Why people don't want kids anymore (apparently)

[Saul Goodman]

That just seems unpleasant.

Nah, we can say anything without the other getting offended. We're very close... it's not an online forum relationship.

 

[bcuster]

Do you think? I think it's the people with kids who are considered oddballs these days.
My niece had a baby recently, and I take every opportunity to point and laugh at her, and remind her that her life, for the next 35 years, is over.

That's a little weird

 

[Saul Goodman]

That's a little weird

But true

 

[newme]

But true

No not really.

 

[Orang Utan]

Another thoughtful and considered thread Cloo

I don’t know why but I never saw myself as a parent. Or even really being in a relationship. Too much of a loner and probably a bit too self absorbed, certainly not particularly “needing” people. And also for a period of time I guess I wasn’t likely to have kids at all due to how I felt in terms of sexuality.

It’s always seemed odd to me that folk want to settle down and have kids. I mean; I do get it, you feel love for them, you want to nurture them and it’s amazing watching them grow up. I am not blind to that. But that doesn’t motivate me to want to be a parent.

But I would like a dog.

More broadly there’s what I suppose we might call the hygiene factors - precarious employment, housing, despair at the future of the planet as mentioned that make people choose to not have kids. I wonder if religious types can distance these concerns more easily as their God(s) give them faith.

I get all of that. And the dog thing too.
But for me it’s more of a fantasy - the idea of having a dog - cos it’s coupled with owning a house with a writing room by the sea
In reality, I think I would resent even a dog for demanding attention that I’m incapable of giving.

 

[ska invita]

1. capitalism needs constant growth and needs constant population growth to staff its bullshit jobs and consumerism. this is a real challenge to capitalism. And then theres the care system....

theres no bigger general strike by workers than not even turning up to being born

 

[weltweit]

I know some Roman Catholics.

Some of them are trying to repopulate the south east!

 

[newme]

theres no bigger general strike by workers than not even turning up to being born

Enter Texas

 

[ska invita]

I get all of that. And the dog thing too.
But for me it’s more of a fantasy - the idea of having a dog - cos it’s coupled with owning a house with a writing room by the sea
In reality, I think I would resent even a dog for demanding attention that I’m incapable of giving.

im with you .... other peoples dogs for ten minutes is fun but more than enough
when the fuck am i meant to go for a walk every day? who has the time for all this?
about true for kids too tbh

well done everyone bringing up kids though, i respect it.... but glad im not doing it.

 

[petee]

i went into my marriage wanting one kid, the wife wanted more. whatever the number, i wanted to know that we'd have the money, but she proved to be irresponsible with hoth money and alcohol, things she acknowleged, but she believed that it was my job to accept this state of affairs - it's the man's job to be stoic and strong. she blasted me about how much i hurt her when i didn't go through with a family (we had an ovulation watch and knew when to commence etc.). we're divorced, btw.

so that's why i have no kids.

 

[Orang Utan]

im with you .... other peoples dogs for ten minutes is fun but more than enough
when the fuck am i meant to go for a walk every day? who has the time for all this?
about true for kids too tbh

well done everyone bringing up kids though, i respect it.... but glad im not doing it.

I feel privileged not having kids/dogs/cats. I get to have all my shits in peace. That’s quite a big deal, if not quite a dealbreaker.

 

[Happy Tree]

You haven't had a proper shit until you've had a cat nestle into the trousers around your ankles.

 

[Orang Utan]

You haven't had a proper shit until you've had a cat nestle into the trousers around your ankles.

It’s really annoying rather than cute.

 

[Funky_monks]

If I was a 20 year old woman now I wouldn't be having kids.
I love mine obviously and I have a partner who is 50/50 on parenting and housework but kids are so expensive, male partners seem to mostly create extra work - younger women generally seem to do much better on their own.
Very noticeable in my own family with 8 female cousins aged 30-40 - only 3 of us have had children (in our 20s) or even have long term male partners and it's 3 of the 4 oldest.

I find it quite interesting - I was 28 when my daughter was born - my ex is quite a bit older than me (was 37 by the time my daughter was born) so we had to just "get on with it", I wonder now what I would have done had I not been pressured so much to immediately have children as soon as we were married (by her, not society). I've certainly never wanted any more, although I certainly don't regret my daughter. I am rather enjoying that she's 16 now and I'm only 44 and have started going to gig and festivals etc again and she's happy to stay with my parents (although my dad had a stroke last Nov so no more childcare there, I now do "dadcare" instead whenever I can). I like the "second 20s" feeling.

