The deeper tragedy is in the meme as a whole. There has been so much power, control, and hope sucked away from us… and they try to replace it with panic (usually to buy a product or lie). I would like to believe that the situation is not hopeless, and that we are not powerless…
If I ever decide to have kids then I’m adopting because I can’t in good conscience bring a life into this shitty world
Given the glut of unwanted children from our abortion prohibition, we’ll be needing a lot of new adoptive parents in the near future.
Ceaușescu’s Romania
Babies get adopted quickly. It’s the older children who need homes.
Babies get adopted quickly.
Healthy, white babies do. It’s a lot harder for minority kids, preemies, and anyone with congenital health issues (even relatively minor ones)
Not foster kids. Foster parents/adoptions are always needing people, even babies. Sometimes the babies have to sleep in the DHR office, because there’s nowhere for them to go.
Good to know. Thank you for sharing.
Talked to a social worker - kids in DHS care sleep in homeless shelters, hospitals, DHS offices. Teen group homes are inherently damaging to them; I’ve never seen a good one.
Foster teens. Short term commitment. They will have severe trauma and can be hard to deal with, but you would be amazed at how they respond if you can genuinely provide love. Love and Logic is fucking magic.
If you can’t foster, you can be a child advocate. Many states have CASA programs. Visit the kid once a month, let them know someone cares, and tell the court what you think is best for them. Even just something like a phone call “hey, kid left something behind at the group home - any way we could get that moved?”
Or even just someone to protect them from the group home. A dozen seriously traumatized kids, with staff paid less than $15/hr on a week of training. A place that provides opportunities for people to be around children, who are already isolated and have limited access to supportive adults… and financial incentives to cover anything up.
I don’t think there’s much hope for the future, but we can focus on the now and helping the children who are already here.
Please elaborate about the magic of love and logic
The big idea is about giving children choice. “Do you want to get out of the bath and brush your teeth now, or do you want to brush your teeth in the bathtub?” “Should we work on math homework or our essay first?” “Would you like to do your homework at the table with me, or would you like to sit in the living room and listen to music while you do it?”
Both choices should be choices you are happy with.
Many traumatized foster kids will react very poorly to just being told to do things. They struggle with a lot of feelings of powerlessness - being moved from place to place with little consideration of what they want, having to follow new rules from strange adults. You have to work around some “pathological demand avoidance” - you have to avoid tripping them into that flight or fight mode. You empower them by providing them with two acceptable options, instead of reminding them that they have no power over their own lives.
They won’t always go along with those two choices, but then the focus is going to be on natural consequences - “you didn’t clean up your room, so I don’t think we have room for a new squishmallow.”
The name of the book is perfect. You start from a place of love - you want this child to grow into a healthy and happy adult, you want to provide them opportunities because you care deeply for them and that informs your actions. You give them rational rules to their behavior - it’s not about control, it’s about teaching them how to function.
Adopt, don’t shop lmao
Imagine that one guy shoveling fuel on the fire “IF IT GETS A LITTLE BIT WORSE THEN WE CAN RISE UP!”
100% of scientists agree that not-having-kids will solve our climate change crisis in one generation.
Fucking lol
It’ll take more than one…
You only need the one lol
Think about it… If Gen alpha agrees not to have kids, there will still be a generation after them, raised by Gen Z. A lot of families have a generation gap between parents and their children.
generation (noun): “the living things which share a common ancestry and are alive at (or about) the same time.”
The word does not refer solely to humans. It existed before the habit of neatly labeling people born within an arbitrary range of years. For example, medical researchers will record changes in microbes from generation to generation (without making up names for each generation).
So, if our generation (the people alive today, or any time in the next ~9 months) agreed to not have children then humanity’s climate crisis would be solved. In fact, every human problem would be solved. Think about it.
Are you saying every human alive today belongs to the same generation? That’s not how it works.
