Pretty much my feelings on the topic. That said, I have a hard time blaming people for having kids. There are a million factors that contribute to people having them that are impossible to boil down to "you're selfish".
it still does boil down to selfishness, even if they dont see it that way. at the end of the day, if they thought about it at all, they decided that their desire to procreate is more valuable than the autonomy of the child they would be creating that way . thats just selfish however you look at it
i dont hate people for having kids of course. in the grand scheme of bad things you can do, it's pretty mild. it's still on the list of bad things you can do, though
I guess I see selfishness as a trait you can only attribute to people who understand the consequences of what they're doing and choose to do it anyways. For that reason, I don't call people "selfish" who have kids because they lack access to contraception or because they sincerely believe that bringing more kids into the world is legitimately good and that they're doing the right thing, whether that be due to ignorance, religious belief, societal norms, or necessity for their own survival. The "desire to procreate" isn't always literally just the desire to create a new person in your own image and I think it's really reductive to say it is.
I still think it's wrong regardless of who is doing it, but I would only call it selfish when it's the intentional plan of educated people who have their material needs met and understand that whatever happiness they're creating is likely to be equalled if not outweighed by suffering. I realize that's a load of caveats, but that's how I see it.
Pretty much my feelings on the topic. That said, I have a hard time blaming people for having kids. There are a million factors that contribute to people having them that are impossible to boil down to "you're selfish".
it still does boil down to selfishness, even if they dont see it that way. at the end of the day, if they thought about it at all, they decided that their desire to procreate is more valuable than the autonomy of the child they would be creating that way . thats just selfish however you look at it
i dont hate people for having kids of course. in the grand scheme of bad things you can do, it's pretty mild. it's still on the list of bad things you can do, though
I guess I see selfishness as a trait you can only attribute to people who understand the consequences of what they're doing and choose to do it anyways. For that reason, I don't call people "selfish" who have kids because they lack access to contraception or because they sincerely believe that bringing more kids into the world is legitimately good and that they're doing the right thing, whether that be due to ignorance, religious belief, societal norms, or necessity for their own survival. The "desire to procreate" isn't always literally just the desire to create a new person in your own image and I think it's really reductive to say it is.
I still think it's wrong regardless of who is doing it, but I would only call it selfish when it's the intentional plan of educated people who have their material needs met and understand that whatever happiness they're creating is likely to be equalled if not outweighed by suffering. I realize that's a load of caveats, but that's how I see it.