‘Getting married and having children is a natural part of life’
An editor at a prestigious student newspaper is urging her fellow college students: Stop judging and criticizing your classmates who elect to get married and have children young.
Renee Pineda, the opinions editor at the George Washington University’s GW Hatchet student newspaper, writes in an op-ed that, having observed the number of their high school classmates who were getting married, “my friends and I subtly implied, through texts, phone calls and in-person conversations, that our classmates had made the wrong decision.”
“Despite our all-knowing tone, I really don’t know that they did make a wrong choice – no one aside from the couple can really know that. As an outsider looking in, I have no idea what led my classmates to decide to get married and frankly, it isn’t my business,” Pineda writes, observing: “Getting married and having children is a natural part of life, and just because we are attending college and choosing to be more career-oriented does not mean that those who choose to start a family and settle down are lesser than us.”
Pineda writes that, when she was younger, her parents “drilled the concept of independence into my head:”
According to their rules, it was important to be independent and self-sufficient before getting involved in a relationship. I interpreted those life lessons as a plan: go to school, start a career, save money and, once I am ready, get married. So when I see my high school classmates getting hitched and having children, it is off-putting because it is different than the values I hold.
In conversations, I find that women are vastly more criticized than men. I am in no way, shape or form, ready to have a baby, but some of my classmates are. In our progressive society, where women are pushed to be leaders in all types of industries, we ignore that being a mother is just as big of a responsibility, if not bigger. If my former classmates are ready to get married and start families, I shouldn’t judge them – I should recognize the huge responsibility and independence they are exhibiting.
“Most of us grew up with the notion that we should focus on our careers before we focus on starting a family. And while that’s perfectly fine, it’s also fine for people to focus on family first or even at the same time,” Pineda notes.
MORE: Students at Catholic university persecuted for support of traditional marriage
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