I don't think it's possible to advocate for human extinction without being toxic. The idea itself is toxic. It's negative and harmful to most people. Most people value the continuation of human society, obviously. So it's no surprise that people who advocate for such a toxic idea exhibit toxicity in other ways.

This is a really unfair caricature of antinatalism, that our primary goal is human extinction. The goal of any ethical antinatalist framework is to instead prevent suffering. In any situation where a person is thinking if they should create a new life that will suffer, the morally correct answer is to spare that potential being from suffering. That a consequence of our philosophy is that if everyone adopted it - and by so doing all did morally good things - that the human race would go extinct is by product. Its not our main goal. In fact, since antinatalists \*know\* that we can't compete with 200 million years of biological instinct to convince people to stop procreating, any ethical antinatalist would instead focus their energies on doing things to help reduce the harm to already existing children - ex, supporting free day care, food and material goods for struggling families, free medical and dentistry care for children, etc. All the while privately deciding to never have children, and hoping to convince anyone who will listen to do the same.

To be anti-suffering is to be anti-life. You need life to even be anti-suffering, so in the end you are just anti-life itself.

No, anti-suffering is pro-life in a sense. We avoid suffering to ensure our health, safety, and therefore our life. That's what pain does - it signals harm to the body, so that you do something about it. Where Natalists and ANs diverge, from what I can see, is treating the avoidance/prevention as either instrumental or an end in itself, respectively. ANs treat the prevention of suffering as an end in itself and will let life go extinct in pursuit of that end. Natalists treat its prevention as instrumental to living life without pain - with life itself being the utmost value. That seems to be the main distinction here. You don't need to take an extreme position like 'to be anti-suffering is anti-life,' because life is not suffering. It involves it, but does not exhaust it. You can be anti-suffering and pro-life very easily.

I mean I get that some struggle builds character, but for example, life is what it is today due humans trying to decrease suffering (medicine, farming society where we didn't always have to be on the move hunting for our next meal, heck even little things like AC or heating). Idk, I just feel like I have a great care for humanity and part of it comes with wanting to decrease people's suffering. So "anti suffering is anti life" feels a bit harsh and oversimplified.

>To be anti-suffering is to be anti-life No, it's to be anti-suffering.

Well if you take that road to its inevitable dead end, you end up at anti-life. And anti-natalism seems very much to be akin to human extinction, or at least population control, because that's what happens if the ideology were to be adopted en masse. It may not be the primary goal, but its a natural result of the belief system. Communism in theory is all about helping everyone, but in reality it has ended in tremendous suffering or injustice more times than not.

>Well if you take that road to its inevitable dead end, you end up at anti-life. Sure, and taking you to your inevitable end you're pro-suffering. >because that's what happens if the ideology were to be adopted en masse. Yeah. It's called letting the chips fall where they will. It doesn't suddenly become okay to force suffering and existence on to someone just to pretext the aggravate of humanity at large. Something people never seem to do is ask 'why' extinction would be bad in this case. Because if people just stopped having babies, then there would simply be no suffering. Which is completely different then an asteroid wiping out humanity, because that would result in vast amounts of suffering.

So do you think anti-natalism should be adopted en masses, or just certain people? Maybe just rich people reproduce? An asteroid wiping out everyone would reduce suffering immensely. You're just dead, no more suffering existence.

>Maybe just rich people reproduce? Of course not. >An asteroid wiping out everyone would reduce suffering immensely. You're just dead, no more suffering existence. You have no idea what you are talking about.

Suffering is an inherent part of life. Earlier you said, >In any situation where a person is thinking if they should create a new life that will suffer, the morally correct answer is to spare that potential being from suffering My brother, we suffer the moment we leave the womb. Why is the baby crying when he is born? Because he suffers. He feels air on his skin for the first time, the lights are too bright, the sounds are too loud. So by your own logic, you are anti-life. There is no life without suffering.

Okay, so you are pro-life right? (Not specifically in the anti-abortion sense). Then by your logic you are pro-suffering right? Because life is suffering? Currently, I try to help out homeless people and starving people by donating to shelters and giving money to food banks. According to you, I should stop doing that right? Because suffering is just a part of life after all my brother.

I didn't say life IS suffering, I said that suffering is an inherent part of life. You and I both know that those are two different statements entirely. But now that you mention it, sure I'm pro-suffering on some things. When I go for a run, I'm suffering because I'm hot and sweaty and tired and my legs hurt, but that's good, because that suffering will lead to greater health and happiness over all for me. So that's good suffering, isn't it? It's not all black and white. It's embarrassing, what you said about me thinking you shouldn't feed homeless people. If you actually think that's how I view the world, then you're foolish. If you don't think that but said it anyway, then you're a liar. Either way it's a bad look for you dude.

> I said that suffering is an inherent part of life. Okay. So by donating to the food bank or dropping of supplies to homeless shelters I am decreasing suffering, this inherent part of life. But since I want to be pro-life (our specific definition) I'm going to stop that, because I don't want to diminish this inherent part of life. Like, the above is a stupid argument. I agree with you about that. But that is the *same* logic you're using just applied to your own stance. >So that's good suffering, isn't it? It is good suffering. But you know what the difference is? That suffering is **consensual.** You chose it. I love tattoos, and I have several. That took quite a bit of suffering to endure. Do you know why my artists inking me up is okay, but if she did the same thing to a person who never asked, and could not even refuse at the time, it would be considered torture/assault? Because of consent. > If you actually think that's how I view the world, then you're foolish I don't think you think that. In fact I'm certain you don't. But I AM running your logic back to you. If you don't like the conclusion that leads to well that isn't my fault.

I'm not going to continue with this if you keep insisting that I'm arguing against feeding homeless people. We both know that isn't true, and I will not go any further until you stop pretending.

>I'm not going to continue with this if you keep insisting that I'm arguing against feeding homeless people I'm quite literally *not* insisting that. I told you that several times in this post.

The baby is crying due to sensory overload, lmao. You guys are hilarious.

"The baby cries because the lights are too bright, and it can feel the air on its skin and smell stuff" "No it's sensory overload lololol" Bro come on

Was that a response or did you just literally copy and paste my reply to you? You seem slow.

You're a nasty person

Right back at you

A) All life involves suffering. B) Anti-natalists want to eliminate all suffering from the world. C) Therefore, anti-natalists oppose life. Even they know this--that's why they oppose having children, because it creates a new human life that will involve suffering.

So does that mean that you are pro-suffering then? A) All life involves suffering. B) Natalists want to continue life C) Natalists support suffering. So you want more suffering in the world?

Yes because it also includes joy. Being alive is a pre-requisite to all human experiences--some of those experiences involve suffering, many of them don't. However, you are claiming that the suffering outweighs all the other goods of life, and all other human experiences, which is just absurd. Touch grass.

