Couples without kids are selfish?

I have to agree with you.We live in an increasingly hyper-competitive world with rising population and diminishing resources. I'm not saying married couples shouldn't have kids, but they should only do so after serious consideration and soul searching to make sure they are up to the challenge of raising kids properly. And no one should feel it is a responsibility to have kids or have kids because that's just what you're supposed to do when you grow up.

Snake Pliskin wrote:

"Couples without kids are selfish".... that is what I overheard at a race this weekend from some women talking to her friend.

What the hell?

My wife and I are both 40, and are happy that we do not have any children. We like kids, but know we do not want any of our own.

That whole selfish comment is just lame. The lady who made the comment had four of her own kids.

Does she think people like my wife and I are selfish because we are not tired, broke and we can take several vacations a year?

Strange world we live in.

My brother has no children and he is the most selfish person I know. Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

FolsomRunner wrote:

My wife and I live in Folsom, California.

We do not have kids and we are looked down upon treated like outcasts by many in the neighborhood.

We are not part of their clique. (the breeders)

We don't have kids so therefore we are not involved in soccer, swimming, playgroup etc.

We got back from a vacation in South America and one of our neighbors with 5 kids said with a very snotty voice "it must be nice to be able to do that"

F*** her.

Her and her husband made their choice.

And we have made ours.

Using the term "breeders", like the most bitter feminist lesbians, suggests resentment on your part of people with children.

The good news in all this is that "some" of those without any genetic value to pass on are chosing not to. Sadly, this does not include most of the worst genetic offenders. The far below average intellect, un-educatable dolts filling the public school system with individuals who may, at best, eventually find fulfillment working at McDonalds.

Are his girlfriends really hot? Hmmmmmmmmmmm indeed if they are.

Do you yourself have genetic value? What IS genetic value?

If it's looking like Jessica Simpson then I agree.

I don't think your formula works, because you and others on this thread seem to have lots of hostility toward those who have multiple children, but I doubt that you are envious of them.

We have one child and are happy. I could never imagine having more than two kids, but our inlaws have three, are happy, and might even have a fourth. It's just a matter of knowing what you want from life.

Frat Boy wrote:

You probably live your life to please your wife, that is not selfish, that is fine.

It is people that do everything with only themselves in mind that are selfish.

Nothing wrong with not having kids, more people should be making your decision. Too many kids to parents who cannot afford/control them.

Don't worry about her.

Does that mean single people are selfish and everyone has to get married?

Joe Kidd wrote:

Having four kids is irresponsible. Man, that's a load of youngsters. I know a couple with 6 kids. They make good money but they still live just above the poverty line with so many mouths to feed, clothes to buy, sports, activities etc.

that's ridiculous. i grew up in a family with more than 6 kids. my mother never worked (although she was a biology major in school), and my dad never made more than $100k. In fact, it was MUCH less than that until not so long ago. still, we lived in a nice neighborhood in a nice house in a nice, small city.

we all went to private schools while growing up--not fancy, expensive ones, but schools that did not drain anyone's tax dollars nonetheless. all of us who have gone to college so far have gone to top private universities, three of us have been D1 varsity athletes, and we all were top students. Two will have PhDs, one is a nurse, and one is on the way to medical school. Who knows what the others will do.

my parents aren't swimming in money now that they're trying to help the remaining kids through college, but they do fine. Pluse, they know that they raised us such that we wouldn't think twice about helping out with finances in whatever way possible now that we are starting to make decent money.

people who say it costs too much are generally just too dumb to handle their finances responsibly. And those who say it's selfish--if you're going that route (we should limit how many kids are born), then it seems like a better idea to keep those under a certain IQ from having kids maybe? I mean, you're just being practical right? wouldn't be even more practical to keep a lot of the idiots who post here from reproducing?

anyway, i kid. i won't tell anyone what to do with their reproductive systems if you won't blindly rip on families that are bigger than yours.

tab wrote:

that's ridiculous. i grew up in a family with more than 6 kids. my mother never worked (although she was a biology major in school), and my dad never made more than $100k. In fact, it was MUCH less than that until not so long ago. still, we lived in a nice neighborhood in a nice house in a nice, small city

...

people who say it costs too much are generally just too dumb to handle their finances responsibly. .

How many more than 6 kids?

I grew up in a family with 7. There is no way in hell my father could come close to affording today what he afforded then for us.

People are talking about having kids like you just go to the kid store and pick a couple up if you want them. Why is this such an area for judgment? How would anyone know without asking very intimate questions if someone doesn't have kids because they have just not been able to have them yet and might never be able to have them? Sure, adoption is an alternative to that and a truly unselfish act, but it is also expensive and difficult and not possible for everyone.

Alternatively, why is it such a big deal if some people have more kids than others? Isn't that a personal decision and/or a matter of circumstance that is nobody's business but theirs? Isn't procreation the ultimate freedom that we in this country would not want others to dictate to us? I guess you can have an opinion on it without necessarily wanting to deny someone their freedom (just like you might be critical of hot pants but not think wearing them should be illegal), but still. Seems like you should just shut up about it.

Now, people without pets...that is truly selfish. j/k

Richard Perry wrote:

I'm amazed at the venom from the childless by choicers however.

I think this is because when as a DINK you get alot of heat from your previous DINK friends who decided to have kids. They tell you all of their tales of woe about how hard it is and then turn around and want to know when you are going to have them. I suspect that misery loves company?

