I agree that it is political, but you are adding/interpreting such implications. I agree that in fact we perpetuate everything by continuing to breed, but we do so mostly blindly. — norm

We can evaluate negatively the very means of survival AS we are doing it. That is insane as far as keeping this whole thing going. Humans need a justification for any action.

Well, ok. I choose(?) 'perpetuating the superstructure" – the human species – over "negative evaluations" ... So what? Or the reverse. Again, so what? Neither way changes anything. I've not procreated; but so what? ... since the vast majority have and still do and will continue to procreate, all things being equal, for the foreseeable future. — 180 Proof

So they put the continuance of the superstructure over individuals that will engage (possibly negatively) with this superstructure.

I don't make a point of thinking of humans as animals, so this doesn't touch me they way it apparently touches you. — baker

But this is the most important point and informs the other objections you were raising. So it isn't a particular but any society that is being perpetuated by procreation. However, we can evaluate and assign negative value to things. At each decision, we have to put a justification for why we do or don't do anything. It's usually for reportedly "practical" reasons, but even those are justifications. Other animals do not need that. They just "live". I recognize they have preferences perhaps, but they don't need justifications. That is important. At any moment, we can negatively value doing any task of the superstructure (work, chore, task, etc.). Yet this doesn't matter to procreation sympathizers (or agnostics). Apparently, perpetuating the structure is deemed more important than any individual potentially having negative evaluations of the very structures needed to survive.

Are you asking why should any mode of production/survival/trade etc be perpetuated or are you asking why should the current one be perpetuated? — Albero

Good question. I mean any mode over and above any individual's negative evaluation of any given superstructure they (must) find themselves in.

@norm@Albero@baker@Bitter Crank@180 Proof

So another big point here is that bringing a child into the world isn't "just" this...bringing an individual into the world. Rather, it is perpetuating the ideology of the superstructure and reinforcing that superstructure. So I can't emphasize enough this becomes a political issue due to this broader societal nature of procreation. It isn't just, "A child is born". It is also, "And the institutions, values, and ways of life of the society shall be enacted and reinforced again and again with each new child". Our mode of production/consumption/trade/survival/comfort-seeking/entertainment is all wrapped up in the socio-economic-cultural superstructure. Birth is a clear YAY in its perpetuation.

However, who says that this should be perpetuated? As I stated in point 2 in the OP, our animal species can KNOW what we are doing as we are doing it. Any given task can be evaluated as non-preferable. So here we are perpetuating/replicating a way of life unto yet another person who can yet again, evaluate negatively any given task mandated (by de facto needs of living) by the socio-economic-cultural superstructure.

If we lived perhaps like other animals, this doesn't become as much an issue, and certainly not a political one. Rather, if I was another mammal of sorts.. I may prefer to eat rabbits instead of mice.. I might prefer to be in the sun at a particular moment and then in the shade. However, I cannot evaluate the very acts of my mode of living (e.g Aww.. shit, not THIS again!).

So combining this all together, by perpetuating more people (aka procreation) it is de facto akin to saying: The needs of perpetuating the superstructure are more important than any negative evaluations that can be had of any given task or aspect of said superstructure. Why should the superstructure take precedence over the negative evaluations of it in particular aspects or as a whole? This then further becomes a debate between those who want to perpetuate the ways of life of a given superstructure (any superstructure, not a particular one- it doesn't matter what the setup is) and those who do not.

Well, it suffices to be a barren young married woman or an aging spinster, and one is thrown into the matter at the deep end. — baker

Is that really a consideration in non-traditional societies? Yeah there is pressure from parents maybe to be grandparents, but is that such a strong incentive for most people?

It is also true that we cannot not do something. One way or another, as long as one lives, one will do something, even if it means rocking back and forth in a chair.

The question isn't whether to do or not to do, it's what to do and what not to do. — baker

As Ligotti wrote over and over.. Nowhere to go, nothing to do, nothing to be, no one to know one to know (or something like that). Yet, we do need this as you explain. As Schopenhauer pointed out, if life was fully positive, we would not want for anything. We would just "be" and there would be no lack. The main point though is that we are an animal like all others, yet we KNOW what we are doing AS we are doing it. It is an odd paradox. To KNOW one can dislike the very tasks necessary to survive. So then the burden of justification is needed.

@Bitter Crank I'm wondering what you think Schopenhauer would say to Marx. What do you think Schopenhauer's critique would be of Marx's whole enterprise?

As an aside: http://existentialcomics.com/comic/383 :lol:

There is a gradually increasing level of anxiety among people as they discover that going to work in order to consume is not very meaningful.

