Third kid vs the planet

[BendydickCuminsnatch]

I have loads of couples around me planning/pregnant with their third or fourth child. I’d absolutely love a third but I worry so much about the planet, and watching the news today it’s all just so bloody bleak. Not many other people seem to worry about the planet though when having babies so why should I?

Don’t want to get my deathbed and wish I’d just done what everyone else did and have however many kids I want.

I won’t be able to sit back and say ‘I did my best not to contribute to global warming’ anyway - I have 2 kids, I drive etc - so what is one more?

But I can’t put the global warming aspect out of my mind, everywhere I look I see that the best thing you can do for the planet is have fewer kids.

So WWYD - do what’s best for the greater good (me having a third is just a drop in the ocean, but if everyone felt that way...?) or stop being a self righteous martyr and just have the third kid? 🤯

(Then there’s all the other elements of course eg financial, do I actually want the hustle and bustle and stress of 3, etc 😄)

Food not glorious!

But trees are cut down so all these third children have places to live and food to eat.

Besides, what if your third child turns out to be a genius who develops pollutant free high yield energy production methods?

While you're at it, buy every lottery scratch card you come across. What if that last one is a jackpot winner?

I have 2. They are expensive both for the environment and for you as a parent

We can afford to help our two out with university fees etc

The changes we would have had to have for 3 made us change our mind about having a 3rd (bigger house, cost of holidays, bigger car, paying for 3 teens etc etc)

There are benefits in having only one or two. However, equally, we don't want too much of an ageing population so we still do want a healthy birth rate.

It’s so much more complex than how many children you have

It actually isn’t. It’s by far the worst thing you can do for the environment.

“A US family who chooses to have one fewer child would provide the same level of emissions reductions as 684 teenagers who choose to adopt comprehensive recycling for the rest of their lives,”

So to offset the damage of your little darling you’d need to convince 600 teenagers to recycle for the rest of their lives, for ONE child

www.independent.co.uk/environment/children-carbon-footprint-climate-change-damage-having-kids-research-a7837961.html

I'm struggling with the idea of even having one child - with the many reports coming out recently detailing what the world will look like in 20, 30, 50 years if we don't take serious drastic action right now. I don't know if I want a child to grow up in that kind of world.

Even besides that, I don't think anyone should really be having more than 2 children right now - but obviously that's not my choice to make for other people.

The Independent

Humans have exhausted all natural resources the planet can sustainably supply for 2019 faster than ever – overshooting by more than five months.

Due to increased consumption and a growing population we are now using up nature’s resources 1.75 times faster than the planet’s ecosystems can regenerate them.
The results of this ecological overspending is becoming increasingly evident in the form of deforestation, soil erosion, biodiversity loss and the build-up of carbon dioxide.

There are benefits in having only one or two. However, equally, we don't want too much of an ageing population so we still do want a healthy birth rate

We have net hundreds of thousands of people migrating here every year, even if we tried to reduce immigration they’d still be atleast tens of thousands so this is such a silly argument.

@Teagoanngoanngoann How great that that's worked out for you. Unfortunately the knock-on effect of the "do whatever you want!" attitudes of previous generations means that young people - and any child born from now - will likely have to try and survive in a collapsing society with resource scarcity, mass migration, devastating weather events and dying ecosystems. We simply can't afford to have that kind of attitude any more.

I thought eating beef and dairy food was worse than having baby number 3.

I thought eating beef and dairy food was worse than having baby number 3

It’s not even remotely close. Going vegan on average will save 0.82 tonnes of C02, having

www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jul/12/want-to-fight-climate-change-have-fewer-children

One less child will save 58.6 tonnes of C02

Although we should ALL still be reducing, if not eliminating, animal products from our diet.

Have your third, if you want one.

UK fertility rate is already below population replacement level (in fact the global average is only a bit above it now). Global fertility and birth rate has declined enormously over the last half century and is predicted to stabilise at population replacement level by somewhere between 2050 and 2100.

