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Comment by Barrin92 | Hacker News Reader

for the overwhelming majority the issue is raising a kid, not conceiving one. And given Japan's fairly unique aversion for kids outside marriage (I think it's like 2% compared to 40% in the US or Europe), this is almost completely cultural.

If you're facing the choice of not having kids or being delegated to married housewife a lot of women across East-Asia just choose to not want one. Understandable, really.

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"Men in Japan do fewer hours of housework and child care than in any of the world’s richest nations. That keeps women from getting better jobs and holds back the economy."

Slightly old but relevant piece from the NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/02/world/asia/japan-working-...

Having kids outside marriage is frowned upon in general in any civilization, and marriage correlates strongly with having children. Also a contemptuous view of "housewife" shows a disregard for how demanding motherhood is (or fatherhood is, for that matter). This is a worldwide problem, save maybe for Africa, something we also see in the liberal West. People have just become comfortable and hedonistic. Having children is not comfortable. It is demanding. It requires thinking of someone other than yourself (as does marriage, also affected by this mentality). Given the choice between a nicer house and another child, many today in the West would choose the house. Consumerism, hedonistic views of sex, keeping up with the Joneses, all these contribute to reduced birth rates. Japan is clearly about as demoralized as the West, whatever the precise causes.

Clearly in your civilization anyway. One that apparently didn't include studying anthropology at any point.

Is it typical of the conservative line these days, to just repeat their antique notions and insist everybody agrees, despite evidence? It would seem so, in media anyway.

Nothing wrong with being a married housewife. It’s callous to write with a connotation that suggests there is. In fact the best argument is that children need and should have their mother around as much as possible especially in their formative years. Children aren’t a status symbol or a car or a pet.

Some women want to be housewives, some don't. You're reading a very strange connotation into the OP's comment.

There is something wrong with being forced to live any kind of life you don't want. If you don't want to be a housewife then being forced to be one if you have a child is objectively awful. Japanese women have spoken, they'd rather work than have children if it means being chained to a home. Honestly even Japanese men are spoken. The gender expectations around having children aren't pleasing for them either. No one likes being forced into a life they don't want. If all it takes to avoid that is not having kids it appears many in Japan can overcome biological drives and do that.

This is from the children's point of view, and people-who-want-more-people point of view, but doesn't consider at all the person's point of view who would be making most of the sacrifices, which is the "married housewife."

Having a stay at home parent is great. Nothing wrong with a stay at home parent. Although it would be better if it was a man.

The average man has greater physical strength than the average woman, and household chores involve lots of non-automated tasks (lifting laundry baskets, etc). Plus, it is unlikely, but if there’s a burglar, men can typically put up a better fight.

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