I’m not defining terms; I’m repeating how the terms are defined. You can look it up in any dictionary. After that, if you still feel like arguing about it I’m not your opponent. You can contact Mrs. Mirriam-Webster, or Mr. Oxford, etc. Please post the exchange! Maybe the argument, “That’s not how it works,” will convince them.
Since you mentioned Webster… See definition “1.b” for the most common meaning of the term when people are talking about human generations (Millennials, boomers, anything that starts with “Gen”). Context matters.
Well since we can’t count on our leaders to be responsible
This entire thread sums up the utter misery of Lemmy.
It’s a fuckin doomer tumor.
Exactly. I love it. These people are basically self pruning their evolutionary branches all by themselves!
There should be a Darwin awards category for this
So…have kids in a dying world so you have mating success? That’s an asinine reason to procreate.
Intelligence pruning itself out of a malicious environment isn’t really a great showcase of evolution.
It’s not technically incorrect - we are changing, but a species actively taking steps backwards by inflating itself with idiots doesn’t quite hit that stronger/faster/smarter progression that the concept of evolution implies.
These are darwinism’s death throes.
It wouldn’t be intelligence pruned. Plenty of smart people are committed to fighting for humanity, are prospering, and won’t succumb to doomer echo chambers.
Big time Homer energy in this thread.
I wish their children and grandchildren etc the best of luck in finding comfort in the hellscape we’re building for them. I have a feeling they won’t find it in the knowledge that their grandpappy owned a boat or some shit, but I’m sure they’ll be able to science-miracle their way out of all the problems the generations before them allowed to bottle up to a breaking point.
My own children will be happily non-existing, cuz I love them far too much to cast them into this dumpsterfire, especially as pawns against a horde of morons doing their damnedest to strip everyone’s rights.
And scene.
Evolution determined by mating is basically over for humans. In the time it takes a species to meaningfully change, humans will be genetically engineered.
I’m all up for that
Goodbye
garbage health care
mass shootings
violent racism
r/iam14andthisisdeep
The US is far from the only country with violent racism. In terms of healthcare, the privatization. The Canadian healthcare system is being increasingly enshittified by conservatives up here, too.
The Canadian healthcare system is being increasingly enshittified
by conservativesup here, tooFTFY
The conservatives are the main ones behind it, and as usual everyone believes it is failing on its own due to ‘free means shit’ and not realizing just how deep conservative shit is being encrusted into it.
I mean, the UK has 2 out of 3 of those. And most countries have the violent racism.
the UK has 2 out of 3 of those
Change “shooting” to “knifing” and its 3 for 3. The UK has a huge hooliganism problem. The country is rife with domestic violence. But no (non-police) guns!
Most countries have less violent racism now than at any other point in history.
That bar you’re bragging about stepping over is subterranean.
Most countries have racism, some have violent racism… and there are some in which terrorist organizations like KKK are freely roaming the streets and are ok for some reason.
Anyway, it feels wierd to speak shit of the USA when there currently are countries actively working on ethnic cleansing.
Yep. You dumbfucks want to talk about “muh racism”? Be Uyghur or Palestinian or STFU. That’s REAL shit.
Just because a problem is worse somewhere else, doesn’t make the problem trivial here.
violent racism
Now tell us how you feel about g*psies.
RIP Alaska, Hawaii, and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula
Look at this guy who thinks the USA invented racism and holds a monopoly on it.
In Europe it’s just sparkling “let them down in the Mediterranean and/or make sure they stay in their own neighborhoods.”
The comic is very America-centric if you look at the problems mentioned in totality.
I bet they would hold a monopoly on it if they could. Damn I wish they did
I was going to say… I don’t see the UK anywhere on this map
Not the same level of problems with mass shootings in the UK. And whilst I take the point about healthcare it’s a very different kind of issue, and if you get triaged conveniently it can work out for you… Really just depends what you need and how old you are, but at least having a baby and keeping it alive is fairly well covered
When we go down we are taking all of you with us.