In the good old days, religion provided an anodyne for this discomfort. It provided meaning for people's lives. Martin Luther declared that all work was sacred. Farming, mining, carpentry, street cleaning, collecting garbage -- whatever -- is as sacred as the work of priests--that's the Protestant Work Ethic: work is a sacred activity. Luther (1483-1546) lived before our economic world began to come into existence. Still, one can look at work as sacred, because it contributes to the common good of all men. It does that IF it does that. One can certainly argue that a lot of work does not contribute to the commonweal. It's essentially pointless, or contributes to the wellbeing of a very narrow portion of 'men'--mostly very rich ones. — Bitter Crank

Very good insights here. Do people who believe in the Protestant Work Ethic, really sustain this thinking throughout their work life? At no point does the good Protestant worker go, "God I really don't care today to do this"? Also can one be in what is considered really "necessary" line of industry (a doctor for example) and still find it to be unfulfilling to do the work? Is the Prot. Work Ethic just a way to get certain people to not think about the existence itself? Zapffe observed that all humans have the ability to access the truth that we don't need to do anything at all, that we know our existential dilemma.. isn't the PWE just another trope to get people to limit their thoughts. to anchor them so that they don't run into an existential meltdown?

Also, there is no shangrala at the end of the road. We work to work to work to work. I just don't believe work itself is the reason we must be at all. It is a weird fetishization. Even Marx fetishizes it but says work is a "good" in itself as long as one is doing it as sort of a hobby. But I think any activity is not self-justified "goods" that are just "there" in existence necessarily (though I kind of vacillate on this idea of "goods" that are objective to existence).

Deep question, and we could talk about it forever. But yeah, a god-given purpose of some kind given by some kind of god. Maybe the god is just History. For most, the justification should include some restitution, like the resurrection of the dead or the arrival of the Federation (but without the Klingons).*

*To me a big question is whether a society can be strong and cohesive without some external threat, but that's a different issue. — norm

SO I came up with a neologism called "minutia-mongering". I think humans don't usually reflect existentially. Rather, due to the need to "fall into place" In a social setting, and specialization required to be important to a company/employer/community, we need to specialize in the minutia of a particular topic. Instead of asking daily "Why do I even exist and who cares about all this".. Rather, the chemical process of making plastic, or making sure the widget needed so an engine can run so a car can move, so a product can be transported on a truck, so the warehouse can palletize and store the product, so the product picker can grab the inventory, so the inventory clerk can reorder, so the manager can keep track of the numbers, so the accountant can see the accounts payable, so that the payroll can keep track of cutting checks, so the people can deposit their money so they can pay bills so they can save and invest to get extra money for future expenses, so that they can buy houses and cars and gas and groceries and entertainment and vacation trips, and food and restaurants, and so that they can read about philosophy books and science topics (or just blank their minds out with tv, video games, and booze, and drugs), so that they can go back to school to learn more about the intricaicies of the copper alloy needed to create a better CPU processor with cache and memory so that electric pulses can turn on and off to move the micro-wires on the CPU to locations so that it can be retrieved to allow for machine code that allows for compilers to make programming code show up on a screen that uses very specific chemicals to allow for hexedecimal colors to display in a way that creates a user interface experience so people can access programs, so they can type stuff for their businesses and buying more goods and entertain themselves on social media and to write word documents and keep track of minutia in a spreadsheet for more work and budgets and schedules, and to do lists, and meeting people so that they can do their kickball tournaments, so they can take their kids to the extra curricular activity so they can learn the intracies of throwing a curveball so they can get good at baseball so they can be integrated in a team sport in their high school and college, so that they can go to classes so they can learn minutia about physics, economics, or the really soft social science of sociology.. but their best friend is learning the minutia of phlebotomy so they can draw blood to survive, to pay some bills so that they can go to the local store to pick up a certain kind of bread for the recipe needed to create a family recipe, so that their children can eat it and then go play and annoy the neighbors by being too loud, while the roads need to be paved, and news anchors need to tell everyone about the unions, and intellectual property, and the latest news on politicians, and so that people can develop semi-shallow relationships to keep this all moving.

And I'm thinking that your doing the above, "showing it bare for what it is, and expose the harmful political assumptions of perpetuating this package" would go over like Truman's discovery of the real world and departing the fictional one: your deconstruction of group-think, your showing it bare for what it is, your exposing of harmful political assumptions of perpetuating that package would likely be met at first with elation, enthusiasm, that "Yes! This is the truth!" -- and then forgotten about it. — baker

Yes, it is the forgetting that is the mystery here. What does one do once it is exposed? I am advocating for communities of catharsis, of commiseration.. What does it mean for the superstructure itself? Of work? Of needing to survive? Of still having to live life knowing these ideas?

Just wanted to say you have some really interesting thoughts here and I enjoyed reading them. However, I myself have found questions demanding a justification for human life to be kind of strange. What kind of justification do people want? A god given purpose? — Albero

So let's just reduce the socii-economic-cultural thing to one thing to keep it easy. There is thing called "work". What is work? Work is a cultural phenomena built from historical contingencies of civilization. Hunting-gathering was "work" but really it was so built into the existential practice of living (as an animal that needs to do stuff to survive) that it may be inappropriate to call hunting/gathering "work". Work is a phenomena of civilziations that developed from property and specialization. So, when someone is born in a society that has "work" in this environment, is that something that we should "put" more people into? Should more people have to be made to "work"? If you start giving the stock reply that you can simply become a freeloader, homeless, or try to hack it in the wilderness, I will just say that the harm that ensues from this alternative lifestyle to the norm, would also be a part of this phenomena. The choice is sub-optimal "work" (which you must integrate as something you like or just "deal" with it), OR you must make the sub-optimal choice of harm and shame of other forms of living (homelessness and hacking it on your own in the wilderness).. SO why are we foisting this lifestyle (part of the socio-economic-cultural superstructure) on more people? Certainly it is a POLITICAL choice that work is something acceptable, as it is an intricate part of living as an embodied, culturally integrated animal as we are, but why must more people be pushed into existence to engage in it (and yes I use "push" loosely here.. so let's not get caught up in that semantics of non-existence being "pushed' into existence.. that's a focus of a different metaphysical topic).