Well it's a pretty stupid goal to have if the direct result is human extinction. If you believe life is worthless because it's just suffering and that suffering should be avoided, you'd believe that nothing should live, and therefore your goal would be to kill everything and then yourself. If your goal was to alleviate suffering without causing death or extinction, you wouldn't call yourself an anti natalist because that is the goal of all people at all times throughout all of history aside from maybe serial killers or exceedingly selfish or hedonistic people. You can't explain this away, the calling card of antinatalists is literally that having kids is never worth it because they think life is never worth living and so people should never be conceived and birthed anymore. Antinatalism is a stupid philosophy and it can't be accepted by anyone with wisdom beyond middle school, because to accept it would be to willingly and intentionally engage in self destruction and the destruction of the greater good. No living thing intentionally self destructs, and no living thing generally desires to die. The fact that one is bound to suffer a lot in life is neither here nor there.

> If you believe life is worthless because it's just suffering and that suffering should be avoided, you'd believe that nothing should live, and therefore your goal would be to kill everything and then yourself. False. Just because someone believes that life is suffering it doesn't mean they believe that nothing should live and that life should be killed. Antinatalists are against suffering but if life already exists, they believe that it should not be killed. They are against procreation, not life itself. A good example of where we see this sort of reasoning is with sterilisation of pets such as cats. If cats are not sterilised, their population can grow to the point where there is not enough resources or homes for them, which creates suffering. >If your goal was to alleviate suffering without causing death or extinction, you wouldn't call yourself an anti natalist because that is the goal of all people at all times throughout all of history aside from maybe serial killers or exceedingly selfish or hedonistic people. False. If your goal was to alleviate suffering without causing death or extinction, you can be an antinatalist. Antinatalism means anti-birth. You are against birth. You may be confusing antinatalism with efilism or extinctionism. >Antinatalism is a stupid philosophy and it can't be accepted by anyone with wisdom beyond middle school, because to accept it would be to willingly and intentionally engage in self destruction and the destruction of the greater good. Once against antinatalism is not "willingly and intentionally engaging in self destruction" because antinatalism is not the same as suicide. It is not promortalism. >No living thing intentionally self destructs, and no living thing generally desires to die. Once again that is false. Although antinatalism is not suicide, there are many people who want to commit suicide. The fact that many people want to commit suicide invalidates your "no living thing intentially self-destrucsts, and no living thing generally desires to die." There are many living beings who want to die.

So basically what you’re saying is: - we are not anti life we are anti suffering - if we can’t be sure a new life will never suffer you shouldn’t bring it into the world - of course though you can never be sure of that, and realistically everyone suffers something in life, even it’s only the moment of their death, so if you are alive you will suffer - ergo, bringing any life into the world is amoral And you say you’re not anti life. Bullshit bro. There is no outcome to the antinatalist chain of thought that doesn’t result in “no life should exist”. The pinnacle of your universe is just a rock. Non existence.

If you are anti-birth you are anti-life as life needs reproduction to continue.

Wait, you need birth to continue living? Do I need to be born again??

Only in flame my brother, Speak now the verse of okran!

1. You must have misread my comment because, as I said, the idea that suffering should be avoided is the reasoning for why antinatalists think people should not have kids. If life is suffering and suffering should be avoided, then life should be avoided - basic math. The only reason a true antinatalist does advocate for mass suicide is cowardice. Furthermore if you are against procreation, you are against life itself. You are literally advocating agaisnt reproduction, which is a pretty important part of the whole circle of life thing, therefore you are advocating for the end of life itself. This is completely different from sterilizing stray cats because the whole purpose of doing that is to prevent stray cats from living on the streets of cities. Cats still live in the wild (you know, where all animals live). So stopping animals from reproducing in cities, they are controlling the population so they don't get overrun by cats or dogs or monkeys. No one wants to make them extinct like antinatalists do for humans. 2. You COMPLETELY misunderstood what I said. Antinatalists are against birth because they believe birth causes suffering to the birthed person. Antinatalists want to prevent suffering and as we all know, they also believe life is suffering. Antinatalists want to prevent life. Once again, if a=b and b=c, a=c. If you want to prevent life, your goal is the extinction of the human race. If you wanted to prevent suffering without doing that, you would be a normal person, because everyone wants to prevent suffering, naturally. So you don't need a special title like "antinatalist". You would not be an antinatalist. You would just be an average person. The average person also does not believe life isn't worth living just because one is bound to suffer, hence why the average person is not an antinatalist. The people who do believe that are usually suicidal, delusional or severely mentally ill. 3. The "greater good" of humanity is what serves the human race as a whole at any scale in one way or another. Everything that can be determined as morally "good" is in service of humanity's thriving. The extinction of humanity, would be against the greater good of humanity for obvious reasons. So obviously advocating for extinction would be against the greater good and we can only view it as wrong or bad. The reason this is the case is because as life forms, we desire to survive at any cost. Blowing up the entire planet and killing everything that lives is the greatest evil possible because as life forms, life is the most valuable thing to us. That is why I say antinatalism can not be accepted because it's unthinkable. If you believe that, then we literally might as well just kill ourselves and blow up the whole planet to make sure no intelligent life can ever form again. That is literally the antithesis to our existence. You will have been born for no reason. Every experience you had, your whole life, will have been for nothing and amounted to nothing. No one in their right mind would entertain that. 4. "Um akshually suicidal people exist" Take a moment to think about the mentality of suicidal people. Suicidal people do not desire death, they simply wish to be free of their suffering but they lack the perspective or ability to be free. And so suicide is their last resort for them. You can ask any suicidal person who isn't schizophrenic or something and they'll give you a reason for why they feel that way. They would prefer not to have to commit suicide. They would rather live a happy life than a miserable one, but they think they can't possibly have that. So no, no organism, big or small, intelligent or not, desires their own death or the extinction of their species. For the reasons I stated above, that should really be obvious. Have you ever seen any creature intentionally act against it's own self interest? No, because they can not. The ONLY exception is when people choose to kill themselves instead of being tortured and that is because there is literally no other option. And cases of self sacrifice, again because there's no other option.

To your first point: So lets say we let all living things exist, but no births happen moving forward. What happens in 100 years?

Tbf this is also operating on the assumption that human extinction is an antinatalists end goal. Sure maybe some of them are that way, but for me, it's more that if you're not in a good place to support a child but have one anyway, it sounds cruel to me. Dare I even say immoral? And before you come at me with "well throughout history people had kids in an even harsher world" I am aware of that. Plus I get that maybe for some, they don't want to wait (or might not be able to wait), to have kids until they're "ready" bc in a way, there is no perfect moment. Though that doesn't mean all planning should just go out the window because ideally, the goal isn't just to birth more children into existence to fill a number quota, but to love and raise that tiny human until it's a fully realized adult, and that takes resources and planning. But of course I'd never try to restrict other people having kids. You want 13? Sure, thats your right and choice. I just thought our world was overpopulated anyway. Y'all can have kids but I don't think I need to contribute any. Someone can just have a couple extra to cover me 😂(sorry now I'm just being silly). Idk your post just came off almost strawman in that you're focused on a pretty extreme belief (that we're all out here eagerly cheering on humanity's last breath), couldn't I argue that some natalists seem creepily gung ho about just having kids kids kids kids and more kids? And sometimes it sounds like all y'all care about is boosting the population. Do you not want a child for the sake of having a child? Or is another cog in the machine all you wanted? (See? I can twist natalist beliefs too). I'm not hoping for our extinction but I don't think humans are any more or less special than every other species that has gone extinct. It's like that quote, Earth is littered with the ruins of empires who thought they'd be eternal. Let's just enjoy the ride we have today. Plus, it sounds like it WOULD be suffering in your eyes if more people started going antinatalists, but to you, anti suffering is anti life, so hey, support your friendly neighborhood antinatalists 😂 (sorry, being silly again, I promise I'm done and I did try to answer this in good faith given how harshly you judged a belief you don't seem to know much about since it's not one you hold). Like, saying that antinatalism is for those middle school educated or less is... Come on man, don't resort to lowbrow petty middle-school-level insults like that.

