[carlmr]

I see a lot of parents say this. They somehow think their kids are a gift to the world.

To me climate change, overpopulation causing insane resource consumption make it look kind of selfish when people want their own kids.

I understand that in terms of social systems we "need" more kids to support the old. But at the same time these kids will grow old at some point as well, and if you always need more kids than old people that means you need growth forever, which just means you're kicking the can down the road and creating more environmental issues in the meantime.

Have kids, don't have kids, whatever. But don't pretend like you did something selfless.

If people were having more kids we'd just have a bigger demographic collapse in the future.

[giraffe_lady]

I don't think that's what they meant at all. Just that on a personal level raising children means you'll have less time/money/energy/resources for your own pursuits.

[seanw444]

You guys read way into my message. I didn't say not having kids is selfish. I said having kids requires a less selfish lifestyle.

[toomuchtodo]

To have children is a selfish choice, parents are just pushing the selfishness from fun/self consumption to reproductive consumption, like squeezing a balloon.

As you said:

> I'll get to my deathbed and regret not having a family of my own to enjoy time with.

Is that not selfish? Making humans to fill your time? Humans who are in no way guaranteed to want to spend time with you between adulthood and your death [1] [2]? I'm not going to argue against it in this thread, but let's call a spade a spade. I can respect "I am selfish and am making this choice, consequences be damned," but lets not dress up having kids as a noble cause when there are 8 billion people on the planet.

Not directed at you, but a phrase I use often with people considering kids is "Do you need kids? Or therapy?" Enumerate why you are making this decision, and provide evidence supporting this decision. The worst I hear, far too often, is "I'm having a kid so someone will love me forever." Big oof, let me tell you how that goes. I'm arguing for more thought and intention into the default choice, because the outcome is mostly permanent and a one way door. Is it worse to regret not having kids? Or regret having had them?

~40% of annual pregnancies, in both the US and internationally, are unintentional (per the Guttmacher Institute and the UN, respectively), so I think folks who really want to have kids aren't going to be material as long as those folks who don't want them have their reproductive freedoms affirmed.

[1] https://www.vogue.com/article/why-so-many-people-are-experie...

[2] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brothers-sisters-str...

[meowfly]

I'm middle aged with no kids and a very common question i get is, "who will take care of you when you're old?"

How is that not selfish reasoning?

People throw around a lot of theories on the low birthrate but for me it's simply that having kids is a choice. I have low societal and family pressure, my SO and I have effective birth control, and we decided kids wouldn't make us happier.

Ive also read nothing but anecdotes that indicates people regret either decision. I think we all tend to confirm our own decisions.

It's probably much less cool to say you regret having kids, but I know a recent divorcee who sure acts like her kids are in the way of her dating. I'm also sure there are plenty of people who get older and alone and wish they had their own children. But ultimately it seems like having kids is about deciding you want kids in your life and it's no longer considered the inevitable outcome of a long relationship.

Perhaps my mind will change when my dad dies.

[nashashmi]

There was a guy here on ask hn who regretted not having kids as a decision he made. Now he wishes everyday that death catches him. Not an anecdote.

[toomuchtodo]

Be a foster parent [1]. Adopt [2]. Volunteer with in need kids [3]. Lose yourself in the service of others. Life is short, everyone dies, you must find the meaning with the short spark you've been given. If you're prone to self deletion because a door closed you wish had not, grieve, pick yourself up, and get back on the horse. Also, therapy and cultivate a support system. "Embrace the suck."

[1] https://www.acf.hhs.gov/cb/research-data-technology/statisti...

[2] https://www.adoptuskids.org/meet-the-children/children-in-fo...

[3] https://pudding.cool/2024/03/teenagers/

[nashashmi]

you gotta accept that requires you drive yourself to those activities.

with family, it is the children who will drive you nuts.

[nativespecies]

I’ve never really heard a compelling argument for myself to want to have kids. Most of my friends/family have said one of these

“it’s just what you do”

“I want a mini-me” (yikes)

“I don’t wanna adopt. I want my OWN kid”

“I want a best friend”

“I want someone to take care of me when I’m old”

To me these all read as selfish which is why I never reached a compelling conclusion to have my own kids.

[seanw444]

> Humans who are in no way guaranteed to want to spend time with you between adulthood and your death

Correct, they have no obligation to be around me. If you raise your kids poorly, they likely won't want to be around you. Your chances are good if you don't give them a reason to avoid you. On top of that, the fulfillment of raising the next generation to be moral and upstanding people to carry the torch, is also more than enough.

[toomuchtodo]

I wish you well, good luck! If it doesn't work out, I hope you remember this conversation, and that someone tried to show you another door. Life is about choices.

[nativespecies]

Your kids aren’t here to be “your best friend” or be your insurance plan for old age. Some of y’all need reexamine why you brought life into this world.

[toomuchtodo]

I have previously mentioned this on HN, but I did a stint as a Guardian ad Litem, acting as a disinterested third party for children in family court advocating for them. That experience, along with references like "This is a Teenager" [1] (among many, many others), has shaped my beliefs and how I communicate on this topic. If someone wants children, they had better be damn sure they do and they can do the job (financially and logistically). Otherwise, they have just condemned a human to suffering for their own desires and emotional fulfillment.