Yes, indeed. And we are doing that here. It's not the same as in-person, but it's not nothing. Anonymously people can tell some truths. You don't want your next employer to know that you are as proud as Lucifer and think that the company is a piece of smoke. — norm

:fire: YES to this. The character of Lucifer is a good one here. I rather like the the Gnostic concept of reversing this. The NAYsayer of life is the hero. It is the pro-life (suffering that comes from life) that is the "opponent" here. I think people are driven somewhat by superstition. It just make sense that if someone is having a relatively good day (Sunny out, reads a good book, plays a good video game, does some exercise, finds a girl/guy they like, eats a good meal, does some project at work that was fulfilling, listens to good music, stick any X good here) they don't want to then say, "DESPITE the goods that are contingent on living life, it still allows for negative evaluations of various tasks.. it STILL has suffering that is built-in and suffering that is contingent and can be wrought at any time"... This will get the person out of the good mood, and why would they want to do that? The intellectualization of the pessimism has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. So I kind of get why people at a particular POINT OF TIME might not want to let these thoughts in their heads. But I would say they don't have to perseverate on it, but simply keep it in the background that it is not always like this. There is a bigger thing going on here and this is not a paradise. These people don't want to tempt the "gods" to then give them a bad time for thinking these pessimistic thoughts. Maybe the gods of fate will strike them down with idiocy, and they won't be able to intellectualize at all.. Keep your head down, boy.. Don't fuck with me, says the gods of fate. I gave you GOODs that ARE POSSIBLE, don't look a gift horse in the mouth!

I suppose that I do find a piece of paradise when the weather is good and I can have bittersweet conversation with a true friend. We agree about the commiseration clubs. I just find it is fleeting genuine friendships. Even if they last 10 years, they tend to dissolve eventually in the nightwaters of life. — norm

Commiseration clubs.. I like it :D. Communities of Catharsis. It is a good antidote to the usual "self-help" which tries to say YOU have a problem for not finding the LIFE program good, necessary, and worth the engagement. Rather, something is wrong here, let's talk about it, whether in serious manner or in "bittersweet" comedic tragedian style. Indeed, even the Commiseration Club brings its own enactment of the bittersweet brevity of the fact that no person can really "commune" with the other. Rather, we are like porcupines that don't want to get too close because we tend to bother each other, but we still want some closeness with others to entertain our social minds.

What interests me too is molding this social mindset in becoming a compliant worker for an entity. We can't but NOT do this if we need to survive as we humans do (by social effort), yet just as the OP states, here we are KNOWING and EVALUATING dislike for this effort WHILE we do it. What an insane world. Have you ever read Peter Zapffe? He talks about how we have an "over abundance of consciousness" that provides us more evaluative reflective capacities than is needed for an animal to survive. This meta-evaluation gives us that much more to grapple with. We don't just "do". We don't just go from garbage can to garbage can looking for food, and finding shade under a tree like a racoon. We KNOW we are doing something and can say, "Ah shit, not this X task again...". Why!?

You can probably grasp that I don't see a justification for human life, and I don't subscribe to an ideology of hope. — norm

Yes, I think we are on the same wavelength here. Also, as much as I do advocate for grappling with AN as an UNAVOIDABLE political topic (as it is the foundation for all existence and therefore all socio-economic-cultural and experiential things that ensue), there the moroseness of the matter does still get me down. I don't revel in it like a horror writer might revel in the morose. I simply think it is the most accurate aesthetic synthesis of the whole existential situation, DESPITE its unfortunate moroseness.

We can, but this doesn't already mean we do or that we will.

This isn't limited to having children, it's much more general: from career planning to retirement planning, in failing to prevent a bad habit from forming, in making poor choices in terms of romantic or business partners, ... — baker

But we still have to do this habit forming and prevention. This isn't inbuilt, wrote anything. You are forcing people to grapple with this. It is deliberation and grappling. One can still evaluate all the way through that they don't like this.

So people who have children for such practical reasons don't believe in pronatalism per se, but in their practical reasons, even if those people are nominally pronatalists. — baker

True.. but how can this topic be elevated from these practical reasons to be seen as actually a political choice? By having the child, you are promoting the fact that someone else needs to experience life, and that they should engage with the soci-economic-cultural superstructure. This idea though seems so remote to certain mindsets. Why do you suppose some people cannot think in these more abstract terms? I guess socio-economic status and environment have a lot to do with it. If one isn't exposed to philosophical thinking, one doesn't engage with it naturally..

