Is it morally wrong to have children in a world that a person

Yes. But I'll probably still do it anyway.

>>34929826
Yes, it is. Frankly, I'm completely shocked that humanity's focus isn't something like, just destroying the universe as soon as possible. The universe is undeniably evil as fuck and I don't understand how people are just accepting this. Shouldn't we be working hard to end this shit? It's not justifiable that all this unfair pain is allowed to continue. It's incomprehensible to me.

>>34929826
Some children aren't losers.

Also there are a lot of poor, but mostly happy idiots out there. They half ass their work, the watch their sportsball, they drink their beer, and they fuck their fugly wife, and they're ok with it.

>>34929887
>they fuck their fugly wife, and they're ok with it.
And that miserable pittance justifies the endless suffering that others have to endure? What the FUCK is wrong with you? Do you really think it's worth it?

wtf ok

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in my parents case
>life is well shit
>know there's suffering everywhere
>but let's bring a child into our lives so our own lives can be fulfilled and happy
I don't particularly understand it, I mean the lack of forward thinking about that child. What, they just think I'll meet someone and have the same idea? Well; Mom, Dad, I'm a 28yo virgin, so what the fuck do I do now?

>>34929895
>And that miserable pittance justifies the endless suffering that others have to endure? What the FUCK is wrong with you? Do you really think it's worth it?

It's not suffering for most people, cuck. They are too stupid to feel that way. They like their shitty lifestyle and don't care what you think. It's your problem if your parents neglected you and you turned into a bumbling loser.

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When I look at pictures like this I'm amazed that the lucky blessed people who randomly received good lives can even enjoy any of it at all. Don't they think "Ok, that ugly miserable loser could just as easily have been me. Alright. This is fucked. This is shit." How can they even enjoy their lives after seeing someone like that? It's so depressing. I'm not bad off myself, at all, but when I see someone hideous for example, I just think it's all so fucked. It's DISGUSTINGLY unfair. It's genuinely, literally EVIL.

>>34929887
>some children arent losers
Damn that cane out sizzling

>>34929936
>for most people
I know. The point is that it is for some, and the happy people's joy does not justify their suffering.

>>34929887
And many of them will die slow painful deaths from cancer. Or watch their family members do the same. People who aren't losers die terrible deaths. Look at Robin Willliams. Worked hard all his life. Made millions. made people laugh and smile. Had a wife and child he loved. Reduced to hanging himself with a belt.

>>34929865
it won't ever stop because the people in charge are making money off of it

>>34929928
What you need to understand, contrary what parents and the media telling you, making a child has a sole reason: to feed the ego of the parents.

They don't love you when they reach the highest point of their arrogant existence and make a child. They don't even know you then, and you can bet they regret it a million times before you grow up. They don't give a shit about you or the world or muh bible who told them to make children. They want to be gods, creating a life and ruling it.

>>34929895
I never said I thought it was worth it.

I'm just saying they do.

>>34930005
Ok? Good contribution. The sky is also blue. Just saying it is.

>>34929972
Why does suffering need a justification again?
Do we bother justifying the shining of the sun, or lions devouring gazelles?

Pessimistic ppl shouldn't have kids is the vibe I'm getting from this thread.

>>34930016
Does it need more explanation than that?

>>34929895
you've made the vital error of believing that people give a shit about other people. that's not even a dig at normies, i'm the same. can you tell me why, objectively, i should give a shit about another persons suffering if i'm happy? that sounded edgier than i thought it would

>>34930043
The discussion at hand posits that things can have meaning or value, since the OP is asking if it's "moral" or not. Obviously, meaning or value is impossible, but for the sake of this discussion we are pretending that it exists. You saying that nothing matters isn't smart or useful, it's something everyone knows already.

We're trying to be humans here.

>>34929994
>they want to be gods creating life and ruling over it
You certainly have alot of opinions boyo

>>34929928
>>34929994
>Its all mommy and daddy's fault! I hate them!

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>>34930046
Optimistic people are kinda evil for forcing children to come into a world where stuff like this happens. One day you're fine, next you're this.

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good goyim, let the africans do the breeding for you and have mass immigration instead, it's easier

>>34930097
HOL UP

This is the bitch that got her face ripped off by that chimp. In this case she fully deserved it for treating an extremely violent, strong animal as a little babykins human.

My sister treats a little dog like a baby and it makes me sick. Animals like dogs and monkeys aren't human. Women are such dumb fucking trash.

>>34930081
Wow, I cant believe you were actually replying to me considering how off-track your comment was.

Im not saying shit doesnt matter. Im just saying that not all phenomena have moral justifications, since they precede morality. Suffering is like this; it can inform our morality, but the existence of suffering doesn't really demand a justification. Possibly an explanation, yes, but not a normative justification.

>>34930097
That's anecdotal, don't you think?

>>34930130
How the fuck are you going to argue about MORALS and then just say "there is nothing wrong with suffering, it's fine." It's not a discussion then, it's just you saying that morality doesn't or shouldn't exist.

Well, my life isn't very interesting, but that's the choice I made. Life itself could be. I saw some cool stuff under the microscope today. Sometimes, it's the small pleasures.a gf would be nice, though. I'm pretty ronery.

Yes, absolutely.

