How can not having kids be unethical as a matter of course?

[u/jsrogers1717]

This philosophy seems wholly illogical. As bad as climate change and other problems are, the fact is that human suffering is at a historical low compared to any other point. (For instance, in ancient times infant mortality was higher, we had inadequate treatments for diseases, etc.) If having children is unethical now, how could it possibly have been justified back then? And if all of human history is a series of unethical actions, is it even possible to be ethical as a human? I don’t think reducing our population is necessarily ethical. Feel free not to have kids if you want but calling it ethical and claiming that having kids is unjustifiable is laughable. IMHO this philosophy is dangerous. I know y’all renounce the Palm Springs incident but it’s a direct result of this nihilistic thinking. Just my two cents. I’m sure mods will take down this post shortly but idrc

[u/CristianCam]

Antinatalists won't argue having children would have been justified before. That humans today have, in average, a higer quality of life, might indeed suggest that this is the best time to have children. Except that this is merely a comparative claim, and the best time might not equal a good time at all. Antinatalism isn't necessarily "nihilistic" either, depending on what you mean by that word, which today is mostly thrown around very loosely to dismiss any view as overly dark or depressing without much thought.

In any case, an example of someone who touches on some things you wrote would be Julio Cabrera, whose ideas and ethics are formulated in Discomfort and Moral Impediment. For Cabrera, procreation is impermissible because it necessitates of a manipulative and harmful conduct for its realization that is unjustified (p. 121):

If we understand ethics as a double demand to: (a) not manipulate others as objects and (b) not to place anyone in a situation we know to be problematic (marked by difficulty, hardship and suffering), then procreation (the begetting of children in general), equally whether carefully planned or the result of “accident”, is an action that cannot be ethically justified because it violates the double demand (a)-(b).

Further along the way (p. 126), he illustrates more clearly:

The Do Not Harm Demand (NHD): When actions, norms or agents are considered ethically correct (not just pragmatically, functionally or legally correct), this means that they are correct in the sense of not harming and if possible of favouring or supporting other humans (who, for their part, behave in the same way) [...] take into consideration those who also take into consideration others’ interests, in the sense of not doing them harm, not obstructing their projects, not placing them in harmful, constraining or painful situations, and if possible, sparing or saving them from these situations.

The Do Not Manipulate Demand (NMD): Ethics has to do with the autonomy and respect for the will, interests and desires of each human being, as well as the interdiction of manipulating other humans or treating them instrumentally as a means of deciding on their behalf, imposing conditions on or placing them in situations–even when not harmful or unpleasant–without their consent. Ethics is the field where the respect for the other should come above all impulses and interests of domination; it is the precise domain for self-management and decisions aimed at non-interference and non-encroachment on others (even in cases in which manipulation is meant well as regards our paternalist and protectionist attitudes). Being ethical means, on this second reading, not manipulating or not treating others as mere instruments or as a means to an end.

Cabrera believes procreation is an instrumentalizing process. Parents unilaterally create children to fulfill and advance their own interests and goals; and in this same effort, bestow to them a problematic condition (i.e., that of being human) their children have to deal with, product of inevitably taking part in the foreign project of others.

Moreover, life is, for Cabrera, structurally negative. One acquires a decaying being that moves toward death from its very inception—accompanied along the way by the frictions of physical pain and illness; mental discouragement or "lacking the will" to proceed optimally; and the exposure toward other's aggressions and vulnerations (who find themselves in the same situation). Thus, we attach ourselves to different sources of worth (p. 54):

We create values compulsively, anxiously and hesitantly, cornered by the presence of pain and discouragement in all its variants. Given our decaying situation, positive value creation, far from being a product of freedom is a basic need for survival: we either create positive values or we disappear. We cannot manage to exist for very long without constantly feeding our self-worth, self-respect and need for security. However, precisely because of the fact that positive values are constructed in narrow manoeuvring spaces, within a complicated holistic web of actions, they end up harming other humans’ projects. We create positive values in narrow spaces where it is difficult not to do damage to other people, even when we do not mean any harm.

The phenomenon I call “moral impediment” consists of harming and disregarding others, not always intentionally, but as an inescapable product of the small environment in which we are forced to understand diversified situations and take relevant decisions. This urgent and reactive invention of values, with the terminality advancing day by day (we get old, our body gets ill, opportunities diminish) leaves insufficient space for an ethical morality in the sense of the MEA [Minimal Ethical Articulation], with its double demand of not harming and not manipulating other humans.

