Thankfully, This is a Problem That Solves Itself

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• It's a total misnomer. It's not a community of child-free people, it's a community of people who hate all kids and, apparently, want to see humans become extinct...?

• While I won't defend the childish antics of those in the Child-free Community, I do find it personally galling the extent to which parents expect the whole world to bend over backwards for them just because they decided to reproduce. From mandatory paternity leave to the child tax credit to increased property taxes, I feel I am being asked to subsidize someone else's expensive hobby. I'm not saying that people shouldn't have kids, I'm just saying I wish parents wouldn't act like the world revolves around them.

• Hey Joe!

  I'm kind of split on some of the parent issues that come up. I'm all for comfortable space for breast-feeding, and stuff like that, but the tax credits and things kind of piss me off in a time of overpopulation and widespread homelessness and things.

  *head splits in two*

• One: Define overpopulation. In countries with a minus replacement rate (Canada, most of Europe), it's a slipper concept, innit?

  And how is there a direct link between children and homelessness. Surely there are other factors that play a more decisive role?

  Two: Considering that every new child is a)a future taxpayer b)a considerable expense, you can argue that tax credits are simply a good investment by the gov't, like the old baby bonus.

• I don't currently live in a place with a minus replacement rate. I live in a place where there are kids who don't have FOOD.

• Look at places like Sub-Saharan Africa, India, or most of Asia. I think in places like that you can make a pretty decisive link between overpopulation and general poverty (of which homelessness is a symptom). But even in places like the US, Canda, and Europe I think it's pretty well established that poor, ignorant people are just going to have poor, ignorant children. By denying these people access to reliable common sense information about family planning, we're only exacerbating the problem. I realize that flies in the face of the "Handmaid's Tale" society we seem to be trying to build here in the US, but there it is.

  I realize that it's in the government's best interest to help people breed up more little draftees and taxpayers, I just don't like the idea of subsidizing it. But then there are so many other things I wish the governement wouldn't spend my tax money on *cough* Iraq *cough*

• I dunno about those folks, but when I reach retirement age and I'm visiting the doctor more often than I go to the 7-Eleven, I want to have a healthy pool of young taxpayers out there.

  --arcane

• Joe, you sound more than a bit paranoid, and I'd have said that even if you didn't include the Handmaid's Tale allusion.

  And in Sub-Saharan Africa, India, Asia, you can make a link between general poverty and bad government as well. And the unfortunate fact that it's a bad idea to have big families or to even live in a desert.

  Instead of "reliable common sense information about family planning" - which might work for university students but seems to generally fall flat in most other social milieus - why don't we conentrate on improving their governments, discouraging corruption, perhaps even taking a strong stand when those governments take rather draconian population control tactics like slaughtering or starving their population?

  And about the Handmaid's Tale thing - please explain. How is that rather imaginative scenario anywhere close to realizing itself? Try to answer my question without using the words "religious wackos" or "fundamentalists". And keep in mind that George W. Bush is a Methodist, not a Falwell-type Baptist.

  And that the person asking you to explain yourself is religious.

• Redhead, I assume you live in a place where there are food banks, charities, food stamps programs? (I'm assuming you're talking about Boston.) If the people you're talking about - in a general sense, I assume, perhaps even in a "I've read about this in the paper" kind of way - are in dire straits and can't take advantage of these programs, it's both tragic and criminal. Why have kids if you haven't a clue how to provide for them? Or perhaps there's the little matter of a culture of dependence that encourages people to wait for catastrophic circumstances to leverage their position for aid? I'm sorry if that sounds cruel, but it happens.

  That said, what do you propose? A means test for child-bearing women and their prospective spouses. Confiscation of children by the state? Sterilization? These have all been proposed/utilized in the past, to rather horrific outcomes.

  Not simple, is it? And are you proposing that these people (the so-called underclass) be denied tax breaks, public aid, etc., because you resent their fecundity. Because if you do, you're sounding like a carticature of a conservative.

• Let's take a look at why family planning seems to "fall flat". Here in Minnesota we have abstinance only sex education in public schools and the 24 hour wait law, a law that requires a 24 hour waiting period before a woman can recieve an abortion. These initiatives were introduced by a conservative Republican legislature and govenor more interested in ideology than what is reliable or common sense.

  I don't think the establishment of a theocracy (as seen in "The Handmaid's Tale") in the US is as far-fetched as you might think. It would take something extraordinary to push us over the edge, but the building blocks are there. Everywhere I look, I see the steady errosion of the line between Church and State. From "Faith-based Initives", to the constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, religious ideologues seek to advance their adgends through the government. Is that a cynical view? Yes, but I haven't seen a reason to think otherwise.