As part of a couple who is in the uncertain about kids category, if we do decide to have them, i already dread the commentary of "well now you get to see what we have been going through all these years and how lucky you had it"

If you can't relate to this, think about those guys you know in the middle of a hard training phase whining about how tired they are and how many miles they are putting in. you want to just say "well if you are that miserable, then don't do it"...

so, the venom is kind of a defense against those people whining about how hard they have it and how lucky we are. when the way i see it, there is really no luck involved.

Yeah...I can see that.

I also think, adding to my previous read on the situation, that the kids r us people look upon the no kids crowd as lacking responsibility. IOW they are so focused on themselves that they can't take care of anyone else. At least that's the view from the we love kids people.

To Snake wrote:

The childless aren't selfish, they're smart.

Actually, most of the DINK's I know are selfish. I'm not saying that they're selfish because they don't have kids, I saying that they don't have kids because they're selfish.

Most of the DINK's I know have all of life's material luxuries - SUV's (ironic since they don't have kids to haul around) flat screens, gaming systems, expensive clothes, jewlery, etc, and still tend to complain about how "tight" money is. They don't contribute to society in any meaningful way - typically they spend their time eating out, going to movies, travelling, golfing, shopping, etc. There doesn't seem to be any real substance to their lives - more or less just the pursuit of decadance.

Again, I'm not saying not having kids is a selfish act, rather, I'm turning it around and saying that selfish people, in general, are probably more opposed to having kids because it would drastically change their selfish lifestyle.

By the way, to the original poster, it really seems like the comment you overheard severely offended you. If you weren't a selfish person, you probably wouldn't have cared enough to be offended. Just a thought.

whitee wrote:

I'll tell you what's selfish...selfish is all these black and mexican women who fart out kids so their welfare check is higher.

I'll tell you what's selfish - all the father's of those children who never take responsibility.

I'm always fascinated by the fractured reasoning I find on LetsRun. Paying money for goods and services which drive the economy and keeps others employed. How is that not "contributing to society"? What should they be doing that they are not?

So not having kids = decadence? How do you figure?

Again, what are they not doing for "society" that people with kids ARE doing?

Why do people always say that right after insulting someone? That phrase, "Just a thought"? Were you under the impression that somehow fools people into not realizing you are insulting them? What you are really saying is, "f*** you" but want to make it somehow sound palatable.

If the original poster is NOT a selfish person, perhaps he would have been offended at being lumped in with the selfish people.

Just another thought.

And in case my meaning is not clear, f*** you. Hope you aren't offended.

Average_Joe wrote:

How many more than 6 kids?

I grew up in a family with 7. There is no way in hell my father could come close to affording today what he afforded then for us.

7 kids here as well. and a couple are still at home so we aren't talking about making 100k back in the 1980s or anything.

people will be amazed to learn that you can in fact grow up without going on big family vacations, eating out every other day, or having closets full of designer clothes.

like i said, though, we lived in a nice house. we had good clothes (enough name brand stuff so we could keep our egos intact during those difficult middle/high school years), good cars but no big SUVs, and all that...

all of us worked from the time we were young with paper routes, lawn care jobs, babysitting, and more...but we were not allowed to have fulltime jobs until we were heading off to college (we were all in sports, band, etc...). even then, only one of us worked during the college school year so far. So we all had our own money to cover entertainment expenses and stuff like that, but weren't slaving away to buy our own cars.

there's no point in going on really. most people will still think they need huge TVs and trips to Disneyworld to raise their poor little ones properly. i hope they enjoy living check to check and watching the brats grow up to be puzzled about why shit like that doesn't fall into their laps as soon as they finish their 5 years of fumbling through undergrad.

Megadeth wrote:

I'm always fascinated by the fractured reasoning I find on LetsRun. Paying money for goods and services which drive the economy and keeps others employed. How is that not "contributing to society"? What should they be doing that they are not?

If buying goods and services is your only contribution to society, then I'd say that's pretty selfish. There are plenty of other causes in this world to which one can contribute time and money other than necessities and luxuries.

So not having kids = decadence? How do you figure?

Again, what are they not doing for "society" that people with kids ARE doing?

See, you're missing the point. I'm not saying NOT having kids is selfish. I'm saying that selfish people tend to NOT have kids, BECAUSE they are selfish. Just like selfish people probably don't do much volunteer work or give money to charities. Raising children (correctly) requires sacrafice, something selfish people probably aren't in to all that much.

The fact is, the original poster said "Does she think people like my wife and I are selfish because we are not tired, broke and we can take several vacations a year?"

In other words, his evidence that he is NOT selfish is that he and his wife are well rested, well off financially, and have spare time in spades. Hmmm. He could have said "the fact that I don't have kids gives me more time to spend volunteering at the animal shelter" or "since I don't have kids I build houses for habitat for humanity on the weekends" or "since I don't have to save for college I give $100 to the salvation army every month.

But he didn't.

He said he was well rested, well off, and enjoys taking multiple vacations a year. Sounds pretty selfish to me.

Just a thought.

Look at the magnitude of the carbon footprint "breeders" vs. "nonbreeders" leave on the planet...

A household of greater than two is going to consume more food, more electricity, more gas, etc. Then as the breeder children grow up to reproduce this consumption is compounded.

From a purely scientific standpoint I have to argue that not reproducing is the most selfless act anybody can do for the good of our planet.

goin mobile wrote:

Using the term "breeders", like the most bitter feminist lesbians, suggests resentment on your part of people with children.

I don't think anyone posting here is resentful of couples with kids, but rather annoyed that they are talked down to because they don't have any.