If you're not brought into existence, you will never suffer. You will never know pleasure either, but you won't have any urge for pleasure, so it doesn't matter. Pleasure itself is nothing more than the fleeting soothing of pain such as fears and urges. If you don't have any fears or urges, pleasure is nothing anyway.

If you're brought into existence, you WILL suffer, guaranteed. You might experience a lot of pleasure, or you might experience very little. Either way though, the pleasure you experience is just easing of your suffering--not some independent thing. It's just like how "cold" isn't really a thing independent from heat--it's just an absence of heat. Anyway, after all the fuss, all the rigamarole, all the jumping through hoops...at the end you will die.

It's just better to cut out the middle man and skip the whole thing.

>If ye unto your sons would prove
>By act how dearly them ye love
>Then every voice of wisdom joins
>To bid you leave them in your loins

-Abdul Al-Ma'ari

>>34930157

>Well, my life isn't very interesting, but that's the choice I made.

Why did you choose that instead of some alternative?

>>34930096

There's no free will, so nothing is really anyone's "fault" in a deep sense.

In some cases it can make sense to hold people pragmatically responsible for things (for example, punishing criminals to recondition them against committing future offenses, or killing someone who wants to murder you in self-defense if there is no other option), but that doesn't mean they should be "blamed" in a profound, fundamental sense. They're just doing what they had to do at the time.

Face it OP, marrying and having a family is great.

And life isn't "full of suffering". Get off your intellectualist high horse.
Life is life. Good shit happens, and bad shit happens.
Only mentally unhealthy people who have been conditioned always look at the negatives of life would say that life is suffering for the majority of people.

The reason why the birthrate in western countries is so low and the depression rates so high is because we have this poisonous culture of pessimism and the need for "objectivity". Everything needs to be questioned and everyone needs to be an intellectual.
Even if you know that something is natural and it makes you happy, like family life, you need to question it until it doesn't make you happy anymore.
And look what the consequences of that are.
Everyone is miserable, nobody wants kids anymore, it's a disaster.

>>34930150
Jeeeeesus CHRIST you are dense.

Did I ever fucking say suffering was good? Or okay? No.
My point is only that suffering, in its general form, which is most often not caused by purely human action, does not exist as a thing that demands a normative justification. Normative means an "ought" claim, as opposed to an "is" claim. So when you ask for a justification, your basically asking something like
"Why ought the sun to shine?"
"Why should lions kill deer?"

Do you see why these questions dont make sense? They arent moral concepts, and hence dont need or demand normative justifications.
"Why should suffering happen?"
Is not a thing you said exactly, but implied in your search for a justification (and not an explanation).
You see why this question is rather silly? The obvious answer is that it just shouldnt, if its under our control. But not all suffering is human caused, and thus suffering in general cannot be questioned in a normative frame. It makes more sense to ask:
"Why does the sun shine?"
"Why do lions eat dear?"
"Why does suffering happen?"

>>34930210
>Life is life
spotted the normie

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>>34930210
>life isn't full of suffering
>it's intellectual to notice the complete depth of pain and anguish that happen to people
>it is mentally unhealthy to notice how much more often bad shit happens than good shit to people
>or that suffering is all that people know

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Its a gamble really, you may give birth to someone who loves his life, or perhaps you give birth to a miserable robot or criminal.

I'd never take that risk myself, maybe adoption if I really feel up to raising someone lol

>>34930268
Don't you think Elliot would have been better off never have been born?

>>34930246
>it just shouldnt, if its under our control
The point is that it is. It's in the very first post. Humans should, at the very least, stop having children, that is under our control. Although I would prefer it if we work toward destroying the entire universe completely, so that no animal or thing will ever suffer again. That would be the ideal scenario. Literally ideal. It's the best outcome possible: nonexistence.

>>34930283

Would have been better for him and those he killed.

>>34930295
I suppose youre right, but that doesnt make humanity a direct cause of suffering. You dont suffer simply because you were born, thats just a necessary condition for suffering. If we take the existentialist route, we suffer because we search for the essence of man and it isnt there, or because we fail to find meaning in our lives. The buddhists think its because of unsatiable desire.

But it makes more sense to solve the immediate cause then go for a roundabout solution that will make the goal of avoiding suffering moot in the first place.

>>34929994
2 things:

first, thats a super edgy post. love it.

second, i think you give the majority of the populace too much credit. they dont really decide to have kids, they dont make a choice. they do it because its just what you do. life has a nice comfy trajectory, and you follow it or you're weird and a loser.
school->job->house->kids->retire->die
thats how the vast majority of people on earth see life. they dont question it because they lack introspection. its 'just what you do'

not for robots though.

>>34930176
I'm a lazy shit. I don't know that it was a conscious decision, but now everything is all built up and I don't know how to start again. I could go find meetup groups or something, but my life is bad enough that more basic things are a higher priority.

>>34930256

>talking about suffering
>using starvingafrican.jpg to illustrate your point

Even people in war torn african countries have good in their lives. Being hungry or destitute doesn't mean people don't have family or faith or purpose

But we aren't in africa, are we?
We are in the first world.
There are very few people in the first world that will ever experience immense suffering.

And I'd argue that even for the rich, the poor, the ugly, the beautiful, the weak, the pwerful...
Everyone experiences roughly the same amount of suffering in their lives.