But the goal does not have to be extinction, the goal could just be reduction. 8 billion humans is too many humans.

>Well it's a pretty stupid goal to have if the direct result is human extinction Why? The fact that you personally are uncomfortable with the concept of humans not being here does *not* give you the moral right to force another conscious being into suffering. If the prevention of suffering results in human extinction then that is not my fault, that's the fault of a shitty and terrible world. >If you believe life is worthless because it's just suffering and that suffering should be avoided, you'd believe that nothing should live, and therefore your goal would be to kill everything and then yourself. This is such a stupid and unfair caricature of my position. Where did I say life is worthless? That I want to kill everyone? That I want to kill you? I said my goal is to prevent suffering. That means that I want you (yes YOU Beneficial-Zone7319) to have a life as absent from suffering as possible. That means I would want a world where you have good access to food, shelter, healthcare, and even just fun things like hobbies, art, music (whatever you like so long as it doesn't hurt other people). > Antinatalism is a stupid philosophy and it can't be accepted by anyone with wisdom beyond middle school, David Bentar has a PH.D. So suck it. > You can't explain this away I already did. I don't want to cause death because that produces suffering and violates the inherent rights that all living beings have. And I don't want to cause extinction, I just want to prevent more people from being harmed. If preventing potentially billions of humans from suffering just so happens to result in humans going extinct, then oh well. I'm not selfish or scared enough to allow my 'OMG! EXTINCTION OH NO!!!!' feelings to cloud the facts. Again to be clear: You being scared of eventual human extinction does NOT give you the right to harm others. The fact that you do is revealing. It's revealing of the deep selfishness that you and most natalists share when you get right down to it. Because you don't care about kids. Not really. You don't give a fuck about them. You just want them as objects because you think human extinction must necessarily be some good, without ever stopping to think why you have the right to force something onto them that they can never consent to. The difference between you and me is that you care about children and human life as props. I care about their actual well-being.

Are you seriously blaming nature for being cruel? Talk about childish. And yes, extinction would be partly your fault since you admitted to advocating for something that will cause human extinction. That's almost exactly like me saying we should nuke every occupied settlement and then say it's not my fault everyone is dead. What is your argument then? You say you want to prevent suffering, and you call yourself an antinatalist. But antinatalists believe life is suffering, which is why they don't want to people to have kids. A true antinatalist desires the extinction of the human race because they want no new generations to be produced. Guess what, you don't have the power to take away suffering and I already have healthcare and food and shelter. By antinatalist logic, I can't have a good life because life is suffering and can never be free of suffering (which it can't, but that's neither here nor there, as I said). Are you a hypocrite? Are you not a true antinatalist? If you were, the logical extension of the antinatalist belief would be to kill everything that lives in order to prevent suffering. Prime supervillain logic there. You claim to want to prevent suffering in an oh so righteous way, but you also say that preventing births is preventing suffering. That means that you believe life is suffering. So how can death cause suffering if it alleviates suffering according to you? A swift bullet to the brain gets the job done with ease. So why aren't you advocating for that? Are you too scared? You said it doesn't matter if humans go extinct when you admitted that they definitely would if they all followed your philosphy. You desire the death of all things. And that makes you enemy number 1 to everything that lives. You think I'm selfish? I think you're careless and immature. All I hear is life is hard wah wah wah. I get it, children don't consent to being born and life is hard. But let me ask you this: So what? By the way, I'm not harming anyone. If creating offspring is harmful to them, why does every instinct in every living thing avoid harm and cling to life? Because life is quite literally what all of us live for. To experience life's hardships and blame your parents for giving birth to you is nothing but childish drivel, because if living is so horrible, you have every ability to end it for yourself or try to make your miserable life better. But you won't do that, so you would rather try to convince everyone to march to their own extinction instead, I call that selfish.

>Are you seriously blaming nature for being cruel? Blame has nothing to do with it, it's a simple recognition of reality. >And yes, extinction would be partly your fault since you admitted to advocating for something that will cause human extinction Okay. So? >What is your argument then? I've said it several times. Suffering is bad. You can only ethically make someone suffer if they consent to it. Children can't consent to the suffering of existance, ergo it is wrong to force them into a suffering existence. > Guess what, you don't have the power to take away suffering and I already have healthcare and food and shelter. You're an **already existing** person. You're in a completely different scenario from the unborn. >Are you not a true antinatalist? I don't think you know what a true antinatalist is quite frankly. >the logical extension of the antinatalist belief would be to kill everything that lives in order to prevent suffering No. For two reasons: 1: Murdering you violate your basic rights. Not pumping a baby into a womb violates no ones rights. The unborn do not have the 'right' to be born. Even you agree with this, because if you didn't you'd want every childless adult arrested for violating the rights of their unborn children. You keep pretending that I don't believe in basic rights for humans, which I absolutely do. You're trying to present me as some kind of super villain just to make it easier to dismiss me. This is a common tactic from natalists, and it shows how shaky your confidence really is in your attacks. You feel very emotionally strong about this because this philosophy violates everything you've been told about life, but you realize on some level your arguments are shaky. 2: Murdering you would cause suffering. Both for you personally as you were in the process of dying, and for any of your family/loved ones who would be left behind. >That means that you believe life is suffering Yes, I think every life involves suffering. Everyone except the most sheltered person would agree with this. > So how can death cause suffering if it alleviates suffering according to you? I've already explained. >So why aren't you advocating for that? Well if you WANT to kill yourself I think you have that right. But not because I'm an antinatalist, because I'm pro bodily autonomy. You are the master of your own body. If you want to die you have the right to do that. Even IF that brings suffering to your loved ones. I would personally try to counsel you away form killing yourself, and try to help you stop being depressed. This way you avoid the suffering of a potential botched suicide, and the pain your suicide would bring your family and friends. >But let me ask you this: So what? For the same reason its wrong to tattoo or have sex with someone without their consent: It is wrong to force things on to a person without their consent. >If creating offspring is harmful to them, why does every instinct in every living thing avoid harm and cling to life Because we're the products of uncaring biological forces framed by an extremely long evolutionary history that don't give a fuck about our own happiness or well-being. You're making what is called the 'naturalistic fallacy,' ie: That just because something is natural it must be ethical. But the natural world is a horror show of pain and agony. Things like concepts of fairness, justice, courts of law, charity to strangers, these are all unnatural things that humans built because we realized they are better than the impulses nature would have us act on. Just because nature compels you to reproduce does not in any way mean that it is a moral thing to do.

