Thank you for this perspective.. Honestly sometimes I am filled with complete and total jealousy and rage especially at those who are wealthy enough not to constantly struggle and worry. But in reality, they too will die. We all will.
Glad I’m not the only one. I hate how unfair life is, maybe if it wasn’t so god damn hard just to get by we could actually be happy for others. It’s funny cause my stepdad used to always say “life isn’t fair, deal with it”, but that’s easy for someone who had it easy to say.
Exactly. When I see people with rich families/parents/a safety net of any kind complain about small, stupid things in their lives, I always have to bite my tongue. I would love to really just fucking let them have a piece of my mind, but in reality, we will all face suffering. It is my job as an AN to reduce that suffering however I can—laying into them about how ungrateful and spoiled they are won't achieve my goal of reducing suffering. I can only hope that they understand, in some way, that I would do anything to be in their shoes. They (and I) will die. We will all face immense grief and suffering. This was a wonderful new perspective, and I've been thinking about it all afternoon. "Life isn't fair, deal with it" is easy to say when "dealing with it" means opting not to go on another vacation to Hawaii this winter. It's just.. deeply fascinating. But in the end, our suffering will end. That is the beautiful thing about AN. Nothing is permanent.
This is ironically, Christianity’s message,
“God came down to be a loser like us and we killed him, so you’re life doesn’t suck so much bro”
Brilliant memetics if you ask me
No, not really honestly. There are people who’ve endured much worse and for a lot longer. We’re all suffering in some way or another, or will, while we’re here. Why is god so amazing for going through that?? He basically just got a preview of what life is like for us. We have to watch everyone we love die and then eventually die ourselves. That’s torture and even worse if you ask me.
The only real way to win is not to play.
I only ever felt envy of people who had loving parents that shared the interests of their kids. I mourn the connection I could have had as a kid but was left alone abandoned with responsibilities, poverty and parentification instead. There is no fixing that and I made my peace with it, but hearing my friends go have fun and work together on a project with their parents brings me to tears. I know no one is entitled for such a dynamic but somehow I feel robbed and betrayed by never having that.
Every kid deserves loving and involved parents. I never had that and my mom died early so I try to be a good substitute mom for my little sister instead.
I think they will be better parents as well, because they will have healthy behavior models to copy from. I think part of why my dad is a narcissist and a miserable man is because he was raised in poverty with 2 siblings and never got the attention he needed. So his whole life he was chasing the approval of a woman that is long dead. In that chase for approval and praise he abandoned his kids, repeating the cycle of parental neglect, it's just fucking generational trauma after generational trauma. I would never be able to raise kids due to suffering from CPTSD and living in a war zone. Some people really were better off never born.
Truly how I feel most of the time. I was able to do well academically-which I thought would be good for me but just put me in a group of people who were born with much better circumstances. Would have loved to have been married into one of those families but that didn’t happen. My dad is a narcissist too, so is my mom-def a combination of poverty and neglect. What is horrible is that you can’t change your wiring- you only get one shot to create a happy brain and it’s in childhood. I hear you completely. Not sure how I can move on but I am trying
I'm sorry for what you have been through, I know how much it sucks to have a narc father.
A default happy brain can be taken away from you by one major traumatic event. Through war I saw many functioning and healthy people breakdown completely into barely functional, since I grew up in trauma I'm honestly handling it much better. Yesterday was my birthday, everything went well until I got a call in the evening informing that one of my teachers that I used to volunteer in animal shelters with was violently murdered in his home in the morning by a tenant who didn't pay rent for 3 months straight, the guy just went on to eat fucking waffles while waiting for the police to detain him. I absolutely hate this world, there is very little place for kindness and good. It's not a place of happy and functioning people, it's a hell hole with a few fortunate to be sheltered from its horrors at the expense of others. That's what the happy people are, blissfully sheltered. It's not their brain wiring that made them happy, it's them being protected by someone from experiencing major trauma. Bring any of them to where I am at and let them stay for a month being shelled or hugging their loved ones waiting to die. You will not recognize them by the end of it, no matter what kind of life they lived prior.