Have you ever heard of the hedonic treadmill?
No matter how good you get it, or how bad life goes, everyone eventually returns to the same level of happiness.

>>34930450
>everyone eventually returns to the same level of happiness
All the more evidence that it is worthless and that the suffering doesn't justify the fleeting mild happiness you might experience occasionally.

>>34930450
Do you know the average day in the life of that person? They don't have family. They walk from feeding center to feeding center until they can't anymore, die. Only to be eaten by vultures. Many people in those war torn african countries have much more bad in their lives than good. They are raped and beaten by tormenters. Shot if they get out of line.

Here in the first world we have plenty of immense suffering. Violence, murder, poverty, drugs, uncurable diseases. We live long arduous lives. The rates of depression and suicide are on the rise. I'd argue that you are completely wrong when you say everyone eventually returns to the same level of happiness. People with chronic pain and terminal illnesses never return to the happiness they had prior. Robots on this board all admit that they were happier as children.

>>34929826
If you're a depressed cynical bitter little shit like 95% of r9k users are, please don't have children

>>34930520

The happiness justifies the fleeting mild suffering you might experience occasionally.

And it is fleeting and mild.
Your out of control animal negativity bias just makes suffering seem more grand and significant than it is.
Life isn't like that for most people.

>>34930577

Africa is a shithole, but that just paints it worse than it actually is.
Parts of the continent experience times of war and times of peace.
And war time africa is pretty bad, but that doesn't mean that life is worthless just because of those times.

And like I said, we are all in the first world, where even the violence and murder and all the things you mentioned aren't that commonplace.

But, your sensitive negativity bias and your pessimism is making seem like they are omnipresent.

>>34930210

>life isn't "full of suffering"

Yeah, it really is.

>Get off your intellectualist high horse.

Take off your blinders and actually look around you. This world is hell.

You're either blind or just have a low level of sympathy. What I'm saying is, either you don't notice the suffering of others, or you see it, and you're like, "eh", because your brain isn't formed in such a way as to compel you to feel their pain.

>>34930450

>There are very few people in the first world that will ever experience immense suffering.

Oh, bullshit. Your odds of dying painfully of a horrible cancer that will eat you alive, slowly, are about 1 in 3.

Millions of people in the first world struggle with cancer, palsies, mental illnesses, chronic pain, poverty, lameness, the list goes on.

You are blind.

>>34930656

Oh, and by the way, if you have a child, that child will need to consume more resources, and that burden is going to fall on other children in the third world, who are working in factories, breaking their backs for pennies to produce the clothes that your child will wear.

The only reason the "first world" exists the way it does now is because a lot of the nice things we have, we have due to the oppression of the poor, both here and even more so in the "third world".

>>34930210
>intellectualism is bad

go fuck yourself you unthinking troglodyte.

>>34930450

>No matter how good you get it, or how bad life goes, everyone eventually returns to the same level of happiness.

If this is true there is no point in doing anything.

May as well just stop brushing your teeth and let them rot. After all, you'll be just as happy with rotten teeth as with healthy ones.

May as well not work, you'll be just as happy poor as you would rich.

May as well not get friends. You'll be just as happy alone.

>>34930961
>life is full of suffering
Life is full of alot of things. A whole range of emotions and experiences. To limit your focus to only suffering limits your understanding of what it is to be human.

>>34931128

All good experiences in life are simply easing of suffering.

Had an orgasm? It was a relief from sexual frustration.

Your headache went away? Relief from pain.

Play a video game? Relief from boredom.

Find love? Relief from loneliness.

Got rescued before you drowned? Relief from fear.

If you don't exist, you don't have any of these desires, urges, or fears. You don't want or need any of these experiences.

You cannot be harmed in any way, which is good.

You cannot experience pleasure, but since you have no desire for pleasure in the first place (as you had no suffering for the pleasure to alleviate), this is irrelevant.

>>34931128
Suffering is guaranteed to all living creatures.

>>34930210
>Face it OP, marrying and having a family is great.
>Life is life.
spotted the normie, what are you exactly doing here? go to /pol/ or something like that

>>34931176
So you're arguing for non-existence? And dismissing growth and bonds and self fulfillment?

>>34931214
I didn't say it wasn't. Suffering hardly makes life less livable.

>>34931222

>So you're arguing for non-existence?

It's better not to be born, yes.

Think about this. Is a woman better if she has one child she can afford, or 10 children, 9 of whom she can't?

Sure, the kids will have shitty lives, but they got to BE BORN.

So, if being born is so great, the mother who has 10 children has the moral high ground over the one who had one, even though the one who had 1 could have given that child a better life.

Clearly this is ridiculous.

>And dismissing growth and bonds and self fulfillment?

No. Grow, bond with others, and fulfill yourself. Try not to make others suffer as you go about it.

>>34931265
>clearly this is ridiculous
I would agree that the situation you posit is ridiculous. If you look at the average American household you don't see ten kids. The average American suffers a great deal less then the power stricken family with ten kids. It's ridiculous to posit that the average American family is doing a disservice to mankind by breeding within reason.

>>34931374
>poverty stricken, not power

>>34931374

So what you're saying is, you agree that if it comes down to not being born at all, or being born into a family that can't afford to raise you, it's better not to be born at all.

