Pro-choice is in the middle of the spectrum. The opposite of pro-life is the belief that people should be required to have abortions
Pro-choice is in the middle of the spectrum. The opposite of pro-life is the belief that people should be required to have abortions
Neither pro-choice nor pro-life but a secret third thing (not forcing the hypothetical potential progeny to become sentient without its prior consent)
I cannot understand this kind of anti-natalist perspective. My life isn’t perfect, and I’ve definitely had my share of struggle and suffering, but I’m elated at the experience overall. There’s absolutely a lot of cruelty and ugliness in the world, but there’s also profound beauty. Not even physical beauty like landscapes and sunsets and stuff, but moving, personal beauty: selfless generosity and compassion, performing artists in flow state, unity and cooperation, real love.
There wasn’t a me to consent to sentience before I had the sentience to consent with, so by your ruling no one could ever be born. Now that I have sentience, I’m glad of it and give my enthusiastic retroactive consent.
Well yeah, sure you are happy to be alive. You have luxuries like a communication medium and some electronics that you use to your liking.
You are literate and an least not heavily disabled, or at least not disabled enough that discussion and socialization are locked away from you.
How many people are born that do not meet that minimum baseline, or are on a clock until they don’t?
As do you, as does everyone else on the digital platforms on which the anti-natalist sentiment primarily resides.
And you can always revoke consent.
I want to be clear that I don’t recommend it. I think in the vast majority of cases, it is a permanent solution to temporary problems. I think the vast majority of people who consider it can live to change their minds.
I do think there are those who are so irreversibly disabled that their lives really are mostly suffering, and I support the right of those people to revoke their consent to life. But I think those cases are very rare.
Assuming the environment is reasonably stable, and there’s no serious history of irreversibly disabling conditions, I don’t think there’s a moral compunction to anti-natalism.
Buddy
My point is the anti natalists have the perspective that the risk of suffering is not worth imposing on a new human.
You saying that assessment is overblown does not change their perspective. It’s simple enough that with a bit of thought you can understand it, if you end up agreeing or not.
If you are using the phrase “I don’t understand” an a synonym of “I don’t agree with that stance” then I’m wasting my time.
The real part I didn’t understand is the “prior consent” part. Like I said, before you have the child, there’s nothing to ask for consent. It doesn’t make any sense.
But as to the rest, I’m saying that the assessment is so overblown that it ceases to be rational. A fraction of a fraction of a percent of people will never get fulfillment from life, so no one should ever have children?
There’s always some risk associated with everything. To never do anything because there’s a minuscule chance it could be disastrous is ridiculous.
Ok so you do understand it, but you are dismissing the concern. That’s fine.
For the prior consent part, consent requires active and willful assent to the act being effectuated. By the constraints of existence, children can not consent to be created. It’s an order of operations issue.
The act of consent is not asking. The act of consent is being told, yes you can do that to me.
I know what consent is. I’m saying that applying the concept of consent here is nonsensical. Consent is so logically impossible that it’s irrelevant. This is the part beyond understanding.
That’s why I bothered to go into any of the rest of the concern. The prior consent angle is meaningless, so the next place you go is retroactive consent.
And when you don’t get it retroactively?
I agree, bringing new people into sentience is not morally wrong at all, living is pretty cool.
I think people should prioritize adoption over birth. Supporting someone who was abandoned is way better than giving birth, and also avoids the physical and psychological pain/trauma of giving birth. That’s the one antinatalist point I agree with.
Same, I used to participate in antinatalist forums because I strongly believe that it’s selfish to bring new life into the world when you could instead love one of the children already in need of a home. But I don’t agree with the extreme antinatalist stance that nobody should be born ever. I think if you get pregnant and you want kids, by all means, keep it. Antinatalists are extremely cynical people who think life isn’t worth living at all.
In terms of ethics, adopting is beautiful. But there’s that one ugly factor that comes to make it so much worse: demographics.
If people come to adopt children instead of having their own, we won’t have enough new people to drive the economy (I know, I know, economists suck, but they’re right on that one). No one will be there to produce goods and services for ageing population falling out of workforce.
Children that aren’t going to get adopted will still be alive and join the ranks of adults. Children that weren’t born will not.
I wish there could be a good way to have both, though.
I do want a biological child or two, but I do also agree with prioritizing adoption. I plan to adopt/foster several children after my biological children grow up. Personally, I feel that’s a bit more ethical, as I’d like to establish my parental skills with the benefits of raising from birth and biological similarity, before I presume to handle the additional complexities of a child with a past.