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McAlister posted:This is a thing, unfortunately: quote:Parents have had babies to provide bone marrow for siblings and relatives or even, in one case, a kidney. Okay, how in the name of Talos is that remotely tolerated in the medical community, or even legal? Bone marrow donation is arguably not that big a deal (to my knowledge), but kidney removal is a pretty significant operation. I had heard of parents making babies for umbilical cord stem cells, but that's hardly comparable. EugeneJ posted:No, I mean this: Plus there's the various factors which could keep your kids from being of much help to you in your old farthood. Such as them not making enough money enough to cover whatever proper nursing care ends up costing (it's already beyond the means of a pretty large percentage of Americans), or having children of their own to care for.
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Jun 23, 2015 23:06
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OwlFancier posted:However in the case of a child, what you want should not signify. Jesus Christ, see my previous post. To want a child is a fundamental biological function, and no different from the desire to preserve your own life. Either way, you are preserving human life, and to argue that's a negative is to argue that life has no meaning or value.
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Jun 23, 2015 23:27
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EvilGenius posted:argue that's a negative is to argue that life has no meaning or value. It doesn't. Life on planet earth is plentiful and cheap - there is nothing special about pissing, making GBS threads, or having progeny - every animal does it.
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Jun 23, 2015 23:33
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To continue the family line and hopefully be a good enough parent to raise someone with the skills to be rich enough to mooch off of, but not in an abusive child actor parent way. Just enough so I can live comfortably while also donating money to museums and churches and the homeless
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Jun 23, 2015 23:37
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McDowell posted:It doesn't. Life on planet earth is plentiful and cheap - there is nothing special about pissing, making GBS threads, or having progeny - every animal does it. Then kill yourself. I am of course being facetious to try and make a point. Why do you continue to preserve your life if it has no value? Deep down, very few people actually believe that. EvilGenius fucked around with this message at 23:55 on Jun 23, 2015 |
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Jun 23, 2015 23:47
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EvilGenius posted:Then kill yourself. Easy answer for that one: my life has value (to me). Others' lives? That's an open question. There are plenty of "others" but just one me.
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Jun 24, 2015 00:20
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Suicide is arguably a sensible action for someone who believes life, including their own, has no meaning or value, but it's not the natural conclusion of the whole philosophy. I think to accept meaninglessness can actually be a liberation. A lot of stresses in life evaporate as you become aware they simply don't matter. It also allows you to take superficial pleasure in everything existance has to offer by recognising its superficiality. Would it matter if I chose to gorge myself on greasy pizza every day of the week? Only as far as I personally care about the benefits of good health and appearance. See, this could be a normal question for a guy totally unaware of any kind of philosophy. All nihilism does is provide the ultimate context. In this mindset, there is no "Why have kids?". To have kids or not becomes a choice as difficult as domino's or papa john's. But can a nihilist care for their children? There are plenty of people who profess to believe in more hopeful things who don't give a single poo poo about their children. This doesn't automatically make the reverse possible, of course. I'm still thinking about this part.
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Jun 24, 2015 00:54
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chalk posted:But can a nihilist care for their children? If they chose to reproduce, yes. They will probably find their brains producing the same reward hormones as everyone else.
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Jun 24, 2015 01:04
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Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. They will not be put to shame when they contend with their opponents in court. See thats why your suppose to have as many kids as possible.
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Jun 24, 2015 01:20
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EvilGenius posted:This unfamiliarity of reproduction causes some people to see it as something other than a fundamental part of your biology. Back this statement with something more useful than just your gut. quote:That's why I find the question 'why have kids' rather odd. The question, as I'm sure has already been stated in this thread, should be 'why not have kids'? Because I don't want the direct responsibility. Your move.
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Jun 24, 2015 01:30
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Because we must secure the existence of our people and a future for White Children.
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Jun 24, 2015 01:45
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But what if you're not white?
