Having a child is the worst thing you can do for the environment

[saveourtrees]

I disagree with this wholeheartedly. My family of 7 (I will not apologise for my children's lives) create less waste than my brother and his girlfriend. In fact we take in their pet waste and food waste for composting.
Virtually all of our clothes, toys, boardgames, furniture is secondhand. A couple of white goods (does oven count as white goods?)
we grow our some of own food, process and preserve, batchcook and freeze, hardly ever use the heating (hot water bottles and blankets), bake, make dinners from scratch etc.
I knit (using wool from the charity shop), sew badly to fix holes in clothes.
we don't buy cards or wrapping paper, we do absolutely everything we can.

We still make about 1.5 black bags full of rubbish a week though, solely from food packaging. We just don't have enough to stretch to a zero waste bulk shop in the city center. But one day, when I go back to work I think we could probably manage it.

So why am I feeling guilty for having children? If it wasn't for my children I probably wouldn't have even cared as much about the environment and the state of the world. A big drive for me changing from a typical consumer to a more conscious one was the birth of my first child. Suddenly when people asked 'what world are we leaving for our children?' they were talking about my children.

I think the eco conscious people not reproducing to ''save the planet'' is stupid. If the people who care, who would teach their children to mend and say no to fast fashion, eat less meat, don't holiday abroad, etc. .. if they don't have children but the avid consumers do then isn't that worse? There will be less eco friendly grownups in 20/ 30 years but just as many grown-ups who weren't taught by their parents how to be eco friendly

I don't know, but don't come onto mumsnet and tell mums they shouldn't have had their children. That really is horrible.

Wipe out the human race?

If looked at dispassionately, the disappearance of the human race altogether would absolutely be the best thing for the planet. That's a statement of fact, and again, not tantamount to saying 'I wish everyone would drop dead tomorrow.'

You get it with everything on here.

"Oh you did that ... I would simply never because ".

People lie to make themselves sound great on the internet all the time.

Live your life, make your choices, and take everything said on here with a pinch of salt.

I think when people say that they're talking about long term i.e. that you've created seven new people who will grow up and have seven lives which will inevitably damage the environment. If each of them has 7 children you're looking at 49 new consumers, no matter how many secondhand board games they buy, they will be a drain on the planet. It's an inevitable part of being alive.

Reducing the population is the best way to reduce the damage the population are doing to the planet, therefore not having children is good for the environment. That's how I understood it anyway.

www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/2/13/21132013/climate-change-children-kids-anti-natalism

@StrychnineInTheSandwiches

It doesn't matter how green your day-to-day life is in terms of weaving your own pants and making your own yogurt. You've had 5 kids and they will most likely go on to have at least one kid each. You've created a lot of people who will all go on to have a huge carbon footprint for decades to come.

I'm not being aggro, just factual. A person who doesn't give two hoots about recycling or plastic waste or flying around the globe three times a year etc will still have a far smaller impact than you if they never have kids.

The logical conclusion of that line of thinking is that we just stop reproducing and let humanity die out, which is fucking stupid. Give your head a wobble.

@BiscuitLover09876, you're embarrassing yourself. The answer to the question isn't 'it's environmentally fine for me to have five kids as along as I recycle my yoghurt pots'

People with large families are obviously touchy about this subject but no one genuinely concerned about the climate crisis decides to have lots of children.

Raising eco conscious children isn't enough in itself if they never get into power. There's loads of eco conscious people alive today but the powerful have ignored them for decades! It's a power issue, not an individual family issue.

So you have 5 children? Then yes, you are damaging the environment. Your children will have children, drive cars, produce waste, use energy...

That said, never apologise or feel guilty for having children. People who virtue signal about being childless/free to save the planet are twats. Every single person does stuff that is "bad" for the environment. Whether that's eating meat, being too quick to throw away instead of reuse/recycle, or whacking the heating up instead of putting a jumper on. All we can do is try our best within our own lives and stop fucking judging others

@MrsColon, why so sensitive?