Edit: Based on your version before the edit, but I see you and understand. "Be the person you needed when you were younger."

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40053774

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

> I see a lot of parents say this. They somehow think their kids are a gift to the world.

Quite literally so. If you want to benefit from our society/civilization, without making the next generation that will become that society/civilization, you're saying you deserve to get all the things you get from it without contributing back. The government took out debt in your name, to be paid back by future generations that you aren't helping to create... it's borderline fraud.

> To me climate change, overpopulation

A crazy doomsday hippy wrote a book with an unsupportable, unsubstantiated crackpot theory in 1968, and now you believe this concept that never existed and is pretty meaningless. What is the cutoff population number after which is overpopulation? Did you know that in the 1980s the UK's population crashed and only a few roving cannibals still lived there?

> I understand that in terms of social systems we "need" more kids to support the old. But at the same time these kids will grow old at some point as well, and if you always need more kids than old people that means you need growth forever,

This is bad math. You need to hug pretty close to replacement fertility (2.1 kids), but you don't need growth.

[carlmr]

>The government took out debt in your name, to be paid back by future generations that you aren't helping to create... it's borderline fraud.

I already paid back more in taxes than I've ever gotten from the state in education. And since I don't have children I pay more taxes, making up for it more quickly.

Children would create future resource consumers that cause damage not only to my country, but to all human and animal life on this planet.

>A crazy doomsday hippy wrote a book with an unsupportable, unsubstantiated crackpot theory in 1968, and now you believe this concept that never existed and is pretty meaningless.

If you're post fact there's no purpose discussing anything with you, because you won't accept reason.

>What is the cutoff population number after which is overpopulation?

Overpopulation is any population that utilizes more resource in a year than what is regenerated by mother earth in a year. I.e. earth overshoot day moving past December.

>Did you know that in the 1980s the UK's population crashed and only a few roving cannibals still lived there?

Ok now you've really stopped making sense.

>This is bad math. You need to hug pretty close to replacement fertility (2.1 kids), but you don't need growth.

Not according to our politicians, who need an ever growing tax base to keep up social systems that are not sustainably set up. Mostly because the first generation didn't pay in, but took out massive amounts.

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

> Ok now you've really stopped making sense.

Paul Erlich. The asshole that reinvented Malthus for the hippy age. The Population Bomb, 1968. It's on archive.org.

[skeaker]

Does your work and economic contributions not count for anything to society? Does your standing in your local community mean nothing? If having a child is the only thing you can do that has any value, life seems pretty pointless.

[benterix]

I like your style but you could state the same in one sense and without insults. 1968 was the year when the world population growth peaked and although it is in decline, in 2022 the population peak was estimated to peak in 2080 but later corrections point more towards 2060. So at least for the next 30 years the population will still grow worldwide, unless something unpredictable happens.

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

Sub-replacement fertility is human extinction. When people talk about it at all, they're always yammering about "how will we pay for social security" and other nonsense, like any of that matters.

> in 2022 the population peak was estimated to peak in 2080 but later corrections point more towards 2060.

It will be revised earlier and earlier. This problem is accelerating.

[carlmr]

>Sub-replacement fertility is human extinction.

Um, why would you say that? Only if you stay at sub replacement for hundreds of years will you reach extinction.

If we get back to 1 billion people in 200 years we can go back to having replacement level kids again.

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

> Um, why would you say that? Only if you stay at sub replacement for hundreds of years will you reach extinction.

Why would you think this? Is it because it's a comfortable thought? "Oh gee, but we'll be able to fix it later!" Sub-replacement fertility causes demographic collapse, which causes extreme economic collapse. If you're bitching and moaning that you can't afford kids now, how will that be any different for the few grandchildren you had 50 years from now when they have to each support three or four social security retirees and pay back the $35 trillion credit card bill you ran up? Sub-replacement fertility doesn't just cause a dip in population, it actively causes more sub-replacement fertility. It accelerates. And, I'll have you note that however many centuries you think this takes, the better part of that last century consists of childless people (the last generation) living out lonely, desolate lives as they wait for humanity to become extinct.

> If we get back to 1 billion people in 200 years we can go back to having replacement level kids again.

All people aren't equal when it comes to this problem. Only the (next to) most recent generation can even make kids. Roughly from age 15 to age 35. Do you think those 1 billion people would all consist of people age 15 to age 35? Most of them would be geriatric. That's one of the things people don't ever seem to get... they're counting the wrong fucking thing. You thought "hey, we have 1 billion people, that's more than enough". But what you really had is maybe 10 or 20 million people at that point who are still capable of having children. Virtually all of those people were only-children themselves. Do you think they're going to say "hey, I want 10 children, and I'll be a good parent too even though no one alive knows how to raise that many children in a single family!" ?

Maybe I'm being mean. Maybe this is counter-intuitive. But you're just flat out wrong, refuse to do the thinking necessary to get past your own biases and cognitive malfunctions, and you and other people will live to see at least the first stage of a rapid decline that you don't even have the mental tools to understand.