to be amazed at how many people are still having 4 or more children?

[JackShit]

Yikes! I'm going to get a new one ripped here, but this has been bugging me of late.

Our planet isn't in a particularly marvelous state. Overpopulation is a very real problem. We are responsible for the legacy we leave our children and surely part of loving them is to be concerned for their future quality of life on this planet.

I know there are a lot of people with larger families on MN and I need to understand why, in full knowledge of the facts, people continue to have so many children? Just read a thread on facebook where a woman was proudly stating she has 11! 11 ffs!

I don't go for the argument about some having only one or two so it cancels out and I also don't believe in replacing our ageing population problem with an even bigger one.

So what am I missing here? Do people just not really give a shit? Does biology take over?

I have 1 btw.

silverbangles I am sorry you are getting shit for this. Other people's good experiences don't make yours any less bad, and I am sorry they don't see this.

silverbangles I am sorry you are getting shit for this. Other people's good experiences don't make yours any less bad, and I am sorry they don't see this.

If all of us Developed-World-Residents had absolutely no further children lots of (probably no less) Developed-World-Resources would still get used up because the Developing-World people would immigrate here to get our lifestyle.

The logic that 'we' shouldn't have more children makes little sense when there is a globalised highly mobile world workforce.

There is a massive demographic imbalance in Europe (we have too many people age 50+) matched by an opposite demographic imbalance in most developing world (they have too many young people). The reason that 1/4 of new UK babies is born to a foreign-born mom is because the UK or European native born women are overwhelmingly over 40/50.

silver I hear you on larger families. For us adding another two means I will stay home, we will hire a FT housekeeper and probably get an au pair too so we can parent the DC. We have the space and the money for this. If it would be stretching I wouldn't do it. College fees are a concern as we live in the US and private schools are $250k for a bachelor degree and about $120k for a masters. We also live 3000 miles away from family which means it's $9k just to fly home in economy. No discounts for kids these days. Luckily we own enough property already to give them a house each!

I don't think couples really think these thing through and I don't agree with the lifestyle that the Duggars have chosen.

Sigh. Such a huge lack of understanding about the actual issues, so many loud opinions anyway. Such is MN.

Western Europe has a rapidly declining birth rate. It's going to cause huge problems in the near future. Really, if you cared at all about the future of your country and planet, and you are at least reasonably educated and/or vaguely self sufficient economically, you'd be having MORE children, not less.

Some people are talking about Ireland having a high birth rate. It may have the highest in Western Europe , but its still actually below population sustaining levels. And if you don't think that its important to replace your population, ask yourself who's going to pay for you in your old age.

The Duggars are beyond 'big into Jesus'. The belong to what might be considered a cult, the truly believes they must have all the children god sends in order for Christianity to be prepared for an upcoming apocolypcal war against non-Christians.

What's even scarier are the number of US christians who believe and expect this war, though not to the point of not using birth control after far fewer children.

Maybe we should allow larger families if they are good, productive people who add to society. So 7 kids who are on-track to be nurses/doctors/teachers/jolly good eggs = fine. 1-child families who don't contibute to the greater good = boo hiss. The trouble is that the buggers are at least 2 1/2 before you have much of a chance of telling which way they're going to go so that's a bit of a problem. Pies anyone?

By the way - that post wasn't in response to anyone else's.

Also ask yourself how innovation, technology and economic initiative dwindles in a rapidly ageing population, especially as the tax base shrinks and you invest less and less in the education of the young people you do have.

So, is it better to have only 2 kids and 2 cars, or, say, 4 children and no car?

Is it better to have 2 kids in reusable nappies and no tumble drier, or 1 kid in disposables?

Is it better to have 3 kids that prevent you being able to afford skiing holidays, with all the environmental damage from aeroplanes and piste preparation?

I don't the answer, but it seems to me the question about caring for the planet is a bit more complicated than just family size...?

It worries me greatly that the worlds population will be massively reduced in the not very distant future by antibiotic resistant TB.

The apocalyptic scenario is most likely to arise in the form of something we currently are unalarmed by eg. flu, TB or Malaria.

Ds quite rightly informed me recently that the living creature responsible for most human deaths is the humble mosquito.

I think a parent raising many good kids who care about others and the environment, contribute to the good of society is worth a million more times than one selfish person who thinks of them self and pollutes the earth and contributes little to society, community

Stupid generalisation

I was from a big family and learned a lot about putting other people before oneself and also competitive drive

it's definitely a point worth considering.. Funnily enough a friend of mine posted on fb the other day saying they "didn't care for spawn photos" and went on a rant about children in care and the overpopulation of the world.