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Jun 24, 2015 02:03
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Definitely good replies in this thread. Good reads on the topic: http://www.amazon.com/Every-Cradle-...adle+Is+A+Grave This is definitely more about suicide than birth, but same philosophical ground. http://www.amazon.com/Better-Never-Have-Been-Existence/dp/0199549265 http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Antinatalist-Jim-Crawford/dp/0989697266/ref=pd_bxgy_14_text_y
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Jun 24, 2015 02:18
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Some people seem to have kids due to social pressures, whether that be the incessant interrogation, "So when are you two having kids?" or just the sight of everyone at church bringing their crotchspawn to the party. Same thing happened to my social circle when everyone hit 22-25; it must be time to get married! How about the "American Dream" that still lingers as an ideal? Grow up, get good grades, go to college, get a stable job, get married, buy a house, have children, rinse, and repeat. That social pressure - to do what you're "supposed to" - has got to have a role. Personally, I've plenty of psych issues and trouble taking care of myself. My wife has genetic funtimes too. We figure that the world has enough humans.
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Jun 24, 2015 02:46
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 I feel this is roughly accurate.
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Jun 24, 2015 02:59
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Except it isn't. And also poorly put together. Negatives always outweigh positive, the positives have to be pretty strong to win. If you found 50 bucks but put your back out bending over to get it, you would be more upset than happy. Change it to 50k and you can pay for a physiotherapist.
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Jun 24, 2015 03:07
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If it was accurate though, and the jury is still out on that, it would just add another dimension of moral dilemma to the decision. If we agree for arguments sake that having kids is like an infinite spigot of happiness and not having kids is like a desolate wasteland, then by having a child I make myself happy. But then that child will be miserable unless they have a child. So I would be condemning that child to the same decision. And so on until the last generation, who either can't have kids (and so by that metric would not be happy; I think that says a lot about how infertile people get treated by pro-natal arguments), or succumb to some kind of accident or something that affects the whole species, neither of which sounds very good for their happiness. The moral thing to do in that situation would be to say "the buck stops here".
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Jun 24, 2015 05:20
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Solkanar512 posted:Back this statement with something more useful than just your gut. Do you really need me to back up that reproduction is a part of life? Or the reason I think people reject it? The former doesn't need backing later. The latter is my opinion. I suppose what I'm driving at is that I find the fors and the againsts argued this thread pretty absurd, given that every animal on the planet reproduces. Chimps don't sit there and wonder if their children will look after them when they grow old, or if they will bring money into the family. Dogs don't decide they'd rather live their own life and not get tied down. A human doesn't owe you an explanation as to why they had kids any more than a koala bear does. It's just what we do.
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Jun 24, 2015 07:21
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You can buy tickets to the latest disney movie and appreciate the graces of fine animation without people heaping their disparaging looks and snide comments upon your weary back.
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Jun 24, 2015 07:29
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EvilGenius posted:Jesus Christ, see my previous post. To want a child is a fundamental biological function, and no different from the desire to preserve your own life. Either way, you are preserving human life, and to argue that's a negative is to argue that life has no meaning or value. Well, it doesn't? Other than what you assign to it anyway. Making more humans isn't inherently, objectively Good. It's also rather different from preserving existing life because existing life already happened, and thanks to our wonderful survival instincts, wants to keep on existing. Someone who's already alive has a right to autonomy, to decide what they want and how they want to live, because that's perhaps the best universal medicine for escaping the inherent unpleasantness of being alive. Life is inherently difficult and painful, it is only through effort and good fortune that it can also be pleasant sometimes. But if you can spare somebody that dependency on fortune and struggle in the first place, you should. If you want children, adopt. Plenty of people have already made the mistake of dumping the burden of life on others for stupid and selfish reasons, if you want to do a good thing, try to lighten that weight for people who are already stuck with it, don't make more people just because you want a child in your preferred colour/genetic flavour. EvilGenius posted:A human doesn't owe you an explanation as to why they had kids any more than a koala bear does. It's just what we do. A koala bear will also maul people who pick it up wrong, but we expect humans to justify their actions if they attack people. That childbearing is common and something you are capable of does not mean you are under no ethical obligations regarding it, nor does it mean you get to be irresponsible about it without judgement from others. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 07:56 on Jun 24, 2015 |
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Jun 24, 2015 07:49
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OwlFancier posted:Well, it doesn't? Other than what you assign to it anyway. Making more humans isn't inherently, objectively Good. I don't believe anyone is under an ethical obligation to reproduce, but only in that ethics are a social construct, as opposed to a part of nature. This is why in western civilisation, there are no laws on how many children you're allowed to have. Being violent is a part of our nature that we suppress, because it's detrimental to society, whereas children are the reason society exists in the first place. It's contradictory to say that children are a detriment to society. You could argue that they are detriment to the environment, but what is that environment for if there are no people in it?
