Holly Brockwell was affected by how personal and nasty people were about her decision. Photo / Getty
Holly Brockwell was affected by how personal and nasty people were about her decision. Photo / Getty
A woman who spoke out about her decision not to have children was left stunned by the vitriolic online abuse she received in response.
In a column for the BBC's 100 Women series, Holly Brockwell, 29, wrote about why she doesn't want children and hopes to be sterilised: "The fact is, there's nothing about creating another human that appeals to me".
Of her seemingly extreme approach, for which she can't find a doctor who will agree to perform the procedure, she wrote:
"You may wonder why I don't choose another, less drastic, form of contraception but the pill has been making me sick for years and the only other option is the coil, which I'm not willing to have because I know two people who've experienced horrendous side-effects.
"I don't need reversible contraception. There's a 10-minute keyhole operation that can solve this problem for good, and I can't believe that at the age of almost 30 in 2015, I'm still having to fight to get it.
"We can choose to get pregnant at 16 but not to decline motherhood at 29. It seems our decisions are only taken seriously when they align with tradition."
She said as a woman, "there are four little words I can say that invite more condescension than almost any others: 'I don't want children.'"
The reaction to her article was instant and the sheer volume of messages she received on various social media platforms became overwhelming, she says.
Holly Brockwell says telling people she doesn't want children seems to invite condescension. Photo / Twitter @holly
At first, there were a lot of supportive messages from both men and women saying they felt the same way, and the initial negative responses were nothing she hadn't heard before: She would change her mind. She was selfish and the National Health Service shouldn't pay for her to be sterilised as the money would be better spent on sick children.
Then came the abuse.
People said they were glad she hasn't reproduced. That they were pleased there wouldn't be more people like her in the world. Others said she needed psychological help, Brockwell says.
But those comments were mild compared to what ensued: "One man said he wouldn't want to have sex with me (except he was far less polite about it). Some said the solution is for me to stay celibate which suggests they only ever have sex when they want babies, which is ludicrous."
She told the BBC there were other comments she "can't repeat and I would never say to anyone no matter what they had done".
She also said the majority of comments were from men and "very gender specific - words that wouldn't have been said to a man in the same situation".
In her role running a women's tech company, Brockwell notes she has become used to trolling, but this time she was affected by how personal and nasty the comments were.
"Most of it washes over you but the one that disturbed me the most was a man saying he'd like to crowdfund an operation to render me physically unable to speak. It's always about silencing people".
While some of her followers told her to brush off the cruelty, it became too much for the London woman and she signed off Twitter.
The marvellous Holly Brockwell has been driven off Twitter simply for stating publicly that she doesn't want children. This is all messed up
But 36 hours later, after trolls "said it was very quiet on Twitter without me and they deserved a prize", she was back tweeting again. And this time to much kinder responses:
