Childlessness as the Ultimate Virtue
Modern Western people have been actively choosing sub-replacement fertility for decades. This choice is often attributed to factors such as career demands, increased urbanization, easy access to contraception, and the changing social and economic roles of women. There is no doubt these factors play a role, but in the end they are merely symptoms of a much deeper factor influencing sub-replacement fertility – spiritual malaise. Naturally, the metaphysical and spiritual factors behind low fertility are rarely considered and almost never discussed in the post-Christian West. And why would they be? To do so would be to play against the positivism, reductionism, materialism, and secularism the post-Christian West has so eagerly and self-destructively embraced. In the contemporary West, it is better to ignore and deny the metaphysical and spiritual aspects of any problem and attempt to find solutions in the same positivism, reductionism, materialism, and secularism that caused the problem in the first place.
On the surface, sub-replacement fertility is the most obvious and blatant example of just how utterly insane and anti-life the post-Christian West has become. In the past few decades, people have claimed things like education, careers, and urbanization are the sole causes of low fertility. Other factors such hedonism, selfishness, value-inversion, and the avoidance of responsibility are rarely, if ever, mentioned. Having and raising children requires a significant amount of self-sacrifice and responsibility. Despite arguments to the contrary, it is readily apparent that avoiding self-sacrifice and responsibility is a major driver behind the decisions of the ever increasing number of Westerners who choose not to have children. Let's be honest; kids are a drag. They get in the way of climbing the corporate ladder, weekend parties, and exotic sex-urlaub adventures in Thailand.
Choosing not to have children may have been stigmatized in previous decades, but childless adults have increasingly become the norm in the contemporary West. So much so that adults with children – especially adults with many children – are often regarded as quaint and old-fashioned. Still, I imagine some childless adults question the choices they have made, especially as they age. They must have moments when they feel they have missed on something significant by not having kids – that their choice to forgo children may have been based on essentially shallow and selfish reasons.
Well, childless adults who feel such pangs of remorse need fret no longer because climate change hysteria and environmental fanaticism has made childlessness one of the highest virtues to which a contemporary Westerner can aspire. Choosing not to reproduce in an effort to save the planet has become the ultimate act of self-abnegation and social responsibility. Hence, Modern Westerners who consciously chose not to have children in order to preserve hedonistic lifestyles need no longer fret over the possibility of being stigmatized or judged. On the contrary, their choice to remain childless will be regarded as an admirable act of self-abnegation and altruism.
A conversation that surely occurred at a recent cocktail party somewhere in the West:
“Naturally I wanted to have kids, but when I considered climate change and the state of the global environment, I knew having children would be the wrong thing to do. It would just be so . . . irresponsible.”
“Oh, I couldn’t agree more. Only selfish and ignorant brutes consider having kids these days. I mean, do you know how big a carbon footprint a child accrues over a lifetime?”
“To say nothing of disposable diapers in landfills!”
“Yuck!”
On the surface, sub-replacement fertility is the most obvious and blatant example of just how utterly insane and anti-life the post-Christian West has become. In the past few decades, people have claimed things like education, careers, and urbanization are the sole causes of low fertility. Other factors such hedonism, selfishness, value-inversion, and the avoidance of responsibility are rarely, if ever, mentioned. Having and raising children requires a significant amount of self-sacrifice and responsibility. Despite arguments to the contrary, it is readily apparent that avoiding self-sacrifice and responsibility is a major driver behind the decisions of the ever increasing number of Westerners who choose not to have children. Let's be honest; kids are a drag. They get in the way of climbing the corporate ladder, weekend parties, and exotic sex-urlaub adventures in Thailand.
Choosing not to have children may have been stigmatized in previous decades, but childless adults have increasingly become the norm in the contemporary West. So much so that adults with children – especially adults with many children – are often regarded as quaint and old-fashioned. Still, I imagine some childless adults question the choices they have made, especially as they age. They must have moments when they feel they have missed on something significant by not having kids – that their choice to forgo children may have been based on essentially shallow and selfish reasons.
Well, childless adults who feel such pangs of remorse need fret no longer because climate change hysteria and environmental fanaticism has made childlessness one of the highest virtues to which a contemporary Westerner can aspire. Choosing not to reproduce in an effort to save the planet has become the ultimate act of self-abnegation and social responsibility. Hence, Modern Westerners who consciously chose not to have children in order to preserve hedonistic lifestyles need no longer fret over the possibility of being stigmatized or judged. On the contrary, their choice to remain childless will be regarded as an admirable act of self-abnegation and altruism.
A conversation that surely occurred at a recent cocktail party somewhere in the West:
“Naturally I wanted to have kids, but when I considered climate change and the state of the global environment, I knew having children would be the wrong thing to do. It would just be so . . . irresponsible.”
“Oh, I couldn’t agree more. Only selfish and ignorant brutes consider having kids these days. I mean, do you know how big a carbon footprint a child accrues over a lifetime?”
“To say nothing of disposable diapers in landfills!”
“Yuck!”
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