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I wish the world weren't so bad that potential parents don't want to bring new lives into it... honestly, if I were a mother considering whether to have a child

I wish the world weren't so bad that potential parents don't want to bring new lives into it... honestly, if I were a mother considering whether to have a child, I wouldn't want them to have to grow up in this terrible day and age. They'd end up more traumatized than I am. I wouldn't be able to live with myself.

samatman 3y ago
[flagged]
- LoganDark 3y ago
  What do you mean? Would I want my children to be at risk of school shootings? Would I want my children to have to deal with the fact that I can't afford to pay for health care in the only country where it's not free? Would I want my children to have to deal with the current state of the internet, with TikTok and other predatory social media running rampant? When they get older do I want them to have to deal with how hard it is to get a job and make a living? The housing crisis? No I don't want to bring children into this world. These are not everyday struggles to be overcome. Today's world is extremely ugly, extremely unfair and I would not under any circumstances want to make a child suffer through it all... Would I want to bring children into the world if it weren't this terrible? Maybe. I don't know. I'm not a potential mother, so I obviously don't get to make the decision of whether to give birth or not, but right now there are just too many obvious, overwhelming reasons not to.
  - foobarian 3y ago
    I'm pretty sure the world was at least as terrible at any given point in the past, we were just much less informed/aware of it thanks to the lack of Internet like mass-communication.
    - SoftTalker 3y ago
      It was far worse. Imagine having kids when they could get polio. Or taken from you and sold as slaves. Or conscripted and sent to war.
      - bre1010 3y ago
        These things are all becoming more likely again
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - jb1991 3y ago
    > the only country where it's not free Hyperbole. And false.
    - SoftTalker 3y ago
      All the other concerns are wildly overblown as well.
  - Vecr 3y ago
    Try to actually do the math on school shootings, and compare it to car crashes when you were conceived. If you were objective and considered risks equally, for school shootings to even come into your calculations (instead of immediately dismissing it as not worth your time) the world would have to be almost utopian. Try to calculate how many times more likely it is for you to have a miscarriage than any of your potential children to even be anywhere near a school shooting.
    - kelnos 3y ago
      I don't think that's a good way of looking at it. The increase in school shootings is independent of car crash rates. While it's still unlikely that any given person's kid will be killed in a school shooting, the idea of it is heartbreaking enough that I can understand why it's a part of someone's calculus.
  - plutoh28 3y ago
    > Would I want my children to be at risk of school shootings? Everyone is at risk of everything. Since the beginning of time. > Would I want my children to have to deal with the fact that I can’t afford to pay health care in the only country where it’s not free? I agree the healthcare situation in the US (where I’m guessing you’re based) is not ideal but it’s far from the worst. Medicaid exists. CHIP exists. Obamacare exists. A competent enough parent would be capable of efficiently using their resources if their childs health was at stake. > Would I want my children to have to deal with the current state of the internet… The internet is a double edged sword where it can both be a blessing and a curse. It’s 100% possible to raise a kid to have a healthy relationship with the internet. Just don’t give them an iPad at 5. > Housing crisis… Yeah housing crisis is hard too. But markets fluctuate and who knows what it’s going to look like by the time a kid grows up to be of home-purchasing age. I’m sad you have such a negatively skewed view of the world. I don’t think today’s world is “extremely ugly” and “extremely unfair.” Compared to life 100 years ago, I think we’ll be ok.
