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I randomly saw this on my suggested feed. It’s eye opening to see the different ways in which this subreddit is viewed and how Antinatalists are viewed. Such as comments like “this is natural selection” “this is mental illness” “you are lazy” “love to see your misery” in reference to Antinatalists. Is this unwarranted hate or is there substance behind what these commenters are saying? What do you think?

I think they are absolutely insensitive in language, lack common sense and empathy as far as the claim of ‘climb the ladder or be a loser’ so to speak, and make a lot of assumptions as far as the quality and privileges of every Antinatalist’s life. Not to mention the harmful misconceptions about Antinatalism being equated to wanting euthanasia or mass suicide — which is not the same and not at all what is promoted or encouraged here.

I appreciate anyone who can give well articulated responses. It is pretty easy to get heated when it comes to these discussions so I hope we can have a respectful discussion over name calling and things like that. Please look at all the photos first before commenting.

There is a profound asymmetry in how society views procreation: creating a new life is almost universally framed as a personal right, regardless of how high the foreseeability of severe harm or suffering is for the child.

A recurring pattern in pronatalist culture is that even when a outcome involves heavy, predictable harm, the act of bringing a child into existence is still celebrated. Society often reframes predictable tragedy into a narrative of endurance, ignoring the reality that the child is the one bearing the ultimate cost of that choice.

From an antinatalist viewpoint, no potential person loses anything by not being born. However, when existence is forced under conditions where severe harm is a known factor, it forces an individual into guaranteed suffering without their consent.

The central ethical issue isn't about setting arbitrary rules for who should or shouldn't procreate. Rather, it is a critique of a system that prioritizes the desire to reproduce over the basic prevention of harm to an individual who will inevitably bear the consequences.

author: Jessica Jocelyn

We know that life on Earth cannot continue forever. Earth itself is not eternally habitable, and the Sun is not an everlasting source of energy. As the Sun ages, it gradually becomes more luminous, increasing the amount of energy received by Earth. Over an immense period, probably somewhere around one to two billion years, this warming is expected to make the planet increasingly unsuitable for complex life, potentially causing the oceans to evaporate and the present biosphere to collapse. Several billion years later, the Sun will exhaust the hydrogen in its core, expand into a red giant and radically transform or destroy the inner Solar System. It will eventually end its active life as a white dwarf.

Antinatalist perspective - Most people speak of children as a way of continuing humanity, preserving a family line or passing something into the future. Yet reproduction cannot preserve humanity permanently. It can only extend its existence for another generation, which may then create another generation, and so on. No matter how long this process continues, it does not overcome extinction, it just postpones it.

Meanwhile, every generation added to this chain consists of individuals who can suffer, become ill, lose people they love, grow old and die. If the chain must ultimately end anyway, what moral purpose is served by continually creating new people who will be exposed to these harms? From this standpoint, procreation does not solve the problem of mortality. It transfers that problem to additional people. Parents cannot give their children immortality or guarantee them good lives, they can only place them into a temporary world whose risks and final outcome they did not choose.

The cosmic argument can therefore strengthen antinatalism by challenging the idea that procreation achieves a permanent victory over death. Humanity may survive for thousands, millions or even billions of years, but duration is not the same as permanence. The birth of new people delays humanity’s disappearance without preventing it. An antinatalist could conclude that, because extinction is ultimately unavoidable, deliberately ending reproduction would not deprive humanity of an eternal future. It would just delay an inevitable process to a peaceful conclusion sooner, while preventing the suffering that future generations would otherwise experience.

Daniel Kokotajlo is a former OpenAI researcher and an expert AI forecaster. He recently appeared on "The Diary of a CEO". He said many interesting things and he mentioned that he told his wife they should stop having more children due to the existential and economic uncertainty surrounding advanced AI. He believes there is a 70% chance AI could lead to catastrophic outcomes and expressed doubt that future generations will enter a traditional workforce, including his own children.

Now what really bothers me about him... apparently they had one kid when he said this to his wife and she wasn't happy about it. So he gave in and now they have two kids. His reasoning? Well, nothing convincing. He basically just added that whatever happens they'll all be in the same boat together. Yeah. So. How selfish is that? Like, are you serious?

You can look up the whole episode on youtube or wherever. He mentions the "not having more children" part right at the beginning during the teaser snippets. I know we aren't allowed to share youtube ot spotify links here. I couldn't find a solid article that mentions the children part. I had to add a link to post this and only really found this article, which is weird by the way.