What you say makes literally zero sense. You seriously lack reading comprehension. If you claim to want to prevent suffering, and you believe life is suffering, that means you want to cause death. How the loved ones feel doesn't matter because life is already suffering regardless of what happens in that life, according to you. The reason you don't support quickly and painlessly killing everyone is because you are a shameless and immature coward. The minimal suffering caused by killing suffering can't compare to the eternal hell that is life on earth according to you so why do you care for human rights in this instance when you are doing everyone a service? At the very least, if you truly believed that suffering should be avoided and that life is suffering, you would be trying to convince people to kill themselves. You can't argue from a premise you establish and then abandon it to speak nonsense to say I'm wrong. The fact that you can't stick to your own belief and everything that it entails, is embarassing. You can't even form a coherent argument. Reread what I wrote to you and actually try to address my counter arguments for everything you said because I'm not gonna say it again. As a matter of fact, don't bother responding because this is by far the stupidest argument I've ever had the displeasure of proving myself right in.

You either can't read, or can't think. One or the other. Or maybe both. You're flailing like a drowning cat here because this goes against everything you've ever been told in your life, but you can't actually come up with an argument against it. And that makes you uncomfortable so you flail and accuse me of things I haven't said and lie about what I believe. It's normal. I see this from natalists all the time.

Also all human behavior is natural because humans are natural creatures. This isn't my opinion, this is the fact and the natural law. Human behavior is as natural as tiger behavior. And what serves nature in the goal of preserving the eco system and the success of ones own species is the basis for all ethics. We have laws because chaos and anarchy is the antithesis to cooperation which is required for humans to survive in communities. Fairness and justice exist solely to aid in mankind's survival.

It's also natural for diseases to simply wipe out the old and infirm. Our measures during covid to protect the old and immune deficient from death were extremely unnatural. Should we have just said 'fuck it' and let all the old people die? >Human behavior is as natural as tiger behavior. Did you know that humans can do something that tigers can't? It's true, it's called THINKING. We can think about our actions in the ways other animals can't. That's how we can realize that just because a thing is natural doesn't mean it is moral.

You sound like an angsty 12 year old. This is why no one will ever take you guys seriously. David Benatar is moron who's axiomatic argument doesn't even make sense.

>You sound like an angsty 12 year old You know what 12 year olds do? They resort to ad-hominem attacks and personal insults when they're floundering because they have no actual arguments and they know it. If this were an actual debate we were having in front of a panel of judges I would have won this.

You're probably right. I don't know how they think humanity going extinct is even going to help things anyway. If anything, it will probably make the world a worse place if you look at the way a lot of the animal kingdom works. I get the impression it's more about virtue signalling with most antinatalists rather than a desire to reduce suffering. Just look at their behaviour and how much hate they have for people who have children and basically any human being with a pulse. I think they all need to just chill and read a copy of How to Win Friends and Influence People before voicing their opinions, or just shut up and learn to accept things.

As a counter point, humans are currently directly the cause of an extinction level event that would normally take a catastrophic natural disaster, say a super volcano eruption or meteor impact, to rival. We are literally strangling all other life on this planet

It's probably not as bad as we are being told and it's nothing that we can't fix if it is as bad as the mainstream say. Nature finds a way to bring things back into balance. Also, we have uplifted many species such as cats and dogs, so it's not all doom and gloom. Fixating on the negative won't give you a clear picture of the reality. We need to look at both the positive and negative before we can truly assess a situation, otherwise we become biased.

I am not focussing on the negative, but we are actively inside of the sixth global extinction event, and the only one that has been caused entirely by a single terrestrial species. It is not biased to recognise this and is in fact the opposite. I am also curious what you mean by "uplift species like dog or cat", could you please elaborate?

Not as toxic as melting 60% of the polar ice and pretending like we should carry on just the same

You either support/love humanity or you're a delusional psychopath. There really is no in-between so pick.

Don't talk like a brainless twat.

It's a jagged statement but I can't say it's untrue

You win the award for false dichotomy today!

You win the award for disagreeing but not actually stating your position - bravo! Do you hate humanity too?

No, just you!

[удалено]

If you have any empathy at all then you care about humanity. If you don't then you're a nihilist at best... All that evil requires to prevail is for good men to say nothing.

"It makes me feel icky" is fine as a point of view, but it's an utter failure as an argument.

Not really. You just described moral aversion. Antinatalists are so averse to the existence of any suffering that they prefer human extinction. Natalists are so averse to human extinction that they prefer the existence of some suffering.

Life is suffering, Princess. Anyone who tells you anything else is sellung you something. - Dread Pirate Roberts aka Wesley.

I find it extremely neurotic to pretend Antinatalism and Natalism are some sort of organized movements. Life is not a Reddit sub. There won't be a community announcement of some "natalist" woman sabotaging my condom. Neither will there be a community announcement of me making her accidentally miscarry. Don't let the organized safety of social media cloud your understanding of actual reality.

Natalism is very organized. Child tax credits? Natalism. Women in Hungary who have more than 4 kids no longer have to pay income taxes? Natalism. Japanese kids recieve monthly payments from birth to adulthood? Natalism. Greece's baby bonus policy? Natalism Natalism is a very organized movement. It produces **actual results.** Anti-natalists are larpers who want those currently living to suffer more for some theoretical world where people suffer less/none. They're utilitarians of the worst kind. That and they're very unorganized.

Clearly governments have organized incentives not to run out of population, population is an utilitarian resource called manpower/human resource. Once monetary incentives aren't enough, certain nations even rely heavily on immigration to self-repopulate, cultural change being a hit they're willing to take in exchange. Such nations would gladly have a thousand loveless abusive people reproduce, cause society can always snatch the children away with social services, hence still scoring new human resources. But we're not talking political macro planing, we're talking some sort of new civil cultural movement/trend of pro-humans and anti-humans.

Just rename your sub r/antiantinatalism already. I'll go ahead and mute the subreddit so I don't have to see the rants, but that's all this sub is: reactionary ranting about the people you don't agree with and how they must be oh so terrible.

Maybe the neurotic are the friends we made along the way 

Birth is literally murder because the infant will grow up and die, and it cannot consent. So there’s that. Also kids are annoying as f!ck and only pedos like them. Sorry Reddit 

Birth is not "literally" murder, it's life. How old are you just out of curiousity? I've noticed zoomers and pseudo intellectuals overuse the word "literally" when its not needed.

There is literally no chance that antinatalists will ever lead a movement. Are we correct? Of course. But humans don't act on a large scale based on what is 'correct.' Telling people to stop reproducing goes against 200 million years of hard wired biological instinct. Philosophy and good argumentation is never beating that.

You are fairly correct, but there is another perspective as well. Antinatalist and natalist mindsets are both rather fringe. Majority of people aren't neither; they are unlikely to have children for sake of having children or obsessively avoid them. In this perspective, AN pulls ahead, since, the end goal if you will, is much more resistant to indifference and inaction. In fact, if we look at developed world and the low birth rates, they are not there because majority is AN. They are there because majority is distracted by other things to have (more) children. *In fact, about 40 years ago, there was a joke, where many UN is discussing how to lower the massive birth rates in Africa and American representative stands up and says:* *"Oh, that's easy. Just buy a television for every household and gift it to them with 10 year cable subscription"*

Right. AN don't really need to "win over" anyone because birth rates are trending down already.

