Yes, I'm Judging You, and It is Not Pretty

The most deeply troubling hot take I have seen increasingly from young couples, even from some people I care about, is that it is ultimately no business of anyone else whether or not one chooses to procreate. The decision to remain child free and do what is right for you is yours alone, and has no bearing on and is not the business of other people.


Depending on what source you draw from, the average cost of raising a child is somewhere between 300Gs and half a million to adulthood. I think that number is a bit high, even at the low end, but I will let the experts be the experts. Although private school tuition will do its best to make a liar of me. So for my family with four beautiful little girls I will spend an extra decade of wages and countless hours of parental care to bring these children to maturity, and to raise them as contributing members of society. I will take fewer vacations. I will have fewer nice things. I will see far fewer nights of full sleep.


Your end of the bargain is that you will not do any of the above. You will take the vacations. You will have the nice things. You will sleep all the sleep. And maybe you will even feel morally superior for not overburdening the earth through overpopulation by removing yourself from the surplus population.


And then you will get old. And then you will start to collect your social security and Medicare. You will continue to enjoy the subsidization of your lifestyle on the backs of the tax revenue from the labor of my children. The children I saved and scrimped and worked to bring up as productive citizens will not just burdened with me; they will be burdened with you, too.


But the wise elders have decreed that the ants must care for the grasshoppers, and the children of the ants also. Those who have chosen to live hedonistic lives will be supported by those who choose a path of sacrifice, and there is no choice in it.


Everyone who gets a vasectomy before reproducing without grave genetic preconditions should be excluded from Medicare and receive prorated social security.


I have empathy for the poor and the disadvantaged who never had the instruction and upbringing that I had the advantage of, and I actually am a supporter of programs to support the poor, the widows, and the disabled in living in dignity. But my attitude toward those who are capable as myself who do not even stop to think that they are choosing to live for themselves, and in the process, by the sweat of the brow of my progeny in their retirement is galling.


Do not tell me with pride that you are child free, and do not dare try to forbid me to judge you. You are leeching off of those who are sacrificing. Who are doing the hard and needful things. Accept that you are a parasite. Choosing what is "right for you" when the cost is borne by everyone else is pure selfishness.


And even if you are totally financially independent because you are capable, talented, and hardworking; these are the kinds of people who are in a good position to raise up good citizens to advance and better society. High performing adults do the world a service by bringing up high performing children. It is by our collective efforts as parents bringing up children that civilization continues, and it only improves if we do our part. Retreating and saying "I prefer Bali" is understandable to all of us--we like Bali too, but we understand that we live for something greater than our own pleasure. I don't even need to get theological about this; this is obvious to the pagans as well.


I judge you. It is a wrong and antisocial choice, and your continual protestations I take as evidence that you suspect I am right.

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