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By Jennifer Asencio | Published
Actor and debatable comedian Seth Rogen recently reaffirmed his lifestyle, which he describes as “child-free.” A 2023 interview with Kelly Clarkson has resurfaced in which the actor talked about how happy he and his wife, Lauren Miller, are without having had children.
It’s not that Rogen is unfamiliar with the challenges of raising children. At 40 when he gave the interview, he pointed out that most of his peers are parents, so he’s had a lot of exposure to the idea. But he and Miller find that they can develop their careers and themselves in ways that having children does not facilitate for them. The couple has opted to remain childless by choice.
DINK, Defined
Rogen is an infamous goofball, and it’s probably a good idea that he not procreate, especially after Animal Farm. He makes some good points about what being childless can do for an adult, including hinting at the idea that some people should not be parents. He made it very clear that he’d rather work on himself than on raising a child, and, although the two ideas are not mutually exclusive (many of us who are parents have grown because we had children), someone whose focus is more on themselves than their progeny shouldn’t be raising children anyway. At least he accepts that.
However, he makes being childless sound like paradise when he claims that having kids seems like it wouldn’t be fun or that he and Miller are doing things with their lives that they wouldn’t be able to do with children. These days, it is perfectly acceptable not to want children; there is no imperative to keep the species alive or even to maintain the family line. Glorifying childlessness goes too far, though.
Rogen is hardly unique. There is an entire online community of so-called “DINKs,” which stands for “dual income, no kids.” These are adults who have chosen not to have children so they can enjoy expensive vacations and lifestyles without the responsibility or commitment of raising children. Many of these couples are driven by women who are more interested in careers than family, as well as the recent movement that has made terminating one’s pregnancy into a political statement about bodily autonomy.
Conflating Two Different Mindsets
In some ways, Rogen and other DINKs have a point: dragging kids around on vacations or managing them alongside a career is very, very difficult. These days, a dual income is almost a requirement, even for childless couples, to ensure the bills get paid, which emphasizes this juggling act even more. Kids require sick days, have temper tantrums, and might keep you up all night before a big meeting because the Boogeyman is hiding under their bed. They are dirty, messy, and unregulated. It’s okay not to want children. It’s even okay to admit that the reason you don’t want children is that you’d rather keep your time and assets for yourself.
What’s not okay is judging other people when they do have kids. Rogen objects to people expecting him to have children, which is a fair point. Often, we socially do expect couples to reproduce as if that’s the only point of being a couple (and forget about you if you can’t have kids at all!). Many people are perplexed by couples who choose not to have children and continue their family line, and the pressure on couples to have children is immense and personal, coming from family and friends.
But Rogen’s observation that “it doesn’t seem that fun…” and his statement that “People describe having kids as brief glimmering moments of beauty amongst a sea of pain. Whereas not having kids, it’s just lovely all the time,” are both statements made by someone who obviously has no idea what raising children is like. I don’t know who describes having children the way Rogen claims, but raising kids is a timeline of novelties and pleasures that last a lifetime. Playing with one’s kids is not only fun but also gives parents a chance to pass down hobbies and share pastimes (my son and I play Dungeons & Dragons together, and I learned how to play from my mother).
Getting to know one’s children is also a remarkable experience that cannot be matched or understood by DINKs and shouldn’t be written off as a hardship. On some occasions, personalities may clash, but for the most part, one’s children are as much their friends as they are their charges, and doing things with friends is also fun.
Thinking In Terms Of Transaction
Rogen was also dismissive of the idea that children will eventually “take care” of their parents, claiming that it was selfish to expect that. These days, many elderly people are choosing to age in place, in their own homes rather than those of their children. Many elderly are living active lives that separate them from their children socially. Being taken care of as an elderly parent doesn’t always mean living with a free caregiver who is working off a DNA debt. Just hanging out with one’s adult children is rewarding and fulfilling when one has a relationship with them. The affection that is built between parent and child also moves many children to participate in their parents’ care organically, without being forced by expectations.
Rogen really summed up his lack of parental fitness in an exchange with Clarkson in which she said, “People with kids, that’s what we call ‘me time.’ You have to carve it out.” Rogen replied, “All the time is me. Why wouldn’t it be me time?!” While he considers the idea of having kids to “take care of you when you’re old” selfish, he admitted openly that he does not feel capable of putting time into anyone other than himself and his own pursuits of both business and pleasure.
There are a lot of good reasons to have children, and a lot of good reasons not to. Some people just shouldn’t have children because they themselves are ill-equipped to be parents, like Rogen is. These are personal choices between the couples involved. But Rogen’s derision of parents is an example of the very judgment he complains about facing as a childless couple with Miller, even as an equal and opposite response, and especially because it comes from a place of ignorance that he frames as popular opinion.
Unfortunately, people will listen to Rogen, as social media is filled with people applauding his choice and justifying their own decisions not to have children or disillusionment with becoming parents. This is yet another example of celebrities needing to stick to entertaining us rather than sharing their opinions.