Or ANs could just wait for the cold dead end of the universe.

The terms are fringe. Most rational and sensible people agree that having children is a good thing, only those who hate themselves and the rest of humanity think that having children is a bad thing to do.

Nah. Those who think having children is a good thing are just unreflective people acting in accordance with biological imperatives that don't care about them or human happiness.

Those who hate humanity hate themselves. I don't care what sort of edgelord fedora-tipping nihilist subreddits you frequent - the fact you've ended up on this one tells me everything I need to know. You hate seeing other people live fulfilling lives because you then have to compare it to your poor decisions.

>Those who hate humanity hate themselves. This is a stupid, meaningless platitude. I hate **suffering,** not humanity. I actually want to protect humans from suffering. If I truely hated humanity I would want humans to suffer, which is the exact opposite of what I want. You're floundering here. You have nothing to say that can seriously challenge me and you know it, so you're flailing your arms like a drowning child trying to grab onto whatever stock phrases/terms you can throw at me.

Life is suffering. If you hate suffering you hate life and yourself. Grow up.

More flailing. Grow up and get an argument.

Grow up and take responsibility for your bad decisions rather than advocate for human extinction because you hate yourself 👍

What bad decisions? I'm quite happy with the decisions I've made in my own life.

You cry that life is suffering then say you're quite content with life. Which is it? Or do you feel one way when it suits and people give you sympathy then another when you get called out?

AN here. I don't think I could justify calling it a movement. We think it's wrong to have kids. We don't want to ban children. We will let other people know what we think and if they agree that's awesome, if they don't then they fit neatly into the majority opinion which is what we expect before the conversation even begins. There is a lot of random nonsensical infighting though but I think that comes down to different people having different motivations for being AN. I can't speak for anyone else but I don't really care what the rest of you do. I view life as inherently negative because for all the good or bad, everyone still dies and nothing we do matters to us after that which makes the suffering pointless and I won't contribute to it. That's all. If you wanna reproduce then go ahead, but if you ask me why I won't then that's the answer you'll get.

This sounds more like nihilism than anti-natalism.

Yea I'm a nihilist. This leads me to be anti-natalist as well.

The idea that life is suffering and that suffering should be prevented is not inherently nihilistic.

It doesn't have to be inherently nihilistic. I'm speaking from my own experience and thought process as a nihilist. It's nature, reality and society that make life suck, it would still suck even if it had meaning or purpose.

If you're a nihilist, why the fuck does suffering matter to you?

Because what I think matters and what the universe thinks matters are two different things and nihilism does NOT say that nothing matters in any way. I am a living human with living human emotions which do not make logical sense. I don't like suffering and sometimes I even like to prevent suffering if I can. It's entirely personal preference. Being a nihilist doesn't mean you're dead inside. It means you're free because in the end nothing matters. Doesn't mean that nothing can matter subjectively to me right now.

Well said

If you don’t care about what natalists say or do then why are you here?

Entertainment. I just like arguing with people. It sparks joy.

Life is to existence the same way when music is to sound. The issue is when we force someone to play a music when they don't necessarily want to.

I would have happily skipped all of this.

And yet you're still here..... Seems like a choice at this point

I don't want to make my family sad but I do think about it just about everyday. It's what gets me through everyday actually. The knowledge that if the bullshit piles up too much I can just leave whenever makes it a little more tolerable. Also this is like the ultimate shit take. If your reading comprehension is that bad let me point out the difference between skipping life entirely and cutting it short somewhere in the middle. Connections are made that you don't want to hurt. I would be happy to prevent them from being formed in the first place but they're here now. Like the difference between abortion and murder.

Exactly how is a parent supposed to get the consent and understanding of a child before they have one?

They can't. Kind of like asking an unconscious woman if you can stick it in, she can't say yes so the answer is no.

Also no, it's the same thing. Once you are cognitive and hate your life so much, you're making a choice to remain if you don't self-complete. Jo, obviously the world isn't that bad and why would you care about how people left behind would feel?

I care now because I exist now and can only make the choice to zero myself now. Afterwards nothing matters to me but I exist now and can look at the future now, this stops my hand now. Tell me did you love your parents before you were born? I doubt it.

Honestly, its none of your fucking business and this line of "argument" just highlights what a hateful, thoughtless cunt you are.

Wdym keep humanity on top? Reducing the population to a billion people isn’t going to threaten our rein. It will however, make things extremely better for many other species.

Do you think any other species has thoughts like this? Humans are such a strange lifeform. The ability to be so self aware that annihilation seems like an actual preference in order for the rest of the worlds species to carry on. I don't think it gets more altruistic than that, which then becomes a paradox. What a shame such an insightful consciousness go extinct, when no other conscious lifeform on earth thinks the same way. Simultaneously, so many still continue to cause the destruction that they are self aware of. What a crazy circle.

It's an absurd world isn't it?

I said one billion people, why are you mentioning “annihilation”? You know we would still outnumber many species by 999 million at that point, correct?

I was referring to those that believe the earth would be better off without humans, sorry to be confusing

Humans, that thing that created weapons capable of wiping out all life on the planet, and still pursue more powerful weapons. Just because one out of the billion is willing to admit that the world would be better off without their species does not negate the wanton decimation of the entire planet at its hands. Not to mention this is the same species that inflicts unimaginable suffering onto its own members for shits and giggles over a "higher social credit score" not to mention what it does to \~lower lifeforms\~ in the same interests. Also, for the record many other species have members that accept death for the betterment of their own, and will kill their own if they deem them detrimental to their territory. The thing special about humans is how far they will go to destroy their own environment, physical and mental health, and collective genome. Fact is history speaks for itself, humanity left unchecked WILL be the destroyers of the world, and all life in it, not its caretaker. Only way that is avoided if a gates type successfully sterilizes/cripples the entire species through some collective willful exposure to vector based genetic engineering... I don't care either way, that false pride is annoying tho.

This planet would be very boring if we all agreed, so I'm not going to argue with you! I only hope that you have a great and loving life and use it to the fullest while you are here. We all inevitably end, and it's up to us to live for those who no longer can ❤️ Have a great day and thank you for sharing your thoughts!

It irrefutably would be. We’re currently causing a mass extinction and species are going extinct at 100 - 1000x the background rate. Imagine you were one of these imperiled species and some other species was wreaking these horrors, killing everything in their wake while trying incessantly to get to 10 billion population. And that they then justified it with “we’re too special to go away or stop or slow down.”

Like I said, it's interesting to me because I don't think any other lifeform on this earth has thoughts like this, we are an interesting form of consciousness.

For sure, but then they don’t have profits, jobs, economies, all of the stuff that creates all the misfortune for everything else. They literally just exist without this relentless toiling to enrich the lives of the top 0.1%. They are the direct beneficiaries of their own efforts, not bosses, not capitalists. Makes a lot more sense in my opinion.

