>And if Raphael could come up with a rational explanation as to how we could have sought his consent to be born, I will accept my fault," she said.

As there's no rational way to seek a dog's consent to be fucked in the arse, I suppose I have the freedom to fuck dogs in the arse.

Terrible argument for a lawyer to be making.

>>17829

>As there's no rational way to seek a dog's consent to be fucked in the arse

There will be indications though whether the dog is ok with you bumming it or not.

When I was a younglad, one of the council estate kids at my school told me that he and his brother wanked off the neighbour's Rottweil one afternoon. Broken Britain.

>>17830

Coma patients, then.

I'm fucking someone without their consent, I don't really care who or what - and this indian lad is helping me get away with it.

There was a pervading rumour that a lad at school used to fuck his dog. His surname was Barker so I always assumed it was definitely made up, but years later he got arrested for filming dog porn.

Considering he's well educated enough to be informed about anti-natalism and has the spare time to dick about like that it's pretty reasonable to assume that his lawyer parents are fairly well off and the only person who's going to really lose out of this is him losing some of his inheritance to the court system, fair enough. It may set some interesting precedents if he wins.

>Mr Samuel says his decision to take his parents to court is only based on his belief that the world would be a much better place without human beings in it.
The anthrocentric nature of mainstream anti-natalism puzzles me. Humans aren't special. There'd still be suffering without us. How much more or less is really impossible to say. If you genuinely want to end suffering you need to sterilise not just the planet but the entire universe. If you sincerely feel a moral imperative to end all suffering and not just your own, then you should throw in your lot with the accelerationists and aim to start an aggressive hegemonising swarm; a universal grey goo scenario that will destroy and prevent the emergence of all and any forms of life. As edgy as his behaviour may seem at a glance, it's actually quite quaint; parochial.

>>17832

>The anthrocentric nature of mainstream anti-natalism puzzles me.

I'm kind of more puzzled at the thought that that's really "a thing" to begin with.

And really, where is this shitbag's gratitude? His parents changed his nappies as an infant, they afforded him a decent enough upbringing that he could become a businessman (in India, no less, where without well to do parents you pretty much end up a penniless slum dweller). And how does he repay them? By being a mopey manchild who posts daft self portraits with the words "Why must I work?" on the Internet.

What a fucking dickhead.

>>17833

The idea that life is suffering isn't a particularly uncommon one. Not having a go or anything but you're sounding a tad sheltered.

>>17833

And thus you miss the point of antinatalism entirely. I have some books you can read on the subject, although given the banal, vapid, vacuous, and inane content of your post I can only presume that they'd be far beyond your meager comprehension.

>>17832
> then you should throw in your lot with the accelerationists and aim to start an aggressive hegemonising swarm; a universal grey goo scenario that will destroy and prevent the emergence of all and any forms of life

Reminds me of the Auditors of Reality in the Discworld series of novels.

>>17835
It's meagre, not meager lad.

>>17833
If I break your legs, I don't deserve your gratitude just because I pushed your wheelchair around for a bit afterwards.

>>17837
Breaking your legs was an act of aggression against you. I'm trying to think of how conception might be the same, but last I heard sperm and ova don't really have much in the way of sentience.

>>17835

>And thus you miss the point of antinatalism entirely. I have some books you can read on the subject

Never change, .gs.

>>17835
Antinatalism is good for nothing other than academic debate and literary analysis. Anyone who adopts the position in any seriousness is a mental case.

>>17841

It gives me a good moral excuse to glass you in an Essex pub car park just because you're suffering anyway.

>>17841
Good for? Is this some sort of meta-utilitarian ethics, judging the use of different philosophies? Have a word with yourself.

>>17838

If you adopt a puppy knowing full well your house is full of bear traps, would you not consider that an act of aggression?

The same can be said for conception. You're fully aware of the pain and suffering humans must endure, yet you decide to bring another baby into existence. It's cruelty.

>>17844
>If you adopt a puppy knowing full well your house is full of bear traps, would you not consider that an act of aggression?
No. There, that was easy.

PR stunt.

>>17841

Finally, somebody with some sense.

It's a bit like taking Nietzsche's philosophies too seriously. It can lead you down a very dark path.

I knew a guy who got a vasectomy at 21 because he deemed it cruel to bring another person into this shitty world. Seems like a sad way to live.

>>17855

Now that's proper nihilist shit.

>>17855
People are actually doing this because having less children is currently thought to be the best way to help the planet. Respect to him if that's his reasoning.