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Jun 24, 2015 08:59
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Radbot posted:No offense, but I'm going to have to discount the opinion of a parent whose oldest child is (3? 5?) years old until they're 20 or so, considering how the opinions of parents I've known have changed as their children age. I have no doubt that a 3 year old is magic, but having a 19 year old telling you to go gently caress yourself while still expecting a free ride to college might be something else. I have a 19 year old and I am still glad I had children. He's never actually told me to go gently caress myself (though I'm sure he's thought it very loudly). Speaking from my own experiences as a parent, having a child changes everything. They are endlessly fascinating and precious and always in your mind like a nagging toothache, even when they're 17 and have been brought home by the police for getting caught drinking and you have to put them to bed while they talk crap. But it's a feeling that is impossible to rationalise which is why conversations like this are always stupid. If you personally don't want children then that's fine - don't have children. The only people that will judge you harshly for it are the same people that will judge you harshly for having the wrong number of children, or the wrong kind of children. But assuming that people who do want children are mindlessly procreating then sitting in a pile of dirty nappies and sour milk bitterly regretting their decision for the rest of their lives is obnoxious. I realise this doesn't go into the ethical reasons of not having children because of overpopulation, because I have no defence for that and it is something I feel guilty about. But the whole 'everyone should just adopt' idea isn't realistic - adopting children is a lot more difficult than having your own and even though I consider my husband and I to be pretty good parents I don't even think we'd be allowed to or at least pretty low on the list as we don't earn a huge amount and don't own a house. But the idea that only rich people should be allowed to raise children seems a bit horrific (especially in a society with huge inequality and where salaries don't necessary reflect the intrinsic value of the work the person receiving it does).
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Jun 24, 2015 08:59
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OwlFancier posted:...the inherent unpleasantness of being alive. OwlFancier posted:Life is inherently difficult and painful ... OwlFancier posted:... the burden of life ... OwlFancier posted:...all of the misery and hardship of life. Not only are you not speaking of the experience of the majority of people here, these most certainly aren't inherent facts of human existence. This is you. These are not the truths of existence, they are artifacts of what seems to be your incredibly depressed worldview.
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Jun 24, 2015 09:57
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Imma have a kid someday. My reasoning is that I'm p awesome. This world needs another me. Best part is that other me is gonna have some of my spouse mixed in, and she's p awesome. So this world gets a X2 awesome version of me.
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Jun 24, 2015 10:04
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Elukka posted:Not only are you not speaking of the experience of the majority of people here, these most certainly aren't inherent facts of human existence. This is you. These are not the truths of existence, they are artifacts of what seems to be your incredibly depressed worldview. Schopenhauer got dragged into the thread earlier, so I think his analysis of the balance bears some thought: "Whoever wants summarily to test the assertion that the pleasure in the world outweighs the pain, or at any rate that the two balance each other, should compare the feelings of an animal that is devouring another with those of that other." hookerbot 5000 posted:But the whole 'everyone should just adopt' idea isn't realistic - adopting children is a lot more difficult than having your own Anybody that is interested can read more about them here: http://www.adoptionuk.org/sites/default/files/documents/LetsLearnTogetherNIMarch2013.pdf I have much respect for those that do adopt and see their children through to a happy adulthood, every existent child deserves such a chance, but it's not going to work for everyone.
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Jun 24, 2015 10:28
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EvilGenius posted:Do you really need me to back up that reproduction is a part of life? Or the reason I think people reject it? The former doesn't need backing later. The latter is my opinion. First off, I never asked you or anyone else to explain having children, so this perceived slight on your behalf is completely unjustified. Why do you see folks like me as such a threat? What I object to is your insistence without any evidence what so ever that people who don't want kids are somehow ignorant of their own basic biology, and if they were more comfortable they would be popping out kids left and right. First off, that's batshit crazy. We aren't simple animals driven only by our most basic needs without that ability to plan for the long term. It's nothing more than a romanticized version of the naturalistic fallacy. We've had various forms of birth control for thousands of years yet you completely ignore that as well. Do I need to sit here and list everything else human do that animals do not? Furthermore, your naturalistic argument has some incredibly insulting and sexist implications. People choose to have or not have children based on their current lives and their access to appropriate medical care. Those who chose not to have children (right now/later/ever) are not denying some intrinsic or "natural" part of themselves, and they aren't defective or less of a human being for doing so. Not to mention your naturalistic argument harkens back to that old saw about "a woman's highest calling is to be a mother". Look, I'm happy for you and your family, my nieces and nephews are around that age and they're a lot of fun. But you really need to take a step back before you start judging others for making different reproductive decisions than you.