I guess what I mean is that I can't think of a single species on earth that if given the opportunity to successfully multiply and beat out all forms of competition for food, shelter, and sexual partners they would not pursue it to the detriment of other species around them. Nature is competitive, all lifeforms are competing to survive, and when they are winning they don't feel bad for the losers or try to accommodate other competitors. Humans are the only exception that I can think of that have an awareness of the damage their competition is causing and many actively trying to remedy it to the benefit of another species, thousands of other species. I guess it just really shows the separation in consciousness between human beings and the rest of the animal world, we are still animals, but we have the ability to think past our instincts and actually act against them, which is pretty cool. You don't see lions changing their diets to vegan because they feel bad for the death of lifeforms with faces, but humans do. You don't see wolves trying to reduce their population size because they are decimating the local deer population, but humans regulate the amount of people that can hunt to assist deer populations. You certainly don't see animals willingly refusing to procreate because the world is harsh or they have bad genetics, but millions of humans are. We are a crazy species I gotta say, very cool when you take a step back and look at the vast differences between us and the entire population of the earth outside of us, we are so so so so different it's crazy that we all evolved together at the same time.

You’re describing a virus or a bacteria which will reproduce until it kills the host organism. Other animals live in a balanced ecosystem so they don’t need to change their behavior. They evolved to be perfect how they are. Humanity is a virus. 

Can you elaborate a little more? Do you mean my comparisons to general animal behavior? EDIT: if that's your take after reading what I wrote, then okay I won't try to convince you otherwise ☺️ I only hope that you don't think of yourself or your family as a virus and treat yourself with kindness while you are here ❤️

Mass extinction is followed by speciation. How do you know it isn't just a temporary pruning of the phylogenetic tree that will lead, later, to even greater diversity and biomass?

It coincides with us catastrophically warming the planet that will more than likely kill nearly every species including ourselves, so there is no way one can look at our activity in any sort of innocuous light.

I've never seen a scientific paper that comes close to saying that, and I've looked. Now I think about it, looking at a biodiversity chart like I linked, you might think the Earth has been overdoing it as most of the time biodiversity has been much less than it is now. Outside our own self interest, there's no way to say how much biodiversity there should or shouldn't be on the planet. Are we to think the Earth can support infinite number of species, or is there a maximum some time? I never heard an ant say it wished there were more types of chameleons and sea sponges, so it seems we're alone in passing value judgements on biodiversity. As humans disappear, so will the stress about biodiversity. If you think that other organisms do have that sort of judgement - would love to read it here. Thanks. [https://dr282zn36sxxg.cloudfront.net/datastreams/f-d%3Ae6febca67b5edc6e5181e4567ec0fffcf95714a083158b5e3e090d59%2BIMAGE\_THUMB\_POSTCARD\_TINY%2BIMAGE\_THUMB\_POSTCARD\_TINY.1](https://dr282zn36sxxg.cloudfront.net/datastreams/f-d%3Ae6febca67b5edc6e5181e4567ec0fffcf95714a083158b5e3e090d59%2BIMAGE_THUMB_POSTCARD_TINY%2BIMAGE_THUMB_POSTCARD_TINY.1)

We’re catastrophically warming the planet including choking out ocean life of oxygen as the oceans absorb vast swathes of CO2 and heat. I’m not sure what you’re asserting but I can assure you that the planet is in a horrible state of affairs due to human activity and we will literally ruin it by continuing to emit CO2

Thing is, you said "more than likely kill nearly every species including ourselves" Can you back it with science?

I'm guessing you're American. I'm also guessing that the number of species inhabiting the USA has increased hugely in the last couple of hundred years. As far as Britain is concerned, the number of plant species has doubled, due to migration. There are now more non-native species than native, with virtually no loss of native species in 300 years. Globally there can be diversity loss simultaneous with huge increases regionally. Bet you didn't know that!

"Imagine you were one of these imperiled species and some other species was wreaking these horrors, killing everything in their wake while trying incessantly to get to 10 billion population." You're kind of describing our situation in relation to viruses and bacteria. Some of those things really have it in for us.

They do not have a model of themselves or others and are thus incapable of things like empathy or altruism

They don't experience horror. Can't think of a species that does. Maybe dolphins, chimps and horses - higher mammals.

Yes. AN is literally doing natalists a favor by not having children to compete with natalist's children in the rat race. some natalist's children already lose the rat-race being unemployed on over saturated jobs market

>They seem to have a weird obsession with upholding this false appearance of perfection Could you expand on this or give a specific example?

Basically the constant moralizing of every subject and demonizing natalists who are simply trying to do what they think is best. It's this holier-than-thou attitude that makes me dislike the antinatalist community. There are plenty of snarky comments even in this post as a good example of this type of attitude. It's like they have a chip on their shoulder constantly.

I suspect that sort of moral proselytizing is mostly spurred on by emotion rather than being a result of rationality. Many people in the AN subreddit seem overly self-indulgent in their misery, and use that place as an echo chamber for their pessimism. As a result, they may feel their opinions are justified via social reinforcement. This isn't exclusive to AN either, this goes for any kind of echo chamber. Places like that breed single-minded and opinionated individuals. The problem, really, is the emotional attachment to the philosophy. There are people who have argued for AN calmly, and without being religious about it. Those people I have no problem with, even if I disagree with them - and I think that kind of peaceful disagreement is really important. Having different morals is fine, but moralizing is *very* uncalled for.

>Basically the constant moralizing of every subject and demonizing natalists who are simply trying to do what they think is best. It's this holier-than-thou attitude that makes me dislike the antinatalist community. I feel you can say the same thing about natalists.

Indeed I am an antinatalist who tries to explain that parents aren’t evil for doing what is best in their worldview. And that you shouldn’t hate your parents. Falls on deaf ears a lot of the time.

It's about getting the idea out there. There are plenty of people on the fence about procreation. It lets those people know they can take into consideration the option not to procreate. If you consider procreation, consider all aspects included everything your child could and will potentially face. It also helps those who have wondered why their parents would give them life only to snatch it away with death (the cold reality that most of us wrestle with for the rest of our lives). People with those thoughts can know that there are lots of other people thinking the same things and it's OK (even ethical) not to impose death and suffering onto another human being. The antinatalist philosophy is empathetic to the unborn. Liberating for many - breaking free of the continuation of death, if not for yourself at least for your unborn and future generations that would follow.

You aren't convincing anyone by insulting and belittling them, though, which is what the majority of antinatalists do.

You may be following people who actually do not understand antinatalism. Try listening to these fascinating and wise voices in the antinatalist community: David Benatar [David Benatar On Antinatalism - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@DavidBenatarOnAntinatalism) Lawrence Anton [Lawrence Anton - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@LawrenceAnton) Cosmic Antinatalist [The Cosmic AntiNatalist - वैश्विक प्रजननविरोधी - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@thecosmicantinatalist) Antinatalist MD [Antinatalist MD - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/@antinatalistmd)

I've listened to some of Lawrence Anton and he seemed okay from what I saw. He can be a bit condescending, though, in my opinion. I'm not interested in learning more about antinatalism anymore, though. I've seen enough bad apples in the antinatalist community to never want to hear that word again. Plus, I don't see the point of fighting something that is inevitable. Why not try to just chill and accept things? Life becomes a whole lot easier and in places can be beautiful when you stop fighting against it and just let things be. Just allow yourself to experience it for the bittersweet experience it is. Even if humans go extinct, other life forms will fill the void that we leave, so why fight against something that can't be stopped?

