QotD: "Breeders"

If people choose not to have children, that's their decision. Obviously. You could make the argument that the future needs kids, and plenty of them, especially if you believe there should be an intermediary government entity transferring part of their income to you when you're old. You could make the argument that childless people are doing their part to save the earth, and the earth will be so grateful it will show up at your funeral and sit in the front row sniffling into a handkerchief. The other guests will nudge and point — is that the Earth? I didn't know they were close. I tend to believe we have reached an unusual point in human history when we have to debate the merits of reproducing, but there you go.

I'm not talking about the people who don't want their own kids but love kids anyway, and prefer the Cool Aunt or Cool Uncle role: bless you. I'm not even talking about the people who are indifferent to kids. I'm talking about the people who find some sort of personal identification in a militantly anti-kid stance. ( I suspect a lot of anti-kid people would be offended if you told them they wouldn't be a particularly good parent, because it requires skills they lack; the strenuously anti-kid types often believe that these skills are simply beneath them, and could be mustered if — God forbid — the occasion arose.) Granted, some people aren't parent material, and it's best they not do something they don't want to do.

[. . .]

So I don't judge people who don't want kids, but I can't stand "breeder" and "clones" and "crotchfruit" and all the other terms of derision. It's the worst form of misanthropy, and a curious protestation of ignorance: these people literally do not know what they're talking about, since there's nothing about parenthood you can observe from a distance that compares to the thing itself. Being irritated with poorly-socialized children in a restaurant does not set one up in a moral high chair. Believe me, parents are just as irritated with those people as you are.

James Lileks, The Bleat, 2008-03-05