I remember my father telling me (probably slightly after my first son was born, great timing indeed!), it would have been a pity to gave birth to someone in this timeline.
Period was around 2010/11, I thought he was just extreme and depressed. Today I can’t really say he was wrong. We western people are just going to see a colossal crash and I feel bad having my kids as a spectator for that.
I don’t regret parenting itself, but when you see Elmo desperately asking us to make more children, in an already overpopulated planet, you start thinking that doing the opposite is the right way.
Sure, I agree, but I think it’s reasonable to think about limiting procreation ideally to one child per couple ethically who wants the experience of parenting - obviously if you’ve already had more, there’s no backsies, but the pathway of many countries now is even below that number anyway. It’s absolutely sick the Christofascist obsession with forcing women to give birth especially as they really don’t care what happens to the babies once they are born. But if you want to parent, it really is a wonderful thing. If you WANT it, not forced, and not selfishly breeding beyond the capacity of the planet, which no individual is doing if they only replace one for two leaving, that’s the right direction (but it doesn’t work for colonialism, oh noes)
Managed population descent is possible though, even if unlikely, and we can hope that the overall population growth curve is maxed out very soon by choice not by circumstance/disaster.
