Large Families

[Czerny88]

I'm trying to understand the psychology behind people having large families (by which I mean anything over three children, I guess). NB I'm thinking about people in the 21st century, in the West, with access to contraception and low infant mortality, who don't belong to a culture where it is particularly encouraged to have a large number of children, such as Judaism. And obviously there are circumstances such as multiple births which don't apply.

My visceral feeling is that it is often wrong on many levels. In attempting to enunciate why, I would say people should not have more children than they can afford, than they have time to care for, than can fit comfortably in their living accommodation.

And even in the case where the parents are very wealthy, have a huge house and extra support such as a nanny, there is still the hugely important issue of over-population. It feels like we are at capacity already, without room to increase the population by the amount would result by every couple having even three children.

I'm trying not to be too goady or right-wing, and I have personal reasons for the way I feel (I am involuntarily childless) so please don't be too harsh, but it's something I struggle with ideologically as well as emotionally.

So... AIBU to think that people should be more responsible about how many children they produce and not act solely on their own desires regardless of the potential effects on others? Or is that an unrealistic, draconian expectation?

There should be excess funds each month after all bills are paid to ensure your children are never stopped doing something they want due to lack of money

By this metric huge amounts of people should have no children at all. Most, in fact.

If you were in charge the human race would die out

Anyway, I'm certainly not going to apologise for thinking that people should give due consideration to actually creating a new human being

If that really is your basis for this thread (it isn't, its being a goady fucker)...then why have you come to the conclusion that anyone with more than 2 children DOESN'T give "due consideration" to creating more?
Do you imagine that number 3 and above just fall out of us without any thought being out into it? Whoops, here's another kid, guess I'd better buy more bunk beds!

ffs. Take a minute to realise that your hypothetical (and hypocritical) musings are actually about real people: our children. All of you banging on about people shouldn't have more than 2, its wrong, it shouldn't be allowed: you are saying our real children are unwanted, unacceptable, and should not exist.
Would you walk up to someone in real life and say that to their face: your kids should not be here...? No, so why would you imagine its acceptable to say it here?

Prawn there's a huge difference between planning your family sensibly and according to your means at the time and then suffering straitened circumstances due to events outside your control, and just going ahead and knocking out six kids you already know you haven't got a hope in hell of supporting without benefits.

And besides, even if you think you can afford five kids at the time, I agree it's not a brilliant idea to have more than you feel sure you could reasonably manage if your circumstances changed and you suddenly couldn't keep with the expense of a large family that you previously were very comfortable with.

Would you be happy to live in a society where the 3rd or 4th child goes hungry, because not entitled to benefits? I wouldn't.

More to the point it would be inequitable and would, I'm sure, be challenged in law. Benefits are paid to the parent but they are for the child. I suspect it would be difficult to justify not paying subsistence benefits to an individual on the basis of something over which they have no control, i.e. birth order. Would be interested in what a specialist lawyer had to say about it.

Anyone who thinks that critical illness cover is an answer to health problems that make work impossible is naïve. Read the personal finance columns to find out how unsatisfactory such policies often are, and how many people aren't eligible. Plenty of common chronic disabling conditions aren't covered and most policies pay out for a very short time.

There's also the situation where one of the DCs of single parent with a good income develops a permanent or long-term disability. No insurance covers that, but if a child needs special care it's almost impossible not to have to give up work.

Sorry if it bursts your smug bubble, but it's not always feckless parents who end up reliant on benefits. Shit happens.

Almost every human in the world has to go without things they want to do because of lack of money. It doesn't mean that they live a worthless existence. . In fact I'd go so far as to say that a child who has the opportunity to do everything they ever want to do in terms of hobbies and activities might miss out on learning some other valuable life lessons.

Well exactly my kids were moaning this morning they don't have enough room in the car well zipppeee dodaaa first world problems buster, be glad you have a car, lunch to take to a school wearing clothes. You might expect it from a 12 years old not an adult - assuming posters are adults

Prawn that is English law though now isn't it and one reason the Tories won as there was so much support for the plan to cut tax credits for all new 3rd children from next year.
"the main tax credits cuts are for people......... having a third child, from April 2017."
The people have agreed it and the state has legislated for it and I support the change despite having a large family as I see the family as my responsibility not the state's.

And while you are appalled at the idea of high earning DCs, others are appalled at the idea of parents and/or children not being high enough earners to afford the children they have and only surviving because of benefits.

Why do you twist my words so?

I said I was appalled that someone would use the fact that their children will be high earners (what folly! how do you know?) to build this case that they're actually being generous. Obviously I am not appalled by high earners. How silly.

And even if your children do turn out to be high earners (as you've mentioned many times on this thread) - you couldn't have known that from the outset.

Unless you're using the correlation between high-earning parents and high-earning children, which in turn can logically be extended into an argument for wealthy people having lots of children and poor people, few.