>>17861

Sure there will have to be fewer children on the planet in the long run.

But does that have to include my own children? Why can't everybody else stop having kids?

>>17845

Why isn't it an act of aggression to introduce someone something into an environment you're aware will cause them pain and eventual death with absolute certainty?

>>17869
Because that's literally not what aggression means, you dense mong.

>>17871
It would be an act of aggression to do it to a person.

>>17871

Semantics is your argument? Call it what you like, violence, delayed violence, putting someone in deliberate danger, assault via beartrap, we're just arguing synonyms. It's still malicious.

>>17874
But it isn't, is it?

>>17873
No, it wouldn't. Now fuck off, Humpty.

>>17877

So you're saying kidnapping and torturing someone to death isn't aggression or malicious?

>>17878
No, I'm saying deploying enlisted troops to a war zone is not an act of aggression against those troops. It might be an act of aggression against the opposing power, but that's not at issue here.

>>17879
So when officers sent soldiers they personally disliked into no-man's land, or on otherwise suicide missions, that wasn't an act of aggression?

>>17880
I heard the IOC rejected mental gymnastics again for 2024.

>>17881
Okay I'm just going to keep you in this Iron Maiden for shits and giggles. Nothing aggressive about that.

>>17882
Are we taking before or after Bruce Dickinson joined?

>>17879

What about putting a puppy in a house full of bear traps?

>>17887
>What about
Stop that, lad.

>>17889

Don't be dense, it's a perfectly relevant phrase to use while asking someone about their line of reasoning. Just because you read about 'whataboutism' being bad, that doesn't mean you're not supposed to ask the question at all anymore.

>>17890
>Don't be dense
Says Mr. "puppy in a house full of bear traps".

>>17891

I used the simplest and most obvious device I could think of to get my point across, yet you manage to be confused enough by it to call me dense, and 'no u' me at the same time. Incredible.

If nothing else, your parents giving birth to you was an act of aggression against the rest of us.

>>17892
> If nothing else, your parents giving birth to you was an act of aggression against the rest of us.

Mirth

>>17893

Passive aggression even, it seems.

>>17892
>I used the simplest and most obvious device I could think of to get my point across
You succeeded in getting across that your point was patent bollocks.

>>17895

Could you explain why you think that?

What is it about the example that doesn't work for you? It's bringing a lifeform into a known, dangerous area without consent. Perhaps to be accurate we have to add positive experiences to the house alongside the bear traps, then ask if it's still inherently bad to put the puppy in there?

If shrodinger got to use a poisoned cat in his thought experiment, I don't see why I can't use a puppy in mine.

>>17896
>Could you explain why you think that?
Well, your point is patent bollocks, and I don't think anyone can deny you've done a good job of communicating that.

>What is it about the example that doesn't work for you?
Everything. It is literally in no way whatsoever an analogue for giving birth.

>I don't see why I can't use a puppy in mine.
Has the puppy consented to being used in your thought experiment? Is it from >>17829? If it's already been fucked in the arse I think the bear traps are just gratuitous at this point.

>>17897
>>Could you explain why you think that?
>Well, your point is patent bollocks
That's a "No, I'm just responding emotionally to something that upsets my unquestioned world view" then.

I can't believe we are actually having a debate about whether it's an act of aggression to bring a new life into this world.

You don't see other species pondering anti-natalism. When was the last time you heard a chimp complain about his parents not asking him if he wanted to be born into this world?

>>17899
I never saw a chimp moan about philosphical blathering on an imageboard either, but it didn't stop you. If "chimps don't do it" is your threshold then why aren't you up a tree?

>>17897

Why are you bothering to engage with the debate if you're unwilling to actually explain your reasoning? Saying "no you're just wrong" is how a ten year old argues, and it's very un-britfa.gs of you. Sort it out.

>>17901
> and it's very un-britfa.gs of you
It's been like that for years.

>>17900

>If "chimps don't do it" is your threshold then why aren't you up a tree?

I'm probably more adept at climbing a tree than somebody like you who appears to have spent his life pondering pointless considerations like if it's an act of aggression to bring a human being, or other creature into this world.

Didn't think I'd say this at this point of the debate, but maybe your parents would have done us a big favour if they hadn't conceived you. Hey, I'm only echoing what you are saying.

>>17903

You tell 'im, Steve-Dave! Appeals to nature are never specious!

>>17903
>I'm probably more adept at climbing a tree than somebody like you who appears to have spent his life pondering pointless considerations like if it's an act of aggression to bring a human being, or other creature into this world.