I think many pronatalists are also defending their past bad choices, rationalizing them, so as to make it easier to live with them. This can explain their vitriol toward antinatalists. — baker

Yes, very true. I don't see AN as a personal attack on them though, but many take it as that. What already happened happened. I think a lot of the vitriol though has to do more with questioning the "goodness" of life itself. Also, there is the idea that things are always improving, and it isn't so bad, don't tell us to end it by passively not procreating.. etc.

The procreationist sympathizer probably feels otherwise, feels that the antinatalist is forcing on them their view. — baker

But it's not forcing because there is no actual forceful stopping of anyone. It is simply stating the view and they can take it or leave it. The ironic thing though is the instant the procreationist actually has a child, that is indeed literally forcing the view onto someone else. Now the child is literally pressed into existence. The AN has no such analog. They are not literally forcing anything on anyone. So there is an asymmetry here for the consequences of one vs. the other in terms of force.

Because it's a big project that requires the cooperation of many many people. — baker

And why must it be that people need to exist to pursue the project?

What if this is the mistake, thinking that ad populum/ad baculum is "just political"? — baker

Can you explain? I just mean that people think because the majority thinks it, it must be the right course of action. The political consequence is that the YAYs win out by default by voting with their procreation.

How come I’m on every AN thread then? — khaled

That's my point, why? You are interested in debating me specifically it seems. But why? You keep wanting to tell me the same thing. You think I'm wrong, and you want to make sure I know it at every turn. Got it.

And you took it as an attack. I don’t understand why you prefer to spend more time psychoanalysing my intentions than respond to my actual critiques. Culture not being the main reason we reproduce for example being one. — khaled

Because you all you do is critique. This isn't UFC fight all day forum.. It's a forum.. More than just knock down disagreements have to take place.. at least for me. It's not like we haven't indulged the form you prefer- the toe-to-toe debates all day all the time. We've done that.. So no we just continue in this mode forever?

And even when I dropped the whole “Why are you responding to me” line you specifically brought it back up in a separate comment saying “I’m still waiting for a reply to this”. For what? And you accuse me of not engaging with your arguments and not trying to find common ground, while being more interested in debating my intentions than the actual arguments I put forward? What a joke. — khaled

Yes, I don't get why it's debate mode all the time and am trying to understand this now.

That khaled is targeting you because he’s a mean bully. And no matter how many times I tell you it’s not personal, and no matter how many times I try to respond to anything new you’re saying, you choose to see it as an attack, while ignoring the actual responses. And you would rather prove this than actually address what khaled is saying. — khaled

To repeat, because I know how this plays out. I even did a mock debate that pretty much encapsulates it in an earlier post. But you seem to want more than just debate. You specifically do want to target me to prove me wrong.. To stick it to me. You want something from me... but not sure what.. I am not a video game boss that you have to try to defeat over and over here.

I’m not going to waste my time debating my intentions for commenting on a public forum with someone who would rather argue (in bad faith) about said intentions rather than address the arguments against the positions they put forward. Have a good one. — khaled

Good use of my terms there.. But I'm not arguing in bad faith, but rather am telling you how I prefer to engage in the topic with you as we've already done the toe-to-toe thing where everything we say is just a volley back and forth. Are you able to engage in a different manner? If you're not interested, then totally fine with that too. I think you have a good analytic mind, but it doesn't mean let's just keep doing the same thing.

Because I clearly care about this TOPIC. You don't seem too keen on the TOPIC but of specifically trying to personally tell something to ME. It does then seem personal, and it does seem to be taking a page from Isaac, albeit without all the dramatic histrionics. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that you think you have something over me, but it doesn't make sense to keep telling me about it except for some targeted reason. You aren't engaging with others on the thread, we aren't exploring any common ground, so I'm sorry there seems to be some sort of trollish thing going on here, otherwise I don't get it. And you can go ahead and turn it around and say why is me posting about AN any different..but its well known I like this TOPIC, so its not like there's some other motivation here regarding what I feel I need to say to another individual poster. In other words, I'm not trying to stick it to any one poster that they better know whats right. I'm not saying it's wrong to disagree just wondering about the motivation once that disagreement is already known.

Rationality is something we can strive toward occasionally, but we seem to be animals only dimly aware of what we are up to. As I see it, people like you and me are freaks to spend the energy we do articulating these things. — norm

Speaking truth here.

I speculate that anti-natalism is also driven by a contempt for vulnerability. Humans are so disgustingly fragile. Maybe it's not only pity but also even hatred. If we can't roam the world like gods, then fuck this place. We think we are such clever monkeys, but we sit in traffic for hours and can't keep the heat on in the cold, etc. — norm

I liken it to this: Is it worth perpetuating a life that is anything less than (and not even close to) a paradise? In a paradise, one would either want for nothing (you would be all things at once or nothing at all), or you can turn the dial of harm wherever you wanted at any given time. Clearly we are none of those things in this actual world.. In fact, we are so gaslighted about suffering that we have to say bullshit like "Suffering leads to more meaning".. If that's true, what does that say to live in a world where "meaning" is obtained through suffering? Fuck that shit.