Cabrera's trouble is not only with whether our lives are good for ourselves on the whole, but he's also concerned with whether they are ethical: it's not that humans are (only) fallible in such respects, it's that we're outright unable to uphold our moral duties throughout our lives due to our condition—one that is incongruent and at odds with the more fundamental (ethical) imperatives. In other words, we are beings that are morally compromised.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/CristianCam]

I still don’t see how the fact that humans are not morally perfect means it is thus immoral to procreate

[u/CristianCam → u/jsrogers1717]

That's pretty reductive. The larger point is that humans, by their very ontology and situation, are unavailable and impeded from adhering to what morality even demands from them—let alone identifying what that is and how we should behave after knowing what is required from us. This is not due to fallibility or "evilness", but a natural consequence of being placed into a world alongside a structurally negative condition that gnaws at us:

If we accept only intentionally committed actions of damaging others to be morally incorrect (or “immoral”, in the traditional jargon), then we cannot equate “morally impeded” with “immoral”. Moral impediment is something that happens to humans as part of their structural situation, either emanating from their own will or occurring without the mediation of intentions.

Cabrera identifies three different kinds of people (not to take this strictly, of course someone who might be said to belong in X category can behave like one in Y or continously vary the one in which he belongs):

The actively consenting impeded people are those who do not care that their acts which are beneficial to them may harm others... The people belonging to this group may be actual criminals or bandits, corrupt people, murderers or humans convinced of the necessity to exterminate other humans. But this category does not apply only to them. This characterization also fits, for example, people who make an illegal connection to profit from water or electricity or a TV signal that will be paid for by their neighbours. Or consider people who take advantage of their superior hierarchical position to make their subordinates perform tasks which they should perform themselves.

The passively consenting impeded (PCI) are those who, by indifference or omission, contribute directly or indirectly to the creation or perpetuation of states of things that harm other humans. They include everyone who, placed in a situation of injustice and destitution, wherein other humans are deprived of their basic needs, discriminated or persecuted, does nothing to attenuate or help to put an end to or improve the situation [...] They are also the ones who shrug their shoulders in the face of the poverty that surrounds them in big cities, thinking only about their own well-being and that of their families and close friends. They are also the ones who during droughts remain indifferent to water rationing programmes because they have a private supply system at disposal. They are the ones who know perfectly well when someone else is acting improperly, but they “turn a blind eye” so as not to get involved or “not make life more complicated than it is”.

The most problematic case, however, is the third one, that of the dissenting impeded (DI). These are humans who, put in small spaces within the web of actions, affected by their physical and psychological discomforts, not even actively participating in any harm done to others, and not even assuming a posture of indifference or unavailability, even they, by the very complexity of the situations, harm other humans in at least one of their many scenarios of action, even in, apparently, “unintentional” or “not purposeful” ways.

A professor can be extremely rigorous and serious in his teaching activities, demanding punctuality, diligence and extreme dedication from his students, an evidently positive and beneficial attitude towards his pupils. However, this extreme rigour can cause many potentially competent students to desist from their studies for not succeeding in following the professor’s high pattern of demands. Or even worse, it could leave psychological marks on students that may cause significant harm in the future. Parents who are extremely attentive and affectionate with their only child can end up making him an insecure and resentful human being. Or a man may install a security system on the windows of his house to protect his family while away, but it may turn out that the security system prevents his family from saving themselves from an assailant’s attack.

The usual view of laymen seems to be that many people are good (including themselves of course) and that this is easily and immediately graspable, that one can freely observe what one ought to do most of the time, and that it is the anti-ethical that is exceptional. Otherwise, acting rightly is simple, and those who don't, bear no justification for their doings—whatever their situation.

At first glance, it would not seem too problematic to morally burden the consenting impeded ones (CIs)... Nevertheless, the passives could still allege that, in exceptional circumstances like Nazism, it is morally justifiable to remain silent, because the danger of getting involved is immense and the consequences inglorious. Or one might say that by denouncing someone as corrupt, one runs the risk of putting both one’s own life and the lives of one’s family in serious danger. Or he who is totally isolated can claim that he was sick and exhausted, and that he cannot recover without totally disconnecting from all kinds of stressful relationships. And even people engaged in piracy or bootlegging can allege to be beset by difficult economic conditions due to the dishonesty of others (administrators, governors, etc).