Well, first off, this is the most appropriate instance of "weird flex, but okay" I've come across, and secondly that was the only post I've made ITT so 'ave that you hairy arsed, simian, tosser! Go on, lad, up yer' tree.

It seems fairly obvious that the lad you're arguing with is harmlessly philosophising for the sake of it, I don't know why it's gotten you so irate.

>>17905

>harmlessly philosophising for the sake of it

Didn't seem like it to me. Sounded more like a true belief in this kind of nonsense. Who else would say that they have actually read, and own books on anti-natalism, if I understood correctly.

Autism thoroughly checked.

>>17906

By that logic you're a true believer in sparkly vampires.

>>17907

That shit is perfectly real, lad.

>>17908

Still, the implication that everyone believes everything they read and therefore must deliberately only read things that agree with their preconceptions is a bit dodgy.

>>17903
>your parents would have done us a big favour if they hadn't conceived you
someone else already did this joke and they did it better
don't do it again.

>>17909

If you go through the trouble of buying a book on a nonfictional subject like this one, then presumably you will already have a favourable opinion towards the subject matter. At least when you then go on an image board and tout it like it's the best thing ever. True, you can still read a book out of interest and then throw it in the corner because you come to believe it's absolute tosh, but again, not likely when somebody defends anti-natalism based on the books they have read about it.

>>17903

>I'm probably more adept at climbing a tree than somebody like you

Fucking hell. I don't know what yet, but this has to become a wordfilter for something.

>>17912

May I suggest this as a word filter for "Have a word, lad" or "Have a word with yourself".

>>17911

You're arguing for the totally ridiculous sort of wilful ignorance that gets paediatricians murdered.
>If you go to the trouble of looking up how it's not the same as paedophile then you probably are one innit

>>17914

Fucking hell, lad.

Like I tried to argue, if you read a book on a subject and then appear to defend the key points of that book on an image board or otherwise publicly, then it's indeed fair to say that you identify with it. On the other hand, if you indeed read a book about paedophilia and then think what a fucked up lot of perverts they are, either before or after you've read it, then naturally you've informed yourself about the issue but aren't a paedo yourself.

For example, I've got an acquaintance who is a lapsed Catholic, and I gave her my copy of The God Delusion to read. And then three weeks later when I saw her again, she was furious about the ideas that ol' Dawkins lays out in that book. So you see, I'm well aware that it's perfectly possible, and reasonable to read a book and then afterwards passionately disagree with the views expressed in it even if you are interested in the subject matter itself.

>>17915

Both you and your friend seem to lack any sort of intellectual curiosity or the capacity it takes to play devil's advocate. We're getting off topic here though, you're yet to show why anti-natalism is at all wrong, other than because you say so.

As an aside, it's also pretty funny that you're the sort of person to give a copy of The God Delusion to a Christian yet still manage to be morally outraged by this.

>>17916

>you're yet to show why anti-natalism is at all wrong, other than because you say so.

I just think that anti-natalism is idiotic. It's a moot point in and of itself, and serves no purpose whatsoever in trying to make your brief existence in this world any more bearable or even enjoyable, not for yourself, and certainly not for others.

Whether you wanted to be born or not - on the one hand, it's all pretty easy to fix by offing yourself. That will unequivocally express your opinion to the whole world that you don't agree with having been born in the first place. But on the other hand, you can just accept the minor inconvenience of being an existent human being, in this world as we know it, and try to make the best of it instead of moping about the world being such a horrible place, and you being hard done by just because you were thrust into it after your parents had a bonk together.


>>17917

>that you're the sort of person to give a copy of The God Delusion to a Christian yet still manage to be morally outraged by this.

Lapsed agnostic Catholic, to be precise. I was not asking the Pope to read the God Delusion. And I don't think you can compare atheism to anti-natalism. Not to get off topic here again, but how is doubt in the existence of a divine being comparable to the idea that somebody didn't ask to be born and thinks it gives him the right to go through life as an ungrateful cunt. You will rightly say that atheists are ungrateful cunts if it ever turns out that there is actually a God who created them, same as all the other humans. But unlike there being indisputable evidence that you were conceived by a physically existing human father and mother, God, the old bugger, still refuses to show himself at all.

>>17831
>There was a pervading rumour that a lad at school used to fuck his dog. His surname was Barker so I always assumed it was definitely made up, but years later he got arrested for filming dog porn.

