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No one wants to have kids anymore

torturechambersmalltalk.substack.com

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Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#61

Post by Lastodon »

"Are we millennials so busy coming up with pronouns that we can't find a weekend to make copies of ourselves?"

Oh sod off with this. The primal prerogative of reproduction is predicated on the primal need for safe and secure territory. The wealthiest oligarchs of the boomer generation have done everything they can to ensure the consequent generations are unable to attain that one entirely reasonable primal need. Women's rights have had an affect on birth rates, yes, but I'd rather take away the oligarch's right to own all the single family homes than my girlfriend's right to decide what to do with her life.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#62

Post by jcpst »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #43

A word of advice to anyone on the fence about having kids: There’s nothing wrong with choosing not to have kids, but do yourself and consult with actual parents for what it’s really like to have kids. Articles like this one, which are written by someone who apparently has chosen not to have children, are almost universally terrible at representing the true experience of being a parent. Yes, being a parent involves a…

> If you’re focused on these experiences as the defining characteristics of being a parent, you’ll completely miss the big picture.

Right. Because that’s the easy part, when they’re babies.

At first I didn’t believe my friend’s dad when he told me it actually gets more difficult when they get older.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#63

Post by ozborn »

bparsons wrote: post #4

The unspoken subtext of these hysterical articles is that they are only speaking about wealthy white people. The rest of the planet does not exist to them.

No, that's you reading into the article. Go look at recent global demographics data, it's not restricted to "wealthy white people", it's been an issue in East Asia for decades and countries from in Latin America, to Iran, even India all are dealing with or are now fast approaching the issue.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#64

Post by thweoruio34234 »

gaterin wrote: post #22

Does the change over from home manufactured children to imported mirror the offshoring of North American industry? This could be an inevitable outcome of optimizing for labor costs.

You kid but in reality our children are nothing more than mere genetic copies. Memetically they are assets of the state and the media, academic and pop-culture class. No one really cares about the genetic part (it's generic) today; furthermore, there's no culture or tradition to pass on, so you're essentially paying a great amount to run the debt-economy.

I'm sure people have caught onto this, esp. with the breakdown of the family system (a big cause is the memetic disconnect). It's not even like you'll be looked after later on in life - there's zero justification for having kids (other than things like 'companionship', which let's admit it, a dog would do a better job of).

If you're a guy esp. in insanely misandric countries like India (where you and your family can be thrown in jail at the mere word of the bride; where the culture/languages of the land are increasingly banned by the colonial state) it's even less so.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#66

Post by inetknght »

nicodjimenez wrote: post #29

The only solution is to ban condoms. Will solve so many problems. Btw this article neglects to mention a very important feedback loop: less babies equals less economic growth, which equals less babies because it’s too expensive, which in turn leads to less economic growth and so on. Collapsing birth rates are a serious problem! You won’t notice until the country becomes a depopulated wasteland and then it will be too…

> The only solution is to ban condoms. Will solve so many problems.

It might solve the "problem" that the article discusses. But it will create many many more worse problems.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#67

Post by ehutch79 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #43

A word of advice to anyone on the fence about having kids: There’s nothing wrong with choosing not to have kids, but do yourself and consult with actual parents for what it’s really like to have kids. Articles like this one, which are written by someone who apparently has chosen not to have children, are almost universally terrible at representing the true experience of being a parent. Yes, being a parent involves a…

Real parents consistently make it clear how terrible having kids is.

The childless among us hear every complaint and lament about how terrible it is. Why would we do that to ourselves?

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#68

Post by thr0wawayf00 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #48
thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #36

> But deep down I get it. Babies are a huge opportunity cost. Financially speaking, they are like winning the lottery but backwards. You can't even think of having one without cancelling your subscription to a good night's sleep. And if you take into account inflation, economic recession, and the rest of the news cycle's highlight reel, even a one-child family can seem to have one too many mouths to fish Lego pieces…

It costs $310k to pay for a kid from 0-18 per Brookings. The math is straightforward to work backwards to the income you need to afford that along with your basic needs and retirement savings, and most people don’t have the means. Median US lifetime earnings are $1.7 million. https://thehill.com/policy/finance/3608647-new-estimate-proj...

Not to mention that this represents a very median case, whereas a lot of parents want to pay for higher status schools and real estate to get access to higher status education, it's a never-ending keeping-up-with-the-joneses pi*-ing contest. To raise kids around my peers, a child could easily cost $500k+.

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#69

Post by cloutchaser »

thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #36

> But deep down I get it. Babies are a huge opportunity cost. Financially speaking, they are like winning the lottery but backwards. You can't even think of having one without cancelling your subscription to a good night's sleep. And if you take into account inflation, economic recession, and the rest of the news cycle's highlight reel, even a one-child family can seem to have one too many mouths to fish Lego pieces…

It’s your decision, but not having children because of your comfort is like saying you won’t ride an amazing wave as a surfer because it’s hard and dangerous.

Yep, it is. But when you ride that wave it will be the most amazing experience of your life. Even if it is hard.

it’s your choice, but you’re definitely missing out on something special. Something we were genetically created to do (which makes it even better than surfing)

Re: No one wants to have kids anymore

#70

Post by [deleted] »

thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #36

> But deep down I get it. Babies are a huge opportunity cost. Financially speaking, they are like winning the lottery but backwards. You can't even think of having one without cancelling your subscription to a good night's sleep. And if you take into account inflation, economic recession, and the rest of the news cycle's highlight reel, even a one-child family can seem to have one too many mouths to fish Lego pieces…

[deleted]
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