their deepest secret, you may never know their true intentions or personality, and that is a reality that many women face, even married women. 

Women who experience those types of relationships are used and then discarded. Their trust is broken, but people fail to realize that and blame them for something that those women could never see coming. People who hide behind a screen criticize these young women for the man that they trusted, for the man that got them pregnant and for the man who lied to their faces … all things that those women, or really anyone, cannot predict.

These cruel types of reactions show how demonized sex is for women. No matter how monogamous, how safe they are and what their intent for having sex is, people will still criticize women for having sex, especially when they become pregnant and wish they had not. These are issues that everyone may deal with, but women are criticized more often. Even when it takes two to have sex and have kids, the responsibility for both always seems to fall on women. 

I follow a teen mother on TikTok named Bailey. When she first announced her pregnancy, many people were upset, and many people commented harsh things. Ever since then, her teen pregnancy is the only thing that many people still comment about on her posts. She and her baby’s father, Dylan, separated some time ago, and when she posted about it on her page, most of the comments were like this: “grew apart? wanted different things? after having a baby?,” “breaking up cs yall dont have the same interests?,” “‘want different things’ babe u got a kid together. this is not really how it works *crying emoji*” and more like that. Comments like that show how people only associate women with their kids and their pregnancies, and expect them to thrive because of them, when women are so much more than their kids. Those comments expose people’s true feelings about women because they only blame the woman or mother, when in fact, it takes both a woman and a man to have a kid.

Concepts within feminism relate to this topic as well, as feminism deals with making women and men equal to each other, while not making women more “important” than men, which is a common misconception. Feminism ultimately fights against misogyny. So many people are feminist, including many women, so something that often confuses me is when those who claim to be “feminists” only blame the mother in situations of unwanted pregnancy. Feminism is for all women, and that includes women who make mistakes like accidental pregnancies, because they were not the only ones who caused it.

People will bash women for literally any decision they make after finding out they are pregnant. The blame goes as follows. She gets an abortion? She never should have gotten pregnant in the first place, and it should have been her responsibility to keep and raise the child, claiming the pregnancy was just the consequence of her own actions. She decides to keep it? She is too young and stupid, and that kid will not have a good life. She is happy about her pregnancy? She should not be celebrating a mistake and needs to take it seriously. She is upset about her pregnancy? She should not have had sex in the first place if she knew she did not want to have kids yet. She stays with the father? They could have had a bright future, but tried to “grow up” too fast. She does not stay with the father? Having a kid is a commitment and even if they are not happy together, they should stay together so the kid can have both parents. The list goes on.

These examples of misogyny tie into people’s real feelings about these women, or just women in general. They criticize those women, make fun of them and simplify them to just their pregnancies and kids. In reality, women are so much more than pregnancy and children, but most people fail to realize that and kick men out of the picture. Women want empathy and know their regrets and mistakes, but they are constantly belittled by people who do not understand what they are going through. 

If you want to support and advocate for women and make them equal to men, you have to change your beliefs about young women who regret their pregnancies and partners, and provide them with some empathy. They know they have made a mistake, they know that this is not what they wanted or what others wanted for them, so why do people feel the need to constantly remind them and belittle them?

People’s feelings against women show when they react to women who regret their pregnancies or partners. The only way to move forward from these underlying misogynistic thoughts is to understand these women and support their journeys. 

• misogyny
• teen pregnancy
• tik tok
• young moms