I’m not sure you’re going to get an objective answer to this as no one has lived a life of either having kids or not having kids, hungrythirstyhorny.
I will say that, as a single male in his mid forties who has observed a good amount of life; first, the thought of not having people to rely on in you’re old age is a little worrisome; and two, not having had someone to pass my knowledge and skills down to is a little sad. However, I really enjoy the freedom and opportunities my life (and bank account) affords me.
There is always a cost to freedom. Or, as Jonis Joplin put it - freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose. Choosing to not have children is a selfish act. Whether “selfish” is a bad thing or not is subjective.
I would offer that anyone who’s going through life without children, find some altruistic outlet to participate in. You can otherwise find yourself wondering what your legacy may be or what the point of your life has been - aka a mid-life crisis.
I think that deciding not to have kids is not a selfish act. Having kids just to have a fallback when old and frail on the other hand side is very much so.
That argument makes sense. Though I see it more from choosing to prioritize yourself and own self interests over having children and sharing a life with them as selfish too. I guess we’re all selfish one way or another.
I agree, I don’t think not having kids has anything to do with being selfish.
But I guess what they meant to say is just that having kids is hard. A lot of times, people become more selfless and less focused on their own wants and needs after they become parents.
Of course, some people don’t actually become more selfless or responsible, and instead they just become bad, narcissistic parents. But the choice to have kids is associated with the choice to be a responsible adult and work for the benefit of others, at least in theory.
My initial reason for not having kids was financial. I think a lot of people have learned it may be better to have children later in life when you can properly care for them. I know many people who’ve had their first child in their late-30s and early-40s. My aunt had her first child in her fifties. That’s not something that was common before modern medicine.
I have always had the idea that I would have a kid if and when I met the right person to share parenting with. That hasn’t happened so I’ve had to put some thought into my priorities. It’s not fair to have a child just because it’s what society says you should do or just because you want someone to take care of you when you’re old. It’s so much more than that and I think people should be more mindful of the responsibilities and long term repercussions.
I offered two reasons I personally may regret not having children. I could list several others such as the pure joy of watching them grow into adults and mimic you and your partner. If you want to say that’s selfish, to bring another human into the word to experience a universe of emotion you’d otherwise never experience, I understand that perspective. No argument.
But then I offered that choosing to prioritize your own life is in and of itself a selfish act. It’s more explicitly about you than it is about another person.
Would you disagree that going out to eat by yourself is more of a selfish act than inviting a friend to eat out with you? Sharing an experience is less selfish, no?
It’s not such a binary thing. For example, you can obtain some, hodl for a bit, and later return them for a profit. It’s basically like the stock market, except people refer to the money you get as a “ransom” rather than a “profit” for some reason. What many people outside the industry don’t know is that it doesn’t officially become a crime until police get involved. So just insist on “No police!” in your sales calls. /s
I’m in my 40s now and never liked children, even when I was one myself. So to me the decision not to procreate came very natural and has never changed. I was so certain that I never wanted any kids that I got myself sterilized when I was 25 or 26, don’t remember exactly. Just to be certain I couldn’t be trapped by some oopsie. Didn’t regret that step for a second.
If my life were financially more secure and if the climate didn’t seem objectively fucked in the future I could imagine myself being a happy father of kids
Yeah man, this is it. I like freedom and disposable income. But I feel like it would be rewarding raising kids. But also it’s sentencing them to whatever fucked up reality the last few generations have pushed us towards.
This is it for me. I absolutely love kids, but everything is so expensive. Having kids would be a big risk as things could quickly become very difficult is there was an emergency.
I wish I could, but given the condition I’m in - soon-to-be 24, unemployed, mentally poor, no heirloom, no inheritance, no labor laws, high levels of pollution - these aren’t ideal conditions for a child.
I’ve also never courted a woman before - I can probably not, because it is my intrinsic bias that I won’t have anything to provide from my end, and that I don’t want it to be one-sided, and also because personal circumstances - abusive family, you know.
I don’t want another cog to this exploitative capitalist machine. I guess I’m just unlucky, but hopefully, this suffering ends with me. This makes me feel a little sad, but I don’t want to be selfish.
And no, I’m not taking care of adopted kids. There’s barely a few rupees in my account. Worst case possible, I want save it for the endgame.
It’s not our genes that he cares about. It’s his genes.
For me personally, I feel that I am inherently good, humanity is inherently good, and I just want to pass the torch to the next generation and see how far they can carry it. We’re currently in a bit of a slump as a species, but I believe that everything will turn out alright in the end and I’d like for my descendants to be around to enjoy and indeed contribute to it.
Why does it matter if they’re your descendants or others’? My 16 great great grandparents are as much strangers to me as any other 16 people walking around 100 years ago. And everyone here now is in the same place, whoever they came from. Not like I’ll be alive to (or would do so in any case) take pride in saying 'ooh those 12 people have something to do with me if you go back far enough"
Why wouldn’t it matter? If your family doesn’t matter to you, what does?
