The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century

by Louise Perry

Feminists have historically succeeded in challenging this restriction on freedom through advocating for greater availability of contraception and abortion, which has been effective up to a point, in that it has allowed women more of a say in when or if they have children. But what about when the children are actually born? Here, we come upon an anti-natalist streak in both liberal and radical feminist traditions that leaves mothers shut out, which means – even with historically low birth rates – that at least three-quarters of women are shut out. Motherhood is discussed in fewer than 3 per cent of papers, journal articles or textbooks on modern gender theory34 – but then, less than half of tenured female academics have children,35 which makes the omission somewhat less surprising. The whole topic has slipped out of sight.