vanerv:
... to know you just do not want children (maybe just now, maybe never) just because you'd have to sacrifice too much?
Why would it be wrong?
bekahdrum: Technically it is selfish, but you are a grown adult and smart enough to admit it. Like I said I am the same way, I don't want to give up my life just so I can add another person to this crazy world we live in. Selfish? sure ... Smart? HECK YEAH!
Why is it selfish?
Why is it any more 'selfish' to choose not to have a child based on your own desires than it is to make any other choice based on what you want?
I don't want to have a large dog, because I don't want to make all the changes and sacrifices that go along with having a really big animal as a pet - no one says this is a 'selfish' decision.
I am not an architect or a social worker because I am not interested in becomming one, and don't want to do the associated work - no one calls me 'selfish' for that.
So why are these same rational decisions magically somehow 'selfish' only when it comes to the choice to parent or not?
Why is choosing not to have a child because you don't want want one or don't want to deal with the necessary sacrifices any more selfish than not going to law school because you don't want want to deal with the costs/work connected to becoming a lawyer?
In my opinion, pretty much any argument otherwise, at its core, is based on an unproven idea that having a child is just something that people are 'supposed to' want to do.
I am starting to get sick of seeing comments on articles where people go "I don't want kids because I am selfish and love my fill in the blank - but it is OK because I own my own selfishness, and really would you even WANT someone as selfish as me having kids?"
The ever-increasing number of these are starting to annoy me because it seems like often no-one takles the underlying question - and related assumptions - of why it is any more selfish to decide not haave kids because you don't want to take on the workand scacrifices involved, than it is to decide that you don't want the work involved with any other possible job.
In fact I would say it is LESS selfish - if I were to force myself to train as a lawyer against my own wishes, the probable damages if I do a less than stellar job are far less than if I were to do a less than great job in child-rearing.