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Jun 24, 2015 13:12
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hookerbot 5000 posted:But it's a feeling that is impossible to rationalise which is why conversations like this are always stupid. If you personally don't want children then that's fine - don't have children. The only people that will judge you harshly for it are the same people that will judge you harshly for having the wrong number of children, or the wrong kind of children. But assuming that people who do want children are mindlessly procreating then sitting in a pile of dirty nappies and sour milk bitterly regretting their decision for the rest of their lives is obnoxious. Nobody here said that, I believe. This isn't /r/childfree. I strongly disagree with words like "crotchspawn" (stupid because we were all crotchspawn, and it's a temporary condition, hopefully). At the same time, what is to come of a society that rewards those who don't have children? The life of the median non-parent in America, in particular, is nearly infinitely easier than that of a parent. That can't be sustainable, right?
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Jun 24, 2015 14:22
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Radbot posted:Nobody here said that, I believe. This isn't /r/childfree. I strongly disagree with words like "crotchspawn" (stupid because we were all crotchspawn, and it's a temporary condition, hopefully).  Crotchspawn is dumb though, and is down there with "children smell of poop and pee" for antinatalist arguments.Radbot posted:At the same time, what is to come of a society that rewards those who don't have children? The life of the median non-parent in America, in particular, is nearly infinitely easier than that of a parent. That can't be sustainable, right? The solution to that is either to have a positive fiscal pressure through more child benefits (money or things like free daycare) or to have a negative social pressure to go with the negative fiscal pressure. (Hell, you could even have a negative social pressure and still have a positive fiscal pressure to ensure no child is in poverty. We're basically in the worst quadrant.) As for sustainability, I'm not convinced that this is sustainable:  I'm not going to call for mass genocide or anything, and I'm aware that the rate of growth is slowing (but the population itself is still growing), but we as a species could afford to shift it into population deflation for a while.
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Jun 24, 2015 14:39
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Guavanaut posted:As for sustainability, I'm not convinced that this is sustainable: Reproduction rates go way down once an area becomes developed and there is easy access to education, medical care, birth control and so on.
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Jun 24, 2015 14:42
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Solkanar512 posted:Reproduction rates go way down once an area becomes developed and there is easy access to education, medical care, birth control and so on. Then you can couple it with negative social pressure and positive fiscal pressure to achieve slight deflation while reducing child poverty.
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Jun 24, 2015 14:51
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Solkanar512 posted:Reproduction rates go way down once an area becomes developed and there is easy access to education, medical care, birth control and so on. That's the problem - what happens when we become Japan, demographically?