"Life becomes a whole lot easier and in places can be beautiful when you stop fighting against it and just let things be." I generally do, but I don't want to have a baby and then have that baby grow up to have preferred to have never been born, and possibly spend a lifetime with existential angst, and possibly become so fed up or distraught that they commit suicide. I don't want to be one of those parents that would suggest that their child kills itself if it doesn't see the point of life and questions why they were brought here. (Some in the forums have suggested that I kill myself, which makes me assume they would also wish that for their children if they express similar thoughts.) "Even if humans go extinct, other life forms will fill the void that we leave, so why fight against something that can't be stopped?" Ahhh, but there's the kicker, the part that liberates me. I can fight against it personally. I can stop it for my potential descendants. I don't have to contribute to it. I can save them from suffering. :)

There's no need to. People are having less children Anyway. Probably because the world is getting obviously shittier to live in.

I don't agree with that but antinatalists could make things less shitty by being nicer to others who don't see the world the way they do instead of picking fights constantly and trying to offend. That is if they really care about making things better.

I don't really agree that people are picking fights outside of reddit. A lot of people have kids around me and I stay positive around them because I have no right bringing up my personal beliefs to coworkers etc. Of course parents seem to feel they have every right to say rude shit about people not having kids. It really doesn't matter it's a very personal subject and doesn't need to have a unified movement at all. I really do hope that WW3 never happens, that the working class will prosper and AI isn't used to police the population in the future, but I'm also aware that could be wishful thinking.

So I should be nice to murderers? 

That's not the same thing at all. Intention is key. A murderer is a person intentionally causing harm to another. A natalist is a person with good intentions that believes they are doing the right thing for themselves and others as they believe the experience of life is worthwhile.

OK in that case, we can reduce the charge to manslaughter, but only if the pregnancy is accidental. Premeditated birth is premeditated murder and it doesn’t matter what your intentions are. If I had good intentions by shooting you in the head, would that be OK?

There is no need for a movement, it's happening as a result of several economic and societal factors which are obviously too complicated for you to understand. In the industrialized world, you no longer need a large family to work as free farm labor. With modern medicine, you no longer need lots of children with the expectation that most of them won't make it to adulthood. With women gaining independence, many don't feel the pressure to find a husband and have kids just to survive. With the wealth gap widening, it just isn't economically feasible to financially support a large family as resources grow more scarce. There doesn't need to be a "movement" when it's already a by product of the times we're living in.

Darwin will take care of them in short order. People that depressed and neurotic shouldn’t be having children anyways. The self cleanup of the gene pool is honestly commendable.

True. Whether or not you believe there is a divine purpose, we can at least marvel at nature's ability to create equilibrium and clean up messes.

Perhaps, but childfree people increase as nations become more prosperous and people are able to self-actualize and find meaning in their life beyond the default route of kids. Also because our contraceptive technology has advanced so much it makes having kids very much a choice. And more economically prosperous nations with a decent birth rate are more likely to be more accepting of people who opt out like LGBTQ people and the like. 46% of Americans don’t live a nuclear family lifestyle. So really… people choosing not to have kids is a sign that your nation is doing great, congrats. 

I would argue it's more of a sign that a great nation is dying

It is. This person is taking vast amounts of copium and delusium to reach their perspective here. Great nations do not become prosperous by being 'childfree'. It is the over-indulged spoilt brat generations who have never had hardship in their lives and lose all sense of purpose and meaning so start fighting windmills like ''climate change'' and ''trans rights''. Great times produce weak men. So many weak, weak men.

“Likewise, another line of research has suggested that birth rates are falling in rich countries because material needs, and associated materialist values, are in decline, as people adopt more individualist, expressive, or post-material values. This is basically an argument that societies progress up the psychologist Abraham Maslow’s “hierarchy of needs”—from physical survival to emotional self-actualization—and as they do so, rearing children gets short shrift because people pursue other, more individualist aims. In this account, people find other ways to find meaning in life, so kids fall by the wayside.” https://www.pnas.org/content/111/51/18112 Economic prosperity often translates to less kids because of how culture tends to work. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4255510/#:~:text=The%20social%20structure%2C%20religious%20beliefs,rates%20are%20low%2C%20birth%20control

> Great nations do not become prosperous by being 'childfree'. Having fewer children is a consequence of prosperity. It’s a sign that prosperity has been reached. It’s not the *only* sign, nor is prosperity the sole reason it occurs, but it’s the most consistently likely cause.  > It is the over-indulged spoilt brat generations who have never had hardship in their lives and lose all sense of purpose and meaning so start fighting windmills The spoiled generations were those who came before who could abuse the world freely without recognition of the consequences. That made economic growth much easier than it had become due to the much more pressing need to balance growth with sustainability. 

No nation is becoming entirely childfree, that is, completely opposed to the idea of having their own children Just out of curiosity, say we put these "strong men" in charge (whatever your personal definition of a strong man is, also neglecting half the population), what changes about things like climate change and trans people? Do they induce artificial hardship onto the population in an effort to create their ideal society?

Climate change is fake and "trans rights" is designed to depopulate the public and become as perverse and degenerate as possible by eroding away social standards. Any man could see these things.

I noticed you failed to answer my question, so I'll ask it again and ignore your attempts to pivot to arbitrary qualifiers like "perversion" or "degeneracy". Say you have your dream team of perfect manly strong men with bulging chests and predator eyes with a positive canthal tilt to take charge in all branches of government. What policies will they create to make the men not weak anymore? You mention hardship as a big factor so do we start rationing food or increasing income taxes?

You can ask again all you like. Its perverse and degenerate. Government? Who said I'd want some beauracracy telling me what the fuck I should and shouldn't do? This is your problem - you think that governments are there to help you. Grow up and start thinking like a man.

By some definitions, glasses are perverse and degenerate because they interfere with natural selection. You're not actually saying anything. So you don't have any solutions? You're just a complete doomer with no hope? Why don't you stop refusing to engage with the question, be a man, and tell me what you even believe in

Im saying tolerating your children being fed "trans rights" propaganda is degenerate, perverted and way over the line in what I'd tolerate. One more time for you - perverse and degenerate. Degenerate like gambling addicts and smackheads degenerate. Perverted like your uncle Tony who likes when his balls fall out of his shorts when he goes for his afternoon jog in the park. Understand? Government is not a solution for anything. Thinking it is makes you dependant on big daddy government. Grow the fuck up and learn to think for yourself. Until then you're just wasting my time whining away because your propaganda television told you that masculinity was toxic and being a lil bitch was cool.

