The “Femail Today” section of the Daily Mail often features such can’t-miss content as Doja Cat “flashing her bare bust beneath fishnet body stocking in VERY racy shoot” and Emily Ratajkowski’s every move. Lately, though, there’s been a shift in the Mail’s focus: pregnant women are everywhere!
Femail last week, for instance, featured as many women with child — Lindsay Lohan, Rihanna and Serena Williams — in its top stories as women without. Kourtney Kardashian is regularly pictured “showing off” her growing baby bump (today it was in a TINY string bikini). When Lohan gave birth this week, the Mail lauded the occasion and reported how Lohan and her husband are “‘in love’ with their new addition.” Jamie Lee Curtis, too, offered a pro-baby message by celebrating becoming a “movie grandmother.” Even Paris Hilton, the vapidity queen herself, said of her six-month-old son, “He is my world and makes my life feel so complete.”
What’s behind this pro-baby tabloid trend? I offer a few theories, some more encouraging than others: the world can only get so weird before people become re-enchanted with nature. News of men “breastfeeding” and reports of female military recruits “being forced to shower with trans women with full male genitalia” are confusing to most people and morally objectionable to many. We may be coming full circle, to the point that the tradition of a husband and wife having a baby together (all the pregnant celebrities I cited, except Rihanna, whose relationship status is shrouded in rumors, are married) has become something novel, especially as “the proportion of births outside of marriage in the United States” has increased “dramatically” in recent years. Pictures of a committed couple excitedly growing their family must be welcome relief from the disturbing and tragic Dylan Mulvaney beat, as the Mail and other outlets consistently rely on gorgeous expectant mothers for clicks.
The appeal of happy, healthy, pregnant women flaunting their burgeoning bellies is encouraging, but there’s something less encouraging you may have noticed about the list of soon-to-be and new celebrity mothers. Not to prompt a Don Lemon, they’re-not-in-their-prime moment, but by birthing standards, these stars are older than average. At thirty-seven, thirty-five, forty-one, forty-four and forty-two, respectively, Lohan, Rihanna, Williams, Kardashian and Hilton represent the new reality of older mothers. The median age for new mothers is now thirty, “the highest on record,” reports Spectrum News. And of course many of these later-in-life celebrity pregnancies are only made possible by costly fertility treatments. In the case of Paris Hilton, it was through a surrogate, and in the case of lesbian actress Molly Bernard, her pregnancy came about through the totally bizarre practice of “home insemination.”
Model and social-media mean girl Chrissy Teigen made headlines earlier this year for being pregnant at the same time as a surrogate who carried a fourth child for Teigen and her husband, John Legend. Teigen announced on social media that, for as long as she could remember, she “always wanted four children.” In commenting on her choice to use a surrogate, Hilton, too, inferred that acquiring a baby because you want one is something you can and should do (at least if you’re a celebrity) whenever you want. Hilton said past abuse made her too scared to have a baby, but “I want a family so bad.” (Cue Holly Hunter in Raising Arizona.)
I’m all about pregnant women — glowing with life and promoting the joys of motherhood — commanding the tabloids. But let’s also keep in mind that being able to have a child whenever you feel like it is not most people’s prerogative — nor should it be.