That's a great question with an endless answer. I'm using 'shaman' somewhat metaphorically when I say that comedians and some philosophers are shamans. A 'shaman' will say out lout (to the right people) what others might not say in the privacy of their mind. I think of people who know both the angels and the devils, while being neither. I'm tempted to call all great drama shamanic in that it conjures spirits within the magic circle. What is it to watch a simulacrum of MacBeth? I just reread Dostoevsky's Demons, and that's 'shamanic.' Spirits are summoned for my mind's eye, mad with the madness of this world. To see it calmly, to contemplate it...detachment, transcendence, some kind of dark laughter that lifts one out of one's petty little life. — norm

So what if a serious (not comedic) shaman said, "Don't force others to have to engage with the socio-economic-political structures of life". Survive, find comfort, find entertainment all through the social structures historically situated.. Why should more people deal with this at all? If people can evaluate the very activities needed to survive as negative (I hate doing this task, etc.), then why create these evaluative creatures? Hope in some positive experiences and positivity-in-struggle is just an ideology as much as any antinatalist one that people should be not forced into this.

I'm still waiting for your response to this:

I just don't get why you want to respond anymore. What do you care? Obviously I care a great deal on this topic, but why do you care so much to rebut it? For some reason then this topic resonates with you as well, even if just to be contrarian.. However, I can't but feel if it is just to be contrarian, you do have a bugaboo to put me in my place rather than want to have a non-zero-sum-game conversation. That then makes me resentful and posts become hostile, and tedious. But maybe that is your aim- to wear me out... I've been doing this for a while. Clearly that's not something I do easily on this topic. — schopenhauer1

And did you read the NYT article and how it frames humans as a some agenda of productivity?
Here it is again: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/04/opinion/coronavirus-baby-bust.html

@Bitter Crank What do you think of the idea that we are just productivity-agents for the superstructure? Screw it if you don't want to engage with it, people need to be around so production happens. Plastic needs to be made! I believe it was George Carlin and The Graduate that revealed this.

I don't deny there are pessimists in history. But a more organized version of this has only come in the guise of religion, and with a whole lot of other baggage (Cathars, Buddhism to some extent, etc.) But even these allow for escape hatches (humans must live to become enlightened and escape the cycle). There were poets and aphorists going back to Near Eastern Wisdom literature and Greek philosophers that thought the best course of action was to have never been at all. I'm sure there are equivalents in the East. And if there were records in Africa and South America, you can probably find an old man or a contingent of the disgruntled.

It is hard to laugh during a root canal, no doubt. I suppose I'm saying that 'spiritual' pain is sometimes contaminated by a wicked pleasure (and the reverse.) — norm

Yes, hence I think there should be opportunities for communities that allow for catharsis.

Or of the agenda of AN. There is nothing self justifying of any agenda. — khaled

But AN constantly must be on the defensive (as we speak actually), and yet the other side does not, so you see why it seems like there's no justification necessary for the other side because we are so used to it being the given.

It won’t be hashed out because the nays will die out much faster than the yays — khaled

No fossil record as @180 Proof said. Again, I am not worried as much as the outcomes as how this is hashed out- the attitudes of those who are currently running society. We can rebel against it, whilst still of course having to deal with it. It's not a contradiction to realize one cannot escape but rebel nonetheless via antinatalism. I believe one time @Inyenzi mentioned its akin to "going on strike".

Sure there is a whole lot of cultural accessory around it. But it is still an instinct. This doesn’t address my argument as to why. — khaled

What was your argument then? You mentioned evolution.. In our species culture is part of how evolution develops. We are a "symbolic species" (pace Terrence Deacon). What makes procreation an instinct really, though? Sexual pleasure and how it is used are two different things, often learned, often a choice, and is not a given. Not pursuing it doesn't do anything detrimental to your body either. So again, not so cut-and-dry.

Sure. But at any given point in history the answer will always be yes. — khaled

Sure, but that's because AN thinking wasn't even on the radar in any significant way. It's time it has more of a presence on the political discourse as it IS political in nature. It affects others, and the whole structure of being, so yep it is.

No. It's that the twin aspects of path of least effort (dumbing minds) and path of least action (humping bodies) have predominated 1000:1 ratio (at least) for hundreds of millennia. — 180 Proof

Agreed there.

Whether or not it's "good" ..., pro-natality is, as it's always been, most profitable for "political-economic-cultural" elites than not. — 180 Proof

YES. And here is a point I'm also trying to highlight. Who or what benefits from this arrangement that people must be born to de facto engage with the political-economic-cultural structure? Why is it necessary for people to experience it and continue it?

I'd say "You're entitled to that opinion". — 180 Proof

My opinion doesn't lead anybody (literally) to be forced into a situation. The otherside does. So it's more than opinion, its action creating situations for other people.. In other words, it is political in its most fundamental sense. It is time for the "NAYs" to make their voice heard.. to call for others to passively NOT foist this structure onto others.

