Working online, women are redefining parenting publications, shifting the emphasis to personal, political and less commonly depicted motherhood experiences and rejecting the model of consumer information and child-rearing tips found in glossy magazines such as Parenting and Child.
In some cases, alternative motherhood websites address topics that are either off limits or rarely acknowledged — say, transgendered motherhood. Or they explore traditional subjects like breast-feeding, health and home but focus on underserved audiences, such as African-American mothers. Founders say their websites provide an alternative to print publications that dispense mostly how-to advice on nutritious eating, educational toys and discipline while catering to presumably white, two-parent households.
Most motherhood websites are run from home and staffed by volunteers, offering a mix of news feeds, activism, discussions and in some cases reader-authored personal pieces. Others rely on a print model, with professionally reported articles, book reviews and essays. Sites are tapping into the incredibly lucrative market for baby products and literature, and, in some cases, luring advertisers and promoting books by website editors and contributors.
Girl-Mom.com
A true example of niche publishing on the Internet, Girl-Mom.com was set up in 1999 to support and reflect the lives of teen mothers, largely through their own writing. One narrative, “When I Was Garbage,” tells the story of a pregnant 10th-grader who decides not to allow a wealthy older couple to adopt her baby. “How to Tell Your Parents You’re Pregnant” is another feature. Other subjects are explored in a service format: how to deal with custody conflicts, reproductive freedom and going to college, for example.
Girl-Mom does not encourage teens to get pregnant but attempts to provide an accepting environment for those who do. This excerpt from the site’s mission statement makes its unequivocal editorial philosophy clear:
We believe that all teenagers are sexual beings with the ability to love, procreate and nurture. We believe that teenagers have the ability to parent well, but are socially conditioned to believe they are irresponsible and reckless.
Girl-Mom attracts its share of critics. And as a result, the website staff monitors discussions carefully to weed out attacks, which come as no surprise to publisher Bee Lavender, a former young mother herself.
“When I was a young parent, the most significant challenge I ever faced was dealing with judgmental older people lecturing me. I was a good mom, and it would have been hugely helpful if I had known other young mothers back then,” she says. “I developed Girl-Mom as a safe haven for young mothers to find and help each other.”
Mommy Too! Magazine
Like Lavender, Jennifer James was a mother who did not see enough editorial content geared to her unique needs, prompting her to start the website Mommytoo.com in 2003. Mommy Too! is aimed specifically at African-American mothers, with a focus on stay-at-home mothers. African-American mothers have traditionally worked outside the home, says James, who bemoans the lack of support system for women of color at home with kids and who, like James, home-school.
Her website offers articles on pregnancy, childcare, teens, health and beauty and home — a relatively traditional mix that resembles the contents of a parenting glossy. The difference is that traditional print magazines mostly feature black children in the ads rather than the article photos, says James, who goes to great efforts to use photos of black families. Black women’s perspectives hardly surface in the editorial content of print publications on parenting, she says, offering an example:
“A lot of mainstream parenting magazines tackle tantrums. Black mothers don’t read those kinds of articles in general. We don’t allow our kids to have tantrums. We can’t afford for our kids to act up in public because they’re black and they don’t need to be looked upon as black and unruly,” James says. Like traditional motherhood publications, Mommy Too! advocates breastfeeding but with a special emphasis on understanding why black mothers breastfeed in lower numbers than their white counterparts.
“One of the things that happened in the early 20th century is that when white women started using formula, black women said, ‘Oh that’s the way to be middle class.’ And they started using formula. Also, black women were so often wet nurses.”
Her website will soon have a print-version counterpart and already has a growing base of advertisers. With each new monthly issue, Mommytoo.com automatically is emailed to members of a national group called Mocha Moms, a network of stay-at-home African-American mothers. Readers typically hail from cities in Eastern states with large middle-class black populations: Maryland, Virginia, Georgia and North Carolina, where James is based.
“People want to reach this demographic,” says James, who is also advising a Latina mother in the creation of a motherhood website.
Literary Mama
Literary Mama features both fiction and nonfiction writing; its creators believe it to be the first literary magazine focused around motherhood.
Literary Mama Managing Editor Andi Buchanan turned to the Internet in 2003 when she spoke to a reading group in the Bay Area whose members had written about their parenting experiences. She decided a website was the most affordable way to publish meaningful writing that might not be commercially viable. It also offered writers space, she says.
“If you look at mainstream parenting magazines,” says Buchanan, who now also writes for some of these, “the content is limited in word count. They’re looking for short pieces. Even a feature is maybe 1,200 or 800 words. It’s bite-sized. Being online means not having to think about paper costs. … There’s also an immediacy about being online. … I hear people say it feels more intimate to read things online than in a magazine.”
Editorially, she says, “We tend to reject the ‘but it’s all worth it’ ending. … Even when the mainstream glossies tackle nuanced issues, like, say, post-partum depression, they still have a chirpy ‘but it’s all worth it’ attitude. We look for writing that challenges the normal conventions about what mothers are allowed to write about. … We have fiction and poetry that talk about writers’ dissatisfaction with their mothers, or with their daily lives. There’s not a lot of room for that in mainstream magazines because it’s a little scary to go there.”
The Mother of alt-motherhood sites
Alternative motherhood writing got an early start in 1997 in the Mothers Who Think department of Salon.com. By 1999, MWT (since renamed Life) was the most popular feature at Salon after Table Talk. While some stories have dealt with familiar parenting topics such as disability and daycare, others took deliberate aim at taboos. An excerpt from an essay by Lisen Stromberg is one of hundreds of examples:
My son is a cross-dresser. Most mornings he gets up, puts on a hand-me-down dress stolen from his sister, wraps an old white pillowcase around his head with a ribbon (his “long blond hair”) and prances around singing, “The hills are alive with the sound of music.” My son is 3 and a half years old. … I have to admit, sometimes I am embarrassed by my son’s behavior. … Sadly, my husband and I are learning all too early that the constraints of normality are very narrow indeed.
“I really can’t imagine Child or Parenting or any other mainstream mothering publication running Susie Bright’s appreciation of vibrators, or mocking Mothering mag for its earnest worship of breast milk with a story like “Crème Booblee,” or running a special Barbie supplement in appreciation of the doll we love to hate, or a story on circumcision titled, ‘Foreskin or Against it?’ ” muses Kate Moses, an original editor of Mothers Who Think.
“Rarely did we run a story without getting dozens of passionate emails in response,” Moses says. “I think the success of Mothers Who Think expressed the power of the Internet as a tool for mothers, and it allowed women with a wide range of viewpoints to go public.”
Moses also notes that Mothers Who Think and fellow alternative motherhood websites represent online writing’s growing influence on traditional publishing. She and many motherhood website founders developed a readership on the Internet and are using their access to readers to promote anthologies of website writings, personal narratives (sometimes called “momoirs”) and fiction.
“You need only look at the parenting aisles in bookstores to see how many more and varied books are being published by women (and men) writing about the experience of parenting from fresh perspectives,” Moses says.
A Guide to Motherhood Websites
Girl-Mom: Young mothers
www.girl-mom.com
Hipmama: Hip and politically progressive mothers
www.hipmama.com
Mamaphonic: Writer and poet mothers
www.mamaphonic.com
Mamazine: Feminist parents
www.mamazine.com
Mommy Too! Magazine: African-American mothers
www.mommytoo.com
Mothers Movement Online: Political advocates for mothers, caregivers, single mothers and low-income mothers
www.mothersmovement.org
Mothers Who Think archive: A range of topics on modern parenting
Available at www.salon.com/mothers/mamafesto.html