If you're a social psychologist, it's also a fascinating natural experiment. During the baby boom, there were too many children for adults to provide close attention to individual children. So regardless of child rearing theories of the time (and their bizarre anti-attachment beliefs), it was just inevitable that kids would grow up with a lot of freedom. Now, that's flipped -- tonnes of adults per child. Combined with all the electronic devices we now have, children are growing up HIGHLY surveilled at all times. What effect will that have? Time will tell.

Its really hard as a parent to know much freedom you are "allowed" to give them now, and I have ben told that I feel that pressure less than other single parents, because I'm her dad and a) men seem less risk averse and b) her mum has very little input on my daughter's development these days (I've just about managed to get her to see her mum every other weekend, before then it was whenever the fuck her mum felt like it, cos they were "defining their own relationship" or some other bollocks). When I was that age I was a classic "latchkey kid" and was in all probability cooking dinner on a lot of days too. I like letting her go out for walks, she's taken the train by herself etc. Loads of her friends were never allowed out to play in the street, which is kind of sad. She's dying for me to go away overnight and let her stay at home on her own so she can "cosplay being an adult" (her words), but I'm not sure about that just yet. On the other hand I'd been left on my own by then...........

 

[Mrs Miggins]

Is not having kid normalised? I think you're still considered something of an oddball/second class citizen if you haven't done the married with kids for whatever reason.

I’d really strongly disagree with that. Speaking as a child free oddball, it seems like there’s a lot less expectation now than 20-30 years ago when I was in the right age group to be having kids. Even then I never felt very much myself.

Maybe I’m in a middle class metropolitan bubble. Or everyone just talked behind my back.

The only disparaging comment I ever overheard about me being “a career girl and not one for family” was from a group of catty aged aunts at a funeral.

It seems really quite normal for all the young people around me to be either having kids or not having kids as they see fit and nobody seems to give a shit either way.

I like that it feels like a real choice for them rather than an expectation.

 

[Winot]

It's interesting because obviously in the past (any past) there were good reasons for not having children also (most of them died for example and if they didn't then life was nasty, brutish and short). But people did because otherwise you had no one to look after you as you got older.

Not much has changed in that regard - on a societal level we need more workers to fund pensions and the ageing population is a problem.

 

[ska invita]

on a societal level we need more workers to fund pensions and the ageing population is a problem.

that system needs binning, the sooner the better, now as good a time as any

 

[bellaozzydog]

I don't want kids because I don't like them and I'm too selfish. There, I've said it.

I’ll put my hand up to that

Little weirdos, a cocktail of their parents neurosis

Life as an adult is a precarious struggle, never mind adding multiple mini me psychological experiments and what appears to be a 50/50 ratio of personal relationship breakdowns

A firm no from me, cemented with a mid 30s vasectomy and confirmed with the ongoing misery of every one of my friends parental existences

 

[Sue]

It's interesting because obviously in the past (any past) there were good reasons for not having children also (most of them died for example and if they didn't then life was nasty, brutish and short). But people did because otherwise you had no one to look after you as you got older.

Not much has changed in that regard - on a societal level we need more workers to fund pensions and the ageing population is a problem.

And you might not have had much choice about it.

 

[Winot]

And you might not have had much choice about it.

Yes of course that's probably the biggest change.

 

[Hollis]

I’d really strongly disagree with that. Speaking as a child free oddball, it seems like there’s a lot less expectation now than 20-30 years ago when I was in the right age group to be having kids. Even then I never felt very much myself.

Maybe I’m in a middle class metropolitan bubble. Or everyone just talked behind my back.

The only disparaging comment I ever overheard about me being “a career girl and not one for family” was from a group of catty aged aunts at a funeral.

It seems really quite normal for all the young people around me to be either having kids or not having kids as they see fit and nobody seems to give a shit either way.

I like that it feels like a real choice for them rather than an expectation.

That's fine - but I don't think this is just about 'disparaging comments' in the same way that racism or sexism isn't just about people using certain words.

 

[Funky_monks]

And you might not have had much choice about it.