:lol: Now there's some real regret. But this does bring up a point that other animals cannot evaluate like we can. A fish cannot say to themselves, "God damn it, each and every fuckn day I have to search this stream for more bugs and algae and try to avoid being eaten by the bear/human/bigger fish/predator". But our unique species, whilst doing the very activities necessary to survive can say, "God damn it, I have to do this X, Y, Z task I rather not do". Progress I guess?

I think the simple reason this movement is condemned is that it is ugly. To look upon and preach that the world as an imposition, escapable only by suicide and self-sterilization, is itself a negative human activity, and many don’t like believing or participating in it. We can’t paint dog shit on a canvas and expect people to condone and praise it. — NOS4A2

Right, but foisting the engagement with a whole socio-economic-political structure is just a-okay though right? And what else is the choice if not commit suicide or "get with the program that was foisted upon you"? Your answer is probably circular.. "Well, because it's the thing you should DO!! You don't want to look at that ugly alternative of simply stopping the foisting, right?".

But I get what you're saying. At first glance, it's dark. It's literally hopeless and people like the idea of hope.

Having agendas isn’t inherently bad. It depends on the agenda. — khaled

Paternalism then. There is nothing self-justifying of the agenda of life itself. It's just another hypothetical imperative that can keep being questioned in comparison to people who do not want this agenda, or be compared to the agenda of not causing harm or some other counter to the imperative itself that life must be perpetuated and society must be perpetuated and people must be born to deal with it and engage with it and have the choice for suicide or therapy to cope with it.

Changing that belief results in no society. — khaled

I am more interested in the movement itself of the people advocating for AN and the people against AN as they are living.. I'm not focusing on the consequence here but the implications for us the living as we hash this political yay/nay out.

Highly doubt it. All animals reproduce. And none of them have culture except us. I think it’s more reasonable to assume then to assume it’s not culture. Or at least not purely culture.

Another reason it’s not purely culture: If it was purely cultural we wouldn’t have gotten off the ground. You need thousands of people, a couple generations, and a couple decades at least before you get culture. How do you reckon we got all that sorted if culture is what tells people to have kids? — khaled

Maybe a part of it. But not a large part. All animals reproduce. None of them fear universe-retribution while doing it I’d wager. — khaled

But humans have a unique ability for superstition. When things are going well, people don't want want to test fate. When things go crummy, that's when they are more amenable to sympathize.

Procreation is caught up in so many things.. relationships, marriage, tribal relations. It is symbolic as much as it is some physical thing. There is a social dance, there is expectations, etc. It isn't akin to a bowel movement, breathing, the palmer reflex, the suckling reflex, etc. It is learned in development. I would bet you a feral person would not catch on really.

You argue the same thing. I respond the same way. You accuse me of rehashing. If anyone is rehashing it’s you. — khaled

But I don't intend for you specifically to answer. I know your position well. We've been through this before and so between us specifically, there is no other need to engage.

If you don’t want to hear the same response, don’t write the same argument. I’m responding to anything you write. Old or not. I don’t see what’s unfair or combative about that. If you don’t want me to respond at all, you shouldn’t have started a thread. — khaled

I just don't get why you want to respond anymore. What do you care? Obviously I care a great deal on this topic, but why do you care so much to rebut it? For some reason then this topic resonates with you as well, even if just to be contrarian.. However, I can't but feel if it is just to be contrarian, you do have a bugaboo to put me in my place rather than want to have a non-zero-sum-game conversation. That then makes me resentful and posts become hostile, and tedious. But maybe that is your aim- to wear me out... I've been doing this for a while. Clearly that's not something I do easily on this topic.

Not in my experience. When I told people “Having kids is wrong” they reacted very differently to when others told them “I don’t want to have kids”. I think people do understand it’s a stance. Just they think it’s invalid. And repulsive. — khaled

I mean, you want to be tactful when presenting it, but that is fine if they are repulsed. Political debates are often knockdown drag out.. This is THE fundamental debate of whether to have a society at all, not just what kind of society. The debate of whether to have a society at all is even more fundamental and shouldn't be assumed that the answer is a resounding YES. And that is my main point here.


Also, did you read the NYT article? What are your thoughts there?

Completely by chance, I found this NYT article which does exactly what I am saying. It is looking at procreation as some aggregate where individuals are simply utils to be used to increase productivity. This is definitely seeing it as political: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/04/opinion/coronavirus-baby-bust.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage.

You started the thread! If you make the same arguments of course I'm going to give the same reply! — khaled

So my main argument is basically, isn't this socio-economic-cultural structure, the maintenance and perpetuation of it indeed itself a political act? I mean, simply wearing a mask can be seen as taking one side or another, so cannot the position of AN, even though it seems to be diminished into more of a lifestyle choice or just a preference? I think it's more than that.

So if I disagree with you it is my job to find a way to agree with you? C'mon now. — khaled

After all the debate we already have, and you are choosing to jump on this thread to rehash it? Then out of the principle of charity, yes, at this point we should figure out a new course that doesn't lead to aggravation.

