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Tequila_Wolf wrote (edited )

I think that there are multiple versions of it, some better than others. I don't subscribe to it, since I think there are occasions where having a child is ok, but I lean towards it.

The main one I see going around, grounded in David Benatar's work Better Never To Have Been, is built on a utilitarian argument that fails in some of the ways that utlilitarianism fails. But the basic idea that if you bring someone into existence, you are a cause of all their pain, but if you don't bring them into existence, that person didn't exist to miss out on anything, does affect me.

Incidentally, it was antinatalism that made me vegan. The fact that industrial farming of animals, including for milk and eggs actually involves forcing life, pregnancy and birth onto animals, over and over, was an additional kind of harm that made clear to me that was unacceptable. Trillions of animals have been brought into existence by humans, their entire lives just abused through industrial processes. They didn't need to be brought into existence, and trillions of entire lives continue to be forcefully created and filled with horrid suffering. The egg that the vegetarian eats couldn't have been laid without the life of the chicken that laid it, and little-to-nothing about that coming into being wasn't constructed by abusive humans.

I think that whether someone should have kids or not depends on their particular circumstance. For example, I think it's hard to justify having a child if you have the resources to adopt. Choosing to bring someone into existence instead of adopting someone is fucking two people over horribly. Instead of making someone else's life markedly better by adopting them, you're leaving them in that (relatively much worse) position, while creating a whole new life that will suffer terribly, perhaps horrifically in this world.

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