>>34931390
Just because one is born into a bad situation doesn't mean their life will be full of suffering.
I agree that if you're a parent without support structure to help you raise a child, that abortion is an acceptable option, less for the future child's sake than for the unsteady parent.
I agree that life life as a parent without a support structure is fought with pain, frustration, and suffering, but I also agree that those circumstances can create a wonderful, valuable citizen.
It's not binary.

>>34931470

>Just because one is born into a bad situation doesn't mean their life will be full of suffering.

Then what do you mean by "bad situation", if not a situation that will cause their life to be full of suffering?

>I agree that life life as a parent without a support structure is fought with pain, frustration, and suffering, but I also agree that those circumstances can create a wonderful, valuable citizen.
It's not binary.

You're shifting the topic of the discussion.

The point I'm making is that if you're not born, you experience no suffering (good) and you experience no pleasure (neutral).

If you're born, you experience suffering as a guarantee (bad) and you might experience pleasure (possible good).

Good+Neutral > Bad+Possible good.

It's pretty simple.

Those who aren't conceived are not missing out on anything, at all. They have no desires, so "missing out" is not a thing for them.

Those who are conceived and then born will miss out, because they have desires that will go unfulfilled, and even the fulfilled desires are simply reliefs of the urges they were stricken with as penalty for their parents having created them.

Therefore creating a child intentionally is an unethical act. It creates the greater evil compared to not having one in the first place.

>>34930091
Is the grand illusion of people having children out of love and for the gretar good better for you? You can believe it if you want.

>>34930096
Yep it is their fault. Interesting when someone grows up to be famous and rich the parents are always mentioned but when someone does bad things it is just his fault, right?

>>34930370
I never understood why is something edgy when it opposes the dogmas. I don't think I give people too much credit when I talk about how do they gloryfy their animal instincts.

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>>34929826

no, if you are super rich & smart you can make good people of them. if you are poor you can go kill yourself or ger killed by slaving for someone else

>>34931596
>what's a bad situation
Let's go back to the poverty stricken family. Let's say it's a single mom working two jobs to provide for her kids (let's be reasoning say 2-3) and having assistance from family (babysitting, giving rides, picking up from school etc). Her life would be subjectively worse than the children's. She would be busting her ass to provide a comfortable life for them. She will probably push them to better themselves, get an education, make something. Her sacrifice, her suffering aided in providing "a better life" with more opportunity than she had. Her bad experience works as a signpost warning about a bad path, and her determination and will are valuable characteristics to pass down.

Having no suffering or pleasure are both neutral. You would have no desire for one and no fear of the other.
Suffering is bad, but pleasure is more than "possibly good".
Besides the fact that all of those terms can't be accurately quantified because it's subjective.

>>34931869
I'm completely ambivalent to people having kids for whatever reason they want to have kids. It doesn't matter if I believe it, it just matters that they do. I ended up having a kid cause I thought it would be fun. No real greater goal beyond passing down what I know about life and reality to a developing human is fun. You're programming a human that one day will act independently.

>>34929826
Yes. I follow multiple traditions of Buddhism and Hinduism and they consider this reality Hell; so yeah I would never bring a child into Hell.

>>34930961

You are the one with blinders.
You are too enveloped in your chic pessimist worldview to see world for what it is, equal parts good and bad.

>>34930978

>About 1 in 3 will go through a few months of pain at the end of their lives.

Yeah, and close to 100% of people will fall in love, see the birth of their child and raise a family, which brings just about as much happiness as cancer brings suffering. Life is composed of equal parts suffering and equal parts happiness.

>>34931016

Wages in the third world are improving drastically, standards of living are going up, there are some countries in africa where, within a lifetime, they have gone from fretting about famine and starvation to fretting about an obesity epidemic.
This is all thanks to capitalism and western values, which is relieving the oppression of the poor. The world is pretty good.

>>34931072

I don't hate thinking, I just hate this new wave of leftist millenial intellectualism that prizes objectivity over happiness and looking down on people

>>34931115

That's what some Greeks thought a long time ago too. In any case, they didn't get bogged down with pessimism.

>>34929826
In a sense, yes, but morals are based on whats best for society (dont kill your neighbor, dont steal, e.t.c), and continuing society is good for that society as an entity. So you cant really look at it from a moralistic perspective imho, but from the perspective of the societies condition. Like the 3rd Reich was a great society to be born in if you're white, but being born in the [current year] as a whitey isnt probably the best thing.

Either way, giving birth is a selfish act, and a curel one if you give birth and you can't raise the child to be the best they can be. No none asked to be born, no one chose to grow up as a robot, so the least thing these normies could do is let us die when we want. But humans are animals, selfish to keep their body and mind intact.

>>34929865
A world led by thought and philosophy died long ago friend....

>>34929954
I dunno but the guy on the right looks pretty happy

>>34931176

Isn't it just as easy to say that all bad experiences in life are deviations from suffering?

Lonely? It was a temporary deviation from feeling at peace.
Stub you toe? It was a deviation from feelings of wellbeing and calm.
Get an illness? It was a deviation from feelings of health and security.

All suffering is a temporary distraction from a pleasurable baseline.
Its a glass half empty, half full situation.

