Do you want kids?

[Alinestra Covelia]

Mostly you can't drink, run around and party very much, which is where most people **** up.

Yeah, see, that's where I would have a problem straight off

[Cartimandua]

I would love to have kids sometime in the near future. My husband would make an excellent father and I am pretty good with kids myself. We don't want to do anything irresponsible though and since he's still in grad school I think we can wait a few more years until we can actually provide for a child. In the meantime I will babysit my friend's babies and be thankful to hand them back at the end of the night

[Ben Kenobi]

Ben, at the risk of stirring up certain rabble, why are you surprised? Most humans want to reproduce and a significant proportion succeed.

It was, after I posted, 10:1, meaning 90 percent of polytubbies wanted either more kids or kids.

Now it's down to about 43 percent, which is still higher then I would have predicted. I felt that Apolyton would have it at about 40-60 with 40 percent wanting kids and 60 percent against. I didn't think there would be as many (15 percent!) who were uncertain.

I also wouldn't have figured that the number of people who had kids and didn't want more was almost as high as those who didn't want kids. 20-17.

[Dr Strangelove]

It was, after I posted, 10:1, meaning 90 percent of polytubbies wanted either more kids or kids.

Now it's down to about 43 percent, which is still higher then I would have predicted. I felt that Apolyton would have it at about 40-60 with 40 percent wanting kids and 60 percent against. I didn't think there would be as many (15 percent!) who were uncertain.

I also wouldn't have figured that the number of people who had kids and didn't want more was almost as high as those who didn't want kids. 20-17.

I've got 2, a boy 14 and a girl 18. I think I may have to save myself for grandparenthood.

[VetLegion]

I didn't read this whole thread but I remember a similar one from way back. I think this is evidence that internet forums are still not very mainstream. I am hard pressed to think of anyone whom I know in real life and who doesn't want kids. Yet here it seems like at least one third of the posters don't wish to procreate. This is very odd.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Who voted the banana option?

Oddly enough, it wasn't me this time.

[Ben Kenobi]

I didn't read this whole thread but I remember a similar one from way back. I think this is evidence that internet forums are still not very mainstream. I am hard pressed to think of anyone whom I know in real life and who doesn't want kids. Yet here it seems like at least one third of the posters don't wish to procreate. This is very odd.

Yes, same here. Where I am I am 'past my due date' and most of the ladies here are either married or have been married once already.

[Jon Miller]

On the other hand, I have several friends/etc who don't want children/etc.

On a side note, one of the scientist type people on my experience had a child a few years back when he was 55 or something. His wife was over 40. He was surprised... (His other children are all in their 20s, I think, with an earlier wife).

JM

[Q Classic]

Parenting isn't the proverbial "rocket science", so don't agonize too much over your ability to be a good parent. You'll learn as you go along for the most part.

See, you say this, and so do other people, but... parenting's huge.

I mean, even if I do my very best, I'll have to pay for their therapy somewhere along the line, and the therapist will tell my kids that they've got issues with me (your parental unit was emotionally distant. Also, he expected way too much of your academic performance. It's okay that you haven't won the Nobel Prize yet, really), which means I'll have to tell my therapist this (my kids think I'm a horrible, demanding parent, just because I told them if they didn't study and make it into a good school, they'd be a failure), and then nobody will be happy and it'll all just be a horrible misadventure.

Is one Nobel Prize
so much to ask from a child
after all I've done?

-david bader

[Dis]

Such good discussion. I like it.

Is having kids selfish? In a way yes. As I said in my OP, you can adopt which would be unselfish. But it's not that selfish to have your own, it may be more arrogance than selfishness. In that people believe their own genes to be superior enough to reproduce. Or in most cases, people just don't think about it, and it happens.

An earlier post made reference towards the rewarding side of it. Yes there are rewards, but isn't there rewards with everything in life? Including work? Granted most people don't have the same attitude towards work I do (I'm a go getter). I like to feel productive. It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling being the best. Perhaps that is not the best example. But almost everything in life people do based on a reward (either now or further down the line). In a way this is selfish according to the definition. But you can't expect humans to be completely unselfish. It goes against our survival instincts.

