Here is what we are done with: any mention of a pregnant woman "flaunting" or "showing off" or "debuting" her "baby bump."
Enough is enough. Seriously. Stop it.
We're glad people are calling bullshit on Time magazine's sexist and demeaning tweet: "Amal Clooney shows off her baby bump at the United Nations."
Yes, Time, Amal — an international human rights lawyer with a brilliant mind and amazing CV — got all gussied up to pay a friendly visit to the United Nations to flaunt her baby bump.
We repeat: Stop it.
More: Amal Clooney's changing the world, even if you're not paying attention
This isn't just about Amal, however — this is just the most recent example (and one of the most egregious). Any time a famous pregnant woman steps outside, the media describes her as "flaunting" her midriff. Let's see some examples, shall we?
(We're just going to overlook the typo on that last one because we're bigger than that.)
According to Dictionary.com, to "flaunt" is to "parade or display ostentatiously." It implies that the pregnant woman's got a real attitude. She thinks she's hot stuff. Apparently, if she's not wearing a Lanz nightgown while knocked up, she's showing off like the showoff she is.
Here's the thing: Pregnant women have no choice but to tote along their moppet-filled uteruses. It's not a purse they're hoping to show off at Sunday brunch. The morphing of the female body during gestation is not optional. And when you are a celebrity, it generally behooves you (because such is our culture) to gussy yourself up lest you get eviscerated by the press for (horrors!) letting yourself go.
So given that people get pregnant, and famous people go out and look nice because that's their job, what is the hysteria over the sight of a famous pregnant woman? Why do we salivate over the idea of a pregnant woman not hiding the reality of being knocked up? Is she supposed to cower in shame? What sort of dark Puritanical impulse lurks behind all this glee at noticing a celebrity's "bump"?
Better people than we will have to figure that out. In the meantime, though, can we all go 30 seconds without using "flaunt" or "show off" to refer to a person in the public eye who has the nerve to also be expecting? Because right now, we'd really love to flaunt our middle fingers at this insane trend.