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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask if you would still have had your children if...

123 replies

nanbread · 08/06/2019 20:20

You had known then what you know now about the environment / climate change?

I had my DC before the last couple of years when reports from the UN etc have come out about unsurvivable conditions, the end of civilisation etc within maybe 30 years, us having 12 years to do anything about it. And seeing the subsequent reactions from governments worldwide which can be summarised as giving zero fucks.

Knowing what I know now, despite how my children are my life and I couldn't love them more, I doubt whether I'd have had children (they're still young). I feel so scared about what they will face in their lifetime and guilty about bringing them into it.

OP posts:
MorondelaFrontera · 08/06/2019 21:57

Does it matter why someone didn't know about it before then?

Well when you make it sound like YOUR decision cannot be questioned because you didn't know something which was pretty much common knowledge, but others on the other hand must be blamed, then yes, it does matter.

cakeallday · 08/06/2019 21:59

I'm not sure I would. DH could see some of this coming and said so before we had them. I didn't believe him. I do now. It worries me a lot if I'm honest...what sort of future my lovely children will have. I can't change my decisions now, but I do feel I was blinkered back at that time. It may well have been selfish and I'm ready to admit that.

M3lon · 08/06/2019 22:00

Its going to happen more and more without concerted global action.

Its horrendous.

Silvercatowner · 08/06/2019 22:00

I don't see people dying in significant numbers from climate change in the UK in the next 100 years

We might be OK in the UK food wise, if it weren't for the refugees from places that will be impacted hugely by climate change. Whole swathes of our planet are going to be much harder to live in and won't have the capability to sustain the population levels they do now.

Original poster
nanbread · 08/06/2019 22:01

@MorondelaFrontera I'm not sure I follow?

Who am I blaming? The government?

OP posts:
lboogy · 08/06/2019 22:01

Yes I would. I fear people like you tbh. I can foresee in some dystopian future where poor or selected people by the powers that be are prevented from having kids to save the planet , only for certain elites to enjoy

Notabedofroses · 08/06/2019 22:01

Sounds really hysterical. I take climate change seriously but this is ridiculous.

ILikeyourHairyHands · 08/06/2019 22:07

Without a doubt! If everyone thought that then civilisation would end petty abruptly. It probably doesn't matter in the great scheme of things whether humans exist or not (unless we get into a quantum physics debate about the ultimate observer, and indeed the nature of observation in itself).

We seem to be in a bit of a bind at the moment, optimistically, I would put money on it that technology will save humanity in the nick of time (It's only when the gas is turned up full and someone's about to push the ignition that R&D ramp up).

I honestly think we'll be fine. And if not, hey ho, the Earth will endure, and maybe one day a future species will find my footprint as I found the footprint of a dinosaur last week. And maybe they'll wonder about us.

But reproduction is the ultimate act of faith. Even God did it (if you believe on that schizzle). And I have faith, not in God, or man, or any system. I have faith in endurance. Something will endure. Even if my descendants are not here to bear witness.

Hecateh · 08/06/2019 22:09

Many of you were born - or maybe even your parents were born when many people thought nuclear war was just around the corner and many people thought we didn't have a future because of it.

Similar discussions went on - face to face and via tv and newspaper columns pre internet and forums.

In the mid 80s it was thought that AIDs may bring about the end of the human race.

Go back a few centuries and the Black Death was going to kill us all

One thing is sure, the world of humans will end if people stop having babies.

I'm not trivialising the effect of climate change, plastics etc. This may be the final thing - or we may mitigate it or not.

What is true is that if we do sort this problem - there will be another one. (Brian Cox thinks it isn't a foregone conclusion so there is hope for us yet. (Mars here we come))

ThereWillBeAdequateFood · 08/06/2019 22:10

We might be OK in the UK food wise, if it weren't for the refugees from places that will be impacted hugely by climate change

No we wouldn’t be ok without refugees. We can’t feed the current population without imported food.

Original poster
nanbread · 08/06/2019 22:10

I fear people like you tbh.

Haha! If you knew what I was like (or, like, checked my posting history) you'd know I oppose that very thing.

This is NOT about the population issue (although that is indeed an issue...). It's about whether people are concerned enough about the predicted near future of humanity to wish their children wouldn't have to endure it.

OP posts:
MirriVan · 08/06/2019 22:17

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Pasithea · 08/06/2019 22:19

I can’t imagine bringing children into this world. We have ruined it.

marvellousnightforamooncup · 08/06/2019 22:20

Fearing people like the OP is shooting the messenger.