Is not having kids selfish? No more so than having kids.

But I really have to say some of you guys are really negative and pessimistic. Yes the world is a ****ty place. No one doubts that. But that doesn't mean your kid will turn out bad. If you raise the kid well, and you manage to give it good genetic material, the kid will turn out good. As an example I take myself. We all know I'm awesome . Yet I was raised in a pretty crummy time. 70's were going on, there was a war in Vietnam. Drug use was rampant, crime was through the roof. Yet I don't hurt people, use drugs, or start wars. I feel I'm a productive member of society. And yes I feel I can pass on my great values to my son or daughter, and would be a good parent.

My parents lacked alot. And I mean alot in terms of parenting skills. But they did teach me a very good value system. While I'm not Catholic or christian, I took many of the values from those religions. In fact I feel I'm more moral than most people who do go to church. This is why I don't go to church, I feel it isn't necessary. I'm already a very good person. I don't think I could get any gooder .

In fact, after writing the last couple paragraphs, I am beginning to think people not having kids are more selfish than those who do. You guys are good people. You claim you don't want kids because all the ****heads out there. Well you should be having kids to counteract all the ****head's kids.

What's been happening in society today (and will bring it's collapse eventually) is the irresponsible have been reproducing like crazy, while the responsible and educated are having little to no children. This will reduce the quality of the gene pool in the future. Eventually mankind will be just too damn stupid to sustain itself. All because none of you smart polytubbies are having babies!

Now I hope I made you all feel guilty. That's all I have to say for now.

[Dis]

OK I do have one thing to say.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2233878.ece

This is why you guys must procreate! We must fight against this kinda stupidity! yes the world will become overpopulated. But it will regardless of your piddly little actions. You guys think not having a baby will save the world? . Having a smart baby is more likely to save the world than having it taken over by stupid people.

with regards to the link, is this true? I know you can't trust British tabloids. She's a bit old for him, he doesn't look like he's hit puberty. Why is this girl not charged with a crime? She had to have taken advantage of him- she's like twice his size!. But all I can really say is. Niiiice. Tagged some of that slutty English flesh.

[Alinestra Covelia]

When I was in Derby in the early 1990s there was a boy in my class who later became a dad at age 13 as well. I never did find out what happened to him, but it was a real eye-opener.

Also, most of the children at my school had double-barrelled surnames, because their parents had divorced when they were young.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Dis, a lot of what you said echoes my own sentiments. I look back at my life and the surroundings I went through, and I frankly wonder how I'm not forgotten somewhere in a hopeless dead-end rut. There were so many potential slip-ups I could have made - so many points at which I could have gone straight off the tracks and over the precipice. Yet somehow something guided me through and I'm doing okay today.

I don't know what it was that gave me that "bright light in the back of my mind to guide me". I also don't know how to implant some such into my kids. This is a further obstacle to me having any kids.


Also, it does annoy me when people treat not having kids as being somehow weird or faintly perverse or "selfish".

Being childless is the default condition: We haven't done anything!

In fact, actually having children is an affirmative step. People who conceive and then raise the kids are the ones who have decided to upset the status quo. You can argue it's through pride and arrogance, or you can argue it's through civic duty and kindness and generosity.

But how you treat the childless as the outliers beats me. We've been childless from the beginning, guys. You're the ones who've gone out and done something weird and unusual and then turned around and said "look at you weirdos".

[Caligastia]

See, you say this, and so do other people, but... parenting's huge.

I mean, even if I do my very best, I'll have to pay for their therapy somewhere along the line, and the therapist will tell my kids that they've got issues with me (your parental unit was emotionally distant. Also, he expected way too much of your academic performance. It's okay that you haven't won the Nobel Prize yet, really), which means I'll have to tell my therapist this (my kids think I'm a horrible, demanding parent, just because I told them if they didn't study and make it into a good school, they'd be a failure), and then nobody will be happy and it'll all just be a horrible misadventure.


-david bader

Parenting is definitely a huge responsibility, but there is such a thing as micro-managing. I reckon if you get the major, basic things right you're 95% there.

[VetLegion]

...

This is a first time ever I've encountered a female that doesn't want kids. I think you're bluffing