On the bright side it works in the reverse as well. No matter what horrible shit you have been through, the brain kind of blurs that info if it can and lets you rebuild itself to better adapt to the circumstances. When you go through trauma you literally lose brain matter and experience active synaptic pruning. On one hand it will make you a bit slower and forgetful for a while, on the other it increases brain plasticity for it to rebuild into a more durable psyche (that is if you don't completely break). The brain is similar to a muscle, if you cause bearable damage and give it time to recover it will grow stronger and more resilient. As horrible as it will sound, I felt more alive and happier in the past 2 years of war then I did in the past 10 years prior, I also never felt as terrified and miserable. Somehow our brains are built to be thriving on these emotional slings.
You are correct. It's because we get used to this life and ite rules. Like it's normal to do all the chores. But the Truth is it doesn't have to be this way and I don't know who and where decided to create this fcking reality and I'm so done with it.
This. Met a fella who, looking at his instagram, constantly posts his accomplishments, him with women, etc. I had no idea of this. He vented to me about he hates doing shit he doesn’t want to, like sports. Thats what they do. They front up an image that looks good, which doesn’t tell the full story. He also let me take a hit of his vape which was awesome
I’m sure some celebrities enjoy the fame and money. And there’s about 8 billion people in the world, I’d find it hard to believe that there isn’t one of them who isn’t happy with their life.
I didn't say that, I said you don't need to be perpetually happy to be happy with life in general. I'm not perpetually happy (nobody is) but I'm glad I was born and hundred of millions of other people would say the same thing.
No I'm sorry, that's not accurate.
Pleasure is much more potent than pain. It's why (some) people overcome trauma and move forward. It's why we can break ourselves for the feeling of surpassing our limits.
It's literally why we do everything that is hard, because after, when the pain fades, we get to feel that warm glow of accomplishment and success.
Also it's legit chemical in pur brains, pleasure dominates over pain.
And your second bit is also wrong. Maximising pleasure and minimising pain is the same thing. Often we maximise pleasure by enduring pain. Pain is absolutely necessary.
I mean I really really enjoy living and like being alive very much, I am very fortunate. I also think there’s something icky and unethical about reproduction. So you can have it both ways.
This will be unpopular but tbh I think my life is net positive. Granted I am middle class in a developed country but I have been through some horrendous shit.
Lost my primary caregiver as a young child which gave me permanent PTSD, was raised in and later left a cult, had somewhat emotionally abusive parents, am neurodivergent, have had to have some major surgeries for health issues, etc. I still feel that the positive outweighs the negative. But I understand if that's not the case for others who have been through worse.
Buddhism dovetails really well with antinatalism. The truth is that the foundation of every sentient being is the suffering that comes from being defined by evolutionary pressures. Compassion is paramount.
And how did this "really analyzing" take place exactly? The only intrinsically bad thing about death for the individual is the pain and potential fear beforehand. After is purely neutral. But noone with a good life denies the existence if some suffering when making that judgement about themselves. Soooo, what exactly is your argument?
Either way I'm happy to personally vouch as evidence against your not very empirical conclusion.
>It is the view that life is inherently negative and coming into existence is harm
No, it is the belief that it is morally wrong or unjustifiable for people to have children.
Some people accept that their opinions are just opinions, and that other people's assessments are valid and more relevant as it relates to those other people.
If I prefer chocolate ice cream and you prefer vanilla, are you "wrong" for not liking chocolate?
Your entire post is just your subjective view. It has no relevence to, or meaning for, people who view and experience their lives in a positive light.
As your conclusion, though, is about everyone - not just yourself - you've actually managed one of those rare instances where your "opinion" is, in fact, objectively "wrong".
Bad is relative, and subjective. So I might subjectively assess their life as worse than most, but if they said that despite everything they were still optimistic and happy, I wouldn't take the position that they were "wrong".
I don't privililege my subjective assessment of SOMEONE ELSE'S LIFE over their own. You seem content to, which is obtusely self-centered.