Maybe it was the rumours that turned him into an animal botherer though, a case of the tail wanks the dog.

>>17832
>The anthrocentric nature of mainstream anti-natalism puzzles me.

It's fairly basic misanthropy tied in with more established societal norms of consent and humanism. I'm not claiming that all anti-natalist thought is like this but you can see why some would adopt it as a fashion statement.

>>17899
>I can't believe we are actually having a debate about whether it's an act of aggression to bring a new life into this world.

I think the point your both getting lost on is this isn't "aggression" but more akin to negligence. His parents were aware of the indirect harm that would undoubtedly entail from his conception but did it anyway.

Although I'm sure it would never pass in a court of law there are legal precedents he can follow on this. If a company put out a product that by negligence led to kids being born fucked up you would be liable for the damages even if the foetus didn't hold personhood at that point. Although it falls apart in any system that allows mothers to undergo selective abortions until they have a disabled foetus.

>>17915
>if you read a book on a subject and then appear to defend the key points of that book on an image board or otherwise publicly, then it's indeed fair to say that you identify with it.

Have you ever heard of the devil's advocate?

>>17916
This is .gs, "because I said so" is a perfectly valid justification here.

>>17919

>His parents were aware of the indirect harm that would undoubtedly entail from his conception but did it anyway.

There is a scene in the nuclear war movie The Day After, after the attacks, where a mother's baby won't come out of her womb and she is overdue for some time. And she then says to the puzzled doctors in the basement catacombs of a hospital that was obliterated by a nuclear bomb, "If you had a choice, would you want to be born into a world like this?".

It's an understandable consideration if you were to conceive a child after a nuclear war. But in the movie, the mother became pregnant quite obviously long before there was even an inkling that there would be a nuclear war soon, so she had no way of assuming that her child would be born into a world rendered almost entirely uninhabitable by nuclear bombs and radiation.

You see where I am going with this.

>>17922
>You see where I am going with this.

Not really no.

>>17918
>But unlike there being indisputable evidence that you were conceived by a physically existing human father and mother, God, the old bugger, still refuses to show himself at all.
There's also indisputable evidence that being born causes you to suffer, whereas it's pretty safe to say that not being born doens't do you any harm at all.

>>17924
There's indisputable evidence that your post added nothing to the thread, yet you still posted it.

>>17925
>no u

>>17923

>Not really no.

The point I was trying to make is that whether or not being born causes suffering to the person who is born is such a first world middle class concept. It's academic tosh perpetuated by sheltered people who obviously don't have to struggle to survive on a daily basis.

If you lived in a poor slum in a third world shithole country with barely a shirt on your back, then yes, it'd be worth thinking about if you are really doing your seventh child a favour by conceiving him or her to live in your 25 ft by 25 ft single-room hut with six siblings.

But here in Britain, even if you are dead skint dolescum, you will still be able to afford your children a halfway decent living. Not saying that that child's quality of life will be stellar growing up, but they still grow up in a wealthy country that looks after its citizens.

Also, when you talk to the WWII and post-WWII generation, they had no time to debate the finer points of anti-natalism. They were too busy clearing away the rubble or not getting shot in a trench in France. What do you think they would have told you if you had said to them your parents didn't ask you if you wanted to be born? They would have put a machine gun in your hand and told you to walk right over to the Gerrys, because obviously you didn't stand to lose much from getting your head blown off.

I really think you don't fully appreciate your own life until it is in jeopardy. Which is an experience that all the sheltered twats who take anti-natalism seriously will probably never go through, although it would do them some good.


>>17924

>whereas it's pretty safe to say that not being born doens't do you any harm at all.

How can you just assume that for the majority of people? My own life hasn't always been great, I've seen some serious misery and fucked up shit in my life. And yet, I am grateful for every single day that I have been able to exist in this world, and I would not have it any other way. To me, never having been born at all would seem like an infintely more depressing thought than existing and having had to go through some serious shit in my life.

>>17927

It's not about money. You're not wrong that this is a first world concept, but more because people born into third world slums invariably don't have the time or inclination to think about such things, as they're trying to survive.

You can have depression even if you have money. You can be miserable and rich. You can be raped as a child even if you're a millionaire. You can contract, or be born with, a rare, incurable disease even if your dad is Bill Gates. You suffer heartbreak, pain, sadness, disappointment, fear, regret, no matter how much money you have in your bank account. My friend was on 180k a year when he topped himself.

Life is full of suffering no matter who you are. You're wrong to say that every middle class english person is guaranteed happiness, you should know that.