  - dopu 3y ago
    I don’t disagree with you that life can seem bleak in the present, but people have brought children into the world under much harder conditions. There is something particular about post-industrialization that has caused this attitude shift.
  - samatman 3y ago
    Depression isn't always treatable, although it's worth a shot. But it's a serious mistake to think it's a fact about the world. It isn't. It's a fact about you.
  - zild3d 3y ago
    > These are not everyday struggles to be overcome. Neither were the slavery, tyrannical empires, war, plagues, etc of the past. But fortunately humans continued to persevere and reproduce and make progress, as hopefully our children and future generations will.
- samplatt 3y ago
  What a rude and deliberately-ignorant way to choose to reply.
  - samatman 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - samplatt 3y ago
      What distemper? Also, your second sentence contradicts your first one, just FYI.
      - RankingMember 3y ago
        Classic online "I'm taking care to reply to make sure you know how much I don't care"
toasterlovin 3y ago
Your comment seems to be coming from a genuine place, but you could really use some historical perspective.
- LoganDark 3y ago
  The only real perspective I have is that a bunch of today's issues didn't exist in my own childhood, and a bunch of my childhood issues haven't been solved. That means there's been a net increase in issues. For example the internet is much unfriendlier to children nowadays, social media is far more predatory than it used to be. The housing crisis is worse (the exact same place is nearly twice as expensive as it was when we first moved in about 10 years ago). Also, the AI dystopia and surveillance state bullshit seems to be worsening at an exponentially increasing rate.
  - toasterlovin 3y ago
    Read some history! The last 500 years are humanity’s Golden Age of Golden Ages. 100 years ago half the people you love would‘ve died in childhood.
    - kelnos 3y ago
      So what? If people think that their children's future will be worse than their own, it doesn't really matter what people experienced 500 years ago. A common sentiment among parents is giving their children more opportunities and a better life than they had. If some people don't feel like they can do that (regardless of whether it's true or not), I imagine that's a powerful demotivator around having kids.
      - toasterlovin 3y ago
        Yeah, so if you are familiar with human history and the exponential curve of increasing human wellbeing that we're riding and you still feel strongly that the future will be worse, then the conclusion should be that you're probably in an irrationally negative emotional headspace for some reason, not that you're right! (I say that without judgement, having been in that exact headspace myself not too long ago.)
j7ake 3y ago
If you could choose any time period (and assuming median standard conditions, so cannot choose being king), which period would you think was best for raising children?
zild3d 3y ago
> I wouldn't want them to have to grow up in this terrible day and age. Today is very clearly the best time to be born, so much so that I'd argue if you could choose to have kids in an older time period or today, it's borderline abusive to choose the past. Medicine/immunization, child mortality rates, human rights, ... https://www.thendobetter.com/investing/2018/6/7/the-best-time-to-be-born-is-now https://www.thendobetter.com/investing/2018/6/7/the-best-tim...
- RankingMember 3y ago
  Both could be considered abusive depending on your perspective