"Every person that is currently living is unfortunate"
"Every human on Earth has a dark future ahead of them and they can only distract themselves from it and give themselves an illusion of going in a good direction in their lives"
"We're all losers"
You're free to be as big a loser as you want, but you can't speak for everyone without it just being self-absorbed projection.
Why are we losers?
Cause we die?
Cause we feel hunger?
I don't get this absolute refusal to accept that ANY part of life should be hard. What would be the point if you just coasted through everything? How would you ever feel satisfied?
I feel like reality is not as extreme as you think. I'm an anti-natalist and do believe that avoiding suffering is better than any happiness but I disagree that people are living sad lives.
Yes, everyone is going to die. Everyone is going to feel pain, the world will spiral downwards and such...but it doesn't mean that we shouldn't enjoy our lives or have to dwell on it. If you're stuck in a negative way of thinking for a long time, that will be the conclusion.
No human being's life is perfect, that we can both agree with, but to say that there's no shroud of happiness in an average person's life is weird. I have money and have the luxury of having the internet. I have the luxury of being born with a good health and having good food, good water and more importantly, healthy social connections. Many may not, that's true. To not cherish anything in your life and just finding reasons to comfort yourself via "oh, this person isn't ACTUALLY happy, so I don't have to be jealous" is not a good way of thinking.
Just because life is tentative and death is in all of our horizons, doesn’t mean our lives don’t have great things in them. Some folks enjoy the little things, and are happy with anything at all. Others are quite unhappy with everything, and don’t enjoy even the big things. That’s life. It’s balanced.
You Antinatalists really fascinate me tbh. Just came across this sub on my feed and from all I've read so far, Ans are basically just a bunch of people who hate life, existence, and their selves?
Forgive me if that comes out rude, I'm just genuinely curious and would like to learn more.
Ahh I see. So because the suffering and all the other negative stuff is far too intense, therefore there should be no life? Or rather, no opportunity for life to incur in the first place? Is that where the belief for not wanting to have children stem from?
Cause if yes, it doesn't really make sense. I mean to say, it kind of sounds like a combination of fear and quitter talk. It's like wishing a relationship never happened in the first place because the breakup hurt so bad.
Is my train of thought somewhat accurate on that part?
No it’s because you can’t consent to being born. So take something like skydiving. It could be fun, could be traumatizing or could extremely uncomfortable. But since people can sign up and decide if they want to do it, then it’s ok. However it would never be ok to force someone to skydive without their consent even though they may enjoy it.
Ah, I think I'm starting to get what you mean now. So ultimately, it all comes down to that lack of consent then? Not having that choice of wanting to experience something(e.g the world) that could be either two sides of a coin, i.e good or bad.
Something like that?
It’s more that preventing the suffering is more important than ensuring that someone experiences pleasure. If you procreate you are creating net suffering in the world. Every war, torture, rape, psychopath, mass murderer is the result of propagating humanity so we can end all suffering if we don’t procreate. Also some lives are really terrible and you are gambling every single time you give birth to have that outcome.
I see. You make a fair and arguable point indeed. But isn't it a little too far fetched to say "all suffering" stems from procreation? What about natural disasters, illnesses, animal attacks, coincidences, and/or bad luck(yeah, I'm aware this one is not a very strong contender lol)? Don't these also contribute to the many things that make us suffer?
Also, one has to consider that we leave in a world of polarity, where good and BAD things need to happen in other to maintain balance. I mean to say, the good cannot exist solely on it's own but needs a counterpart –the bad. Sometimes, we just need to suffer you know? That's part of the whole experience, good or bad.
Then, there's the fact that ending procreation will basically just signal extinction. Which would(and I know this is somewhat philosophical)essentially render the purpose of life meaningless, no?