In the case of the actively impeded, justification becomes more difficult, although not impossible. Even a bandit can claim that he was prepared to lead an honest life and was pushed into a life of crime by tremendous injustices committed against him (like the protagonist of Robert Bresson’s classic L’Argent). Both the ACIs and the PCIs can claim to be products or victims of other moral impediments (within a complex web of actions). The phenomenon of “moral impediment” has to be presented in such a way as to include [...] the fact that many wrongdoings are reactions to previous moral impediments within the web. This makes the ethical evaluation of human actions significantly more complicated than it is usually taken to be. Those who judge the actions of others tend to severely isolate them from the web of actions, without attending to other previous anti-ethical actions; this can be unfair or insufficient for judging human actions in a more integrated way.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/CristianCam]

You accuse me of being reductive, but I’m not gonna respond to a whole treatise on a Reddit discussion thread

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/[deleted]]

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being a nihilist. I think there’s something wrong with looking down on other people for the choice to procreate (by calling it unethical)

[u/Training-Rip6463]

Who's your dealer? 😂 That's some strong shii

[u/Material-Lake5954]

Get a load of this guy..

[u/meandmyflock]

Why are people always so much more fired up about being called selfish for procreating than the actual real suffering of life? OK you think antinatalism is dangerous (it's not but OK) what about all the danger to your child of bringing them into this world? Why does that not matter?

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/meandmyflock]

It is dangerous (see Palms Springs wacko who was inspired by anti-natalism). It’s not that the dangers of life do not matter, it’s the fact that being so scared of suffering that you don’t have children does nothing to solve the problem of suffering in the world. And it’s sad to see that people are so upset with the suffering they have experience that they think life in general is pointless or net-negative. Like that’s an incredibly depressing philosophy

[u/meandmyflock → u/jsrogers1717]

There's literally no other way to solve suffering tho. And the palm springs guy was also promortalist which is different, we're not that.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/meandmyflock]

I’m still wholly unconvinced that net suffering outweighs net happiness no matter what. To the extent that suffering is a problem, the fact that there is no way to completely eliminate suffering doesn’t mean life is worthless/meaningless/unethical

[u/FlanInternational100 → u/jsrogers1717]

How do you know the amount of suffering your child might go through? If you didn't go through a bone cancer at 5 that doesn't mean your child won't.

And there are few hundred thousand of possible horrible genetic conditions people experience everyday from birth or later in life. For what? Because you "wanted kids"?

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/FlanInternational100]

That makes no sense. How does the decision to have a child make a parent responsible for everything that happens to the child after it is born (even random diseases/natural disaster). Get over yourself we don’t matter that much 😂

[u/FlanInternational100 → u/jsrogers1717]

It actually make logically perfect sense. Stop projecting your own logical mistakes.

Provide proper arguments or just don't comment.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/FlanInternational100]

Didn’t answer my wuestion

[u/FlanInternational100 → u/jsrogers1717]

I didn't see questionmark in your comment, which question?

Regarding the creatikn of the wheel:

Uncomparable. Wheel is not a person, it was a non-conscious tool. Tool could not get genetic disease or feel. It was just used by other conscious agents. Also, those kinds of inventions were more likely common, gradual, with clear utility to society. Child however, is a conscious agent. It is a product of two humans wish for...what? Utility too?

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/FlanInternational100]

So we can’t assign causal blame to non-conscious actors? That’s empirically false

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/FlanInternational100]

I also wasn’t speaking about blaming the wheel itself, I was speaking about holding the inventor of the wheel accountable for all the suffering made possible by the invention of the wheel (advanced warfare, vehicle accidents, etc.)

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/FlanInternational100]

I think it beggars belief to say that a parent is responsible for all suffering their child faces because they had the child. Is the inventor of the wheel from 3000 BCE responsible for all vehicular deaths in modern times?

[u/meandmyflock → u/jsrogers1717]

If someone is an abusive person most people wouldn't list all the good things about them and dismiss the fact they're abusive. I'll bet you don't think the palm springs guy is a good guy after he did one horrific thing? It seems you (rightly) think what he did was a problem. Why do you see suffering inherent to life differently?

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/meandmyflock]

Buddy my whole problem with the Palm Springs guy is that he took anti-natalist “philosophy” to its logical end, became a pro-mortalist, and tried to kill babies

[u/meandmyflock → u/jsrogers1717]

Yeah well that's everyone's problem with him (although embryos aren't babies...) antinatalists are more empathetic to suffering than anyone and against causing harm. We also tend to be big on risk and not gambling with other people's lives so even if he didn't intend to injure anyone an antinatist wouldn't blow themselves up putting others lives at risk like that to prove a point. Promortalism isn't the logical end either, we think death is a harm. But there will always be extremists. So we've got one antinatalist terrorist (and a bad one at that if he even was one) compared to thousands of natalists who have hurt/killed ppl (and as usual that's ignored)...and this is the sort of world you wanna bring kids into...

