Those who are unfortunate enough to spend a significant time on the app formerly known as Twitter have probably seen the recent discourse regarding women’s bodies. It’s a popular topic on the app right now, and every moderate to large account run by a female has had something to say about how and why a woman’s body should or should not look a certain way after pregnancy and childbirth.

This particular kerfuffle is more than just a silly social media spat. In many ways, it signifies the generally unfair shake which good men and fathers and husbands are given due to the actions of a small segment of extremely shallow males.

“I’ve had multiple women in NYC tell me they don’t want to get pregnant because they’re afraid of what it will do to their body,” X account Tasteful Lindy wrote.

“That’s because men are disgusted by postpartum bodies,” another user responded.

Responses to this allegation generally focus on how no woman should stand for that kind of treatment from a man whose child she has carried (and she shouldn’t). But the hypothetical wife-hating husband who despises the very body which bore him children is an infinitely small breed of human, so much so that the current discourse around this topic is yet another classic example of women projecting their own insecurities – born of a culture that commodifies female bodies – on to innocent men.

As married women, our worst detractors are most often ourselves, other women, and single men whom we don’t need to bother attracting in the first place. Indeed, a quick overview on X of this very topic reveals most angry comments on either side come from women. Genetically gifted women make subtle brags about their ideal postpartum bodies, while feminists declare this the reason they would never procreate with a man.

But let’s face it. For women, discussion of the female body is uncomfortable because of a culture that has ingrained into us since puberty that our social worth is tied up in our bodies. Many resort to competitive pettiness about other women to elevate themselves in their sexual status.

The only other people who care about a woman’s stretch marks or hormonal hair thinning are men whom this hypothetical postpartum mother doesn’t need to attract in the first place. Indeed, the only reason she would need to care is if the father of her children had left her or she him, or some tragedy had befallen him.

Beyond these extraordinary circumstances, the bodily changes of a pregnancy are incredibly freeing. It is the only time when a woman’s body can change in ways that our sex-obsessed culture would faint to behold, and yet she can firmly say that all of that change merely indicates she is infinitely attractive to her man.

If anything, the postpartum female body proves that men, for the most part, are not the shallow beings feminists claim. Every year, women with permanent stretch marks get pregnant again by the same man, despite commercialism assuring us all that she really should have applied that $60 cream dutifully since conception to “get her body back.” If it really were the case that men only cared to impregnate women who have not yet been pregnant, there wouldn’t be any second or third babies, and no one would have siblings.

While a small sect of even smaller men may lose interest in their wives after childbirth, I would guess that most do not care. Again, with a few shameful exceptions, the attraction men feel towards their wives would only increase after watching her work to bring his child into the world.

So let’s all log off Twitter and go back to loving our husbands and children, focusing on the real men in our lives who love their wives better and better with each pregnancy.

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The republication of this article is made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal.

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