My answer: I don't care about evaluations of the structure as a whole, I only care about specific people. If you can't show me someone who gets harmed then I couldn't care less what "structures" are "harmed" — khaled

No, I don't mean about the structures.. I mean the people that must engage with the structure. That is where the harm is. You know that I would never (intentionally) make an argument that abstracts where harm takes place. Rather, the superstructure itself involves tasks which can be negatively evaluated as stated in OP.

My answer: If you mean a decision taken by looking at aggregates, not necessarily. You can have children because of the specific people they are likely to help. I'm not sure exactly if you would count that as "aggregate" or political but then again I'm not sure we're using the terms the same way. — khaled

I mean political as in there is some sort of agenda one wants to enact for other people in the world. "I want to see the world look a certain way.. This way of life is the way I want it to look, and so I want it enacted and perpetuated.. thus says I and thus I create new person who will endure this and he/she WILL like it (group-think yadayada feedback loop re-enforcing strengthening the groundless goodness of this structure that is the status quo).

My answer: Evolutionary reasons. And it's not so much "cannot be criticized" as "You will be shunned if you criticize it". Which is the case for any popular belief. — khaled

Yes, how can this be changed? What would it take? I mean, everything seems too intractable until it isn't. This shouldn't be any different just because it seems more intractable from our current vantage point. Saying evolutionary reasons opens up a whole debate. My hunch is that the preference for continuing this socio-eco-cultural structure is more of a cultural reinforcement.. group-think rather than anything inbuilt. Perhaps it is also magical thinking. People want there to be hope because if they think otherwise the "gods" will throw their thunderbolt for their lack of faith. I do not deny people have some weird irrational fear of universe-retribution for eschewing the universe that has been so "benevolently" bestowed upon them. Even atheists may have these weird subconscious superstitions surrounding hope and not tempting the "gods". I am not sure if my idea is being conveyed well here...But superstition does seem almost ingrained in human psyche.. However, that too is ratcheted up more from how the human develops in a culture that promotes superstitious thinking.

If you think there's something new here then you gotta tell me what it is because I'm not seeing it. And I'm not trying to be rude, I just genuinely don't see how this is a new angle. — khaled

I'm hoping to get new and interesting conversations. If you don't see it as a new angle, are you then writing in this thread to put me in my place and tell me how it is? What is your intention here, simply to say, "Stop posting about this topic Schop". Why not just let the thread ride out with other participants then? How does it really harm you if I want to post about this?

Just curious, do you and Isaac come in pairs now?

Not one that I’d find convincing. If I could think of an argument that could convince me to change my mind I would, well, change my mind! But I can’t so I don’t. And anyways that’s your job. You’re the one starting a new thread with the same old arguments. So expect to get the same old replies. — khaled

Cool. Your passive-aggressive comments aren't appreciated. I just don't get why pick the same fight? I am interested in moving the conversation into different territories not rehashing it. You seem to be a bit high on your horse thinking that I can't have a conversation about antinatalism unless it addresses the great powerful arguments of the great khaled. Either have a productive conversation or don't. If you don't, and want to have the same repetition, then I'm not interested unless you yourself can find a way past yourself, and no that is not my job that is yours.

I don't see these debates as zero-sum game, like you apparently do. If you want to elevate this so we can get something out of it besides aggravation and a shoving match, I am totally for it.

However, if not, it's going to go the same way:
K: Oh, we can use people once born to better the world.
S: But in doing so you are forcing others into negative experiences.
K: This doesn't matter, because we do it in other things like school and waking up lifeguards.
S: But they are already born so have to live in a community to survive, which is the very point I am trying to make of why perpetuate this society even further.
K: Because you can think of things in aggregate and find the best total gain.
S: But that is not taking into account there will be a new person on the other end who actually has to face this and is not just an tool for aggregation in an overall sum of life.
K: But most people won't find this sum bad but will totally like most things about life like video games and doing work they are proud of
S: Just because I like bowling doesn't mean everyone should like bowling even if a lot of other people end up liking bowling
K: Then you are unrealistic to think that what most people like will be not be thought to apply to most future people as well.
S: As you know, I think that most future people will also be greatly harmed, and that my main point is that tis socio-economic-cultural structure should not be assumed as something that ought to be perpetuated, especially because of some utilitarian-based approach that "good" must be had no matter what.
K: There is no good argument against perpetuating the socio-economic-cultural structure
S: There is a good argument against perpetuating the structure. We can evaluate it as bad, and thus is not a given that this should take place for people with self-reflection of negative aspects. K: So what if people are forced into negative aspects that can be self-reflected? Force isn't bad here as repetio ad absurdum, all things can be forced so this isn't any different.
S: Because one outcome leads to a way of life, and one there is no one that leads any way of life as they don't exist clearly.

Of course we can skip all that and all its variations because we've done it before. What we can focus on maybe to keep it more elevated (and not zero-sum) is see if whether keeping this structure going, is whether it is a political decision and why this political decision is seen as good, necessary, and cannot be criticized.

Let me put this another way, to respect the fact that we have argued this same thing before, and to honor the fact that a new thread does not wipe away previous conversations, can you at least think of an argument I might give in the hypothetical thousand pages that would try to counter what you are saying, and frame it in a respectable way?