No, I wouldn't have had my children and they are my world. I'm fearful of the world they'll inherit and I envy the fuck heads like Trump who give no shits because they'll be dead.

Redpostbox · 08/06/2019 22:21

I wouldn't. I love them so much I can't bear to think of what they will go through when civilisation ends. Starvation, terror. It fills me with horror to think of it. I know we will go through it too but I figure I will be older.
Why won't politicians think further than their own term in office? Blush

wheresmymojo · 08/06/2019 22:23

The Cold War wasn't a 'scare story' - those closest to the centre of what was going on are on record saying we got within it being minutes of a nuclear war.

It didn't happen but it wasn't a scare story.

ClemClemFandango · 08/06/2019 22:25

I think we could be self sufficient in the UK, but don't see why we'd have to be. Why would we not be able to continue importing from Europe, surely even with climate change that would still be possible?

Anyway, we grow most of our own wheat, make our own cheese, grow our own tomatoes, so we could live off pizza, if nothing else.

wheresmymojo · 08/06/2019 22:30

We can't be self sufficient in the UK - there isn't enough land to feed the whole population that exists here now. Especially in years with lots of rain or too much heat when the crops wouldn't produce a full yield.

wheresmymojo · 08/06/2019 22:31

...and Europe would be feeding its own population.

If we assume masses of land become untenable for crops Europe would need the land it has to feed its own people not to export to us.

nomad5 · 08/06/2019 22:31

I do not regret having my DC, they are the light of my life. But if had not had children already, I don't think I would have them.

Some of the posters here don't seem to get it. It's not about the environmental impact of the children themselves. It's about how much life is going to change and that our children are likely to experience hunger, suffering and massive upheaval due to climate change. They may not even have as long a life span as they theoretically should. I know enough climate scientists to know that the risk of social breakdown and environmental collapse is very real.

Let me say it again: it's not about the effect of having children on the environment. It's about the ever likely fact that your kids are going to have a shit life because of climate change.

I also think women should be a lot more worried about this than they are. As life becomes more difficult, who do you think will bear the brunt of home and care work? I think there's a real risk that the past 60+ years of progress will go out the window.

I no longer expect that I will have grandchildren or that my children will ever stop needing our support and care. I have a DC with SN and worry especially for them.

NoIDontWatchLoveIsland · 08/06/2019 22:31

That report is described as "overblown rhetoric". Please do all you can to be sensible about the environment but that doesn't mean going into a panic about the (many) sensationalist reports out there discussing the extreme (and unlikely) end of the spectrum if possible outcomes.

magicfarawaytrees · 08/06/2019 22:34

Oh goodness me... if some of you aren't stockpiling for Brexit then you are worried about climate change or nuclear war or Ebola....

Enjoy life for what it is- we are only here once.

Malteserdiet · 08/06/2019 22:35

Absolutely yes and do you know why?

Because the world still needs people and it is now only people, together with nature, that will decide the future of humanity. Like it or not, humans have always only tackled large scale disasters when faced with immediate destruction or when they’ve finally learned from past catastrophic events and climate change is no different. It’s the latest, plague; nuclear war threat; widespread famine etc.

At some point even the indifferent and far removed powers that be will have to take action and if my children are around to pressure them more or even invent the next eco friendly power source then all the better.
New, more aware generations cause change and I haven’t given up on humanity yet.

Furthermore, life is for living to its fullest and for me this means enjoying my children and looking forward to the future. If everyone shuts down and doesn’t push forward with life then where’s the progress and where’s the drive for the world’s governments to make changes?

ClemClemFandango · 08/06/2019 22:36

It didn't happen but it wasn't a scare story.

Sorry, I used 'scare story' simply for want of a better phrase/wording. I meant each generation has something they believe is a major threat to life and/or the life of the planet.

ILikeyourHairyHands · 08/06/2019 22:36

MirriVan, that's a very depressing view (and I say that as a 45 year-old teenage Nhillist). I always thought that Epicurus had it pretty bang-on out of all the Greeks.

Maybe we need to go back to basics in the form of the ancient philosophers, maybe instead of shouting at each other and trying to fill our lives with spurious shite, we need to sit down and try to determine what being human actually means.

Maybe when we reach an accommodation with ourselves we'll be able to 'save the world'. We're just children really, the Earth's been around for 4.5 billion years and we've been here for 200,00 (give or take). A toddler left by themselves will always trash a playroom, it's inevitable. But we are from the Earth, so anything we do is also 'from the Earth', we're not divorced from it.