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What are your opinions on anti-natalism? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 day ago by nutbutter@discuss.tchncs.de to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

118 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Anti-natalism is the philosophical value judgment that procreation is unethical or unjustifiable. Antinatalists thus argue that humans should abstain from making children. Some antinatalists consider coming into existence to always be a serious harm. Their views are not necessarily limited only to humans but may encompass all sentient creatures, arguing that coming into existence is a serious harm for sentient beings in general. There are various reasons why antinatalists believe human reproduction is problematic. The most common arguments for antinatalism include that life entails inevitable suffering, death is inevitable, and humans are born without their consent. Additionally, although some people may turn out to be happy, this is not guaranteed, so to procreate is to gamble with another person's suffering. WIKIPEDIA

If you think, maybe for a few years, like 10-20 years, no one should make babies, and when things get better, we can continue, then you are not an anti-natalist. Anti-natalists believe that suffering will always be there and no one should be born EVER.

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[–] PonyOfWar@pawb.social 26 points 1 day ago

I'm child-free by choice and I think there are a lot of good reasons not to have kids that I would probably share with antinatalists. I think there should be less population growth. But radical "no-one should be born ever" antinatalism goes to far I think. IMO the whole "being born without their consent" argument doesn't work, as the whole concept of consent doesn't exist for a nonexistant being. In order to make any kind of choice on whether you want to exist, you need to exist first. If you make the argument that not having kids is sparing them from suffering, then you can just as easily make the argument that you're depriving them from ever feeling love or happiness, which they "didn't consent" to either.