samatman 3y ago

[flagged]

LoganDark 3y ago
What do you mean? Would I want my children to be at risk of school shootings? Would I want my children to have to deal with the fact that I can't afford to pay for health care in the only country where it's not free? Would I want my children to have to deal with the current state of the internet, with TikTok and other predatory social media running rampant? When they get older do I want them to have to deal with how hard it is to get a job and make a living? The housing crisis? No I don't want to bring children into this world. These are not everyday struggles to be overcome. Today's world is extremely ugly, extremely unfair and I would not under any circumstances want to make a child suffer through it all... Would I want to bring children into the world if it weren't this terrible? Maybe. I don't know. I'm not a potential mother, so I obviously don't get to make the decision of whether to give birth or not, but right now there are just too many obvious, overwhelming reasons not to.
- foobarian 3y ago
  I'm pretty sure the world was at least as terrible at any given point in the past, we were just much less informed/aware of it thanks to the lack of Internet like mass-communication.
  - SoftTalker 3y ago
    It was far worse. Imagine having kids when they could get polio. Or taken from you and sold as slaves. Or conscripted and sent to war.
    - bre1010 3y ago
      These things are all becoming more likely again
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- jb1991 3y ago
  > the only country where it's not free Hyperbole. And false.
  - SoftTalker 3y ago
    All the other concerns are wildly overblown as well.
- Vecr 3y ago
  Try to actually do the math on school shootings, and compare it to car crashes when you were conceived. If you were objective and considered risks equally, for school shootings to even come into your calculations (instead of immediately dismissing it as not worth your time) the world would have to be almost utopian. Try to calculate how many times more likely it is for you to have a miscarriage than any of your potential children to even be anywhere near a school shooting.
  - kelnos 3y ago
    I don't think that's a good way of looking at it. The increase in school shootings is independent of car crash rates. While it's still unlikely that any given person's kid will be killed in a school shooting, the idea of it is heartbreaking enough that I can understand why it's a part of someone's calculus.
- plutoh28 3y ago
  > Would I want my children to be at risk of school shootings? Everyone is at risk of everything. Since the beginning of time. > Would I want my children to have to deal with the fact that I can’t afford to pay health care in the only country where it’s not free? I agree the healthcare situation in the US (where I’m guessing you’re based) is not ideal but it’s far from the worst. Medicaid exists. CHIP exists. Obamacare exists. A competent enough parent would be capable of efficiently using their resources if their childs health was at stake. > Would I want my children to have to deal with the current state of the internet… The internet is a double edged sword where it can both be a blessing and a curse. It’s 100% possible to raise a kid to have a healthy relationship with the internet. Just don’t give them an iPad at 5. > Housing crisis… Yeah housing crisis is hard too. But markets fluctuate and who knows what it’s going to look like by the time a kid grows up to be of home-purchasing age. I’m sad you have such a negatively skewed view of the world. I don’t think today’s world is “extremely ugly” and “extremely unfair.” Compared to life 100 years ago, I think we’ll be ok.
- dopu 3y ago
  I don’t disagree with you that life can seem bleak in the present, but people have brought children into the world under much harder conditions. There is something particular about post-industrialization that has caused this attitude shift.
- samatman 3y ago
  Depression isn't always treatable, although it's worth a shot. But it's a serious mistake to think it's a fact about the world. It isn't. It's a fact about you.
- zild3d 3y ago
  > These are not everyday struggles to be overcome. Neither were the slavery, tyrannical empires, war, plagues, etc of the past. But fortunately humans continued to persevere and reproduce and make progress, as hopefully our children and future generations will.
samplatt 3y ago
What a rude and deliberately-ignorant way to choose to reply.
- samatman 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - samplatt 3y ago
    What distemper? Also, your second sentence contradicts your first one, just FYI.
    - RankingMember 3y ago
      Classic online "I'm taking care to reply to make sure you know how much I don't care"

toasterlovin 3y ago

Your comment seems to be coming from a genuine place, but you could really use some historical perspective.

LoganDark 3y ago
The only real perspective I have is that a bunch of today's issues didn't exist in my own childhood, and a bunch of my childhood issues haven't been solved. That means there's been a net increase in issues. For example the internet is much unfriendlier to children nowadays, social media is far more predatory than it used to be. The housing crisis is worse (the exact same place is nearly twice as expensive as it was when we first moved in about 10 years ago). Also, the AI dystopia and surveillance state bullshit seems to be worsening at an exponentially increasing rate.
- toasterlovin 3y ago
  Read some history! The last 500 years are humanity’s Golden Age of Golden Ages. 100 years ago half the people you love would‘ve died in childhood.
  - kelnos 3y ago
    So what? If people think that their children's future will be worse than their own, it doesn't really matter what people experienced 500 years ago. A common sentiment among parents is giving their children more opportunities and a better life than they had. If some people don't feel like they can do that (regardless of whether it's true or not), I imagine that's a powerful demotivator around having kids.
    - toasterlovin 3y ago
      Yeah, so if you are familiar with human history and the exponential curve of increasing human wellbeing that we're riding and you still feel strongly that the future will be worse, then the conclusion should be that you're probably in an irrationally negative emotional headspace for some reason, not that you're right! (I say that without judgement, having been in that exact headspace myself not too long ago.)

j7ake 3y ago

If you could choose any time period (and assuming median standard conditions, so cannot choose being king), which period would you think was best for raising children?

zild3d 3y ago

> I wouldn't want them to have to grow up in this terrible day and age. Today is very clearly the best time to be born, so much so that I'd argue if you could choose to have kids in an older time period or today, it's borderline abusive to choose the past. Medicine/immunization, child mortality rates, human rights, ... https://www.thendobetter.com/investing/2018/6/7/the-best-time-to-be-born-is-now https://www.thendobetter.com/investing/2018/6/7/the-best-tim...

RankingMember 3y ago
Both could be considered abusive depending on your perspective