You Are Not Stuck In Traffic

You are traffic

Yes, it's a marketing slogan, but I think it illustrates the way we think of ourselves.

Each of us is the star of our own show. However empathetic we are, we only see through our eyes.

As the world hits 7 billion people, it's time to realise that there is not "an over-population problem". Rather, "we are an over-population problem!"

Each of us is contributing to over-population. There are many ways we can mitigate our impact - go vegetarian, recycle, practice energy efficiency - but there is a zero-effort solution.

Don't reproduce.

How Not To Have Children

• Don't have sex.
• Use contraception.

That's pretty much it. It's cheap (or free in many parts of the world). Reliable. And incredibly easy. It's a positive choice you can make to keep the population at a sustainable level.

Child Free - Not Childless

Being child free is a choice. It's not for everyone.

The use of the world "Childless" - as though there is a deficiency - is not applicable to me. If you can't have the children you desperately want then, yes, you are childless - and my heart breaks for you.

But, for me, it's a positive choice. I am free from the pain, heartbreak, responsibility, agony, and boredom of rearing a child. I am childfree

We're Not Special

As I mentioned, we're all stars of our own shows, but that doesn't make us special. Every single one of us is here because every ancestor managed not to die before procreating. In a Darwinian sense, each of our ancestors was able to adapt to their environment and reproduce.

We have to think of our responsibility to the whole of our society, our civilisation, our species.

It is the act of a monstrous ego to assume that one's genes are special and deserve to be passed on. Unless you have an extra-special mutation which will be useful to the species, you are just one of billions.

Some Resources

If you do decide to go down the child free path - and it is a choice - you may find these resources helpful.

BBC article with a good set of comments.
A selection of resources and blogs about being Child Free.
Bella has a (mostly female) section about modern Child Free topics.
Wikipedia article on being Child Free.
A (mostly American) forum for discussing Child Free issues.

Most of them are fairly biased towards the female experience. There's usually some discussion from a male point-of-view, but it is in the minority.