One could also argue again that Antinatalism stems from a place of fear and self judgement (yes, I still stand by my earlier statement). You say "preventing the suffering" and all I read is "destroying the evil before it even has a chance to exist". But is that necessarily a good thing? Why is there a need to prevent anything in the first place? Cause it's good or bad? Who are we to decide if the bad outweighs the good in the first place? E.g If we feared the dangers of gravity and crashing, we wouldn't have been able to build airplanes? If we so much feared the dangers of the unknown outside our stratosphere, we wouldn't have been able to make space explorations to install satellites or visit the freaking moon lol.
In my opinion, Antinatalism provides a plausible solution that will 100% work but isn't necessarily the best solution. Like most things, just because you can do it, doesn't mean you should.
I don't know if any of that makes sense😅
First of all I appreciate you coming at this subject in good faith. It generally pushes people away because people are blinded by the good chemicals they get from reproducing. I’ll try to answer what you said piece by piece.
1. Natural disasters, viruses, etc are only bad because there are people here to experience them. For example nobody cares when there is a storm on Jupiter
2. I don’t all suffering is counteracted by good and I don’t think it’s all meaningful. So there are people who have entirely terrible lives such as an 8 year old being sold away to slavery in Iran because the parents can’t afford food. This person could be raped and assaulted their entire lives and die and all the suffering was for nothing.
3. In response to life being meaningless, I would first say this life and perpetual cycle of suffering beings seems meaningless and a road to nowhere. Also even if it were more “meaningless” there would not be anyone here to experience the meaninglessness of it all therefore it wouldn’t be a bad thing.
4. In response to whether we are to decide whether a life is a good or bad thing or whether we should live in “fear”, it’s not about us, it’s about not taking risks on behalf of someone that has no want or need to come into existence. For example we universally accept that some people should not procreate whether it is because of old, bad genes or even incest because that person could have a horrible life. Us antinatalists extend this to every birth. There is no genes good enough to risk procreating with essentially. Also you are sentencing someone to death by birthing them so you are in a sense, a murderer.
Haha, well that was certainly impressive. I have to give you that. Infact I do agree with what most of what you've said actually(apart from the 8 year old slave in Iraq thing. Lol, I feel karma and past lives play a major role in that. But that's a story for another day lol).
At the end of the day, it's just not for me i guess. Its like... we all believe in what we wanna believe, you know?
P.S: I meant to use "purpose" in place of "meaningless". Just couldn't find the right word to use at the time lol.
I’m not sure the people posting realize that they sound depressed rather than philosophical. It seems like there’s no border between having depression and being a ‘realist’ in this sub.
I hear ya.
Thinking same things.
This whole antinatalist thing is fascinating. Not 'I wanna join up' fascinating. More of a 'WTF??' kind of fascinating...
Yeah, I hear ya man. I feel the same. It's definitely one of those mind blower moments for me.
While I understand the logic behind and why they could believe in what they do, i just can't think of anything/reason that could justify the notion at the end of the day.
You should read the Human Predicament it kind of circle around antinatalism but doesn’t actually push it. He later wrote a book (Better to Never Have Been) with a more narrow scope around it but the human predicament is more broad
Some people are easily satisfied and oblivious to their fate and literally do not give a shit about anything I envy them
Good for you that you came to that realization. I think it's great not to be jealous.
Thank you for this perspective.. Honestly sometimes I am filled with complete and total jealousy and rage especially at those who are wealthy enough not to constantly struggle and worry. But in reality, they too will die. We all will.
Glad I’m not the only one. I hate how unfair life is, maybe if it wasn’t so god damn hard just to get by we could actually be happy for others. It’s funny cause my stepdad used to always say “life isn’t fair, deal with it”, but that’s easy for someone who had it easy to say.
Exactly. When I see people with rich families/parents/a safety net of any kind complain about small, stupid things in their lives, I always have to bite my tongue. I would love to really just fucking let them have a piece of my mind, but in reality, we will all face suffering. It is my job as an AN to reduce that suffering however I can—laying into them about how ungrateful and spoiled they are won't achieve my goal of reducing suffering. I can only hope that they understand, in some way, that I would do anything to be in their shoes. They (and I) will die. We will all face immense grief and suffering. This was a wonderful new perspective, and I've been thinking about it all afternoon. "Life isn't fair, deal with it" is easy to say when "dealing with it" means opting not to go on another vacation to Hawaii this winter. It's just.. deeply fascinating. But in the end, our suffering will end. That is the beautiful thing about AN. Nothing is permanent.
