My wife and I have always strongly preferred to not have children. Ever. And this belief is reinforced time and again in various instances. Each time we set foot in an airplane and there are babies crying uncontrollably, we look at each other in horror and praise our luck. Whenever we hear about the travails of parents trying to get their kids into nursery, school, or college, we congratulate each other on our good fortune. When we watch movies like “The Good Son” or “The Bad Seed”, we thank the stars for our fortuitous escape.
Also, we’re ****ing up the earth so badly that I’ve lost hope and I don’t want my children to curse me for bringing them into a doomed world. They’ll look at me and say “What right did you have? I never asked to be born – it’s your fault that I’m choking in this putrid air!” Thoroughly sound reasons to keep my progeny off the earth I say.
But here’s the rub. The theory of evolution says that a successful organism manages to pass on its genes. Logically this means that:
Successful => Kids
And the Contra-Positive is:
No Kids => Unsuccessful
Am I dooming my genes?
So by definition, my wife and I are evolutionary failures. To make matters worse, my brother and his wife have decided not to have kids either. This makes both of them evolutionary failures too. And here’s the nub – my brother and I are the only two children of our parents. If the both of us are failures, then my parents are failures too! In essence an entire branch of the “Park” family is about to be pruned from the evolutionary tree – a dead end. A cul de sac.
This makes me wonder. My wife and I as well as my brother and his wife are not having kids because in our estimation, it’s logical to not have them. In developed countries, more and more people are reasoning out the same thing (thereby lowering the population). Ergo it seems that intelligent people are being wiped off the face of the earth! Those individuals whose logic dictates that they must not procreate are evolutionary failures whose genes are squished out of the gene pool – leaving only…well those without that particular brand of intelligence shall we say :D
My wife and I have given this some thought, and I’m fairly keen on having my genes survive in this world – I mean I think they’re pretty good after all! But how to do that without the attendant consequences? And then I hit on an idea, and my wife agrees. I’m going to go to a sperm bank! The one in Apollo hospital in Chennai seems to be just the thing. Propagation of my genes without having to take care of the resultant blighters. :D . Something like the Koel strategy I say, but with no deception involved. And to seal the deal, I might as well donate to several banks to maximize the chance of my genes getting along fine.
Now if I can just motivate myself to get off my lazy ass and implement my master plant – ha ha ha ha (Evil grin)
What do you think of sperm bank donation for people who don’t want to take care of their kids? (Two answers allowed)
@Vikas Gupta
I'm quite serious – seems to be a logical culmination of the thought process don't you think?
@bhagwad
I am confused and don't know what to say! Yeah, you are nipping an Odesk champion in the bud! ;)
I, for one, love babies and would not want to donate sperm in a bank.
@Vikas Gupta
But IMHO those babies who are a product of a sperm bank will be even more loved than regular babies – since the parents want one so badly they're willing to try anything…
Or do you know something I don't?
@bhagwad
I am not very educated on this topic. I speak emotionally. All I know is that I would not want my sperm to produce results that I am not aware of. If I donate, I will be uncomfortable all my life and want to search the baby that has resulted (and take care of him/her).
I also agree that universal marriage is a big cause of India's population. I also agree that people should adopt babies from orphanages (I may adopt one or more).
@Vikas Gupta
Interesting – perhaps I can imagine how you feel. I've made a poll at the end that might help understand how other people feel about sperm banks.
**I don’t want my children to curse me for bringing them into a doomed world**
If this is your biggest concern why not adopt one?
Me – Good point – but then that's only one reason for not having kids. Other reasons are that I don't want to be responsible for them… And of course, adopting belies the purpose of spreading my genes :D
I hope you are only kidding about that sperm bank thing!
I have many blog friends who chose not to get babies. 1. http://thistimethisspace.com and 2. http://www.sebastyne.net/ You can find interesting posts on their blog on this theme.
I'm confused…Since we are f***ing up the world so badly and you don't want your children to curse you for bringing them into this f***ed up world, why donate your sperm? I'm assuming that the sperm you donate will be used by another couple to procreate and not for medicinal or other purposes…
Me – True, True! I guess I don't feel it because I completely absolve myself of the responsibility for the kid's future. That's the point after all isn't it? Any decision to bring the kid into the world will not be mine, but the future parent's…
…and yet you would like your gene pool to continue…Isn't there something narcissistic about it? But I admire you for deciding against having children knowing your limitations…There are so many unfit parents around that I feel really bad for their kids…
Me – You're quite right. It does seem so. The way I see it, if it's not my genes then they'll find someone else's or find another method (maybe surrogacy?). So I'm not contributing negatively to anything on the planet – just doing my evolutionary duty…Win win for all concerned!
All this crap about the desire to be an evolutionary success is just that – crap! There's no need to try and sound as if you're doing something noble and important :D …
Sraboney has hit the nail on the head. Narcissism is all that this is about. You feel your "superior" (self proclaimed, of course!) genes need to be spread out in the world but you'd like that to happen without much effort on your part.
Ergo, the sperm donation plan.
Me – Fairly sound reasoning, I agree. But there's no harm is there? I mean the world's not worse off in any way whatsoever by the aforementioned donation, so why not let my genes remain in the pool?
True true… no harm. Knock yourself out! :D
hey ! i'm involved in this too. some of my genes will remain in the physical universe if you go ahead with your plan! i'm quite happy to have them end with you and your brother. this may be a desirable end. if DNA are all linked in a matrix and if the anhilation of some, helps the whole matrix in its ultimate evolution to a different level of consciousness, then i wouldnt want to go against the process
"In developed countries, more and more people are reasoning out the same thing (thereby lowering the population). Ergo it seems that intelligent people are being wiped off the face of the earth!"
