I don’t usually waste valuable ink on celebrities unless they do or say something in excess of the expected amount of ignorance. Jennifer Aniston has done just that. She apparently thinks the idea of being a single mom is OK–like as if anyone could do it.
Everyone in your little circle of wealthy Hollywood and professional types Jen, or did you realize that when you say stuff like that everyone hears it?
“Women are realizing it more and more, knowing that they don’t have to settle with a man just to have that child,” Aniston said at a press conference Sunday. “Times have changed and that is also what is amazing, is that we do have so many options these days, as opposed to our parents’ days when you can’t have children because you waited too long.”
Options? "We?" What world do you live on?
Single Mother’s are the single greatest source of poverty in America. Their children end up on average in the worst of all circumstances. They require the most support from the government and their communities. And while Jen may not have to worry about it, most of them have what might best be referred to as a subsistence lifestyle, and very few of those "options" she is talking about.
Some single moms do overcome the adversity and manage great things, but by sacrificing things Aniston will never have to give up. Most real single moms spend their lives facing challenges that would drive the powder-puff Aniston into rehab, except that most people can’t really afford her kind of rehab. They end up addicted, abused, and lonely. Their children are often abandoned to the state–shuffled between foster homes, physically or sexually abused or left unattended for too long. These are the kids that find themselves in gangs and involved in crime, the next generation of sperm donors to the next generation of single mothers.
All of them? Of course not. But Aniston may not remember what it’s like to just get by or not get by at all becasue she’s never had to worry about that. She has no point of reference except a script and some stage play. And it has obviously never occurred to her that with great wealth and success comes great responsibility.
There are, right now, young women who look up to Jennifer Aniston, most of whom will never have her lifestyle or her "options," and if they become single mothers probably never will. But right now they may believe that being a single mom in their own circumstances is probably no big deal thanks to Jennifer Aniston.
I know she didn’t ask for it to be that way, but that’s how it is. Next time she opens her mouth she might want to consider the inconvenient fact that, as hard as it might be to believe, her words could have consequences.