Don’t worry we know
Nah bro, trump try will nuke the superbowl for his false flag and accidentally have his ketchup covered fingers slip and push to many buttons and nuke the rest of the USA leaving the rest of the world and native American reservations in tact
I’m Gen X, but cusp with Millennial. I said at 15 or 16 I’d never have kids & stuck with it. I’m more resolute than ever & feel like I would have massive guilt if I had caved. I felt the world was too fucked up back in the 90s. I wonder how my younger self would deal with the world today.
I got a vasectomy as soon as I could which was at 26. I would have done it sooner but I had insurance problems and was broke before that. It was the best decision I’ve ever made for myself.
I’m on the other side of the generational gap (nearly gen x, but millennial), and I was terrified during my late teens/early 20s of becoming a parent. I could not imagine raising a child the way I was living paycheque to paycheque, if I had a paycheque at all…
That feeling never went away, and I still wouldn’t know how I could possibly afford that. I decided in my mid 20s that children would be a decision I would leave up to my wife (wherever I had a wife to make the decision). I was/am instinctually driven to want them (a feeling I mostly disregard), but given the state of the world and my own financial situation, I can’t say that I want to force any intelligent being, especially one that is my offspring, to suffer through a lifetime of this shit like I have been forced to so far.
I didn’t ask to be here. If someone had given me a choice, I would have probably opted out of gestures all of this.
I’m currently in a long term relationship, and we’re planning on signing the papers next year, so soon I’ll have someone I can legitimately call my wife. She is very much on the side of “never have kids”. So that’s my decision as well.
Instinctual drive isn’t enough to cause me to overlook how things are going. I love my (non-existent) children too much, than to force them into living a life in these circumstances. Fuck no.
I was/am instinctually driven to want them (a feeling I mostly disregard), but given the state of the world and my own financial situation, I can’t say that I want to force any intelligent being, especially one that is my offspring, to suffer through a lifetime of this shit like I have been forced to so far.
This is interesting to me, as I’ve never had the biological urge to have kids. I love them and enjoy hanging out with them, joking, playing, etc., but never my own. In any case, I commend you on being resolute.
I’m currently in a long term relationship, and we’re planning on signing the papers next year, so soon I’ll have someone I can legitimately call my wife. She is very much on the side of “never have kids”. So that’s my decision as well.
My girlfriend doesn’t want them either. She’s a good deal younger than me - 31 years old - but she says something similar to me: raising kids in this world would be a tragedy.
Frankly, I’ve always felt there are too many humans. I never understood the push for more. Just maintain or reduce the population naturally.
Good luck staving off that biological imperative. I feel lucky not to have it myself.
You could adopt a kid. And give them a home. That is 1 option.
I considered that and it was part of my early stands: IF i had a kid, I would adopt since there are so many without parents.
Just like Millenials and Gen Zs, my life is hard enough to pay for financially. I don’t know that I could provide something positive for a child. I need to be honest with myself about this shit.
It’s not difficult for me, to say the feeling isn’t felt very strongly, would probably be an understatement.
The other comment I want to make is that I agree that there’s too many humans, however, the economy survives by constant growth, so that’s a thing. It has to do with how money works and is valuated.
The video “money as debt” is a good resource for more info on that.
Bluntly, I don’t care since I’ll be long dead when the economy collapses under it’s own weight.
You can be damned sure the crazy fundamentalists are gonna have a shit ton of kids. And some of those will vote.
Yeah, and they’ll die in the water wars too.
no toilet paper?
During covid and maybe bird flu if it takes off. Also if vaccines stop being a thing In murica.
Cringe
2020 called, they want their self-pity memes back
A shitty life situation has never stopped anybody from having kids. Quite the opposite, the less educated a society and the lower the prospect of comfort, the more kids people have. Poor and miserable people fuck for fun and don’t care about proper contraceptives, resulting in more kids. Further more, people believe that the more kids you’ll have, the more likely it is that one of them is going to end up rich and successfull.
Generational-wise, we are having less children then the previous. That’s the point of the comic.