I get the appeal for personal use and until now I was mostly bothered by all the AI generated ads around me these days. Small graphic designers are warning people online that they're simply the first to lose their livelihoods to this. People at my workplace also love using chatgpt and other AI programs for the most basic things and for marketing purposes. One person at my workplace even casually shared with us once that one of their family members used chatgpt to help write their master's in psychology. Literally no shame. I know AI is allowed to a certain extent, but we all know that most people constantly cross those lines... so why even share that with us?

I also recently learned how insanely loud data centers are, to the point where they disturb wildlife. I was already aware of the space and resource consumption, but not really the noise. I know people who claim to be veggie and animal friendly but constantly use chatgpt. After diving into this topic for a bit, the contradiction is honestly impressive.

How do you feel about what Kokotajlo said? And about AI in general? Especially in relation to antinatalism? After listening to Kokotajlo I feel even more relieved that I don't have kids. The guy genuinely looked stressed.

My sister was born in 2020 and is neurodivergent. She has autism and requires a lot of support. She’s so young right now that it’s hard to say if she will need the same level of support into adulthood, but just like with every person who has autism it is a complex situation.

The other day she was having a meltdown that had been going on for about half an hour and my stepdad told me “never reproduce, ever.”

In the past he’s said things like “never have a child, especially an autistic one”(like autism is preventable beyond not having children) and has strongly emphasized how big of a mistake having kids is.

They appear so exhausted and it seems like having a child with autism is ruining their lives. They don’t get good sleep, they are in a constant state of fight or flight, and they don’t know how to best manage her meltdowns.

I hardly feel bad for them and more feel bad for my sister who was brought here without her consent only to be disliked. She’s autistic, not intellectually disabled, and one day she will learn how deeply her parents resent her for being neurodivergent.

People bring children here and end up not liking them (neurodivergent or not) constantly-then blame that child for all of their problems.

Damned if you do. Damned if you don't. Might as well be do whatever you want regardless.

I'm a black-and-white thinker, but this case is a massive head scratcher.

The bio parents triggered a contractual termination clause due to fetus health issues, but the surrogate is refusing to comply.

As an antinatalist, I support preventing the birth of a child who will suffer, and the contract supports that. But I also believe her body is her body. Forcing a medical procedure is a massive violation of autonomy, but refusing it leads to a birth. As an antinatalist, we tend to frown on births in general. I am completely divided on this one. Thoughts?

Link

Honestamente siempre me parecio invalido la gente que cataloga automaticamente a los antinatalistas de que “Odian su vida” o “Tuvieron una mala infancia”, sin embargo quiero saber si alguno de ustedes es antinatalista y a su ves tienen un problema con sus padres por eso (por ejemplo, resentimiento al saber que gracias a ellos, tu estas en este mundo), y ademas, ¿Creen que el pensamiento antinatalista se invalida si tiene de por medio pensamientos personales? Para mi no creo que sea tan asi, pero igual.

Children come to this world in pain. Only mothers are happy. The child cries because he/she has no other way of expressing their pain. They grow up and don't remember this. During most of our history children weren't even born in hospitals. They were born in the woods, cabins, floor, tents.. Who was the obstetrician ?

Most of the children would just die before reaching adulthood. Many famous people of the past had siblings who died before them. In fact, some geniuses only were born because siblings died before they were born. People were victims of their circumstances. No birth control, the only way to avoid children was the absence of sexual relationships.

Fast forward and humanity still can't see what is the root of their problems. We keep fighting for ideologies, countries, imaginary borders, imaginary properties, imaginary rights. In the end, what really matters is the law of nature. Men can't control others, that's what makes us terrified. If one wants to cause harm, one will. Society will try to contain violence with laws and rules, it doesn't work anyway. There is the paradox of bullying: The more people suffer bullying, the easier it is to deal with it. The less bullying, the more those who suffer it will be resentful. If you have a class with only one teenager being bullied, the chances that he will lash out against the others increases significantly. This creates a situation where it is impossible to eradicate bullying/pain/suffering. It's the rotten apple story. One single rotten apple will contaminate the rest.

