Re: Quest for the CFers

From: abacus (abacus67210_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 09/15/04 

Date: 15 Sep 2004 07:12:45 -0700

Since you asked, I'll respond. However, since many of your newsgroup
regulars don't care for posts by people who don't share their outlook
and attitude regarding children, I'm crossposting this to sci.econ.
It's another group I lurk in regularly and occasionally post to.

In addition, I think the regulars there might provide some interesting
answers to your question regarding why people choose to have children.
 However, anyone who responds to this post should delete the group
alt.support.childfree to avoid further irritating those childfree
posters who are irritated by those with different POV's and come to
this group for solace and companionship with those who feel the same
as they do.

I'm also going to snip quit a bit to make this post of a more
manageable length. Interested readers may backtrack.

nilkids@invalid.com.au wrote in message news:<dg5ck0hkfv5tdc9h078q3rhvqam0dbqqmsg@4ax.com>...
> In
> Message-ID:<ce9f3a02.0409131109.3aea7fc6@posting.google.com>
> posted on 13 Sep 2004 12:09:53 -0700, abacus wrote:
>
> >I'll delurk to respond here.
> >
> Actually, I am curious about why people who aren't childfree
> want to post on this newsgroup, but I don't know if others
> are or not.

I decided to post after reading your response. You dismissed the OP's
original impression of your group as having a significant number of
"rabid fucking child haters" as being strange. Whether the majority
of posters actually feel that way, I can't say. Certainly some do. I
also know that people often vent on newsgroups and their words may be
stronger than their actual feelings. Still, that's how an awful lot
of the regular posters come across and the OP was drawing a reasonable
conclusion based on the posts in your group.

> If you are a breeder, how do you justify bringing children
> into an already overcrowded and rapidly deteriorating world?

If you are alive, how do you justify breathing, eating, and consuming
resources of all sorts in an already overcrowded and rapidly
deteriorating world?

Overpopulation does concern me to some extent - it's one of the
reasons I had myself fixed after my second was born. But
overpopulation is a problem with a build-in solution. It's just that
the solutions that nature will provide are extremely unpleasant.

> [snip]
> >>
> >> > What
> >> >makes you so angry and hostile towards society's weakest link.
> >>
> >> What makes you think that children are definable as such?
> >> Just how do you define the this term? Seriously, some of us
> >> are curious.
> >
> >That is the generally accepted view of children.
> Can you _prove_ this? Have never heard such a claim myself.
> Feel free to quote URLs.
>
> > What makes you think
> >they aren't? How do you define the term such that children wouldn't
> >qualify?
>
> I didn't quote the term. The original poster did. Am still
> waiting for a definition of the term. No point in
> discussing the term until we can agree on a definition.

Whether you want to admit it or not, the majority of people in all
cultures regard children as being weak and needing to be nurtured and
protected. That seems to me a reasonable way to define "society's
weakest link" - requiring the help of others to survive.

Who else do you think would qualify as "society's weakest link".
Quadriplegics? The comatose? The profoundly retarded? And how would
you perceive people who regarded any of those groups in the way that
CF's regard children?

> >> > This
> >> >newsgroup is chocked full of posts that encourage and find humor is
> >> >children being maimed abused and killed.
> >>
> >> Encourage? Find humor? Where do you get those weird ideas?
> >
> >By reading your newsgroup. That's how many of the posts come across
> >to me as well.

> Why bother to read it then?

I find it fascinating to listen to people talk who have ideas and
values so divergent from mainstream society.

> >An opinion shared by others. The CF people posting here come across to
> >this lurker as being less tolerant of children than white supremicists
> >are of niggers. Frankly, I've been stunned at the level of hostility
> >presented here. It's been an education for me.
>
> That is OK, no charge for it, the info is free. Actually,
> there is more hostility to the people who are irresponsible
> enough to have children, not the children themselves. They
> cannot help being born. They were given no choice in the
> matter.
>
> If you have children, don't you ever feel any guilt for
> bringing them into the world? If not, why not?

No, I don't feel guilt. Why not? Why should I? I don't feel guilt
for having children anymore than I feel guilt for being alive, for
eating, drinking, and polluting the world with my bodily wastes.
Should people feel guilty for peeing? For breathing in oxygen and
breathing out carbon dioxide?

I'll look for your response in sci.econ. Regards.