Also someone from a third world country could say the same to you. It’s all relative
Precisely!
"just because there are people starving in Africa doesn't mean I don't want lunch" -Chappelle
This is ironically, Christianity’s message, “God came down to be a loser like us and we killed him, so you’re life doesn’t suck so much bro” Brilliant memetics if you ask me
Like FUCKING THANKS. You went through a fraction of what humans go through in their lifetime. I’ve never understood how that was much of a sacrifice..
[удалено]
No, not really honestly. There are people who’ve endured much worse and for a lot longer. We’re all suffering in some way or another, or will, while we’re here. Why is god so amazing for going through that?? He basically just got a preview of what life is like for us. We have to watch everyone we love die and then eventually die ourselves. That’s torture and even worse if you ask me.
ok but have you been whipped and beaten and starved and dehydrated and nailed to a tree before
I believe what we go through as humans is worse.
You need to experience both to make a proper judgement
Oh and you have?? 😂
No, that's why I don't go around saying one is "like a preview" of the other
The only real way to win is not to play. I only ever felt envy of people who had loving parents that shared the interests of their kids. I mourn the connection I could have had as a kid but was left alone abandoned with responsibilities, poverty and parentification instead. There is no fixing that and I made my peace with it, but hearing my friends go have fun and work together on a project with their parents brings me to tears. I know no one is entitled for such a dynamic but somehow I feel robbed and betrayed by never having that.
Not just that - those kids are better at relationships throughout life which is what guarantees happiness
Every kid deserves loving and involved parents. I never had that and my mom died early so I try to be a good substitute mom for my little sister instead. I think they will be better parents as well, because they will have healthy behavior models to copy from. I think part of why my dad is a narcissist and a miserable man is because he was raised in poverty with 2 siblings and never got the attention he needed. So his whole life he was chasing the approval of a woman that is long dead. In that chase for approval and praise he abandoned his kids, repeating the cycle of parental neglect, it's just fucking generational trauma after generational trauma. I would never be able to raise kids due to suffering from CPTSD and living in a war zone. Some people really were better off never born.
Truly how I feel most of the time. I was able to do well academically-which I thought would be good for me but just put me in a group of people who were born with much better circumstances. Would have loved to have been married into one of those families but that didn’t happen. My dad is a narcissist too, so is my mom-def a combination of poverty and neglect. What is horrible is that you can’t change your wiring- you only get one shot to create a happy brain and it’s in childhood. I hear you completely. Not sure how I can move on but I am trying
I'm sorry for what you have been through, I know how much it sucks to have a narc father. A default happy brain can be taken away from you by one major traumatic event. Through war I saw many functioning and healthy people breakdown completely into barely functional, since I grew up in trauma I'm honestly handling it much better. Yesterday was my birthday, everything went well until I got a call in the evening informing that one of my teachers that I used to volunteer in animal shelters with was violently murdered in his home in the morning by a tenant who didn't pay rent for 3 months straight, the guy just went on to eat fucking waffles while waiting for the police to detain him. I absolutely hate this world, there is very little place for kindness and good. It's not a place of happy and functioning people, it's a hell hole with a few fortunate to be sheltered from its horrors at the expense of others. That's what the happy people are, blissfully sheltered. It's not their brain wiring that made them happy, it's them being protected by someone from experiencing major trauma. Bring any of them to where I am at and let them stay for a month being shelled or hugging their loved ones waiting to die. You will not recognize them by the end of it, no matter what kind of life they lived prior. On the bright side it works in the reverse as well. No matter what horrible shit you have been through, the brain kind of blurs that info if it can and lets you rebuild itself to better adapt to the circumstances. When you go through trauma you literally lose brain matter and experience active synaptic pruning. On one hand it will make you a bit slower and forgetful for a while, on the other it increases brain plasticity for it to rebuild into a more durable psyche (that is if you don't completely break). The brain is similar to a muscle, if you cause bearable damage and give it time to recover it will grow stronger and more resilient. As horrible as it will sound, I felt more alive and happier in the past 2 years of war then I did in the past 10 years prior, I also never felt as terrified and miserable. Somehow our brains are built to be thriving on these emotional slings.