>>34929826
Yes. Even since I was very young, I could not and still do not logically understand why someone would have a child when life is suffering. While I do not judge those that do it, I feel in most circumstances it is morally wrong.

>>34929865
This describes how I feel.

>>34929994
Youre on the right track there, children is an egotistical and hedonistic thing, natures evolved like that to survive. What truely matters is if that ego and hedonism continues after childbirth. If they expect raising a child to be a great time for them, and they dont respect the challenge and tolerance needed to properly raise a child as its own human being (vs a toy for their ego) you got yourself a problem. Most of the world is like this sadly, parents always projecting onto their child, setting ultimatums, acting like the child is their property to do whatever with. instead of providing reasons and principles for doing things, they just say "im your parent do as I say!" What does that teach? What does that show about the parents and their reasons for having children?

>>34932323
Taught me that being a parent is a meme and that most of our species should be forcibly sterilized.

>>34932364
It taught me that being a bad parent is easy.

>>34932241

>All suffering is a temporary distraction from a pleasurable baseline.

The baseline is not pleasurable, else we would not have to strive. Desires, cravings, and fears come and you then have to struggle against them or suffer the consequences. And struggling doesn't guarantee you won't just end up making them worse.

>>34929865
The answer is simply natural selection. Genes that make their individual want to reproduce will get passed on and proliferate. Genes that make their individual want to perish will end their existence with that individual.

By the physical logic of replicating molecules are the brutal horrors of life and sentience going to propagate themselves forever more, unless a cataclysm ends the basic physical forces that define universe.

You could eliminate all life, every bacterium, but it will do no good. Non-living molecules will again coalesce due to their electronic affinities, and some of those molecules will happen to have the ability to assemble copies of themselves. From there, it's only a quick evolutionary arms race in copying capabilities that will get right back to how we are today.

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>>34929826
Absolutely fucking yes
Especially when the genes prevent the kids to have the courage to end it all

>>34932182

>You are too enveloped in your chic pessimist worldview to see world for what it is, equal parts good and bad.

Your idea that the world is equally good and bad is ridiculous and false. If the world is equal parts good and bad, then there is no need to be a good person. You can be an asshole and some magical force will just "even things out". Clearly that's not true.

>Yeah, and close to 100% of people will fall in love, see the birth of their child and raise a family, which brings just about as much happiness as cancer brings suffering.

If you're not born, you won't want happiness, or anything else. There will be no desire, so there will be no benefit to anything good happening to you.

>Life is composed of equal parts suffering and equal parts happiness.

This is just a superstitious belief of yours, not a real property of the universe.

>This is all thanks to capitalism and western values, which is relieving the oppression of the poor.

Capitalism cannot exist without the poor. It requires a society of people who own the means of production, and others who don't own the means of production and therefore must rent themselves out to create value for their employer, who then pays them a fraction of the wealth they produced for him.

>>34932539
How do you break a normies just world worldview? I don't think you can. The same blind ego that makes a mother go "dont tell me how to raise MY children" propells this normie to go "lol its a just world be more positive k?"

>>34932602
It's amazing how deluded he is. Like third world countries are just spontaneously getting better overnight or how everything is sunshine and rainbows with an occasional rain storm. Is it gullibility? I dunno personally. What else would you expect from them though.

>>34931894
Is that Cheska? She looks like a slug there.

>>34932602
>>34932633
It could be the statistics that state the world is a better place today, regardless of what pessimists and 24hr news outlets like to proclaim.
http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2015/04/28/the-world-looks-like-its-getting-worse-heres-why-its-not/
Or this Gallup poll about personal satisfaction
http://www.gallup.com/poll/14506/americans-personal-satisfaction.aspx

>>34932703

>It could be the statistics that state the world is a better place today

Earlier you said that life is equal parts suffering and equal parts happiness. If we, just for the sake of argument, take that to be true, the world can't ever be in a better position, because improvement is impossible. It's always going to be equal parts suffering and equal parts happiness no matter what.

>>34929826
it is if you know your child is going to be starving like those fuckheads in africa that breed like crazy and can't even feed themselves.
that's why i never feel bad when those horseshit guilt trip commercials come begging for money showing these gross little starving kids.
hold their parents responsible, not me, motherfuckers.

>>34932722
That was a different anon. I'm this anon >>34932081
I believe struggles and suffering can be valuable tools for personal growth and wisdom.

>>34932703
>more people have more material shit than ever before! What? They're slaves to debt because of it? Don't contest the system, goy! Look, your favorite TV show is coming on!

Just wait until the population's number finally outstrip our productive capacity. We've been kicking the carrying capacity can down the road for centuries, and because we're now so deep into it, we're going to see the most massive, spectacular calamity of starvation and privation ever experienced by any life on this planet. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.

>>34932765
Those commercials are for Christian ministries, which probably promote abstinence only or provide proper sex education/birth control.

>>34932786

>That was a different anon.

My bad.

>I believe struggles and suffering can be valuable tools for personal growth and wisdom.

Most of the time they aren't.

>Let's go back to the poverty stricken family. Let's say it's a single mom working two jobs to provide for her kids (let's be reasoning say 2-3) and having assistance from family (babysitting, giving rides, picking up from school etc). Her life would be subjectively worse than the children's.