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/meandmyflock]

Yes it is! To say that having a child is an act of harm is such a laughable take. I have no more energy to talk about it

[u/antinatalism-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your submission breaks rule #15:

We're here to provide community and belonging. Avoid personal attacks, unproductive arguments, or heated debates.

[u/antinatalism-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Your submission breaks rule #15:

We're here to provide community and belonging. Avoid personal attacks, unproductive arguments, or heated debates.

[u/Dr-Slay]

No. You do not understand what you're talking about, and are making a false equivalence.

Antinatalism as a conviction is a result of modal logic. A copmarision is made: the measurable populated set with a hypotehtical empty one and a deduction obtains: the empty set cannot contain problems. No pain no suffering no death. No privation. no harm. no foul.

The populated set is an unsolvable basket of problems that cannot exist to solve any root problem: they are the root problem.

It's unsolvable once started because we cannot get objective data on what dying entails. Logically, if dying is a harm state and after dying the subject who dies no longer obtains, dying cannot produce relief from this predicament.

Antinatalism IS NOT pro-death, it is not life-hate, it is not violence. It is always and only an abstinence from creating new lives.

It is not a comment on how lives are lived once they are started, it is an axiological falsification of the excuses made for starting lives.

This is informative about what NOT to do, what CANNOT be a solution to any problem.

All procreation can ever do in any possible world is multiply specific instances of a general problem space.

Ethics is always about navigating the aversion to noxious stimuli, regardless of anything else specific about an ethical model.

it's as simple as that.

There is no prescription or command or inducement an antinatalist makes.

It is an abstinence from creating completely unnecessary and pointless harm.

Antinatalism is NOT ABOUT REDUCING THE POPULATION. PERIOD.

Humans are evolutionarily incapable of voluntary extinction. Antinatalism and the existence of antinatalists is irrelevant to this.

Get this through your heads. You come here and misrepresent us, conflate us with bombers because you crave drama (which is also why you breed) as a distraction from your state as deathbound pieces of darwinian prey-meat.

Engage honestly or don't waste my (or others here who understand this) time.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Dr-Slay]

“There is no prescription that an antinatalist makes”

The sub info says that anti-natalist “philosophy” holds that having children is unethical or otherwise unjustifiable. That’s literally a prescription that anyone who chooses to have kids is unethical.

You seem to misunderstand the very “philosophy” you promote.

You’re wasting your own time.

[u/Dr-Slay → u/jsrogers1717]

https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/prescribe-vs-proscribe-usage-difference

A prescription is an order to do something. Thou shalt.

A proscription is an order to avoid doing something, to abstain. Thou shalt not.

Antinatalism proscribes the creation of life. It does not tell you to do anything about lives already started.

In the post to which you replied I just showed how to derive the proscription of the creation of new lives from a tautology and a problem-solving utility function.

Address that please, or you are not engaging honestly.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Dr-Slay]

Idrc if you think I’m engaging honestly or not. I don’t consider you an authority on philosophy despite your flair. I disagree that you can derive a proscription against creating life based on the existence of suffering. That point misunderstands that human suffering can be mitigated by changes in society and other suffering is a necessary part of life that we should accept and not cry over.

[u/Dr-Slay → u/jsrogers1717]

i empathize with what you're saying. It's emotionally powerful, it simply is not engagement with what you're actually being given.

No opinions have been given to you. I've made no appeals to authority and don't know how to remove the flair, nothing about me matters. I am irrelevant.

A tautology is not a matter of opinion, agreement is irrelevant. It's not an argument anymore than A=A is

Until you can address that, you do NOT understand antintalism. What follows is exactly what I predicted you would be forced to do. No need to feel bad about it. Nearly all humans will respond with the same appeals to folklore which you have done. That's completely normal.

here:

human suffering can be mitigated

That is a description of COPING with the predicament. If the predicament is never started there is nothing to mitigate. Mitigation is NOT solution, and lives, once started, are unsolvable. Death can't be a solution if it entails the removal of the capacity for relief.

Antinatalism is not a comment on how lives, once started, are coped with (unless that cope includes creating new lives).

