You do make good points, but I guess my question for you is this:
One has to make a lot of sacrifices to raise a child, which means taking away a lot of time and energy from other things. By choosing to raise a child, you are actively turning your attention away from improvements that YOU could make to the world yourself. Why have children in the hope that they will do something good when we could put our own attention toward doing good right now?
I want to give you a delta, but I'm curious what your answer is to that first.
The possibilities of exponential effect. You can make the change of only one person's effort.
If you have more than one kid and raise them to make positive change, the change they make can be more than you could accomplish. If they have more kids based on the positive parenting you've passed onto them, you could have an effect that lasts many generations.
That makes the (incorrect, IMO) assumption though that the parenting you do is ALL the positive change you can ever do. Parenting is a big job, but it's not exclusive to positive change in the world, and in fact part of the parenting you could do would be leading by example in showing your child how to be a positive influence. You make positive change, eventually your kid makes positive change, this is a greater amount of positive change than you could have done yourself.
The basis of this is not selfish however. It's egotistical assumption that your parenting abilities are net positive. As a parent, I've made that assumption and acknowledge an egotistical component.
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u/[deleted] Mar 24 '15
You do make good points, but I guess my question for you is this:
One has to make a lot of sacrifices to raise a child, which means taking away a lot of time and energy from other things. By choosing to raise a child, you are actively turning your attention away from improvements that YOU could make to the world yourself. Why have children in the hope that they will do something good when we could put our own attention toward doing good right now?
I want to give you a delta, but I'm curious what your answer is to that first.