Of course, there's plenty of enjoyment to be had out of life too, but none of that is guaranteed either. The idea is that it's unethical to bring someone into a world with so many pitfalls and dangers, regardless of the potential pleasures alongside it.

And of course, every single conception is a guaranteed death sentence - there's no getting around that, yet.

>>17928

>How can you just assume that for the majority of people?

I'm not just assuming anything. Name five non-fictional people who suffered despite never existing.

>>17918
>the idea that somebody didn't ask to be born and thinks it gives him the right to go through life as an ungrateful cunt.
you're making an unreasonable connection of cause and effect. a moral position has no inherent link to action taken, especially if you factor in practical or selfish concerns.
i believe it's wrong to have children for several reasons - in practice, i won't do it for the completely different reason (I don't want to.) but i'm generally cheerful and the only problem i have to my parents is that of all the first-world english-speaking countries to have me in, it had to be Britain.
what i'm saying is, this sort of cunt off wouldn't be happening on ausfa.gs. or perhaps it would, but with smaller pints and better weather. except in Darwin which is too humid. would every thread be a cunt off in a country that uses the word cunt so liberally? some cunt find out. but don't tell me, i want to find out for myself.

>>17927
>>17928
> It's academic tosh perpetuated by sheltered people who obviously don't have to struggle to survive on a daily basis.
Ahh I love the smell of pathologically overjustified anti-intellectualism in the morning. people are obviously at their most ethically conscious when struggling to survive.
>They would have put a machine gun in your hand and told you to walk right over to the Gerrys, because obviously you didn't stand to lose much from getting your head blown off.
I don't think they were half the cunts you make them sound like, and I wouldn't take any ethical advice from your imaginary cunts. take your moaning twattery of relative privation and... go away. (Also it's Jerry.)
>I really think you don't fully appreciate your own life until it is in jeopardy.
welcome to basic and irrational human instincts. next you'll tell me we have an obligation to have children because your willy gets hard when you see the lady. (Don't.)

>>17930

In fact, name five existing people who've never suffered.

>>17929

>but more because people born into third world slums invariably don't have the time or inclination to think about such things, as they're trying to survive.

This is actually the point I have been trying to make all this time. I guess it's a kind of instinct that is useful from an evolutionary standpoint, switching into "first things first" mode when all that counts is your survival, either socioeconomically or physically. With often a lasting effect on the way you see the world for the rest of your life.


>You're wrong to say that every middle class english person is guaranteed happiness, you should know that.

I did not intend to give that impression, no. All I was trying to say was that anti-natalism is a middle and upper class concept, pondered chiefly by people who for various reasons have the time and excess thought capacity to do so.


> And of course, every single conception is a guaranteed death sentence - there's no getting around that, yet.

As you may have gathered earlier, I am a Dawkins-inspired atheist/humanist. And I believe that because all our lives will end so sadly, and because there is so much misery and suffering in the world, and because there is no afterlife, that all of that makes your life, your existence as a human being all the more precious. So why not spend your life making this drab existence of ours a little more enjoyable both for yourself and those around you. Even in the face of absolutely certain death, why not use the time you have to focus on the positive things in life.

>>17933

You do realise Dawkins is also middle, upper-middle class and always has been, right? I say this knowing full well that class is irrelevant to the philosophy itself. May as well complain that Buddhist scholars and the Abrahamic Priest classes don't work in fields. You're really flailing about looking for something to latch onto as an argument.

>>17930
The victims of the last five abortions that were carried out last week. They suffered despite not being born.

See? You're not the only one who can talk nonsense here.

>>17933
>This is actually the point I have been trying to make all this time.
Why would you ever take lessons on anything from people who haven't thought about it because they were too busy?
>So why not spend your life making this drab existence of ours a little more enjoyable both for yourself and those around you.
If existence is drab and miserable, why force it on more people? In the case of your idealised starving third worlders, there might be a flimsy excuse in that they didn't have time to think about that and a better one in that they need someone to look after them when they're old, but the more developed a country you look at the weaker that case gets. If life in Britain is near the best life gets yet still inherently drab and miserable, what's the excuse for having kids?

>>17932

I am not saying people never suffer, as a consequence of being born into this world. They obviously do, and some of them greatly. What I meant was, you can either allow the world and all the misery in it to bring you down and end up blaming your parents for being so careless to conceive you without your consent, or you can make the most of what you have been dealt and try to enjoy life.