'ooh those 12 people have something to do with me if you go back far enough"
It’s not about that, it’s that those 12 people won’t ever exist if I never have any kids. They have everything to do with me, because without me, they wouldn’t be alive. And I also think the world will be a better place if they do exist.
I think that’s pure conjecture about how having kids affects the world. And the nature, worthiness, or value of those 12 people has nothing to do with whether or not you happen to personally be their ancestor. There’s nothing different or more special about one person’s progeny than another, so who cares if it’s your kids or 8 billion other people. The idea that that is important in the future is all about making yourself important in the present.
There’s nothing different or more special about one person’s progeny than another
How do you figure that? Are you familiar with the theory of evolution? How do you think we got to the point where I’m communicating to you through a global communication network? Dumb luck?
We are as important to future generations as past generations are to us. If previous human beings hadn’t done everything they did, we wouldn’t be here now. Likewise, everything that we do in the present has a rippling effect for the rest of human history. Having kids allows you to have a little more direct input on what kind of ripples you leave behind.
My point is not that previous people haven’t done significant things, it’s that they did those things independently of who one of their many ancestors happened to be. Much like an actual ripple, the larger the pond, the less likely any disturbance is to reach the shore, and the more likely it is to be quickly lost to the natural turbulence of any body of water.
If your evidence against that is the existence of significant inventions, there are very few, if any, that wouldn’t have been invented by someone else within years. No major invention or discovery, from the light bulb to relativity, has been made while others weren’t working on the same problem and making similar, if slightly slower, progress.
That’s why they say necessity is the mother of invention, not a person or an institution or anything that could be credited to a single creator.
And if you think humans are still evolving according to selection pressure the way that other species have/do, you just don’t understand how evolution actually works. The moment we gained self awareness and created social structures, we drifted so far from biological evolution that it’s an entirely moot point in terms of future generations. The least adaptive of us now, on average, still lives through the entirety of our birthing/fertile years, while significant portions of a population dying during or prior to fertility is the only way that natural selection works. That or the existence of bachelor herds that lead to a very slim minority being the only ones to breed. Neither of those are the case with humans.
Ultimately, having kids to ensure your own legacy is possibly the most selfish reason you could create someone and thrust them into 80 years of what should be their own life.
I don’t believe that anyone truly acts independently. We are all products of our environment, of which our ancestors comprise a significant portion. I don’t believe in free will.
Your contention regarding inventions is wrong, but irrelevant anyway. I understand that it’s nearly impossible to discuss this topic objectively without allowing your personal emotions to bleed into it, so I’ll just leave it at that. I’ve already made my points but you don’t seem to understand at all.
significant portions of a population dying during or prior to fertility is the only way that natural selection works. That or the existence of bachelor herds that lead to a very slim minority being the only ones to breed.
And I don’t understand evolution? Wow. I think it’s possible you may be suffering from a severe case of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
What about my understanding of evolution is incorrect, and how do you see natural selection working in present humans? Very possible that Dunning-Kruger is at play, but we may have to agree to disagree as to where…
I’ll get back to you on that. Seriously, I just don’t have time rn but I’ll edit this when I have a chance within the next 24 hrs. The second half of your question is particularly difficult to answer.
Ok I just accidentally wiped my entire edit before saving. Fuck that, I’m not writing all that again. God damn it that was such a good response too. Sorry.
It’d be wasted on you, as my previous insights have been. But yeah, evolution doesn’t exist, genetics don’t exist, whatever helps you sleep at night buddy.
There’s nothing different between me and LeBron James, I’m just not trying hard enough to dunk 😅. If only I made the choice to dunk the basketball, independently of the fact that my ancestors are not particularly tall. But my ancestors are irrelevant, as you’ve clearly asserted.
I'm just a vehicle to my genes which they use to travel to the future. They only can travel when they have a suitable host who can reproduce them and can make sure that the next version has the best chances to reproduce again. So over time natural selection optimized for the vehicles to want to reproduce. Everyone who didn't have the desire to have kids in the past has none (other than rape victims) to move their genes forward.
Anyway this is a extreme oversimplification of the whole idea of The Selfish Gene
I’ve never really felt the urge to have kids. Plus it saves on resources and finances. I have nephews and nieces already and that’s good enough for me. I’m at the point where some of my friends are having kids. Others aren’t. I love being an uncle.
In any case, it depends on how much you as an individual want to have kids. For me, it just didn’t add up. My wife and I both don’t want them. We both work and want to retire as early as possible.
I was well into my 40's when my kid was born, so I've had it both ways. I vastly prefer the kid. Yes it sucks to not being able to do some stuff on occasion. It even sucks more that my parents are gone so I have a real hard time finding babysitters. But I just love the little one so damn much!
My wife had my first when I was 39. I wish I had had kids sooner. I love going to minor hockey games and taking to my daughter about her crafts and school.