I think people usually can know in advance. If you went to private schools yourself and are a high earning family where most people are lawyers and doctors it's a pretty safe bet your children will be to. That tends to be the case in our family. The youngest 2 just did pretty well in AS so I would be surprised if they didn't earn quite a bit after university.

I think people usually can know in advance. If you went to private schools yourself and are a high earning family where most people are lawyers and doctors it's a pretty safe bet your children will be to. That tends to be the case in our family. The youngest 2 just did pretty well in AS so I would be surprised if they didn't earn quite a bit after university.

So, it's like I said:

Unless you're using the correlation between high-earning parents and high-earning children, which in turn can logically be extended into an argument for wealthy people having lots of children and poor people, few.

Well with respect that's a pretty safe assumption and nobody is saying "less educated or lower earning people" can't have large families just that their lives will be different and that's a hard cycle to break out of. I'm under no illusion that I was lucky to break out of a very working class family and each generation does seem to be doing a bit better in our case but it is sheer luck, plenty of people work harder than me and get nowhere.

poster treaclesoda M

Only children tend to be spoilt

Have there every win catered for and never having to wait for attention classic is a child who alway Interputs adult coversation

My nice is hugely jealous and is finds if very diffcult to just go off an play

She also not that good at sharing

I think that for every large family there is a childless family, and for every family of three there is a family of one. So it all evens out in the end.

People should go and find better things to worry about.

Well with respect that's a pretty safe assumption and nobody is saying "less educated or lower earning people" can't have large families just that their lives will be different and that's a hard cycle to break out of

Of course they're correlated, it doesn't follow that it's a safe assumption. I know a lot of offspring of wealthy people who have done nothing but dilute their parent's wealth. I'm sure their parents didn't imagine that they'd never get real jobs.

But this is entirely beside the point. I don't like the idea that wealthy people are more entitled to have big families than small ones because they generate more tax income. It's about their ecological footprint.

For a minority of families I have observed it's a status symbol. Look at us we both have big jobs and lots of Dc. An alpha type thing.

I agree Kerala

Religious objection to BC aside, very large families can usually be subdivided into highly recognisable categories, using the 'type' of parent as the sorting criteria.

I know the type of which you speak.

I think that for every large family there is a childless family, and for every family of three there is a family of one. So it all evens out in the end

No for every large family there are many childfree families, and for every family of three there are many families of one. It doesn't even out at all, large families are unusual.

I genuinely don't understand how people can afford to have six children.

I don't really believe people. It's like the Duggars - who claimed to be able to afford all the children - but somehow were broke once their show was cancelled.

How much do people earn to have six kids? Because most well off people I know can't afford more than 3 (maybe 2) and statistics show that having more children is correlated with poverty and lower education. So this notion that the "right" people are having lots of kids is wrong. It's idiocracy.

statistics show that having more children is correlated with poverty and lower education

They don't say exactly that and don't confuse correlation and causation.

I don't care if you believe I can afford my children, the fact remains I can.

I got massive discounts off school fees for the 3rd and then the 4th was free. There's £200 a week saved right there. I don't use 25% more meat in a spag Bol than you do, there's no waste in my house any more. We wasted a lot when there were 2 children.

More to the point it would be inequitable and would, I'm sure, be challenged in law. Benefits are paid to the parent but they are for the child. I suspect it would be difficult to justify not paying subsistence benefits to an individual on the basis of something over which they have no control, i.e. birth order. Would be interested in what a specialist lawyer had to say about it.

I think this is coming in next April..so presumably it is legal to do.

I can see huge issues with it myself, but do kinda understand why people get so worked up about child tax credit/benefits. However..in my own situation, I have 2 kids. My husband currently earns enough to support us. BUT, if he lost his job, or had to take reduced hours or something we would be claiming child tax credits. I also have the implant as I do not really want any more children, nor could we afford another. However this could fail (I'm sure its 98% effective or something) and if it did, I would be faced with potentially HAVING to have an abortion as I cannot support a third child. Docs will not sterilize me or my husband as we are too young. So basically, if he did lose his job, we either need to stop having sex entirely, or spread our thin income out even further, thus leading to a very poor life for my existing kids, or think about having an abortion.

The issue with this 2 kids cap that I see is..sometimes people do all they can to not have more kids but it happens anyway. I agree something needs to be done about those (very very few) who just keep on popping out kids and claiming for them. But this..just seems quite wrong.

Large families are the best! I wish I had one or was a part of one... What's wrong with you, people? Kids are our biggest forture. And, OP, because you can't have one, doesn't mean the rest of humanity have to solidarily abstain.

Simply... forget about it.

Furthermore, this is defying nature. Like trying to put a lid on a volcano, haha. Get real, is my opinion on the subject.

Don't ever run for Prime Minister will you Googlebabe with debating skills like that.

Have you been at the cooking sherry Google?