>>17934

>You do realise Dawkins is also middle, upper-middle class and always has been, right? I say this knowing full well that class is irrelevant to the philosophy itself.

Dawkins's view seems much more grounded in reality though. He basically thinks that despite the Universe being a cold, probably godless, uncaring place, you can still enjoy your brief existence in it, and greatly so. And from everyday experience, I think you will agree that it is a view that is not exclusive to the middle and upper classes, but is at least congruent with the way many people see the world. Anti-natalism, on the other hand, very much seems to be a pursuit by posh people depressed by their own prosperity.

>>17936

Where did I say anything about "born"?

>>17938

Atheism is a pursuit for non-serfs depressed by their own ability to not have to spend their days in back-breaking labour in service of their ruler by divine right.

>>17939
PUT down those goalposts and read the story linked in the OP.

>>17938
>What I meant was, you can either allow the world and all the misery in it to bring you down and end up blaming your parents for being so careless to conceive you without your consent, or you can make the most of what you have been dealt and try to enjoy life.
That is in no way a valid dichotomy or engagement with the anti-natalist case.
You can make the most of what you've been dealt and enjoy life while maintaining nobody should create any more of it.

>>17940
Calm down, Citizen Smith.

>>17937

>If existence is drab and miserable, why force it on more people?

That's such a Hitchhiker's Guide thing to say.

"In the beginning, the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move"


> If life in Britain is near the best life gets yet still inherently drab and miserable, what's the excuse for having kids?

Except, it isn't. See the chart of the 2017 UN World Happiness Survey. We rank at #23 and therefore below nearly all other developed Western countries.

So I guess it's no surprise that anti-natalism is seriously being debated on an image board like .gs.

You do wonder why the Japanese seem so unhappy, at number 53... you wouldn't expect it from the country of Banzai and hentai.

>>17941

I can just picture you giggling to yourself while you pretend that he doesn't mean "be caused to exist" rather than the technicality of being passed through a woman's vagina from her womb as a child. Calm down MacDuff, you're being deliberately thick.

>>17942
There is no "anti-natalist" case to engage with. It is, as Pauli would say, not even wrong.

>>17942

>That is in no way a valid dichotomy or engagement with the anti-natalist case.

Fuckssake, lad. Pardon me if I have stepped on the toes of the country's most erudite anti-natalism scholar by contrasting you.

>>17945
I don't know, lad. He does explicitly say "born", and your interpretation requires assuming the independent existence of a foetus.

>>17948

It's quite obvious you're just being obstinate for the sake of not backing down.

>>17949
You ok, lad?

>>17944

>So I guess it's no surprise that anti-natalism is seriously being debated on an image board like .gs

So you do understand.

>You do wonder why the Japanese seem so unhappy, at number 53...

I think it has a lot to do with their very strict and narrow social rules. You can be seen as an outcast by your peers for doing something as simple as being late for work. As a result a lot of people with depression or other mental illness will simply hide it as they don't want to be seen as different or as a burden. Of course this stuff happens everywhere, but Japan is such an insular society that it is amplified.

There's a condition called hikikomori which is essentially when someone is so overwhelmed by society they choose not to participate, and become reclusive hermits, with some hikikomori not leaving their bedrooms or houses for years on end.

>>17950
You still haven't named any people who've never existed.

It seems clear to me that some people in this thread don't understand what debate is, and are confusing philosophical questions, and literal thought experiments, with a genuine campaign to ban pregnancies or at the very least people who identify and operate as 'anti-natalists'.

I thought we built on devils advocatism, but apparently some of us are taking it very personally.

For what it's worth I just think we should sterilise half the population at birth, at random. Like they put the kid in a machine and it either zaps your balls/ovaries or it doesn't. Nobody knows until they try to have kids, and when they find out they can't the doctor just gives them a free kid from the orphanage.

>>17952
How about your girlfriend?

You'll get a serious response when you make a serious point, and not before.

>>17954

Your mother is very real, I assure you. Please, continue to have hurt feelings about philosophy.

>>17953

>It seems clear to me that some people in this thread don't understand what debate is, and are confusing philosophical questions, and literal thought experiments, with a genuine campaign to ban pregnancies or at the very least people who identify and operate as 'anti-natalists'.

You know you're supposed to read the thread you're replying to before posting, right? This is /news/ and the story being discussed is someone literally suing his parents for giving birth to him. He identifies and operates as an anti-natalist. To wit, that's the very substance of the story.

>>17955
Again with the projection, lad? Have a word.

>>17956
>To wit

To woo.

