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Comment by gozur88 | Hacker News Reader

I wonder how big a role obesity plays in all of this. It may be that teens are having less sex because so many of them have effectively taken themselves out of the sexual marketplace.

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C'mon - when I was a teenager I would've had sex with the crack of dawn if I knew it was interested. I doubt anyone capable of getting pregnant is truly 'off the market' for every teenaged boy in their vicinity.

It's more likely that popular representations of teen pregnancy in the media gradually taught enough kids that having a baby in their teens will seriously screw up their life. You only need to see one episode of Teen Mom to know that's nowhere you want to be.

I hate to break this to you, but obese people have sex too.

Yes, but not as much.

Im mobile, and cant find sources atm, but doesnt obesity correlate to lower fertility rates as well?

Not in my experience.

Okay where's the data or are you just conjecturing on normalized societal "standards"?

As a former fat teenager, I can tell you that your hypothesis is falsified by the avalable evidence.

The article was talking about drastic declines in the last 10 years. Childhood obesity rates have been stable for the last 10 years (childhood obesity rates include teenagers).

Are you referring to obesity in terms of attractiveness or ability to conceive?

I'm not parent but I wonder if it could be both? Though I think the former was the original intent but I hadn't thought about the latter.

My wild hypothesis is that teens may be more aware of the rising cost of parenthood and may rationally be avoiding the situation altogether.

Parenthood provides virtually no economic benefit in modern industrial society. More so now, with mobility and weakening of family ties. Children cost a lot, and they probably won't help when you're old. So why bother?

I think you underestimate the extent to which pregnancy was always considered an Unthinkably Bad Thing by teens. And also overestimate the extent to which teens are rational.

I was just thinking in terms of attractiveness. Kids today have an unlimited supply of videos of beautiful people having sex. Not only are their expectations rising, but their choice of attractive mates is falling.

So they'd rather just watch porn than lower their expectations and have some sort of sex?

It's not so much that they'd rather watch porn. It's that porn sets their expectations regarding what sex is and with whom they expect to have sex.

If I'm a 4 and I won't settle for less than an 7 (which is a step down from what porn is teaching me about averages), it's likely I'm not going to father many children.

If you're a 14 year old boy wouldn't you go for pretty much anything you could get?

Yep, that was the case for me. But two things: One, it's not the boys who decide when sex happens, for the most part, and two, the amount of effort a boy (or a man) is willing to put into wooing a woman depends in some part on how attractive she is to him.

Do you think it relates with what's going in Japan?

Hmm that's quite a far fetched hypothesis.

> because so many of them

Is this based on your personal observation or are you referencing some known well established statistical fact.

Surely it's not a secret obesity rates have been rising steadily over time?

The CDC has been reporting decreases in childhood obesity rates over the past decade or so.

So the fattest kids would be teenagers now?

Childhood includes teenagers.

Aside from your main point, don't place all the blame for obese children on the children themselves. Healthy habits start at home.

Seriously? It would have such an absolutely negligible effect that the only thing more conclusive is your bias.

The article mentions that is is mostly believed to be a combination of investment in effective and health programs.

How can you say that with such certainty? People who feel fat don't want to have sex as often.

You don't think that's true?

Note: I said people who _feel_ fat, not people who _are_ fat.

On the other hand, there is evidence showing that overweight teens engage in riskier sexual practices. That's the problem with this who hypothesis - it's nothing more than an ungrounded "Just So Story" with no evidence.

>Seriously? It would have such an absolutely negligible effect that the only thing more conclusive is your bias.

You sound pretty sure of yourself.

Why is that?

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