You Are Selfish

113 Replies to “You Are Selfish”

1. No children ==> no real concern for the future beyond your own grave-digging
   I accept that that statement is too broad a stroke, but not by much.
   I also accept that having children does not equate to 100% concern for the future either.
   But whom would you rather have more of in your society? I guess that’s a loaded question, as it strongly depends on which group you are coming from.

2. The whole premise behind the need to procreate like rabbits is that human lifespan won’t change in the next few decades. People would likely have a totally different view of childless couples when the average lifespan became 150-200 years.
   Bringing up life-extension research seems to make a lot of people blow up as “it’s unnatural”. I’m hoping that I’ll still be alive when the singularity happens and that means I will be able to do some space travel and things I’ve been waiting for almost 50 years to do.
   My reason for not having any kids is waiting too long but there was no way that I’d have been able to do the things I did when I was younger with kids. Back when I grew up the standard family had a stay at home mother who took care of the kids while the father put in 16 hour days at work and made all of the money. Taxes are a big reason why both parents no have to work.
   It would be interesting to see the neural development of a kid with my genes, but my wife vetoed the idea of adding a much younger woman with healthy eggs to the family.
   As far as retirement goes, I have no plans to retire as I enjoy what I do. I can’t imagine sitting at home totally bored just because I’ve hit some magical age that means I can no longer work. A lot of doctors practice into their 70’s and 80’s and keeping brain function intact means using ones brain to deal with novel problems on a daily basis. I’ve lost track of the number of people I’ve seen go visibly downhill over a few years after they’ve retired and taken that to mean that they could sit on the couch and watch TV all day.
   The only thing that I worry about is senility setting in, and for that, I have the Ruger plan. I see a lot of 90 year olds who are totally alone as their kids live in other parts of the country and often are pissed off as their mother has spent their inheritance on assisted living given that she’s far exceeded lifespan expectations. Thus, most of the very elderly I see are alone even if they’ve had a large family.

3. My grandparents were looked after by their two youngest daughters. By the time they passed away, their chances for marriage and family were gone. Yet, some people would say they were selfish for not having kids of their own to look after them in their old age or to pay taxes to the ever-dwindling coffers of the government.
   My mom in her last years was looked after by those of her kids who had no children of their own–the cost to the system was negligible. My dad died after a short illness as did my husband–again at a negligible cost to the system. No one can predict how expensive to the state a person will be in their lifetime.
   The assumption that those people with children are earning their way by providing taxpayers for the future is flawed on so many levels. Many young people are not earning much of anything–they remain dependent on their parents well into adulthood. The notion that it’s your duty to provide more people to prevent the evils of immigration is also flawed. Immigrants are being brought in even though our own citizens can’t find jobs. It’s a way of depressing wages and benefits.
   Some of the kids that people assume will be there looking after them in old age, will instead be fighting among themselves for the estate and letting the old folks languish alone in whatever care institution will have them. There are no guarantees.
   People who want kids and can raise them well should have them. But don’t set this up as a unselfish/selfish argument. Those who don’t want them or who realize they will not make good parents or who are not in a stable situation to raise them, can make the unselfish decision to not have kids.

4. cgh said: “It is universally true that birth rates drop in urban settings.”
   Yes. As you say, the reason is simple economics and the physical reality of peasant farming. Peasants need to have labor that doesn’t cost money, because the money goes for capital expenditures that mere labor can’t provide. Like materials, tools etc. The more kids a peasant has the more secure his future is.
   In a city, the more kids a factory worker/clerk/minor official has the more crowded his tiny little room-and-kitchen becomes. Large families are not an asset.
   Six hundred horsepower tractors and 40 foot combines mean that agriculture is no longer labor intensive, its capital intensive. Children consume capital, so less children.
   Then there’s the purely physical wear and tear on women. The -average- woman can comfortably bear two to three children when she’s in her twenties. After that, it starts to grind her down. Women who have many children (more than 6) don’t usually live into old age.
   Thus two to three children per family is what one should expect to see in a peaceful, productive nation. Less or more means there’s a problem.
   Our problem is tax and central planning, with the inevitable associated corruption and waste. Kick the b@st@rds out, cut the tax, we all go back to normal families with the kids playing outside.

5. “I also accept that having children does not equate to 100% concern for the future either.”
   Heh.
   How many people here have kids yet deny the increasingly obvious phenomenon of anthropogenic climate change? It isn’t our generation that’s going to face the malthusian horrors that are just around the corner. It’s today’s infants and toddlers who are going to be around to watch it unfold if things don’t change.
   So yes, frenchie, you are right. Having kids is definitely not something that equates to concern for the future.

6. Childless people are choosing (or in some cases forced) to be irrelevant as far as the future goes.
   We all judge each other’s choices every day. Some are ruder about it than others. Cap’s video is passionate and quite rude in the rhetorical and hyperbolic assumptions it makes about people who live in a presumptive foolish manner.
   What I say is that choosing to remain childless will have consequences. The choice is a personal one, driven by personal wants or needs, and will largely have personal consequences. There are some more diffuse effects on others.
   On the other hand, Cap’s entire point is that he chooses to live a certain way in order to have a certain lifestyle, without regard to the wants of others. How is that not selfishness?
   And why is selfishness a bad thing, exactly? I live my life, with children, in exactly the same manner, with respect to doing what I want without regard to the wants of others.

7. How many people here have kids yet deny the increasingly obvious phenomenon of anthropogenic climate change? It isn’t our generation that’s going to face the malthusian horrors that are just around the corner.
   Posted by: mister curious at October 1, 2012 10:11 AM
   May your solar-powered nightlight shine under your bed forever.

8. I did not have kids because I think that there are too many people on the planet. This little dot in the solar system has finite resources. If you think that Easter Island is the model for our future…then not having kids is one of the most selfless things you can do!

9. I didn’t have kids because my peers set such bad examples as I entered the work force. The divorce rate was astonishing and seemed to occur always after a child was born. The women had custody and ended up living very close to the poverty level. The husbands went on to marry other women and father more children. So, at a relatively young age, I asked myself: Corvettes or kids, what’s it going to be? I chose Corvettes and have never had a single regret.

10. Sleeping half the day, crappy house, ratty patio furniture, empty bottle of rum and a cigar he’s been working on for a few days. Happiness? I remain unconvinced.
    I have all of the things these childless couples have (especially that vacuous woman from Edmonton; evidence parked in your driveway? Really, colour me jealous) and the benefit of a great wife and two well adjusted children to enjoy them with.

11. Of course people who don’t have kids are selfish. Just admit it. You might feel better. Does Captain realize he wouldn’t be here if his parents were as selfish as him. It’s one thing if a few don’t have children, but more and more Captains and there will be a point of no return and we’ll have to start all over again.

12. do people still fall in love? looking lovingly at each other and say (in all honesty) “I want to marry you and have your children.”
    Why even bother getting married? No kids no problemo

13. Cool Pacific,
    Cigar – fresh out of the box.
    Sleeping half the day – yes sleeping half the day, every day…how’s your commute?
    Ratty Patio furniture – only “keep up with the Jonses” people think like that. It’s paid for and the sun basks down on me. Hey, take another HEL to pay for you “new” furniture.
    Happiness? – More than you’ll ever know.
    But hey, your kid took a shit in the toilet for the first time. Congratulations. Take pictures and put it on facebook so other equally sad people can “like” your child’s incredible progress.
    Excuse me while I smoke a cigar your wife will never let you have.
    Cripes. This is the best you people have?