>>17944
>We rank at #23 and therefore below nearly all other developed Western countries.
Yet we're supposed to cheer up and enjoy life because apparently someone in Iraq doesn't have time to think about Antinatalism in their state of noble savagery.

>>17956
It's not exactly an acrimonious lawsuit and as a well-to-do businessman with lawyer parents he's not exactly going to struggle to bare the cost of bringing a court case. Hardly impressive.
Now, the Indycamp case - that was impressive.

>>17951

>There's a condition called hikikomori which is essentially when someone is so overwhelmed by society they choose not to participate, and become reclusive hermits, with some hikikomori not leaving their bedrooms or houses for years on end.

One-third of .gs posters, neatly summed up in a nutshell.

Also though, who looks after these people? Who pays for their food and/or housing, with them obviously not being in gainful employment?

>>17956

I've read the thread and we stopped talking about the lad in the article about four posts in - didn't you notice?

>>17958
Well aren't you a hoot.

>>17961
Was that the bit where some idiot started taking about fucking a dog in the arse and throwing it into bear traps or something like that? Sounds like an interesting thought experiment that definitely has useful implications.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QS6rLF_mqgM

>>17960
>One-third of .gs posters, neatly summed up in a nutshell.
That's no way to talk about ARE PURPS.

>>17960

>Also though, who looks after these people?

The majority are adolescents (or young adults), and I gather those ones are looked after by their parents - I bet knowing that you're so fucked your mum and dad still have to feed you and so on probably feeds into the shame they're feeling and keeps them trapped in that loop. And the parents will be reluctant to admit their kid is fucked up/seek help. The problem almost creates itself.

As for those who are living alone, I'm not sure. Maybe there simply can't be any that aren't living with their parents. Perhaps the Japanese benefits system allows for them to stay at home, or perhaps you can still be classed as hikikomori despite going outside to pick up your giro or answer the door for a pizza. For a while in my past the only thing I would leave the house for was work, then I'd go straight back home and order a takeaway, I wonder if that would count. I was inarguably isolated.

I thought this was interesting, too, in a very Japanese way :

>Some organizations such as the non-profit Japanese organization NPO lila have been trying to combat the financial burden the hikikomori phenomenon has had on Japan's economy. The Japanese CD and DVD producer Avex Group produces DVD videos of live-action women staring into a camera to help hikikomori learn to cope with eye contact and long spans of human interaction.

>>17963


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nQ9lmriWOc

>>17963

Did you know that one of the most famous thought experiments was about poisoning a cat? Another one was about whether to allow six people to die or sacrifice one.

The amazing thing about thought experiments is that you can use almost any hypothetical you like, as long as it makes your point clear, meaning you can suit them to your audience and style of writing.

You do not typically expect someone to freak out at a thought experiment and think that you're actually wanting to poison the cat.

>>17967
Did you know that both of those thought experiments have actual real-world implications?

>>17968

I'm pretty sure giving birth or not also has real world implications.

Honestly I don't see how you can look at the trolley problem, a question about the moral implications of controlling the potential to someone's suffering, and somehow conclude that the Puppy Bear Trap Problem is completely different.

>>17965

> I bet knowing that you're so fucked your mum and dad still have to feed you and so on probably feeds into the shame they're feeling and keeps them trapped in that loop.

There is an idea in socioeconomics called the trap theorem, which holds that once you have fallen through the cracks of society and are jobless and without money, it becomes a self perpetuating vicious circle of long-term unemployment and deterioration of social contacts which negatively affect and feed on each other, so that the longer you have been trapped that way, the more unlikely it becomes that you will ever break free from that cycle.

It's considered to be one reason why dolescum often remain dolescum.

>>17967

I guess it's that thing about travelling back to Austria in the 1890s and being faced with the question if you would kill baby Adolf Hitler. If you did, it would be of no consequence, nobody would arrest you. So what would you do?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=De_HuG7_F7w

I've come up with a different take on that thought experiment. Say it's 1946, Hitler was caught alive by the Russians before he could kill himself, and is sitting in a prison cell in Nuremberg and awaiting his trial and certain execution. You are the warden in that prison. Hitler for some reason hasn't had food or water for three days, and he is visibly thirsty and starving, and begging you to give him some of the bottled water and bread you have on your warden desk. You alone decide who gets that water and bread, with no consequences either way. Would you grant a condemned prisoner facing justice and execution one of his last wishes and let him have the water and bread, or would you deny it to him because after single-handedly starting World War II and killing millions of Jews, being starved and dehydrated is still too good for him?