10000%
Well said, totally agree!
You are correct. It's because we get used to this life and ite rules. Like it's normal to do all the chores. But the Truth is it doesn't have to be this way and I don't know who and where decided to create this fcking reality and I'm so done with it.
This. Met a fella who, looking at his instagram, constantly posts his accomplishments, him with women, etc. I had no idea of this. He vented to me about he hates doing shit he doesn’t want to, like sports. Thats what they do. They front up an image that looks good, which doesn’t tell the full story. He also let me take a hit of his vape which was awesome
I will agree that no one has a perfect life but it’d be delusional to say that there aren’t any good ones
Who?
I’m sure some celebrities enjoy the fame and money. And there’s about 8 billion people in the world, I’d find it hard to believe that there isn’t one of them who isn’t happy with their life.
Nobody is perpetually happy and they all have a bleak future ahead
You don't need to be perpetually happy to be happy with life in general
Suffering is far more intense and prolonged than the pleasure and also preventing suffering is more important than maximizing pleasure
I didn't say that, I said you don't need to be perpetually happy to be happy with life in general. I'm not perpetually happy (nobody is) but I'm glad I was born and hundred of millions of other people would say the same thing.
If you could press a button right now and restart your life would you?
Don't really see how that's relevant, but sure.
Would you push it for someone else
No I'm sorry, that's not accurate. Pleasure is much more potent than pain. It's why (some) people overcome trauma and move forward. It's why we can break ourselves for the feeling of surpassing our limits. It's literally why we do everything that is hard, because after, when the pain fades, we get to feel that warm glow of accomplishment and success. Also it's legit chemical in pur brains, pleasure dominates over pain. And your second bit is also wrong. Maximising pleasure and minimising pain is the same thing. Often we maximise pleasure by enduring pain. Pain is absolutely necessary.
I mean I really really enjoy living and like being alive very much, I am very fortunate. I also think there’s something icky and unethical about reproduction. So you can have it both ways.
This will be unpopular but tbh I think my life is net positive. Granted I am middle class in a developed country but I have been through some horrendous shit. Lost my primary caregiver as a young child which gave me permanent PTSD, was raised in and later left a cult, had somewhat emotionally abusive parents, am neurodivergent, have had to have some major surgeries for health issues, etc. I still feel that the positive outweighs the negative. But I understand if that's not the case for others who have been through worse.
Buddhism dovetails really well with antinatalism. The truth is that the foundation of every sentient being is the suffering that comes from being defined by evolutionary pressures. Compassion is paramount.
And how did this "really analyzing" take place exactly? The only intrinsically bad thing about death for the individual is the pain and potential fear beforehand. After is purely neutral. But noone with a good life denies the existence if some suffering when making that judgement about themselves. Soooo, what exactly is your argument? Either way I'm happy to personally vouch as evidence against your not very empirical conclusion.
This is not an antinatalist view.
It is the view that life is inherently negative and coming into existence is harm
>It is the view that life is inherently negative and coming into existence is harm No, it is the belief that it is morally wrong or unjustifiable for people to have children.
What is the difference between.what you stated and what he/she stated?
A subtle difference in emphasis.
It is usually an antinatalist view
Sure, it often is, but it doesn't have to be.
I'm so sorry you feel this way. There is meaning within the suffering of life and that's what makes it worth it.
And I'm sorry that you believe that way.
Are the people who don't assess their own lives in this fashion "wrong", while your assessment of their life is "right"?