If intelligent people are deciding not to have children, who will use your sperm? And how do you know it will be matched with an egg of equal genetic stature? You might dirty up the gene pool.
I'd much rather choose my mate than have it be left up to a turkey baster.
Bhagwad, I am sorry to know your reasoning and logic against a natural process. If your parents (with due regards) have thought the same way, you would not have seen the light of this day.
You will never know the happiness of learning the news of you becoming a father. Neither you will ever understand the emotional side of taking your little baby in your arms.
I know I sound very emotional but you are declining a Tapsaya (profound prayer) of raising children that can shape the coming generation. If everyone is doing wrong that doesn't mean that your children with the very amount of education you will provide, will follow the wrong doings.
I take this as an inability of people like you to help make future generations and future earth a much better place to live in. Because you believe that you will contribute to the population growth rather than a thinking which says you contribute to the betterment of tomorrow.
Me – the question as I see it Sajid, is whether or not having a kid will contribute to my betterment! Till now, I haven't seen proof that it will…
While I respect and understand your decision to not bring any children to this world, you would be bringing some children into this world with your sperm donation plan. Sraboney's point about medicinal purposes is also relevant.
I voted that it might help childless couples but I feel it isn't such a great idea because there is no way to know what happened to a child born thus. You will have no responsibility but still it will be your genes maybe being treated badly somewhere and you will never know and have no rights to protect them.
A lot of people realise how this world does not deserve any children, only after they are parents – I know couples who have one child and they adopted a second one because they didn't want to bring another child into this world, and they wanted to protect and raise at least one child who was already in this world.
Me – I feel you have a valid point if I was the cause of bringing children into the world. But is it true that because of me extra children would be born? AFAIK my sperm would be selected from a number of others, so if I don't donate, the kid would be born into the world anyway – only this way, it would have my genes.
But if I were to find out that because of me, MORE kids would come into the world, then I probably wouldn't go ahead with it…
I suppose I could indulge in your idea. In fact it was a curious google search after reading Dawkins' [i] The Selfish Gene [/i] that brought me to your blog, since I was thinking along the same lines (as an academic exercise, I'm not particularly serious about it).
In the aforementioned book, Dawkins mentioned both genes and [i] memes [/i] (units of cultural inheritance). Therefore in order to be evolutionarily successful I suppose you need to succeed in spreading both your genes and your memes (in educating a child you end up transferring your ideas, even if your idea is that of being open-minded; I am not good at explaining it so I hope you know what I mean).
By having and raising your own biological child you succeed in both ways.
By adopting a child, you succeed in spreading your memes only.
By donating your gametes, you succeed in spreading your genes only.
If you were rather narcissistic about this exercise you might end up going for all three: have your own children, adopt a child as well, and on the side donate some sperm. You know, diversify it a bit, mix-and-match the gene/meme combination. Congratulations you're partially more successful in evolutionary terms than the vast majority. However, it is important to stress how emotionless and ultimately unnatural this approach is. In the end, you get a egotistical satisfaction but does it really make you feel successful? The kind of peace of mind this might bring someone is similar, in my view, to the pseudo-satisfaction arising from fulfilling a religious commandment.
[...] My wife and I have discussed what will happen to the wealth when we’re gone. We’re not going to have children at any point so all that money will be wasted. I’ve thought of donating it to an NGO for [...]
Whoa! You are the first person I am seeing who has decided not to have children for the same reason I have decided the same thing! What’s more pleasant a surprise in your case is that you have a wife too who agrees with it. Great!
It certainly makes things convenient no? :D
You may be impotent.
Ha Haa
I don’t understand WHY you want your genes to remain in this ‘big bad world’ after all. Why don’t you just let go, truly and completely?!! I voted for ‘it is not right to have anonymous children’. I guess if you see this practically, you are helping out people who need help, but I see this as a huge ego-flattering device, rather than a need to help the world!!! If you really want to help the world, why don’t you bring up a child? Inculcate all those virtues in the child? Bring him/her up in a beautiful manner, and really make a difference?
Oh, I completely agree with you. I’m quite shameless about it being an ego flattering exercise :) . The point I’m making is that since I’m not harming anyone and can actually end up helping people, why not flatter my ego a bit? Poor little ego…
Completely agree with Pal. And since you (Bhagwad) mentioned you don’t want your child to forego its right to be born and compulsorily made to be born. You should not be sharing your gene and thereby partially responsible for another child to be brought into life in this as you mentioned bad world choked with putrid air.
I think I can avoid the guilt easily here. Since I’m sure that if it’s not my genes, then some other genes will be used, the kid is going to be born anyway and so I’m not responsible for another soul being born into the world. I might as well get some benefit out of this no? :)
I was nodding my head in agreement till I stumbled upon that point about your wanting to leave your genes. :D
Somehow, long back, say when I was 19/20 years old, I thought it silly to feel so possessive about minor variations in sequence of nucleotides. I haven’t outgrown that feeling I guess. It is possible I might feel ‘one with my genes’ someday, but as of now, I don’t. :)
And it is difficult to tell what makes a progeny more “mine” – ‘nurture’ or ‘nature’ (genes)? :)
Lastly, is there margin for *ahem* gender equality in this matter, that is, your wife also getting to propagate her family genes in this arrangement? After all, what Koel uses for propagation is a fertilized *ovum*. :P
It’s easy to break anything down to make it sound trivial. For example, pain is nothing but electrical impulses being interpreted by our brain – but try telling that to someone suffering from gout! Similarly, our body itself is nothing but a bag of chemicals. The important thing I feel is to remember that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts…
I’ve discussed this with my wife and she doesn’t feel any need to propagate her genes – so that’s take care of I guess :)