Self-sage for complete irrelevance to the thread.

>>17969
The trolley problem concerns itself with the excluded middle. Your puppy nonsense disregards that and expects your mark to simply accept the resulting contradicting and reason past it. It's shit-tier "1=0" level trolling.

>>17972

No, see, the puppy being put into the house is the baby being born. The house is the earth.

>>17971
>I guess it's that thing about travelling back to Austria in the 1890s and being faced with the question if you would kill baby Adolf Hitler. If you did, it would be of no consequence, nobody would arrest you. So what would you do?

As you are a new member, please read IATT Bulletin 1147 regarding the killing of Hitler before your next excursion. Failure to do so may result in your expulsion per Bylaw 223.

>>17971

I don't think I'd kill baby Hitler. It would be pretty easy to just do something minor that would butterfly effect him into not growing up to be who he would otherwise.

Most likely that wouldn't prevent the rise of fascism in Europe anyway. I think I'd want to talk to some economics professors and historians first and figure out how to do that instead of worrying about infanticide.

People seem to forget that the nazi party wasn't a one man operation. You'd have to kill a lot of party members before you got close to a reasonable chance of preventing the holocaust or WWII.

I'm not sure debating Nazism, of all things, is a healthy direction for this thread to take.

In law, there is such a thing as assumed consent. It's a bit of a shaky concept occasionally, but the idea is that sometimes, in the absence of expressed consent, such consent can be assumed. For example, when somebody is badly injured in a car accident and also unconscious, they cannot consent to an emergency surgery which they might need in order to survive. Therefore, doctors are legally allowed to just assume that the patient would consent to the surgery if he was given to understand that it is a life and death matter for him, and assumed consent is then equal to actual consent and the surgery can begin as needed.

And likewise, because anti-natalism is fairly a niche concept, I would say parents are forgiven for just assuming that their child wants to be born, because by and large, most people do end up happy about the fact that they exist.

>>17977

Whether or not consent can be assumed is a philosophical question. We may feel it can be in certain situations but in anti-natalism, it isn't. Both are valid.

>>17973
You're almost there. What happens if the puppy isn't put into the house?

>>17978
>We may feel it can be in certain situations but in anti-natalism, it isn't.
Go on.

>>17979

It doesn't exist. There's another house next door where the puppy is aborted.

>>17978

Even if anti-natalism thinks consent can't be assumed, again, it's such a niche concept that it is safe to believe it has no relevance for most people in real life, and therefore parents are within their rights to assume their child wants to be born. And this in turn also calls into question the validity of anti-natalism itself.

>>17981
Right. Do you now see why "existence causes suffering" is a nonsensical proposition?

>>17983

No, it's not my fault you don't understand what an analogy is.

Existence is full of suffering. The house is full of bear traps. Same thing. The puppy can't exist outside the house. Humans can't exist without conception.

>>17984
>Existence is full of suffering. The house is full of bear traps. Same thing.
If you say so, luv.

>>17980

I did go on. I said "Both are valid".

>>17982

How many people agree with an idea doesn't have much to do with whether or not it's true. If everyone told you to jump off the flat Earth, it doesn't mean it's right to. Or not to, in this case.

>>17986
>I did go on. I said "Both are valid".
Given that, what do you think you should have drawn from the fact I still said "go on"?

I am actually hiding a thread for the first time in many years of lurking here.

>>17988

If your parents hadn't had you, then you'd not have had to read any of it.

>>17986

>If everyone told you to jump off the flat Earth, it doesn't mean it's right to.

That's dangerous talk. I am sure people have gotten hurt attempting it.

>>17987

That you're being annoying and continuing to deliberately not understand what you're being told, probably.

>>17989

Also, you'd never have got to imagine fucking a dog in the arse over a bear trap as an act of aggression against Eddie.

>>17992

> fucking a dog in the arse over a bear trap as an act of aggression against Eddie


POTW, lad.

Hands down, POTW.

>>17994
My mind is also boggling at >>17992

Everyone go home, bear trap lad has won.

>>17995

>bear trap lad has won

I would like to see how he manages to bum a dog over a bear trap before I go.

>>17995

Looks like everybody did go home.

Did all the anti-natalists suddenly go and off themselves?


I'm bored and looking for cheap Sunday afternoon entertainment, as you can easily tell

>>18002

The winner was declared, so the cuntoff is officially over. Haven't you read the by-laws?

>>18003

I'll get my coat.