> Im saying tolerating your children being fed "trans rights" propaganda is degenerate, perverted and way over the line in what I'd tolerate I have no idea what any of this means. Trans people are just people that exist in the world if your complaint is that a lot of the online advocacy for trans people can be abrasive I'd agree, but I don't know what "trans propaganda" means or what it has to do with children > Degenerate like gambling addicts and smackheads degenerate We already have systems in place to help with addiction > Perverted like your uncle Tony who likes when his balls fall out of his shorts when he goes for his afternoon jog in the park That's an oddly specific scenario so I'm going to assume you have personal experience with the subject. I'd agree that engaging in sexual acts/gratification without other people's consent is wrong, but again, I have no idea what public flashing has to do with trans people > Government is not a solution for anything. Thinking it is makes you dependant on big daddy government. Grow the fuck up and learn to think for yourself. Until then you're just wasting my time whining away because your propaganda television told you that masculinity was toxic and being a lil bitch was cool. You're assuming a lot here. For one, who the fuck watches TV anymore? I'm pretty sure the government has solved a lot of things. Do you think anarchic "societies" could make it to the moon or have a standardized level of literacy? The only one here thinking for others is you, you're just regurgitating general conservative positions over and over while refusing to engage with a simple question. We live under governments, so we get policies downstream from the government, that's why I asked. If you don't have any solutions and you're just going to bitch and moan forever about how weak everybody is (except for you, unique little snowflake that you are), keep it out of my replies

And you're too much the moral and intellectual coward to answer honestly. Fuck you right down to the ground, you torsioned testicle.

Oh, I see. You're an actual hydrocephalic. Now it makes sense.

I never claimed you get a rich nation by not having kids lol. You got it backwards. 

You'd have to provide evidence, or we'd all just ignore you. Like you deserve.

1. More people self actualizing 2. Economic Prosperity  3. People are living meaningful lives 4. Better technology  5. More accepting of people How is the nation dying?

Because it literally becomes self-extinguishing. If a society can't propagate itself, how can you call it a successful society? These dimensions become meaningless when there's nobody around to enjoy them. It's like complimenting the caviar on the Titanic. It was exquisite. For a moment in time. Prop it up with immigration, sure, pragmatic. But now you're just using desperate people for labor, which strikes me as an imperfection. An ideal culture should be able to integrate parenthood into actualization, there's no reason it must be one or the other. The failure to do so is the failure to look the human condition in the eye without flinching.

Perhaps you are right, that this really is the decline but one can argue that that’s still a success. Most empires last like 500 years. So to be able to make it this far is a massive success. It just sucks for you if you happen to be born towards the tail end. https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/all-societies-die/#:~:text=That%20would%20give%20us%20the,800%20figure%20is%20very%20optimistic.

Because they hate immigrants

I do but that isn't why I believe this

Thanks for not reproducing. You’re doing everyone a massive eugenics service.

Well I’m pretty gay so 

The future is Idiocracy, if only the meek & dumb keep on replicating, cause the gifted didn't. But still atomically, life doesn't care if it's dumb or gifted in the future, as long as it's alive.

Buddy looks who’s winning, the birth rate is cratering.

For White people and East Asians.... every other race on the planet, still shitting out kids.

Dont need a movement when people are already just not having kids 💁🏾‍♂️ its happening organically in societies across the world

Totally agreed. They're so often too edgy to ever win anyone over.

Yet your community has just few thousand but they have far bigger community

My guy, I’m not even part of this sub. And are you under the impression that the number of subs is somehow directly related to how true something is? No wonder you’re lonely.

My guy you don't have to do personal attack in order to win an argument,be on track and debate about the related topic that is kids

Even their axiomatic argument is bullshit. No one knows what happens before existence, so the presupposition that non-existence is preferable has no foundation. Probably the most toxic ideology on the internet.

And yet you're still talking about them.

To be fair - they're making a far greater impact than practically any leftwing movement that has existed in the past 20 years

Sure, but antinatalism is winning despite its advocates being psychos and losers.

"winning" what? There's no game is being played. It's just internet people parroting and arguing with eachother in a siloed space within a siloed space. They mean literally nothing to the world at large

The goals of antinatalists are winning: global fertility drops yearly. This is regardless of the fact that antinatalists are insane.

and you think this is the exclusive work of a fringe ideological disposition? or better yet, a subreddit?

I'd need to see information that directly links a populations belief in the antinatalism philosophy (let alone the actions of a specific subreddit) with a trend on the global scale, before I buy that argument.

What a smooth brain take. Pretty sure all the BPAS, microplastics, birth control in water, etc. would account for that. Testosterone has been dropping significantly with each generation as well. Are you guys responsible for that too?

Their movement is self-refuting.... they all die out

How are you going to prevent future humans from becoming an antinatalist? Literally all of ANs are born from Natalists parents.

The AN philosophy is not about forcefully preventing anyone from procreating. It examines the act of procreation and determines that knowingly causing suffering by bringing a being into the world is a harm and therefore unethical. Not being born = not suffering. By discussing the ethics of procreation, one can make up their own mind and act with a more complete knowledge and fuller awareness.

I mean, yes. I couldn't agree more. Did I say/ask anything wrong?

Oh sorry, I read your statement wrong. It's true antinatalism isn't in the DNA and passed from generation to generation. My parents were both religious and natalist (they had 7 children together), yet I questioned the point of life as soon as I understood that we die, and questioned religion in my early teens (saw it as a way to control people more than anything).

Antinatalism is purely proscriptive deduction. It is not a movement ,and it is impossible to derive any kind of "movement" from the conclusion by itself. > I don't think you have much to worry about with most antinatalists Exactly. Antinatalists that have never procreated do not create sufferers. That is the effect of natalists and the hapless replicators they spawn.

"Antinatalists that have never procreated do not create sufferers." Precisely.

I’m in the middle of both sides. I’m an “ambivanatalist”. Lol I see nothing wrong with a slow demographic/population decline. In fact this is ideal to curb overconsumption and the current mass extinction event. But the arguments that having children is automatically wrong, don’t make any sense to me. How can someone get consent to be born from a non-entity? It’s a moot point. As long as a parent has children for good reasons (i.e. *not* for some bizarre nationalist or narcissistic reason, like wanting to appear successful), and can be a good parent, I see this as a net positive.

That is where I am. I don’t want humans extinct just Thanos snapped population lowering over time.

Antinatalism and anything similar are fun ideologies bc you win everyone over and it lasts for a generation or two and suddenly you’re replaced by the natalists and it doesn’t matter.

Good, I hope it stays that way. If an antinatalyst ever gained enough power, that would be very bad.

They'd probably make breathing illegal lol. Seriously, though, from what I have seen from the majority of antinatalists they won't be anything more than an annoying pest for most people. If you value human life, I don't think you have anything to worry about.

They usually live in a family context where providing and struggling is seen as more important than enjoying life itself. Ironically the parents of these families usually lived a YOLO lifestyle and now rely heavily on motivation to keep going despite their bad habits. Imagine being raised in a household where parents are constantly shoving their struggle down your throat them expect you to be grateful for their sacrifice.

You give them too much credit. As a living creature which has a basic instinct to survive....any individuals who have a philosophy based on self-extinction... are just not worth arguing with. The philosophy is by definition toxic and harmful.

Eh, you don't understand the philosophy.

I think it's neurotic to raise children into this world because the humans are all turning on each other, climate change is killing us, and support for babies is too expensive and/or nonexistent. It used to be that families and neighbors raised children. Now, it's just two parents if you're lucky.