Not trying to rehash. Just pointing out that you have an assumption that I don’t think many share behind what you’re saying. It’s not objectively the case that ANs have a moral high ground because they don’t impose, since there are plenty of situations where we find imposing fine, heck, the right thing to do. And there are plenty of ways in which the non ANs are also striving not to impose. — khaled

Yes I am well aware of your argument. What do you want me to say to you that would make us both come away feeling this was a productive conversation? You know we disagree, so shall we take another thousand pages to go over this argument? Are you saying this so your record is noted on the books? What would you like me to do with the information you provide me? Do you think that this has convinced me of your case? I only say this to you in particular because we have done this before.

To some degree I think this already exists. Seinfeld loves to talk about how annoying everything is, ad he's ridiculously wealthy. But even without the wealth, to be able to talk with a friend about the horrors of life and make jokes about it is such a relief that life actually becomes pleasant for awhile. Kafka was a comedian. Dostoevsky was a comedian. The best clowns have tears in their eyes. — norm

Yes, Seinfeld and the like is a sort of catharsis. But the comedy makes more palatable.

This has maybe served the community in some roundabout way, brave warriors and shamans perhaps. But mostly we are along for ride, cameras jammed into neckholes with the illusion of 'free will.' — norm

Can you explain the difference between the shamans and most people with cameras jammed in neckholes? Is it the difference between those who wipe their ass an those who don't or those who put their hands in the spaghetti and those who don't?

FWIW, I sympathize with anti-natalism. If we truly want to be innocent, unstained lambs, then we should not be at all, for we are worse than lions. There's a short story about a sect who takes it upon to destroy all life on earth, not only human life, because they fear than any residue will climb its way back up the evolutionary ladder back to a recognition of its absurd guilt. Actually that was the short story. I haven't fleshed it out. Why bother? [Nothing is funnier than unhappiness and futility.] — norm

Fair enough. Sounds like you should continue it, if it's yours. Anyways, I am not trying to be that completely annihilationist. Rather, I am framing the usual view of life as a political view, not just a life choice or a preference or a lifestyle choice. To have children is to squarely believe life to be worth continuing and expanding, and perpetuating. So we have two sides of the debate.. the procreationist typical view (those think this is good or at least agnostic) and the antinatalist. One is forcing the situation of the socio-cultural-economic way of life (You have to work, get comfortable, find entertainment, suffer throughout all this and repeat basically). But why put forth this way of life over and over as a necessary or good thing as if this is decidedly so? We complain so much about particular things regarding life an how unfair certain things are, even in the best of circumstances. And yet here we are expanding and perpetuating it nonetheless, not taking it to its logical conclusion. And we not only just have neutral creatures, but creatures who can self-reflect on the very tasks at hand needed to survive and can evaluate it it as not good!

Is this so obvious? I agree that sex is mediated, but so are the others. Eat spaghetti with your hands. Take a shit and omit the wipe. Things will not go well for you. Before long, it doesn't even occur to you to eat spaghetti with your hands when you're alone. — norm

I actually agree with you here. So you hit upon what I was talking about earlier. Sex is not just an automatic response. It is mediated just like a lot of our other habits needed to survive as a human bound by cultural practices and conventions. We can break out of the habit of procreation, in other words, just like we don't have to dig our hands into spaghetti to eat our food.

You could argue the antinatalist forces people to not procreate. Most schools of thought don’t see procreation as an unjustified imposition. For instance: you would be forcing christians to go directly against their beliefs, as they’re told to have children.

We force things on people all the time if they’re justified. For instance education. So just because a position doesn’t force anything on anyone doesn’t make it better right off the bat. Not having kids go to school is definitely worse than having them go to school.

Or you could argue that the antinatalist also forces things on people. If you choose not to have children, then the people the children would have helped are worse off. You could argue that’s as much an imposition as having the child itself would be. — khaled

We know our positions well here I think, we do not have to rehash it. You will disagree with me as you have in the past about this, but I do believe there to be a distinction of someone not yet born and the already born when it comes to "forced" situations. The making kids go to school is the new lifeguard, etc. Forcing something that does not exist at all versus taking care of people that exist already are two different types of sets. One is null, one is part of the socio-economic-cultural community I talk about. You can disagree with this, but then we are going to veer this thread into something like the other one. I'd like to explore different aspects than this same argument. So if we can do that I'd like to continue but if this is going to be a rehash, I'm not interested as we've already done it an so won't be interesting or productive to me regarding this particular angle.

I think you're breaking the OT for pessimism. I respect the craft, but I just - what am I supposed to learn from it? — csalisbury

OT does this refer to Off Topic or Old Testament?

I mean maybe you're just randomly interested in this, but why not be interested in turkish government from 200 ad to 700 ad, right?

Anyway, That's not what I'm interested in, though I truly think you have mastered what you've set out to master. — csalisbury

Thank you. Simply because Jesus is such a huge part of Western Civilization, I think it important to understand the origins of all this. Religion needs to be put in its historical context. In fact, a lot of things should be understood in its historical context.. but religion especially goes out of control when it just becomes layers of layers and layers of its own bullshit and isn't put into context of how it developed.