Something tragic
I’m not seeing the source of the puzzlement.
In other words, some women are not having children. And?
Having children is like almost everything else (the exceptions being things like breathing, drinking, eating): some people like it and some don’t; some people want to and some don’t. Isn’t that fairly easy to understand?
Until extremely recently this fact (if I’m right that it’s a fact) was largely concealed by the immense pressure there was on women to marry combined with the near-total absence of birth control. Most women had children because most women married (whether they wanted to or not) and marriage brought procreation with it, whatever either parent or both parents wanted.
But why is it tragic? Why can’t it just be how some people decided to live?
Also it seems a little odd to ignore the looming climate change issue.
Um…I’m a boomer, and my father has assets he has not transferred to his children. He is not a boomer; he is the parent of boomers. None of his children think he should transfer his assets; we think he should use what he earned to support himself.
I see a lot of “tragic” applied to the fact that women are not tying themselves to children and home at a young age, and bringing up tons of children. “Tragic” that women are going into the work world, into satisfying careers and a life they choose, instead of one chosen for them. “Tragic” that girls have choices their mothers and grandmothers did not have, and they are empowered to actually exercise those choices.
Yeah, it’s “tragic”. Women’s rights, get over it, okay?
(And of course, the fact that Millennials are choosing not to have children has to be the fault of the boomers. Okay, boomer, right?) It isn’t lack of resources, because many of us did not have those resources at that age; our parents did not give us resources, either. Many of us had children we could not afford. The children suffered. I know; I was a child born to parents who could not afford their children. Millennials have the choice not to do that, and I applaud them, and encourage them to exercise their own right to choose, much more empowered by the availability of family planning, birth control, and other means of choosing when, where, and how many children.
Not tragic; worthy of celebrating. Yay!
I’ve never understood the idea that a declining birthrate is a priori a bad thing for a population. Pretty sure Eric’s brother Bret could give him a little lesson on the effect of evolutionary pressures and resource scarcity on fecundity in an environment where females are not forced to procreate. With like, math and graphs and shit.
Millennials are facing a future with less wealth, lower life expectancy, and fewer natural resources than my generation (X, that is). They also have the freedom not to reproduce. Is it any wonder, then, that some are actually exercising that freedom?
I’m struggling to see the connection between the two issues Weinstein tweets about:
1. Young women aren’t having children.
2. Boomer parents aren’t transferring their wealth to their adult children.
Is Weinstein suggesting that (1) is causing (2)? Like, young women should hurry up and breed now so a grateful Grandma and Grandpa will give you some of their money? Or that the causation is the other way around, that Boomers are selfishly holding onto their wealth, as a result of which their children aren’t having kids?
I think it’s supposed to be the latter, and that Weinstein is taking a shot at Boomers, and suggesting that they are depriving themselves of the pleasures of grandchildren through their “selfishness.”
And hey, usually I’m on board for a critique of the Boomers, but I’m not seeing it here. It’s not like the Boomers interrupted some longstanding custom whereby parents handed over the bulk of their assets during their lifetimes to their adult children.
As to the supposed “tragedy” of not having children: I got an email recently from an old acquaintance, who recently became a father somewhat late in life. He waxed on not just about how happy he was about it (which is all well and good), but how he hoped I would experience the same because it filled a hole that he never knew he had (which…. ugh). I responded politely and laughed it off, because I only have to deal with this nonsense once in a rare while. I can only imagine how frustrating it would be if I were a woman and everybody felt entitled to comment on the subject.
I think the increased delay in having children hasn’t got much to do with wanting tropical getaways, but with it taking longer to be able to afford to have kids. That Weinstein lays a guilt trip on women for this is typical sexist BS.
Whereas the Boomer parents with grandchildren stay home all year to babysit and gift the stylish German car to Baby’s First Christmas.
I’m not sure how he thinks Boomer/Me Generation selfishness lead them to them having kids, all right — but not grandkids.
J.A., I think that might be part of it, except a lot of people decide to have kids even if they can’t afford a lifestyle for them. A lot of studies have suggested that when you give women the choice, they choose to have fewer children. I think it’s just a natural progression of women having the right to choose.
And a lot of people who do have kids are having fewer children, so they can spend more time with the kid(s) they do have, rather than having their attention distracted by a half dozen of them, and having no time to give much to any one. Instead, they are able to focus their attention on one or two children, and give them a better life.
But, hey, I think it’s a great trend. We really don’t need more people in the world; let’s have fewer kids for a while until we have a sustainable population, and then just maintain a steady-state population, okay? I think that would be great.
“Many of their parents have assets while many of them do not. No massive transfer is seen.”
Is he grousing about boomers having long life spans, or that they are not divesting themselves of their assets for their children? Also, his tweet partly answers itself: younger generations have less and less; it makes *sense* to wait until financially stable before having children.
And what on earth does *biologically* puzzling mean?
As a boomer myself whose mother taught in elementary school, she told me that after the Pill came out it wasn’t long until there were fewer children coming to school.
As for having fewer people in general, my standard line is that eight or nine billion of us are enough to ensure the survival of the species. It’s the survival of species other than us that worries me.
My guess is that he finds this “biologically puzzling” in the sense of crude evo psych reasoning. As in, “why aren’t you ladies listening to your evolutionary urges to pump out those babies? As a society we must have a SERIOUS DISCUSSION about this problem.”
Sheesh. Even Dawkins pointed out that we are NOT required to want what our genes want. Genes just wanna replicate! Ok genes, you be you, but leave us out of it.
Just went back and looked at some of the replies to that thread. Hoo boy. Some dude using the handle “RationalMale” writing exactly the kind of thing you’d expect from the name.
Then I loved this bit: “Then you have women in their 40s with money trying to find husbands and get pregnant. No one warned Gen X women they would run out of time. ”
Yes, nobody ever told women that fertility becomes an issue in their late 30s! The phrase “biological clock” did not exist in popular culture. Officious men have never “warned” young women that they’d better get on with the baby-making. Nope, women just reached 40 and were stunned to learn that they might have difficulties conceiving.
Ditto for “finding husbands.” There was absolutely not a “factoid” floating around about women over 40 being more likely to be killed by a terrorist than get married.
Nope, society has just been one unrelenting chorus of “you go, girl! Marriage and children can happen whenever you please!”
/sarcasm off
Seriously, what world do these people live in?
Ooh I know this one – the one full of contempt for women!
It’s very consistent with the conservative view on abortion though. Basically the value of life drops from infinity to zero at the moment of birth. After that it’s the Law of the Jungle and the Biggest Bully Wins, and if that’s not You, that’s Your problem. You should have thought of that before being born as You.
One thing I’ve noticed when it comes to population discussions is that it seems like there is never *not* a demographic crisis of some sort.
People are having too many kids and overpopulation will destroy the world. Or people are having too few kids and the future will be nothing but old people with no one to take care of them. Or the wrong sort of people are having too many kids. Or the right sort of people are not having enough kids.
Has any demographer in history ever concluded that people are having more or less the right amount of kids?