More debate on broodiness

[djpsyche]

Mainly in case ford_prefect42 doesn't come back to my previous post.

"I kinda figure that everyone has an inborn compulsion to reproduce. It's kinda evolutionary."It's an interesting theory and I'd like to pick it apart

Comments

[biascut]

From ford_prefect42's comment above: LDR, there are exceptions to every rule, doesn't mean the rule is necessarily wrong

Except that describing every exception as "an exception", and insisting on the rule, is not a neutral act. It's actively making it harder for exceptions to exist, and creating an imperative for people who might well be exceptions in a neutral environment to go along with the flow. If you've got people who are determined to reproduce at six, and people who are absolutely definitely hostile to the idea of reproducing at 0, and equal numbers at every point in between, you're lumping 6-1 together, isolating the 0s, and making it harder for anyone in the low numbers to say, "Actually, I don't think I..." Confirmation bias like woahGo back a hundred years, and it's easy to argue that lesbians, or women who simply don't want to be dependent on men, exist but are "an exception to the rule". Being an exception to that rule is an exceptionally hard and difficult path of constant uphill struggle. It most likely means poverty and risk

[littlered2]

Just sharing my experience: I have no compulsion to have children, and never have. (For reference I am female, in my mid-twenties, and in a long-term relationship with a cis man.) I don't dislike children, but I have no desire to have any of my own - I find it very hard to understand how the positives could outweigh the negatives. Obviously many people do, and my viewpoint is by no means the only valid one, but I find it genuinely difficult to understand why people choose to have children, as I have so little inclination to do so

[djpsyche]

I think being female makes it easier to have strong negative feelings. My partner has talked about being interested in the idea of having children, but I feel like it's a lot easier to say that as the person who is not going to have to go through pregnancy and childbirth, and who is statistically less likely to be the primary carer.

Agree entirely. When "spreading one's genes" is limited to "having sex, then seeing whether the result looks like you", it's much more appealing. I think that's why women evolved to be orgasmic. It's not necessary for reproduction; but without it, why would we let men do something to us that would result in babies?

[ivankravtsov]

You can cancel and gay

[dexypunk]

Two points. 1) The need to reproduce is certainly evolutionary. Any species needs to reproduce to survive. If we all stop, we die. However, that doesn't mean that it's a blanket compulsion in everyone. 2) Actual reproductive choice in women is a recent development. This makes it quite difficult to study the compulsion to breed on a long view. There is another point, which is that since childbirth has become safer, the NEED to breed has become lessened in our species since maternal and infant mortality is so much reduced.
I think all decisions whether to have kids or not are rooted in societal and cultural values. However, we now have the ability to choose to have one child, eight children, or no children to suit our lives and personalities.

[sushidog]

Actual reproductive choice in women is a recent development.
Effective and safe reproductive choice is recent, yes; but women have been using a variety of methods (pessaries, sponges, herbal contraceptives, abortifacients) for thousands of years. The fact that they've been doing so suggests that the idea of a universal compulsion to have children is nonsense, of course.

[dexypunk]

I agree. Also, there is no apparent link between desire and ability to have children. If there was, it would make sense that no infertile woman would want kids, and no fertile woman wouldn't.
I am in the position of being totally certain that I am done breeding (2 kids and pregnant) and growing infuriated that people don't believe me. As though having one child means I now want a child a year for life.
I find it interesting that the initial source of this argument is a man, because I have generally found men to be far more protective of their fertility and simultaneously less broody than women.
Sorry for bad typing, I'm on my phone and it makes editing a nightmare.

[djpsyche]

Also, there is no apparent link between desire and ability to have children. If there was, it would make sense that no infertile woman would want kids, and no fertile woman wouldn't.

And only straight people would want kids, while gay people wouldn't.

[meepettemu]

Do not want kids. Never wanted kids. 37. My niece might come stay with me (us) to do her degree and I can just about cope with that. But having my own children? Not on your life.