That's just an assumption. Her children could be getting battered at school by other students, or suffering from psychological conditions brought on by having grown up in poverty, the list goes on. You're making the assumption they're having a reasonably okay time in school, which is just that--an assumption.

>Her life would be subjectively worse than the children's. She would be busting her ass to provide a comfortable life for them. She will probably push them to better themselves, get an education, make something. Her sacrifice, her suffering aided in providing "a better life" with more opportunity than she had. Her bad experience works as a signpost warning about a bad path, and her determination and will are valuable characteristics to pass down.

Statistically this isn't how it works. Children of single parents, and children who grow up in poverty, fare MUCH worse in general than children who grow up with two parents and enough money.

Childhood poverty has been shown to physically damage the brain.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/10/28/early-childhood-poverty-damages-brain-development-study-finds

>Having no suffering or pleasure are both neutral. You would have no desire for one and no fear of the other.

Being without desire and without fear is good, not neutral.

>>34932852
and i've also heard that only pennies out of every dollar actually goes to helping those kids.

>>34932834
It's your assumption that material goods are a good indication of personal happiness. But that's cool man. To each his own.

>>34932786

By the way, true fear (as opposed to thrill, exhilaration, etc.) is a form of suffering, in itself. That's why escaping from something dangerous feels so good--the suffering has been alleviated.

>>34932703
>looking at a poll for proof of a 'better world'

0/10 do not pass go

>>34932877
In this modern world, what else is there to strive for? You don't work for your basic sustenance, you work for shiny objects to distract you while you're not working. That's not self-actualization.

The Reuters article also just waves away problems of population growth and resource usage. More people in existence having a high standard of material wealth can only be good, right? Like I said before, there will be a time of mass starvation and death, because resource procurement cannot continue infinitely like population growth.

>>34932861
A non existent being has no concept of good or bad. It would be neutral.
>most of the time they arent
I would highly doubt that. Every movement in history faced struggles, suffering, and opposition. Their perseverance are a constant influence to countless individuals.
>that's an assumption
As is every hypothetical in this thread
>children of single parents fare much worse
And that's an indicator of personal happiness or the potential of it? I would say that's reductive and nearsighted.

>>34932943

>You don't work for your basic sustenance

The majority of people do. Else how else will they eat, pay their rent, etc.?

>>34932870
That honestly doesn't surprise me.

>>34932959

>A non existent being has no concept of good or bad. It would be neutral.

They don't need a concept of good or bad for good or bad to exist independently of that particular hypothetical subject.

A hypothetical baby can not-exist, and baby-beating would still be bad, regardless of the existence of that particular baby.

>I would highly doubt that. Every movement in history faced struggles, suffering, and opposition. Their perseverance are a constant influence to countless individuals.

To do what?

>And that's an indicator of personal happiness or the potential of it? I would say that's reductive and nearsighted.

Children of single mothers and children who grew up in poverty are more likely to become drug addicts, more likely to end up in jail, more likely to end up in mental health facilities, and more likely to commit suicide. I think the message is pretty damn clear.

>>34932884
And that individual should learn and grow from it.

>>34932943
>what else is there to strive for
Shit. How about comfort, autonomy, a positive future, a purposeful life, etc.

Just because some people also like shiny things is no reason to call humanity a wash.

>>34932966
Buying a burger or buying a premade house to live in isn't fulfilling like making things yourself is. When one directly expends effort to grow the food, you're so much more proud of the accomplishment than if you sit in an office for a few hours and then go buy a sandwich.

>>34933018
You're still not addressing the resource vs population problem.

>>34932991

>And that individual should learn and grow from it.

The "individual" I was referring to by explaining that fear itself is a form of suffering is the non-existent one.

In >>34932081 , it was said

>Having no suffering or pleasure are both neutral. You would have no desire for one and no fear of the other.

But fear itself is a form of suffering, so the asymmetry still holds.

>>34933030

>When one directly expends effort to grow the food, you're so much more proud of the accomplishment than if you sit in an office for a few hours and then go buy a sandwich.

That isn't an option for a lot of people. Growing food is time-consuming and requires capital to even begin.

I enjoy growing my own food, but it is a lot of work. My ability to grow my own food is limited by the fact that I don't own land and have limited funds to grow in containers (and also the fact that container growing is generally less productive than growing in raised beds or in the ground).

>>34932989
But the baby beating would not occur to a being who doesn't exist. Not being beaten would carry the same weight as having a full belly. The situations are independent of the non existent child, but the non existent child would be indifferent to either.
>to do what
Build, create, progress or advance society, to express and communicate ideas, etc. People do alot of positive shit on the backs of those that came before them.
>I think the msg is pretty damn clear
>It bears mentioning that although research has focused primarily on negative youth outcomes associated with single-parent status, positive outcomes also may be associated with such family structures. Following the dissolution of high-conflict or volatile marriages, children often report feelings of relief and lower levels of stress, depression, and anxiety.
>Considerable evidence has emerged indicating that adolescents who live in mother-only households are less likely to engage in deviant behavior and drug use than children from father-only households (Demuth and Brown, 2004; Lee, Burkam, Zimiles, and Ladewski, 1994; Needle, Su, and Doherty, 1990). Compared to single mothers, single fathers have been shown to communicate less often with their children (Ambert, 1982). This result, in combination with studies suggesting that mothers provide better overall supervision than fathers and stronger affective and interpersonal bonds with their children, gave rise to what is known as the maternal hypothesis which holds that youth living with only their mothers are less likely to become involved in delinquent behavior than those living with only their fathers

>>34933113

>But the baby beating would not occur to a being who doesn't exist. Not being beaten would carry the same weight as having a full belly. The situations are independent of the non existent child, but the non existent child would be indifferent to either.