It's not really about the resources that you consume when you are little (though decades of nappy usage whether disposable or reusable will have had a massive environmental impact regardless of how may of your board games are second hand). Each of your children will grow up to be consumers and use the Earth's resources, have a house, eat food, drive a car, travel. And you have no control of how any of your children will behave as adults. They might choose to be conscious of their impact on the environment or they might not. And if each of them have large families themselves that that's just an exponential strain on the planet. No-one is asking you to apologise for your children's existence but their is not point denying that your family's impact on the environment is significantly greater than if you'd had two children.

[quote StrychnineInTheSandwiches]@BiscuitLover09876, you're embarrassing yourself. The answer to the question isn't 'it's environmentally fine for me to have five kids as along as I recycle my yoghurt pots'

People with large families are obviously touchy about this subject but no one genuinely concerned about the climate crisis decides to have lots of children.[/quote]
Please read some scientific research. 👍

Look OP, I'm not saying I'm a fan of the posters who just plop onto threads where people are talking about how they can be more environmentally friendly, and say 'Don't have children!' when almost all the posters already have children.

But... it's really not about how many bin bags your family fills compared with your brother. It's all the waste/energy use/emissions which will be created by our children throughout their lives, and then by all the children they will have, and so on and so on. If your dc all have multiple children, that's lot of people! Of course you shouldn't apologise for your children's lives. But comparing bin bags really doesn't disprove people's point about children and the planet.

@StrychnineInTheSandwiches I don't a big family. I'm just sick of fake news and goady posts like this.

[quote BiscuitLover09876]@StrychnineInTheSandwiches I don't a big family. I'm just sick of fake news and goady posts like this.[/quote]
The OP started the thread. Take your frustrations out on her.

The logical conclusion of that line of thinking is that we just stop reproducing and let humanity die out, which is fucking stupid. Give your head a wobble

You're not too hot on logic, are you? The logical conclusion of saying that we should limit X (children in this case) isn't we should never do X.

May be try Googling 'Straw man argument'?

i don't really know why you started this thread because it's pretty obvious you are going to get frief for having so many children.
but it's obvious you had that many because you personally wanted them. I very much doubt whetehr you thought about the environment or anything else when considering how many children to have and that is the problem, people will continue to do exactly what they want until the world burns.
Nobody is prepared to do anything selfless or go without to make things better and they never will.

It's true though.

That doesn't mean you should take it personally, or that you aren't doing a fantastic job at being environmentally friendly. It does mean that the environmental damage done by your children and their descendants will significantly outweigh any positives of your environmentally friendly lifestyle though.

* YANBU. There are a lot of smug, self-congratulatory folk on MN who present their choice to have one or two DC as 'for environmental reasons'. Bullshit! Most people only want one or two DC. People are re-writing the past so vehemently that they come to believe it themselves.*

^Completely agree with this

@toastofthetown that's my point well made.

I'm afraid having a child is definitely one of the most environmentally damaging things you can do.

I don't eat meat, never fly, rarely drive, took drastic measures to reduce my plastic use, swear by cloth nappies & wipes, grow my own veg and am currently in the middle of my second planned pregnancy... and I still think this. I just love being a mum and don't want to stop at 1 child while other people are having lots and not giving a shit / using single-use nappies etc. It's just not a sacrifice I'm willing to make, especially as so many people don't care at all. But at least I accept the damage I'm doing and don't deny that having a child is very environmentally bad.

Honestly don't feel guilty OP the oy place I hear people spouting this is on mn, you know, the one parenting forum 🤣

Online, not one

Honestly

I don’t give a hoot

I’ve had my two. And I’m over the moon.

Completely off topic but most food packaging can be recycled. Sainsburys and Co-Op (and possibly others too, those are just the ones I use) have big bins now for food cellophane. I know it's not just about waste but 1.5 bin bags a week is quite a lot, you are probably throwing away a lot of recyclables.

I’ll rescue air travel, recycle, jack in my car, pay extra taxes

But no frickin way would I not have had children

No. Way

The logical conclusion of that line of thinking is that we just stop reproducing and let humanity die out

No it isn't.