That’s because people are actually more educated than ever at least in part thanks to the internet. In most places the standard of living has actually gone up, in some cases quite drastically. So people are more comfortable. A lot of the doomerism stuff doesn’t take into account any of the awful stuff that happened in the past, and most are only focused on the USA which is having weird problems at the moment. In most of the world the material wealth of the average person has gone up, not down.
the less educated a society and the lower the prospect of comfort, the more kids people have
Yes, by instinct. And the more educated they are, the more they can make informed decisions.
In that sense, keeping children uneducated is rape by extension.
Why is the whole world on fire? These are all mostly American problems.
Yeah feeling this, I’m a little tired of one country projecting it issues on the entire world.
That sentence can be interpreted in a number of ways and all are correct sadly.
I know Australia is American lite sometimes, but we also have most of these issues. Shit is going bad in a lot of places is my understanding.
Not really. Most of Europe is just fine. We in the UK have elected a labor government for the first time in several elections as the conservatives severely fucked up multiple times. Far right wing sentiment is on the rise in several countries, but that doesn’t make them the majority, so they aren’t winning elections anywhere but locally. Mostly the far right are just taking votes from the moderate right.
In the same breath, we now have climate scientists saying that remaining below 1.5° this century is all but a pipedream, right wing leaders surging in Italy, Germany, France, Hungary, and other EU countries stoking socially regressive rhetoric, and the AMOC could fail as soon as 2026, plunging Europe temperatures by 10° and causing a new annual storm front akin to Florida right above France and Germany. I am less than optimistic for Europe’s future as a whole, as crises drive further nationalism and right wing populism. In future, with european crops struggling under these worse conditions and with the UK currently reliant on imports for 60% its food, the worst is likely yet to come for us.
So nothing has really happened yet then? While that all sounds alarming it’s all theoretical at best. We as a species have already made large inroads on pollution and climate change. Even China is building huge wind and solar farms. It’s now more profitable to invest in renewables than fossil fuels. It seems to me the main people holding us back are the USA who for some reason seem to be going backwards.
You tend to find that as people struggle more it’s far left wing politics that appeals to the working class just as much as the far right. Hence things like the recent labor victory. Last I heard in France the far right party was beaten by a coalition on the left. I don’t really know what’s happening in Germany, but I imagine it’s much the same. Both extremes of politics get amplified in times of struggle. It’s probably why the Democrats failed in America, because they are too moderate and too centrist.
A) keep electing far-right leaders and they won’t be B) global warming
Concise and accurate. Bravo
deleted by creator
I’m half expecting the assholes that ruined this life to ruin the next one as well.
“You wasted a life, why wouldn’t you waste the afterlife?”
Now playing Modest Mouse - Ocean Breathes Salty
[Citation needed]
The sad part about believing in an afterlife is that it’s so easy to give up on the world we have to leave for the next generation.
Even if there would be a blissful afterlife, the people who survive you will suffer more for your complacency.
I’ve done all I can, I just wanna go home man. I’m tired of fighting… espeically when I win nothing
I get it, the world is overwhelming, and one person can’t possibly neither bear nor solve it all.
What helps is limiting your scope: lower your media diet, focus on real people and relationships, focus on the things you can do something about, and do those well.
That’s not the same as doing your thing at the expense of others’, but that it’s fine to learn and correct and simplify as best you can. If you learn that your car is made from endangered child labor and methane leeching radioactive rain forest - you don’t have to burn it at once, but be mindful not to get that type of car the next time.
Find one goal and task and keep your head down until you reach it, it’s the only way any of us can get any real work done.
Believing this tripe is what causes some people to not bother trying to improve the only actual life we have here on this planet. Comforting lies do not help.
Confused the US with the entire world again, honest mistake.
Eh, Canada’s about the same too.
When the US had their boot on the neck of the world we are taking you all with us
Yeah, but that doesn’t mean we have the same problems as you.
*Yet
And you’re not even calling out the war in Europe.
No no. Wars are destined to be over. This? I don’t know how it would end.