And that is good. A full belly is only a good because it alleviates suffering. If it weren't for that it would be worthless. The absence of baby-beating is only a good because it prevents suffering, else baby-beating would be fine.

>Build, create

Not intrinsically good. You can build and create things and end up causing a lot of suffering by doing so. It depends on what it is you're building and creating. Motivation in and of itself is not intrinsically good.

>progress or advance society

Well, that is good only by tautology.

>People do alot of positive shit on the backs of those that came before them.

And a lot of negative shit too.

None of those things are in

>It bears mentioning that although research has focused primarily on negative youth outcomes associated with single-parent status, positive outcomes also may be associated with such family structures.Following the dissolution of high-conflict or volatile marriages, children often report feelings of relief and lower levels of stress, depression, and anxiety.

No shit they felt relief when they didn't see their parents fight in front of them. They're reporting this like it's somehow profound.

The statistics still hold that those without two parents generally fare worse than those with two parents, and those who grow up poor fare worse than those who don't grow up poor.

>>34933174

>None of those things are in

Ignore that part. It was a mistake.

>>34933174
OK pal, I guess we'll have to call it a difference in perspective (pessimist v optimist).
I've got a doc apt to head to. Have a pleasant day!

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>>34933212
DESTROYED DOOD

Note, article is from 2003.

>Children growing up in single-parent families are twice as likely as their counterparts to develop serious psychiatric illnesses and addictions later in life, according to an important new study.

>Researchers have for years debated whether children from broken homes bounce back or whether they are more likely than kids whose parents stay together to develop serious emotional problems.

>Experts say the latest study, published this week in The Lancet medical journal, is important mainly because of its unprecedented scale and follow-up -- it tracked about 1 million children for a decade, into their mid-20s.

>The question of why and how those children end up with such problems remains unanswered. The study suggests that financial hardship may play a role, but other experts say the research also supports the view that quality of parenting could be a factor.

>The study used the Swedish national registries, which cover almost the entire population and contain extensive socio-economic and health information. Children were considered to be living in a single-parent household if they were living with the same single adult in both the 1985 and 1990 housing census. That could have been the result of divorce, separation, death of a parent, out of wedlock birth, guardianship or other reasons.

>About 60,000 were living with their mother and about 5,500 with their father. There were 921,257 living with both parents. The children were aged between 6 and 18 at the start of the study, with half already in their teens.

>The scientists found that children with single parents were twice as likely as the others to develop a psychiatric illness such as severe depression or schizophrenia, to kill themselves or attempt suicide, and to develop an alcohol-related disease.

>Girls were 3 times more likely to become drug addicts if they lived with a sole parent, and boys were 4 times more likely.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/broken-homes-broken-children/

The world has always been full of suffering, but it doesn't mean that you are entitled to suffer an unbearable fate.

To me, misantrophy is a selfish and pretentious point of you. As if the average first world idiot had a thoughtful opinion on how much the whole planet has lost purpose and reasons to live.

Sure there are some real fucking dangers out there even in the first world and life isn't easy in the slightest for the vast majority of humans, but life is a crazy and amazing adventure.

For example, my dad is bipolar and fucked our family twice, I got abused by my mom's bf following this for 5 years and moved on to be imprisoned by my dad's gf once I moved in with him to escape the beating only to live under the rule of another controlling bitch with my bipolar dad having insane and unpredictable mood swings. My entire childhood up until I turned 18 was nothing but suffering, drama and misery. Eighteen fucking years of my life defined by pain and sadness.

My kid won't have to go through any of this. I suffered a lot, but it gave me wisdom. I'll do my best to pass on this wisdom to my kid and encourage my kid to live life with no fear of getting hurt, taking risks when it's a good opportunity and to never be afraid of rejection.

My kid won't turn bitter, jaded and hateful like you guys.

>>34933238

>My kid won't turn bitter, jaded and hateful like you guys.

You can't possibIy know that. You're simply making an assumption.

>>34933238
>Me my me my me my me my
Talk about what you think you'll do all you want, statistic dont lie in that its suffering for a huge majority

>>34933264
The question is, is the suffering worth the benefits of life.

>>34933352

All the benefits of life are simply partial alleviations of the suffering that came from life to begin with.

The basic state of a conscious organism is discomfort, which is why they spend so much time striving.

>>34933405
Thats certainly a philosophy

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>>34929826
no.
We collectively don't see the world as suffering. Look at those tribes down in Africa that eat dirt. They think life is worth risking having sex for kids, even though those kids would grow up in shit conditions; it's normalized for them.

All morality is, is a form of communication.
If you live in the US, then it probably is immoral to have kids.

>>34933429

What good is anything, if it doesn't prevent or alleviate pain?

>>34933264

>but the stats say the stats say but the statistics say but the stats the stats

Stop living your life according to data you hardly even understand, cherrypicker.