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Jun 24, 2015 16:05
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hookerbot 5000 posted:Speaking from my own experiences as a parent, having a child changes everything. Yes, and sometimes for the worse. People do regret having children and are miserable and bitter because of it. Estranged parents, adoption and infanticide exist and lots of parents neglect their children or actively hurt them. It's the extreme end of the scale of course but it is a scale. There is no universal emotional response to becoming a parent´and some people (and their children) would have been better off without it. EvilGenius posted:What are you going to do with the decades upon decades of your life that you've been given? You might find it hard to believe when you're 20, but drinking, loving, and traveling do start to get boring. That's simplistic, but what I'm trying to say is there's a tendency for younger people to assume the things that make them happy now will always make them happy, that they can choose that for the rest of their lives without going insane, and that any deviation from that is failure. It's not. Getting older, settling down, and no longer having to feel constantly like you've got something to prove is actually pretty awesome. It's like saying everybody will eventually get bored watching sports yet we know some people give a massive poo poo about it from childhood to their grave. There's plenty of people who spend most of their lives travelling or pursuing a hobby or at their job. I was a latchkey kid from a broken home so on the whole I probably spent more time doing my own thing than with family. Had it instead been a tidy little nuclear family with board games and coco every night I probably couldn't imagine life without children. If my parents hadn't taken turns dragging me across the planet travelling might just mean tediously going from point A to point B with no emotional connection. We model our lives after the things that gave us joy in our formative years but we have difficulty understanding emotional responses to things we didn't experience ourselves and instead project what we know on to others. It's arrogant and useless.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:13
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Radbot posted:That's the problem - what happens when we become Japan, demographically? We can probably deal with the first one, which is why gradual population deflation is a good thing. Maybe not for the economists and capitalists, but for resources and workers. If you deflate slowly, there will be more old people than workers, but still an amount that we can look after, especially given new technologies that are being developed by Japan themselves. If you suffer a demographic crash that's much harder to deal with.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:14
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EvilGenius posted:I don't believe anyone is under an ethical obligation to reproduce, but only in that ethics are a social construct, as opposed to a part of nature. This is why in western civilisation, there are no laws on how many children you're allowed to have. You misunderstand, you are not under an ethical obligation to reproduce, you are under an ethical obligation not to reproduce, because reproduction is not a positive thing. It may, if you are fortunate, become a positive thing, but it is not automatically so, all it automatically is is bringing someone into the world to suffer, because suffering is unavoidable, whereas happiness is not. Happiness occurs as a result of effort and no small amount of luck, whereas everyone must endure pain. Even human-centric ethics doesn't support having children, because human-centric ethics should care about the quality of human life, and as long as we have children in need of parents, you should be adopting rather than making more children. More humans for the sake of it is a stupid idea. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 16:21 on Jun 24, 2015 |
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Jun 24, 2015 16:18
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Radbot posted:No offense, but I'm going to have to discount the opinion of a parent whose oldest child is (3? 5?) years old until they're 20 or so, considering how the opinions of parents I've known have changed as their children age. I have no doubt that a 3 year old is magic, but having a 19 year old telling you to go gently caress yourself while still expecting a free ride to college might be something else. Maybe don't be such a lovely parent?
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Jun 24, 2015 16:22
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Grand Theft Autobot posted:Maybe don't be such a lovely parent? Who are you talking to? I'm not a parent, just relating stories told to me by other parents. I'd have to disagree with the notion that everyone that has a rebellious, lovely teenager is a bad parent.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:27
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Radbot posted:Who are you talking to? I'm not a parent, just relating stories told to me by other parents. I'd have to disagree with the notion that everyone that has a rebellious, lovely teenager is a bad parent. A 19 year old who tells his parents to gently caress off while feeling entitled to a work-free college education is a shittily raised manbaby whose parents have hosed up hard.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:34
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Grand Theft Autobot posted:A 19 year old who tells his parents to gently caress off while feeling entitled to a work-free college education is a shittily raised manbaby whose parents have hosed up hard. There are few things worse than a parent who insists that they are a better parent than other parents. You might as well tell us all how you were so strict with your own kids that they don't even like sugary treats and only ever drink water always did their homework on time without you having to ask and on and on and on. Children are human beings, and human beings are sentient and have agency of their own. The idea that parents have 100% control over how they will turn out is a rather disgusting thought - they aren't robots to be programmed.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:43
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Anosmoman posted:We model our lives after the things that gave us joy in our formative years but we have difficulty understanding emotional responses to things we didn't experience ourselves and instead project what we know on to others. It's arrogant and useless. Who is this "we?" That's a fairly broad generalization. Empathy is a thing. For example, I've never been in a church where 9 people were murdered by a white racial terrorist but I'm pretty sure I have no difficulty at all understanding the variety of emotional responses to it.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:45
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Solkanar512 posted:There are few things worse than a parent who insists that they are a better parent than other parents. You might as well tell us all how you were so strict with your own kids that they don't even like sugary treats and only ever drink water always did their homework on time without you having to ask and on and on and on. Well, I'm not suggesting I'm better, just suggesting that parenting does matter. I certainly don't see it as programming or mind control either. Kids obviously have the choice to be shitlords.
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Jun 24, 2015 16:53
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