Hacker News Reader

Comment by michelsedgh | Hacker News Reader

You can do whatever you want and I can criticize you for it. Most of people who I’ve seen that don’t have children, when they get old have an emptiness inside them and not much to look for. When they’re younger they think they’re gonna be okay, but we usually don’t know if we feel the same way a few minutes from now, how can you say no I won’t feel that way 30-40 years from now? I hope the writer of this article be happy and fulfilled but I still don’t understand for myself any of their points. Shrugs Edit: Also, you can have a business and travel the world and still raise a child, as people have done since beginning of history, its not either or I feel like. It would even make it more fun some might say.

View on HN

Try not to generalise. I know plenty of people who dont have kids. We are older, we know how this pans out. If you dont have kids bc all you want to do is party and be trivial then thats ok but might not be the best reason. But if youve never seen yourself as a parent and youre kind of not really part of that usually more conventional type of life then it's probably totally logical. I know several couples who are ex musos and have lived together for decades but chose not to have children. They are as happy as anyone else. So am I.

I’m very glad its working out for you :) Although I wonder if you and your friends are in the minority or the majority.

On the other side of the coin, there's a subset of parents that regret having children. Check /r/regretfulparents

I think we don't hear much about the people that hated having children because is not culturally accepted in society to expose that view.

Yeah it’s important to be ready to have a child, be financially and mentally stable. Also you can argue they hate having children, but if they didn’t, they would be more unhappy. Raising a child is very hard work and time consuming so ofc a lot will hate having them, but I wonder if you ask them 10,15 years from now, what would they say? Most parents I saw that had an unexpected child after many years are very happy about having them.

> Also you can argue they hate having children, but if they didn’t, they would be more unhappy.

I have the feeling this is a type of logical fallacy but I can't pinpoint which

> I saw that had an unexpected child after many years are very happy about having them.

It can be genuine happiness. But also it could be what they tell themselves. Because, what would be the other option? Not like they can backtrack. So better to tell themselves that they are happy with kids rather than suffer the cognitive dissonance.

This is hard to prove anyway, but is not unheard of that people lie to themselves to feel better with their past decisions.

> I have the feeling this is a type of logical fallacy but I can't pinpoint which

Although not a logical fallacy, "choice-supportive bias" might do:) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice-supportive_bias

It's also true having kids is a major lifeshift that may not turn out how you hoped and you'll end up with plenty of emptiness inside you.

People report they gained from having to 'move up a level', without kids you are someone's son or daughter and that's it. Having kid(s) you become someone's father or mother as well which changes you hopefully for the better.

Someone has to pop the next generation out. They will look much like whoever did that. They won't look or think like the ones who decided to sit it out.

I think most childless people (like me) would want them, but there's no way to possibly finance even a single one. Even with a relatively high paid job, at least if you want it responsibly.

I think the root problem that this article is talking about is the reasoning you had for responding like that. It's way too meta, it would require too much introspection for you to understand, but try to imagine that the point the person is making is to express the frustration with people who can not accept the decision not to have children. Who therefore feel compelled, at all times, to question the decision not to have children, to make the argument for children, to express unsolicited "worry" about the future happiness of a person without children, etc.

Put a different way, the widespread phenomenon of the behavior you just demonstrated, is what is being pleaded against (unsuccessfully in your case). Perhaps that helps you to understand why "but children are great" is missing the point they were trying to make.

The person isn't asking "should I have children?", ask yourself, (and everyone else who responded like that) why you responded as if they did.

Most of the people I've seen that do have children are extremely miserable for the first couple thousand days and then moderately miserable for the next decade.

So what, probably our sample is not representative.

My pet peeve is when parents tell me (or other people who can't actually have children), that "you'll never know until you haven't experienced it". I grew to think this is the most toxic behavior, triggering FOMO, overstepping boundaries and so on.

Now that I saw these failed parenthoods, I understand that this toxicity comes from their own misery, to justify their life choices. Well, they'll never know how it is to explore the world and be happy and content on your own in your thirties-forties until they'll experi... Oh wait, they won't.

And don't even get me started with the "at least you have a choice to adopt" line, which, since it's not YOUR BLOOD, doesn't count. All those looks on their faces... Sigh.

Look, not caring for anyone is always going to be easier than caring for someone.

I think becoming a parent has helped me a lot in a million ways. You actually have a reason to advance, a reason to do stuff for others. It helps that there's just no way out. Plus I've been part of layoffs twice in about 20 years. Most things in life can and will collapse, including work, your social group at work (amongst other reasons because employers have somehow convinced employees of the "need" to keep secrets, resulting in a tension that will always be there when I work for one company and they work for another). Family doesn't collapse half as easily. The only friends I kept over 20 years I got in high school or at the latest university, and even that group is slowly bleeding dry.

> helped me a lot in a million ways

Again, some people figured how to live a life with fulfilment, being content, having a purpose, but without a kid. In fact, what worries me a lot that some people think the kid is the ultimate solution. And that is really, really bad and unfair to many involved (family, partner, and eventually the kid themselves)

> Family doesn't collapse half as easily

You'd be surprised. Mine did, and in the region I'm from, did many, too. In fact, the modern invention of a nuclear family is more brittle than some want to accept.

With truly a lot of sympathy, I encourage you too, to try to think outside your bubble. I am happy for each one of those around me who manage a life with their babies and new family.

But this "you'll never know until" mentality is very toxic and the ones repeating it don't realize it's true vice versa.

- - -

All the other issues you mention (jobs, friends come and go) are also generalization, and certainly didn't apply to me or many others, thus, not a proof of anything.

I think you don’t know anything in life until you try it. Goes both ways for having children and not having children. You won’t know until you’re old and then see if you are happy or not.

> You'd be surprised. Mine did, and in the region I'm from, did many, too. In fact, the modern invention of a nuclear family is more brittle than some want to accept.

I get it. Some families fail. People get really angry about that, and I understand why. That doesn't mean it will never succeed (and frankly, a failed family is imho, in quite a few ways, still better than no family at all).

I'm pretty damn sure the "mass families", or however you want to call it, so big that kids only really had other kids as parents, that came before were a LOT worse than a nuclear family.

My main point is that there's a strong motivation to keep a family going. And that is a huge part of what keeps me stable. I think it's a necessary part of keeping me stable.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com