Children are a lifestyle choice

[Seriouslywhatnow]

I've actually lost count of the times I've read this on Mumsnet. Posters saying things like "I don't want to have to pay towards little Jonny's education/ food / maternity care. People should t have kids they can't afford"
It's like they can't see that these children are actually PEOPLE. in their own right. And you're not paying for their education as a favour to their "feckless" -it's always "feckless" - parents but FOR THE CHILD. Just like your education /maternity care / whatever was paid for by others as well.
So many people seem to see kids as just an accessory or possession for their parents, and actually like they were never kids themselves so shouldn't have to pay towards other kids. AIBU?

Im sure somewhere online there is a comment from my old neighbour about me the one who decided i was a lazy whore because I had my first child at 16 but looked about 12 because im a shortass.

I can't wait to read it

Actually, I think the expression is more accurate as “life choices” not lifestyle.

Someone upthread said that choosing not to have kids is a lifestyle choice. Well it might be but for many - me included - it was a life choice. It wasn’t to do with liking or not liking kids, wanting or not wanting the responsibility, the “family life style”, wanting more freedom or more money, quite simply no biological urge, and knowing myself well enough to know I wouldn’t be a great mum. Why bring a life into the world that you don’t want with all your heart, or when you know you won’t give him or her a great mum? Parenting is evidently hard and so being aware and making thst choice is not selfish, it is actually considering any child.

So reflecting, I think lifestyle yes it’s a thing, but life choice is probably more accurate a lot of the time for many people. I absolutely think that as a society we need to look after the children, taxes and all, of course. I think, OP, you’ve rather misunderstood some of the comments on the other thread, many were saying that just because they don’t have kids that absolutely think they and we all should contribute!

I bet you loved the Covid lockdowns.

I have awful anxiety but can leave the house for my safe places. Anyone sad enough to watch my house would think I was taking the piss.

It baffles me that people can reduce children to merely a lifestyle choice. It's such a narrow minded and ignorant take to have on a natural process that has existed since the beginning of time. I hope those who don't think supporting children and their families is important accept a robot revolution or drop dead at 65. Those of us who have children want the best for them and ideally they'd be off living their best lives as opposed to serving old people in costa when theyre grown up, people who resented their parents for having them in the first place. I don't know how anyone can defend not having children.

I’ve long thought access to benefits should be given after a period of contribution with some obvious exceptions - disability and the like. Why should you be able to take out of a system you've never paid into.

We need to start colonising other planets so people can move there and have children. IMO this will be a reality before the end of the century.

Ignoring the flight of imagination in to the current impossibility of colonising another planet.

If we sent parent and their children to this other planet, who would be looking after and delivering services to people as they age on this planet?

Robots?

utter twaddle.

Elon Musk is working on it.

They are people.

They are also a lifestyle choice.

Those two things are not mutually exclusive.

And yes - do not have children if you cannot afford them.

I think the Ancient Egyptians had it right... less kids and more cats.

He is a fucking idiot if he thinks that within his descendants, descendants life time it is just because he has massive amounts of money.

One only has to look at the travelling times between here and Mars and back again (four years ish) He can barely get a vessel of the planet.

@LeaCFBC I actually agree that the world needs less humans and the birth rate needs to fall but not just in the west, it needs to fall worldwide in all nations. 10 billion humans is just absolutely ridiculous.

Why oh why does the “My kids will be wiping your arses” claptrap keep being repeatly posted on here to justify having kids? 🤣

Because if you are lucky to live long enough YOUR ARSE WILL NEED WIPING.

What if parent/s become ill and can’t work, have an accident, loose their jobs? This can happen to anyone. You might be in work, car, house, holidays and then it’s gone.

How can kids possibly be a lifestyle choice when humanity literally depends on their existence? No man is an island. The entire tax and pension system is predicated on the fact that youngsters come up behind us and work and put money in to the economy.
Countries with very low birth rates are facing serious troubles ahead.

https://news.sky.com/story/global-birth-rates-crisis-people-do-still-want-to-have-children-but-many-cant-heres-why-13381290

Tbf only the rich can really afford children. But at the same time children are only expensive if you make it that way

Childcare is incredibly expensive, especially in some areas and during the early years.

Why do we need to continue the species?

Ultimately, humans, animals and plants all exist to reproduce. It’s why we’re here.
we have an aging population in the uk. We need more young people. Simple fact.
paying for their education and welfare benefits society and therefore all of us.
you are right op. Some people are self important idiots to be perfectly frank.

This.

Who else is going to look after the nuclear waste in the future?

I so miss the laugh reaction.

Colonising Mars solves absolutely nothing in any case. The only worthwhile reason to do so is because it's an iterative step towards further exploration, so we'd learn a bit about how to go about the logistics of space travel, but the idea that we can just punt the Earth's extra population over to Mars is nonsense. It isn't even about time. Mars has next to no worthwhile resources on it, so everything that goes there has to come from Earth in the first place.

For colonisation to be remotely viable, we're first going to have to develop FTL travel, cryogenics, and figure out Black Holes, and that could quite conceivably be a dead-end in any case, so in the meantime we need to sort our shit out on Earth or go the way of the dodo. Personally I couldn't care less if Earth becomes uninhabitable for humans and we die out as a species, because I'll be long gone by that point, but people who do care about it really need to start taking the issue seriously.

Our children will be doing more than wiping arses. I hope you never expect to see a Dr or nurse, dentist, pharmacist, fly on a an aeroplane, eat at a restaurant etc, when you retire. It's not just about providing care. As I said, we all want the best for our children, and those who merely oppose their existence should be put on a register and never recieve any services ever past the age of 65 haha.