Few things drive the British press quite so demented as the thought of a pregnant woman with a choice. Illegal immigrants eating swans? This week’s most dangerous woman in Britain? Mere side issues to the spectre of horror that is a pregnant woman making a decision about what suits her best as an individual. An individual! After all, we know that as soon as conception happens, a woman stops being her own person but is instead generic “mum”, and should be talked to accordingly.
But I’m getting ahead of myself here (typical bloody woman). “Mothers ‘risk losing ability to give birth’” screamed the front of the Sunday Times last weekend. Various other papers eagerly seized on the story, too, based on the latest book from French doctor Michel Odent, who claims that because childbirth has become so medicalised, women are no longer able to go through it without intervention. Odent writes that the use of synthetic drips of oxytocin means women will no longer be able to produce “the hormone of love” naturally. That’s right, women: not only are you foolishly allowing doctors to divest you of your ability to give birth, but you soon won’t even love the few kids you manage to produce. You disgust me, women.
Saying you’d opt for a c-section is like admitting you’d give your kids heroin to keep them quiet during EastEnders
Related: The cult of natural childbirth has gone too far | Eliane Glaser
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