>>34933468
>Stop living your life on truths and facts

Yes, but I don't care, I want to push them into a life I've always wanted :) I'll live through them

>>34933451
You think the guys in Africa consider their kids when dicking a girl when in the west that doesn't even happen that much?

All they care about is nuttin in some girl, not that the kids will grow up without food and AIDS ridden

Just because it's normal for you to grow up starving with AIDS doesn't mean it's without suffering

Most people, notwithstanding the retards who can't use contraceptives in their teens, will experience a quarter-life crisis, especially the women, and will want to shit out a kid in order to find their 'purpose' in life.

People have kids because they fear the cold, empty, vapid lives they lead, and they want to have an anchor in this world. They want a reason for being, other than just being.

>>34933212
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
NORMIE BTFO!!!

>>34930450
>Being hungry or destitute doesn't mean people don't have family or faith or purpose
Yet having a "family", "faith", "purpose" doesn't mean that these compensate for the suffering of being hungry.

>>34933485

It's sad that your view of life is based more on numbers on a chart than actual experience.

As someone who has known true pain, I say the suffering is worth it for the vadt opportunities that life can have for you and, yes, I do understand that not evryone has, can and ever will have equal opportunities, but I plan on providing every tool that I can for my kid to walk his own path.

>Facts

No, You live your life according to cinclusions you draw from numbers that you see in studies, but living life and adapting a good perspective is not about studies and data.

For example, this study about children in broken homes being more likely to have serious emotional issues tell me one thing only: That children in broken homes will be more likely to have serious emotional issues. It doesn't say if my kid will have serious emotional issues, it doesn't say if my kid's mother will leave, it doesn't say if my kid will have an adequate mother figure.

Data doesn't represent the life experience as a whole. It can only isolate very specific elements of very specific environments. I would assume you're one of those INTP types who have a massive boner for numbers and data, but you gotta learn to look at life a little more in the big picture.

Hell, this study is talking specifically about people like me. Yes I come from a broken home, yes I am broken. Is life worth living? Yes. Does my past and my pain define my future and present? No. Data doesn't answer questions like this so take data with a grain of salt. Not everything in life can be rationalized on paper.

I understand you're probably someone who grew up unfortunate and don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to tell you you are wrong and I'm right about life, I'm just saying your data doesn't answer everything.

>>34933833
>I say the suffering is worth it for the vadt opportunities that life can have for you
This is your opinion, man.
>but living life and adapting a good perspective is not about studies and data
Yes it is. Data shows what's more LIKELY to happen in certain circunstances.
>it doesn't say if my kid's mother will leave, it doesn't say if my kid will have an adequate mother figure
There are other studies that show how likely this is to happen too.
>but you gotta learn to look at life a little more in the big picture
Data is the closest we have to a bigger picture. It takes thousands of people of different backgrounds instead of only your SINGLE anedoctal experience.
>Is life worth living? Yes. Does my past and my pain define my future and present? No.
Again, only your opinion.

>>34933881

Then we trully cannot agree. I'm sorry.

>>34929865
There's nihilism, and then there's this.

Find a way to dull that edge there m80.

>>34934009

His post was basically the polar opposite of nihliism.

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Question to all you antinatalists.

Why aren't you all dead yet? just sticking around for the lolz?

And what difference does it make whether you fuck a baby into the world or not? Both you and they will die in a few decades either way, so so much for "muh eternal suffering". Just have fun, do some drugs and jerk off to some good hentai while you wait to fade into eternity. Or just drink a bleach smoothie, either way.

>>34934250
>Why aren't you all dead yet? just sticking around for the lolz?
I'm afraid to die and I have hordes of normies to trigger into enlightment yet.
>Just have fun, do some drugs and jerk off to some good hentai while you wait to fade into eternity.
This.

>>34929826
No. But it's wrong not to help alleviate the suffering.

>>34929826
yea if you make shitty children who will suffer instead of strong ones who will prosper

Hedonic treadmill or no, I think it is great if rich AND genetically gifted parents have children.They are setting up a potential human for a great human life.

Imagine
>chad genes
>loads of money, set for life from day one
>trips to exotic locales, fast cars for your birthdays,
>no bullshit like cancer or type 1 diabetes or girly wrists

Now there is a life worth living.

A human is SELF AWARE so his suffering is a dozen fold that of animals. Look at the morons here musing over what happens "after" you die, as an example. Human suffering takes on extra dimensions because of our large brains.

In short: don't bother with children if you aren't in the top 20% of wealth/status and genes.

>>34932877
You assume that consumer society doesnt exist. You assume that all the work the cousin of Sigmund Freud did was useless. And are peoples rose colored glasses a good indication of the world? Look at how self centered normies are, how obsessed with social media and hedonism. You try to explain something they dont like, like nationalism or a robots struggle and they pounce on you (for being a xenophobic racist e.t.c and for just "being negative and lazy" respectively). Is this what the world should be? Blind hedonism, where conflicting/unorthodox ideas/traits/people are violently rejected? I think that might stem into the philosophy of "should life be filled with hapoiness?"

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new children is the only way out of this.
new thinkers to challenge the sys.
thats why there is a war on children, that why w do our best to hold them back with school.
they give there parents voice to control elements.