Hacker News Reader

Comment by pmoriarty | Hacker News Reader

I don't have children, but my concern for children makes me not want to be in any position of responsibility for them.

I've considered becoming a teacher before, and one of the reasons that I didn't was that I just didn't want to be responsibility for the welfare of children. If something ever happened while they were under my care, I'd feel horrible if something happened, even if it wasn't my fault. Not to mention the liability in the eyes of parents, who can be less than reasonable when it comes to their children.

I've also refused to take care of children of friends and family, for similar reasons.

Finally, I've decided not to ever have children of my own, once again partly because I just don't want the responsibility, and partially out of a concern that I'd probably just screw it up somehow. Not to mention that the world is way overpopulated as it is, and it doesn't need me adding yet another person to the mix.

View on HN

>I don't have children, but my concern for children makes me not want to be in any position of responsibility for them.

To be fair everyone feels this way before having kids. No one is a perfect parent and there is no particular point at which anyone is "ready" to take care of kids. But that being said I think just having that thought is far beyond the consideration that most people put into having children. It comes down (generally) to a selfish desire of simply getting something that you "want", rather than thinking through the consequences of creating another human being.

And yet 40% of kids in the US are born to parents who are irresponsible enough that they didn't intend to get pregnant. By and large they survive. Kids are sturdier than they look and designed to alert you to their survival needs. For example, you can forget to feed a dog, but it's almost impossible to forget to feed a kid.

Yes kids survive these situations but sometimes the result is they become shitty humans. Just keeping a kid alive is not parenting.

I doubt there is much correlation between whether your parents are careless/careful and whether you are a shitty human.

Really? You know that abused children are much more likely to become abusers when they are older right? https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11731348

Not only is there correlation but there is causation. And it applies not only to sexual abuse but to physical and emotional/mental abuse too.

So yes, having shitty parents is more likely to result in children turning into shitty adults. It's not a foregone conclusion but the odds are not in the child's favour.

But we're not talking about parents who are abusers, we're talking about parents who aren't that responsible.

Neglect is a form of abuse.

https://www.gov.uk/report-child-abuse

> What to report

> Child abuse includes physical, sexual and emotional abuse, and neglect. You can read more about the signs of child abuse.

I was responding to your point that "by and large they survive". I agree they survive but how they turn out is related to how they are brought up and so I dont think that we should be setting the bar as low as "they survive".

I don't see what you're trying to get at. Are you saying that people who get accidentally pregnant are more likely to be child abusers? My post was in response to someone who was worried he was too forgetful, etc, to take care of a kid. The fact that some people are "too child abuser" to raise a kid is a red herring.

It's amusing to me read this, because I think someone like you who truly understands the undertaking of taking responsibility for someone would make an amazing parent.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com