There's so much in that, IMO, even in this day and age. My girlfriend has had her dad living with her since her mom (correct spelling, she's from the black country ) died. Her brother is utterly useless and can barely look after himself, to the tune of their dad still bailing him out financially (he's my age, 44, my girlfriend is 50). She doesn't really want to, but feels like she has no choice. He absolutely can't look after himself, even though there's nothing wrong with him. Apparently he had 2 pairs of pants when he moved in. WTF?
In the case of my parents, my dad has told my mum that if she'd had a stroke and not him there is no way he'd have been able to look after him like she does. I know he means it as a compliment, but its actually pretty depressing. There's a reason that me and my brother could both cook, clean and sew by the time we left home, I think.

 

[Dom Traynor]

It never even occurred to me to have kids and spending a long Christmas break with my partner's genuinely charming and entertaining nibblings reinforces my choices.

Both my siblings have kids, and are really happy to but I know they really worry about the future for them.

 

[mentalchik]

400% (and there’s a lot of great thinkers who have narrowed in on this). We are becoming increasingly cut off and isolated, with third spaces and communities becoming a minimal part of life. All we have left it seems is the plaster givers of psychologists, therapists, and self help and medication.

Also does anyone even remember the time when a family could rely on just one income lol pmsl.

If I didn’t have kids now I would probably stay that way.

Yes as i had a family on one income in the early 80's...have 3 sons who are now 31, 37 and 40 years old, they are the best thing i have ever done....had the first when i was 21 and for me am very glad i was able to have them when (by todays standards) i was relatively young....would not have wanted to be in my forties or even 50's with young children. My eldest has 2 kids....think my youngest and his partner will probably have at least one....don't think my middle son and partner will...but as have always said i really don't care if they do or don't and i have never commented on this subject....find people that are 'desperate' to be grandparents and lay pressure on their kids frankly weird.
This is becoming an issue for a lot of the world now, population has been dropping at a faster rate then expected, really fast in some counties and because of the odious capitalist system that runs the world will sharply become a huge problem with far more old people living longer than younger people coming in at the other end.

 

[og ogilby]

the ongoing misery of every one of my friends parental existences

That's what I see too and my friends kids are all grown up and still constantly ringing their parents with drama the parents are expected to get involved with.

 

[teuchter]

Am hearing more and more from people in their 50s who now have kids in their 20s that they openly state that they wish they'd never had kids. Not that they don't love their kids or wish they didn't exist, rather that if they had their time again they wouldn't go there. That kind of talk was utterly taboo not so long ago, still fairly taboo today, but hearing it more and more often.

It would be very interesting to know how many actually people feel like this, either openly or inwardly. You'd have to balance it against those in the same age group who feel regretful that they didn't have kids. There is bound to be some grass is always greener thinking, either way.

 

[Silas Loom]

Our youngest, who delegates every aspect of life admin to her mother, is very keen on having kids one day. Mrs Loom is glumly expecting to have to raise them.

Perhaps this will be widespread when the helicopter-parented Gen Z cohort starts breeding.

 

[klang]

I feel privileged not having kids/dogs/cats. I get to have all my shits in peace. That’s quite a big deal, if not quite a dealbreaker.

I find my life to be a lot more peaceful and settled since I had a child.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

It would be very interesting to know how many actually people feel like this, either openly or inwardly. You'd have to balance it against those in the same age group who feel regretful that they didn't have kids. There is bound to be some grass is always greener thinking, either way.

Totally with the grass is greener thing. My own sister states that she wishes she'd never had kids, much to our mum's disgust. She dotes on her kids, but I think acknowledges that the past 25 years of her life has been lived in pretty much penury as a result of her being a parent, that is why I think she feels that way and would imagine that is true for many parents. My sister's ex (who left 21 years ago and since then has paid exactly £0 child support), his mum put his sister in a children's home and told him how much his arrival ruined her life, no wonder he was fucked up, that is extreme as hell, but have heard similar tales from others over the years too, hideous, really.

 

[BigMoaner]

I find my life to be a lot more peaceful and settled since I had a child.

I have my kids half hte week - the half i don't have them i am like a galaxy brained anxious 25 year old wanker, the half I do have them i am about as mature and 43 year old like as you can get. my whole physiology seems to calm down. that's not to say it's bloody difficult at times.