The uk birth rate is 11.8 per 1,000. The global birth rate is approx 19.6 per 1,000. Where the birth rate would need to drop in order to have a significant impact is countries where people have far larger families, but that won't happen until you have the economic and social development globally that takes away that need.

Climate change is terrifying, but individual choices of this type in the UK are not what is going to save us. It will be coordinated industry and government (and intergovernmental) actions that save us. Whether you or I have 1 or 2 or 3 children is really, really not going to make the difference.

Obviously if you want to take a moral position on it than go for it, same way a moral position on veganism/not flying/whatever is your perogative. And I understand people not wanting to bring kids into a world that will be massively affected by climate change. But you having one more child won't make much of a difference to anyone except you and your family, so if you feel that's right for you and your family I wouldn't be bullied into not doing so by a particular lobby that will have moved onto something else in ten or twenty years when falling birth rates are decried for one reason or another.

What this planet needs more than anything else is happy people. Have 3. Be happy. Teach them how to live responsibly. Don't waste your life worrying. Be kind.

"One less child will save 58.6 tonnes of C02".

That's an annual figure, not a lifetime one. 58.6 tonnes of CO2 per year.

I don't know where the two trees to maturity statistic comes from, but I think it might be wrong and by a huge amount. Most rough calculations (because there are a huge number of parameters) say a tree sequesters about 50-80 pounds, not tonnes, of CO2 a year. 58.6 tonnes of CO2 is about 130,000 lbs according to Google. (I'd be grateful if someone more expert in this could check!)

Trees also require room to grow and you can only do one thing with a space: you can't build a house, plant a forest, and farm the exact same patch of land. A growing population has to be housed and fed.

@Soola, why do you think Raheem said to wind 'her' up and not 'them' up? I wonder 🤔.

'd happily pay to plant trees and reforest and area to do this. Maybe many of us would?

That would be good, but judging from many a thread here it’s never going to happen.

Trees also require room to grow and you can only do one thing with a space: you can't build a house, plant a forest, and farm the exact same patch of land. A growing population has to be housed and fed.

Well, they would been to be able to breathe first, and the way we’re chopping trees down a big part of the growing population might not even get to the stage where they need to be housed.

In the last few years I have planted about 30 trees and will be planting similar again in the next couple of years. Can I have extra children to pick the fruit?

Bullshit to the PP on the first page. This year, a wildfire in the Arctic has already caused more carbon dioxide emissions than all of Belgium and (the Netherlands?) another country together in a whole year.

Have your third without guilt, OP, and just pass the message on.

I have three, but if I were to make the choice now, I wouldn't make the same one (for environmental reasons - the child is a delight). It is SO hard to shrink a person's environmental footprint once they are here...

There is some wilful ignorance here.

Why do you think the fires in the Arctic are happening? Because of carbon emissions caused by human activity. You cannot used the fires as an excuse to keep overpopulating.

Jesus wept.

Ok good, I was scared to come back to this thread for fear of being told to FTFOTTFSOF 😄

Already vegetarian, do use car too much, try and line dry as much as poss. As little plastic as poss, including nappies. Educating the kids about the world. Don’t fly much. But yes like everyone I am full of contradictions and don’t live off-grid.

I just know so many highly educated people who are having 3+ kids and think, wow am I missing something?? But I don’t think I am, the more I question and research. I AM happy at the moment, absolutely delighted in fact, so it’s not a question of happiness really. I think for me the stress/guilt of having a third would outweigh the wishing I had had a third on my deathbed.

I am fascinated my massive families and follow them on Instagram 😄 they all seem to be having family reunions at the moment and there are pics of grandparents with literally like, 30 grandchildren, and I just can’t help thinking that that’s 30 more cars to be ran as the kids grow up, 30 more lives for the planet to support, all from one couple. Wow...!