I think it's a novel idea that we would all just foster before having children and putting strain on the planet but life doesn't work like that.

Fostering is very very difficult to be accepted for, about 1 in 8 couples get accepted (and from people i know it seems to be down to box ticking more than common sense sometimes)

Contraception fails or accidents happen and not everyone is comfortable with termination - if there were two women, one with one child and one with 4 would you consider the woman with one child "better" than the other.. even if she'd had multiple terminations?

and also maternal instincts are very strong, i'm pregnant with my 2nd and feel deeply sad at the thought it could be my last..

Overpopulation is something that we will all pay for in the future, so it is fair that we are all asking the questions now.

I am shocked that people can still eat meat when presented with the environmental facts on factory farming. In my opinion, we need to change Western eating habits very quickly.

In fact, there are a lot of environmental issues that we need to address quickly. Overpopulation is sadly one of them. We need everyone to play a part in this. That means you too.

I don't have any children, but me and my partner plan to adopt in the future.

We have six, I stay at home, we use cloth nappies, many clothes are passed down, I even have some 15 year old Terries we had to fight to get a second recycling bin but we could've had a normal rubbish bin no bother
I think as we are all going to be old and knackered then the six of them will be working hard to pay for all those selfish buggers who chose not to have any

Hmm ime a lot of the people who aggressively promote the idea of large families being selfish were forced to confine their own families to one for medical reasons or other reasons outside their control. I think there is a lot more sadness to their predicament than they'd admit and they often latch on to how responsible they are and how irresponsible everyone else is as a defensive mechanism to help them deal with it.

Re The racist Muslim video- if over population is a problem it really doesn't matter what religion those people are. However, the Catholic Church also used to bestow a responsibility on it's followers to increase the catholic population an this could be easily seen in Ireland, Spain, Italy. The church has lost an enormous amount of power over the last 30 years and the same can easily happen in the Muslim religion (that's in response to the poster who said Muslims were obliged to keep breeding )

Overpopulation is something that we will all pay for in the future, so it is fair that we are all asking the questions now

It's underpopulation you'll be paying for, possibly even within your lifetime.

The percentage of the worlds population that is European has gone from 13% to less than 8 in only 50 years. Europe, Russia, China, Japan and more are rapidly shrinking populations. While developing nations are booming in population.
Can anyone see the problems that might occur as the educated, economically contributing, tech-advancing, discovery making etc populations shrink and shrink while those that rely on the aforementioned populations continue to increase?

*I said expected to care for younger ones.

Because as an adoptive parent I have up close and personal experience of child abuse and even being expected to care for younger siblings ain't it. It shows a singular lack of understanding of what child abuse is. And being expected to have a degree of caring for your sibling isn;t limted to large families.

But as I say - I do envy that you think it qualifies.*

Kew what a totally unthinking post.

It can be child abuse if the older children themselves are being neglected. If they're caring for children to the point that they have no social life, no time to do homework, having to pay bills, do shopping, taking all the responsibility ALL THE TIME.

Silverbangles clearly wasn't talking about a parent asking a child to watch the baby for 2 minutes while they pop to the loo or something.

YOU have shown a lack of understanding of what child abuse is and a total lack of empathy for this persons experiences.

mrsD I think what silver is talking about is when the older child is expected to provide care for the younger DC to the detriment of their childhood. IMO putting a load of wash on is fine but if you watch the duggars the older girls are paired off with the younger DC and care for them. That is what I fully disagree with. Parents should be making sure teeth and hair are brushed and if an older child wants to help out then great but it shouldn't be expected of them.

There is a big difference between mucking in and doing your chores and having childcare responsibilities thrust upon you because your parents decided to have more DC than they could cope with.

Feckegg blue... The Muslim religion is not controlled by mosques.
Marriage is considered half of the religion and children will never be considered a life style choice as it is in the west.
In my husbands country birth rates have declined slightly but it will never be like Europe where swathes if people get to the end if their lives without a single child. It is the same with Jewish households.
It wasn't a criticism. I consider myself Muslim. Merely a comic observation of the west.

You really can't know that. No one would ever have believed Ireland would have a declining population 30 years ago. The world changes.

I agree with MrsD, just been pondering this while I feed my humongous brood of kind, intelligent, hungry, well behaved, hungry, kids that make me happy, hungry kids...

Only on mums net could somebody come up with such an ignorant op!

There are many, much worse things than a child or 4 being born! Terrorism, drugs, sex trafficking, crime, cruelty, could go on

Shall we stick to two child policy and abort the rest?

Deary me

And picking one abnormally big family out of billions to argue a point is plain stupid