Is It Immoral To Have Children?

People who decide not to have kids are motivated by their own happiness too. Every human on this planet is selfish to a certain extent and will pursue their own life according to what fulfills them.

Not to mention the desire to procreate is instinctual and neccessary to the survival of our species.

I agree overpopulation poses a problem but i doubt anyone on hipforums is part of this problem. Like i poointed out and VG also did, the population is decreasing in western countries.

 

Is it immoral or selfish to have children? How can anyone answer that for anyone else?
It is a private decision, hopefully, between two people....If you want children as you think you would make wonderful parents and have an affinity thinking you would be a wonderful mom and dad with alot to give, and will love unconditionally what ever comes out.....what is wrong with that?
If you want children to try to trap someone, or just to have children to take care of you in your old age.....well, that might be a little selfish.
Perfection? That would be a selfish motive. Who is perfect in this world?
I have heard that one day, humans will genetically program what kind of child they will have including eye, hair color....etc...that is scary to me.

Someone always said to me...why would you want to bring children into the world such as it is?
I think a less populated world would be more idealistic, as Bill stated here. that is my own personal opinion. The planet is flooded with those highest on the food chain already...leaving much little to the other life on the planet in the way of territories, etc....I have these concerns for the other life on the planet.
Too many people are fighting for the crumbs, while a few have it all....
Look at the shit hole this world has become...there are so many things to consider...and only each individual can make these decisions for themselves...

i don't curse out anyone wanting to have children, though, either.....if that is what you want, go for it.....but think about your own motives and things first.

 

I question the thinking of people who choose to have more than two kids. I wonder if they're aware of all the overpopulation problems, or if they just don't care.

 

Yeah, there is that, Karen...one after the other after the other, after the other.....That does piss me off.....and I have to turn a blind eye to it....
Uneducated? I don't know what the thinking is with that thinking in today's world....

but back to the perfection thing. I knew of a couple who were going to have a far less than perfect child.....I forget what the disease the child was going to be born with was called, and they were told, it would be smart to abort in this case....as the infant would require many surgeries to separate hand digits...skull operations, etc....but the couple said no...they were going to have this child anyway.....and I felt angry at first...why bring this poor child into a world where it is doomed for so many operations right away......but they did anyway.....and we all followed the story of this little boy who came into the world and his photos on the doll forum I belonged to, through his grandmother, and all grew to love him, too.....perfection in so many other ways....the heart of that child!....and we all cried, too, when he died at 3 years old by choking on his own vomit....I was like WTF...how did that happen?,....but was so heartbroken, i loved this little boy so much that i never met...and just wanted to hug him, and be with him more than any other child at the time.

 

I had sent him a huge teddy bear that he loved like no other toy. The parents wound up keeping it in memory of him, instead of burying him with it. I was happy i was able to send him something big and soft for him love, at the time, though, but his death was just too sad to bear at the time.
I wrote a poem for him after his death and that was given to his parents.....and it helped them, I was told.

It was so little....I wanted to meet him. he lived in CA.

 

Maybe we should put something in the water to sterilize the entire human race. That way, no more illness, no more than 7 billion odd deaths, and then peace and quiet.

 

^Where did that come from, Bill? A bit extreme statement all of a sudden.. you could always have peace and quiet by knocking out your own lights...no, don't do that!

 

I've heard this point made before, and here's the other side of it.

When parents have a special needs child, they usually don't have enough money to have another child and properly provide for it. Okay, so the special needs child is cute and people love him or her. Fine. But maybe the next child would have been cute too, and would have been loved by everyone, and would have lived a long and healthy life. But it was never conceived, because the first one wasn't aborted.

Since it's impossible to predict how those situations are going to turn out, there's no reason to try. I see that as an argument in favor of following standard medical advice, starting over and trying again when you know for sure there is a major defect.

Does that make sense?

 

I was responding to this, but forgot to hit the quote button. Everybody is going to suffer and die - that's the nature of human life, mixed in with positive things of course, but if you say we can't have kids because one day they will die, I think it's going a bit far.

I have no intention of cashing in my chips just yet.

 

I don't know. It is not for me to tell someone to have or not have a less than perfect child....and perfect by what standards?......
I cannot really say with certainty what i would do if i were in a situation like that.
This idea of perfection is troubling to me, for some reason.

 

Makes sense to me. I know such decisions must be very hard for those who have to take them, but if you know in advance that a child is going to be severely handicapped -

 

Many of the dwarfs that I see on TV decide to have children, knowing in advance that their child will have dwarfism also.....I see both sides to this coin.....and neither way is right or wrong.....it is like saying you cannot have a child that will be a dwarf also. How can I make that judgement call....even though, this world is hard enough even for those who are born with no problems of any kind right off the bat...so I do see both sides...but it is not for me to make the judgement call, is waht i am saying. I can feel one way, as i did at first with the scenario I just wrote about here....but it was not up to me, and I hope we don't become a world where it is up to someone else other than the people having or not having the child...is what i am saying.

 

So sorry for your loss.

 

I support a woman's right to choose, too, which is why I support a woman's right to bear children. I think your position is bizarre, and premised on the notion that the downside risks to human existence outweigh any upside gains. Human consciousness seems miraculous to me and existence is worth the risk of any downside. Yes, we try to minimize the risk, and if a child is likely to be severely handicapped, I can see someone making the decision to terminate it. I think people are also entitled to engage in rational family planning and not to bring unwanted children into the world (although there are plenty of people who want to adopt children). But what a life-denying, bleak view of reality! Human extinction wouldn't necessarily be "good for the planet", because I think "good" is meaningless without conscious entities to perceive it, and "the planet" has no value apart from the value we give it.

 

yoga isnt the essence of life...........just do it at the dog park and blend in......lets get off yoga....i havnt met a yoga person that wasnt a pretentious douche anyway

for people who are afraid off the microscopic odds of having a handicapped kid there is plenty testing past the already MANDATORY testing done where i live......and i might add that we ALL will in fact die....not just the crippled kids.....

not being handicapped is no guarantee of not suffering ....things happen in life and people end up suffering....some suffer far more than a kid born without sight

hey...with your way of thinking we should legalize murder of people who are old and suffering with dementia or other aging diseases......

lkast but not least....this lame thread needed some juice....you're welcome

 

that horrible example depends on dwarfism being a negative thing or burden on society...it is not....so....ya......nothing wrong with being a dwarf....there is no coin and no both sides

 

I did not say it was......I am pro choice.....that two sides of a coin.....I love dwarf babies... I love all babies.....

 

I'm pretty sure the kids who were born without defects, and even some who were born with them, are pretty glad their parents took those chances.

And once the kid is out, they will consume so much time, energy, and money. Raising a child, at least, is absolutely not selfish.

But less people should have kids, more people should adopt. That's another story though.