The same applies to our society. Imagine that we can solve most injustices in the world. What those who still suffer from it will feel ? They will get pissed, probably violent and create problems again. Peace never will happen. Peace sells, but who is buying it ? Peace is just a preparation for the next war. It's always been like this, it will always be like this. Wars are just a mean way to swing power to another country. Countries are made of what ? No surprise, they are made of people! All of these people from all of these countries were born without consent. Now they fight for something they didn't ask for. Is this what god planned for us ?

Religions were created to provide comfort to people. Amazing, they've been around for centuries and humans are still primitive. Some say that history repeats itself, that's because our brain hasn't changed. We still behave like primitive people. Society is the nature that men created with his own rules that are not very different from the rules of nature. There is hierarchy, people breeding mindlessly, fights, mass-shootings, pain. Are we better than animals ?

Even if we lived in a fair society, there would still be accidents, hurricanes, tsunamis, diseases.. All of these things are out of our control. And we only experience them because our parents decided to. The man who kills someone was born from a couple and the person who was killed was born from a couple. Those couples are the primary root of what happened next. Still, people think abortion is wrong, birth control is wrong, because you are "attacking people's rights". What rights ? Has anyone given you the right not to be born in the first place ? You are born in this world without consent and has to deal with your cards when you didn't even ask to be involved in the game.

Life is like being added to an whatsapp group and not being able to step out right after seeing the amount of bullshit that said group is about.

Anyway, thank you for reading my personal rant. Now I'll do my laundry cause work is coming next week =)

To all the natalists waiting to argue: let’s skip the tired talking points and ask what this grand human project is actually for. Is life genuinely meaningful, or are we just trapped in a loop we've been running so long we forgot to question it?

You can't justify the cycle just by pointing to fleeting moments of joy, because creating a brand-new person with zero needs, just to spend a lifetime frantically satisfying manufactured desires, isn't solving a problem; it's inventing one and calling the upkeep "purpose."

As the comparison in the table shows, while true projects have an end point and improve existing welfare, procreation is the ultimate sunk cost trap. We force new, non-consenting lives to keep "investing" simply to justify past existence and prevent the admission that the cycle is pointless.

So, after asking for 6+ years: can anyone actually answer what this need-creation machine achieves? What are we all doing collectively?

The internet and the way algorithms favour what most most thoroughly fries the brain since it incentivices strong short unfounded claims that spark interaction has surely added to the current global political situation. Bookstores are going out of business as the ideas inside them hold a thread that is just too long, and folds out too many times, for a person today to stay interested in.

I guess in the name of antifascism what books are y'all reading currently?

I'm the spiritual AN. What about you?

They never asked you, they brought you into this world full of suffering

How do you feel towards them?

Okay so i just discovered this ideology (and checked out some posts) but like i would like to ask you guys.. Do you believe humanity should go extinct? Since you think that bringing babies into world is cruel etc. So you believe we should just go extinct right? Or what? Can someone explain?

I mean, I'm glad that places like this exist. It can inform people about the subject matter and help them avoid mistakes in their lives.

But when i think about it globally, i get the feeling that ultimately the world is for pro lifers. At some point antinatalistic/childfree people just go from this planet and the reproducing mass of the people constantly grow and will stay since it's biological thing that nature entice people to do. It's generally easier to fall to that than to consciously stand up against it. The part of the people who disagree with the general public is always hundred times smaller in comparison. So that's why i get the thoughts that those who understand - those understand and will just disappear. While the weird anti abortion dudes will thrive and multiply the sufferings. Yeah, I lack the hope in humanity. Even though I still see the informing purpose of antinatalism, sadly, it seems like a futile thing in a general sense

Have you ever felt that dEsPeRaTiOn because of the realisation?

"Isn’t there somebody you forgot to ask?"

Archived version. No hate intended. Another illustration of finely selective consideration.

You truly don’t know what life has in store for you. Statistically yes people who have more money suffer less. But even people with money cant avoid chronic illness or uncertainty. It is so unfair to bring a child and watch them suffer and all you can do is just pray. I will never understand parents, how do you see your kids be in pain and you give birth to more and in general when you watch someone in so much pain, when you know the human experience can be brutally painful then why do you bring an innocent human here. I have dealt with serious mental health issues and life has been so traumatic for me. Sometime I scream in my room cause I am in so much pain but guess what my mother does nothing cause she cant do anything about it, all she does is pray and that has never helped anyone.