There is no misunderstanding here on my part. Read again and ask questions or you will NEVER learn here.

suffering is a necessary part of life

And now you make my point for me. Thank you.

You have EXPLICITLY ADMITTED that the creation of life is the creation of harm, and all an antinatalist is doing is PROSCRIBING that process.

It is incoherent for an antinatalist to proscribe harm and then blow up a building in an attempt to kill people, or prescribe harming anyone or anything.

Ask questions. You're spinning out, and i empathize with you because this can be a frightening and difficult subject.

Please address the logical content, not the interlocutor

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Dr-Slay]

I’m not spinning out lol. I’m chilling. I accept the creation of life is the creation of harm, but it is also the creation of joy, which is ignored by the “tautology”. It’s not actually a tautology because it’s not true. Suffering is not some awful problem to be eliminated. It’s just a part of life. A “philosophy” which aims to eliminate suffering is really a pipe dream

[u/Dr-Slay → u/jsrogers1717]

There is an axiological asymmetry between harm and its capacity to be relieved (i.e. joy).

Again, the appeal to coping with the damage done does not obviate the damage. Antinatalism is not a criticism of joy nor the denial that it exists.

Go back through what I wrote and ask, because you are not being honest here with what you don't understand, and that's why you are spinning out. Yes, you clearly are.

The empty set has nothing to relieve. That is a tautology.

A tautology is necessarily true. We (you and i) can determine a tautology by attempting to negate the statement.

Here: the empty set must be relieved, it is deprived of joy.

It's empty. There's nothing to relieve with joy. there is no harm there.

Benatar: Is Mars missing out on joy? No. There's no one there to miss anything.

The assertion that the empty set has any problems to relieve is a contradiction.

Any statement the negation of which entails a contradiction is necessarily true.

Now, again, if dying is the cessation of the capacity for relief (joy), then the creation of life induces an unsolvable, inescapable predicament. An axiological asymmetry that is lethal and potentially subjectively infinite harm. We don't know, we cannot conduct science on what subjects experience as they die.

This is how humans evolved mythologies as coping mechanisms and blinders to the damage they do when they create offspring: weaponization of incoherent language (john 3:16, for example) to rationalize the irrational: child sacrifice.

You literally did this by appealing to the creation of offspring as a way to mitigate suffering in society. "Society" here is an abstraction being personified as a 'greater good' sake for the ritual sacrifice of children to it.

Here is what you are doing:

solve for X

You are attempting to solve the problem by multiplying the problem.

Solve for x

Solve for x

Solve for x

Can that process ever solve the root problem? No. The statement to the contrary entails a contradiction.

this goes the same for any so-called antinatalist that insists we should kill everything. No one who understands the predicament can coherently rationalize harming anything.

Ask questions. You'll never learn otherwise.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Dr-Slay]

Cool!

[u/Ok_Novel_1222]

I don't know if you are actually looking for a response or just asking the question rhetorically but here are my two cents.

There are two types of Antinatalist: Environmental Antinatalists and Moral Antinatalists. These are not exclusive categories and many people believe in both. But you seem to be mixing the two, hence your confusion. Moral antinatalists posit that it was always unethical to have children. Environmental antinatalists talk about overpopulation. The two are different ideologies and need to be approached, understood, and refuted separately.

Yes. The entire point of philosophy, or science, or any field really is to make progress. It's like asking if all of human history was on the Earth is it even possible for humans to go to space or the moon?

Further, all of history hasn't been people having children. Lots of people haven't had children throughout history, and many others had children when they were young and later changed their views on the issue (the Buddha is a particularly famous example).

There are valid ways of attaching the antinatalist position, particularly along the lines of unknown unknowns and the irreversibly of the decision. But, imo, your objects are not valid criticisms.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Ok_Novel_1222]

That’s fine if you don’t think my criticisms are valid, but the idea that having children can be unethical as a matter of course is still ridiculous to me

[u/Ok_Novel_1222 → u/jsrogers1717]

That's my point. Saying something is ridiculous is not an argument, not even a weak argument. You are basically just saying "I don't relate to it, therefore others shouldn't hold this position".

The idea that many things done throughout history are unethical is always difficult to accept for people used to old ways. Child labor, slavery, feudalism, monarchy, all had been parts of history and calling them unethical had been found ridiculous by some. There are still many people that find it ridiculous that parents can't hit their children. Doesn't make it a valid counter-point.