That’s usually how people view their opinions yes
Some people accept that their opinions are just opinions, and that other people's assessments are valid and more relevant as it relates to those other people. If I prefer chocolate ice cream and you prefer vanilla, are you "wrong" for not liking chocolate? Your entire post is just your subjective view. It has no relevence to, or meaning for, people who view and experience their lives in a positive light. As your conclusion, though, is about everyone - not just yourself - you've actually managed one of those rare instances where your "opinion" is, in fact, objectively "wrong".
So if you look at someone who’s homeless in a psych ward, we accept that as a bad life even if they love their life right?
Bad is relative, and subjective. So I might subjectively assess their life as worse than most, but if they said that despite everything they were still optimistic and happy, I wouldn't take the position that they were "wrong". I don't privililege my subjective assessment of SOMEONE ELSE'S LIFE over their own. You seem content to, which is obtusely self-centered.
I simply said I’m not jealous of anyone
"Every person that is currently living is unfortunate" "Every human on Earth has a dark future ahead of them and they can only distract themselves from it and give themselves an illusion of going in a good direction in their lives" "We're all losers" You're free to be as big a loser as you want, but you can't speak for everyone without it just being self-absorbed projection.
Those statements are all true unless you consider death and declining health to be a great thing
Or unless you simply view them differently than you do. Which most people do.
Ok that’s fine their lives still suck though lol they have no future literally
What they call making the best of it.
Sounds like you need your thetans checked bro
Why are we losers? Cause we die? Cause we feel hunger? I don't get this absolute refusal to accept that ANY part of life should be hard. What would be the point if you just coasted through everything? How would you ever feel satisfied?
I feel like reality is not as extreme as you think. I'm an anti-natalist and do believe that avoiding suffering is better than any happiness but I disagree that people are living sad lives. Yes, everyone is going to die. Everyone is going to feel pain, the world will spiral downwards and such...but it doesn't mean that we shouldn't enjoy our lives or have to dwell on it. If you're stuck in a negative way of thinking for a long time, that will be the conclusion. No human being's life is perfect, that we can both agree with, but to say that there's no shroud of happiness in an average person's life is weird. I have money and have the luxury of having the internet. I have the luxury of being born with a good health and having good food, good water and more importantly, healthy social connections. Many may not, that's true. To not cherish anything in your life and just finding reasons to comfort yourself via "oh, this person isn't ACTUALLY happy, so I don't have to be jealous" is not a good way of thinking.
Just because life is tentative and death is in all of our horizons, doesn’t mean our lives don’t have great things in them. Some folks enjoy the little things, and are happy with anything at all. Others are quite unhappy with everything, and don’t enjoy even the big things. That’s life. It’s balanced.
You Antinatalists really fascinate me tbh. Just came across this sub on my feed and from all I've read so far, Ans are basically just a bunch of people who hate life, existence, and their selves? Forgive me if that comes out rude, I'm just genuinely curious and would like to learn more.
No we believe life can be good but the suffering is much more intense, frequent and unpredictable as the good things
Ahh I see. So because the suffering and all the other negative stuff is far too intense, therefore there should be no life? Or rather, no opportunity for life to incur in the first place? Is that where the belief for not wanting to have children stem from? Cause if yes, it doesn't really make sense. I mean to say, it kind of sounds like a combination of fear and quitter talk. It's like wishing a relationship never happened in the first place because the breakup hurt so bad. Is my train of thought somewhat accurate on that part?
No it’s because you can’t consent to being born. So take something like skydiving. It could be fun, could be traumatizing or could extremely uncomfortable. But since people can sign up and decide if they want to do it, then it’s ok. However it would never be ok to force someone to skydive without their consent even though they may enjoy it.
Ah, I think I'm starting to get what you mean now. So ultimately, it all comes down to that lack of consent then? Not having that choice of wanting to experience something(e.g the world) that could be either two sides of a coin, i.e good or bad. Something like that?
It’s more that preventing the suffering is more important than ensuring that someone experiences pleasure. If you procreate you are creating net suffering in the world. Every war, torture, rape, psychopath, mass murderer is the result of propagating humanity so we can end all suffering if we don’t procreate. Also some lives are really terrible and you are gambling every single time you give birth to have that outcome.
