One of the comments under my recent post on declining birth rates said, “Hands down the best way to encourage births in this country is to invest in the social safety net. Also, actually, invest in robust sex education (not abstinence education, SEX) alongside actually relaxing anti abortion laws. Crazy I know, but if you make life livable and give them proper family planning tools, they might, you know, have families.”
Listen up, everybody! The mystery has been solved. It’s YOUR FAULT people aren’t starting families. Apparently the only thing standing between us and a thriving population is your refusal to guarantee that having children will require zero sacrifice, zero inconvenience, and no risk whatsoever. If you would simply redesign society so parenthood feels like a spa weekend instead of…parenthood…babies would be popping out all over the place.
To be clear, I’m not trying to ‘encourage births’ in this country. The only thing more destructive to our civilization than selfishness is selfish people reproducing. If you’re waiting for ‘social safety nets’ to start a family, let me encourage you to keep waiting! Postpone becoming a parent until the rest of us figure out how to protect you from the icky responsibilities of caring about someone else.
Past generations started families without subsidized everything, free healthcare, immaculate work life balance, and a government-issued assurance that nothing difficult would ever happen to them. Don’t use them as role models! Those people weren’t like you.
Just keep telling yourself that the world is a horrible place and you’re a good person for refusing to bring children into it. Be careful not to think about the future when you’ll need assistance. When you’re old and frail, someone else’s child will help you with your basic needs. Don’t think about that! Spend your time reinforcing the delusion that narcissism is a virtue. If you’re lucky, you’ll never realize the truth.
And if all of this sounds harsh, relax. You’re not expected to deal with any of it. That would require introspection which leads to maturity, and maturity is not for you. Cling to the whimsical fantasy that opting out of family life makes you enlightened. As long as you can blame society for your inability to love anyone more than yourself, you’ll never need to wonder whether the real problem wasn’t the world you inherited, but the one you’re helping create.
(Ecclesiastes 11: 4) Whoever watches the wind will not sow; whoever looks at the clouds will not reap.
One Response
Maybe they worry that there will be no jobs for their kids due to poor economics, high prices, automation and robots, therefore they may also worry their kids will starve or maybe a war involving the US or the world will kill them. It could also be of the fact that no vaccines or medical care is available and allow diseases to claim their child’s life, however that is if a nutter with a gun or a global warming disaster such as flood or fire does not get them first.
As the US has an administration that has no cares for a majority of people or these problems is it any wonder nobody wants kids?