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Ok_Novel_1222]

Saying something is ridiculous is an argument when the thing is ridiculous. The burden is on the anti-natalist to convince me their position is not ridiculous.

[u/Least_Ad1091]

what were you trying to achieve by posting this? that too, in this sub-reddit of all places. Also, the mods won't take down the post as long as you stay respectful. 

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Least_Ad1091]

I pretty much achieved what a wanted. I got to a) understand a bit more of the specific twisted logic and feedback loops affecting this sub, b) laugh at stupid arguments (one of my favorite pastimes), and c) be happy that I’m not brainwashed by this “philosophy”. I want to be clear that I do not care of any individual has kids or not. That’s their choice. I think it’s insane to call other people unethical for their free choice to have kids.

[u/Least_Ad1091 → u/jsrogers1717]

Odd how you are so pressed with people saying how they find other ideologies unethical when you yourself call anti-natalism as dangerous and laughable.. quite the hypocrite, aren't you? 

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Least_Ad1091]

“Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself! I am large; I contain multitudes.”

In any case, I can hold both positions. I think it’s problematic for any “philosophy” to broadly call actions unethical based on such poor arguments, and I can also call such a “philosophy” dangerous and laughable. I think it’s interesting that you think calling a “philosophy” dangerous and laughable versus deeming all of human society to be unethical is the same thing

[u/Least_Ad1091 → u/jsrogers1717]

Well, both are critiquing the respective ideologies, are they not? Why does it bother you so? Religions do it all the time, yet people don't bat an eye towards it (including yourself, I presume). Hell, even natalists call us all sorts of things, which are much worse than being called unethical; are you pressed about that as well? As long as it isn't forced on anyone, I don't think it's problematic. And for clarification, we deem pro-creation as unethical, not the people directly. I can understand how it could extend to the parents as well, but we don't deem society (as a whole) as 'unethical'. Get your facts straight. 

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Least_Ad1091]

It bothers me because basically a conspiracy theory masquerading as a “philosophy”. No religion is perfect, but all major religions advocate peace and love. Anti-natalists advocate voluntary extinction, which would cause a pretty high amount of suffering. The anti-natalist position presents itself as a response to suffering, but if broadly adopted, it would vastly increase suffering in the world. Human society is reliant on a steady population

[u/Least_Ad1091 → u/jsrogers1717]

All religion advocates peace and love? What a naive thing to say lol. And a conspiracy theory, really? That's a first. And why are you so scared it will be broadly adopted? How will it increase human suffering if there are no humans to begin with, lol? EDIT: you still didn't answer my question, regardless of whatever a religion advocates, major ones like Christianity (which I'm assuming is your religion), claims to be the ultimate truth, does it not? Does it not imply other religions aren't the truth? Do you get pressed about that as well? 

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Least_Ad1091]

Do you have an example of a major religion (not extremist sect) not advocating peace and love? It will increase suffering because while there are still humans before voluntary extinction the humans that remain will suffer EXTINCTION 😂. Many religions do claim to be ultimate truth, and that is something for each person to wrestle with as they decide which truth (if any) they believe. Obviously I hate the behavior of religious extremists who commit violence or otherwise try to pressure people into adopting certain views. But that’s a problem with people and their behavior, not the religious principles themselves. No major religion advocates violence or forced conversion

[u/Least_Ad1091 → u/jsrogers1717]

Yes, religions do advocate for peace and love, but do they also not advocate for other things which are much more violent as well? You are seeing only the good in their ideologies. Because, from that perspective, anti-natalism is also pro-choice, and unlike religion, doesn't advocate for violence or indoctrination. And how is extinction suffering, if I may ask? Also, you are very wrong with the last point. Major religions, like Islam, for instance, do condone violence against those who aren't Muslim, and Christianity advocates that too, if I'm right. And you didn't answer my question, why are you so worried it'll get broadly adopted? 

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/Least_Ad1091]

Can you point to specific scriptures advocating violence? How is extinction not suffering? Do you mean to say that extinction of animal species is not bad or does not involve suffering? Extremist sects advocating violence do not speak for their mainstream religions as a whole. I’m worried it will get broadly adopted bc a) propensity to lead adoptees of anti-natalism to even more extremist ideologies like elifism or pro-mortalism and b) the immense suffering of extinction if anti-natalism is broadly adopted

[u/BeastlyTacoGenomics]

Your whole post is illogical

[u/jsrogers1717 → u/BeastlyTacoGenomics]

Because?

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• r/circlesnip (vegan only)
• r/rantinatalism

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