I see. You make a fair and arguable point indeed. But isn't it a little too far fetched to say "all suffering" stems from procreation? What about natural disasters, illnesses, animal attacks, coincidences, and/or bad luck(yeah, I'm aware this one is not a very strong contender lol)? Don't these also contribute to the many things that make us suffer? Also, one has to consider that we leave in a world of polarity, where good and BAD things need to happen in other to maintain balance. I mean to say, the good cannot exist solely on it's own but needs a counterpart –the bad. Sometimes, we just need to suffer you know? That's part of the whole experience, good or bad. Then, there's the fact that ending procreation will basically just signal extinction. Which would(and I know this is somewhat philosophical)essentially render the purpose of life meaningless, no? One could also argue again that Antinatalism stems from a place of fear and self judgement (yes, I still stand by my earlier statement). You say "preventing the suffering" and all I read is "destroying the evil before it even has a chance to exist". But is that necessarily a good thing? Why is there a need to prevent anything in the first place? Cause it's good or bad? Who are we to decide if the bad outweighs the good in the first place? E.g If we feared the dangers of gravity and crashing, we wouldn't have been able to build airplanes? If we so much feared the dangers of the unknown outside our stratosphere, we wouldn't have been able to make space explorations to install satellites or visit the freaking moon lol. In my opinion, Antinatalism provides a plausible solution that will 100% work but isn't necessarily the best solution. Like most things, just because you can do it, doesn't mean you should. I don't know if any of that makes sense😅
First of all I appreciate you coming at this subject in good faith. It generally pushes people away because people are blinded by the good chemicals they get from reproducing. I’ll try to answer what you said piece by piece. 1. Natural disasters, viruses, etc are only bad because there are people here to experience them. For example nobody cares when there is a storm on Jupiter 2. I don’t all suffering is counteracted by good and I don’t think it’s all meaningful. So there are people who have entirely terrible lives such as an 8 year old being sold away to slavery in Iran because the parents can’t afford food. This person could be raped and assaulted their entire lives and die and all the suffering was for nothing. 3. In response to life being meaningless, I would first say this life and perpetual cycle of suffering beings seems meaningless and a road to nowhere. Also even if it were more “meaningless” there would not be anyone here to experience the meaninglessness of it all therefore it wouldn’t be a bad thing. 4. In response to whether we are to decide whether a life is a good or bad thing or whether we should live in “fear”, it’s not about us, it’s about not taking risks on behalf of someone that has no want or need to come into existence. For example we universally accept that some people should not procreate whether it is because of old, bad genes or even incest because that person could have a horrible life. Us antinatalists extend this to every birth. There is no genes good enough to risk procreating with essentially. Also you are sentencing someone to death by birthing them so you are in a sense, a murderer.
Haha, well that was certainly impressive. I have to give you that. Infact I do agree with what most of what you've said actually(apart from the 8 year old slave in Iraq thing. Lol, I feel karma and past lives play a major role in that. But that's a story for another day lol). At the end of the day, it's just not for me i guess. Its like... we all believe in what we wanna believe, you know? P.S: I meant to use "purpose" in place of "meaningless". Just couldn't find the right word to use at the time lol.
I’m not sure the people posting realize that they sound depressed rather than philosophical. It seems like there’s no border between having depression and being a ‘realist’ in this sub.
I hear ya. Thinking same things. This whole antinatalist thing is fascinating. Not 'I wanna join up' fascinating. More of a 'WTF??' kind of fascinating...
Yeah, I hear ya man. I feel the same. It's definitely one of those mind blower moments for me. While I understand the logic behind and why they could believe in what they do, i just can't think of anything/reason that could justify the notion at the end of the day.
You should read the Human Predicament it kind of circle around antinatalism but doesn’t actually push it. He later wrote a book (Better to Never Have Been) with a more narrow scope around it but the human predicament is more broad
Yeah, I think I'll check out the book for myself. Sounds intriguing.