~ Thread moved to Politics ~
| DonFerrari said:
Perhaps were you live it is different, but in Brazil the pressure to have couples generating children is still something quite common, although I totally agree with you, even if I think being father is one of the best things in the world the decision to be one is very specific to those affected and no one else should interfere unless these people are putting the children in harms way. Your case I totally don't consider an attack or trying to destroy family, even if you consider marrying your gf for me that is a family (even if small and personally think that in 20 years you, her or both may repent of the choice - and sometimes one of the partners say they don't want to not confront the other or lose the relationship, obviously I'm not implying it is you case as I do like you as a person and want you to have a happy life). When I talk about attacks and destroying I'm talking more on propaganda, media and etc, individual behaviors can't be taken at that level unless they are very criminal in nature (and I would go further that they also would need to be anti-ethical and the like, because for me something being legal or ilegal don't make it also ethical or unethical as the cases of slavery even when legal is unethical and gay marriage even when illegal is completely ethical - not even sure it should/would have a classification anyway). The attack I mean is more on a structural level. Some may say it is biggoted or retrograde if one want, but I do see the damage the lack of either father or mother figure may give to children and also that a familiar nucleus is the root for growth from generation to generation of well being for individuals. Fortunately I don't have any bad example for both parents of the same sex, but I certainly do have a lot for single parents (and sure also a lot for bad parents or houses in conflict). So for me it is very clear that when the "santity" (I'm atheist) of the marriage is dimished and parents don't respect one another, doesn't share the struggles and help each other you end up damaging the children. Still all of that is very far from the topic =p |
I see. And where is that pressure to have children coming from in Brazil? And in what form?
As for me, I have been open to having children with a previous girlfriend (before this one), if it was really important to her. And it was.
Luckily we didn't stay together for too long, so that didn't happen. I've had that same discussion with my current partner some years ago, but I now feel like that idea would have been a mistake.
Because some people realize later that they are not right for each other, and yet may feel obliged to stay together for the sake of their children. (Which could be better or worse for those children depending on the people.) And I definitely realized later on that my ex was not someone to spend the rest of my life with.
But even when two people are right for each other, forcing yourself to have children for someone else is probably not a great idea.
I'm pretty certain that my gf truly does not want to have children because I did tell her about me being willing to do that for my ex, and she was the one who brought up that she doesn't see herself being interested in children. If someone changes their mind, over the years you'd probably notice some signs. But with her its more like the opposite.
Last week we were in a discord group chat and someone asked if a freind of ours is dong well/is happy. And my gf replied that he must be happy because "he has 5 children. Who wouldn't be happy. The meaning of life :)". And everyone started laughing at the sarcastic tone.
Context, this friend of ours has complained on many occasions about his children, and that started long before he had as many as 5.
No offense to anyone who has a bunch of kids and is happy, because there certainly are people like that I'm sure. But we specifically know that this person is having a rough time with them.
That's just one of many examples over the years, but I'm not getting the sense that she's just trying to humor me regarding having children.
A big part of why I don't want to is that I feel like I only have so much of my time to devote to myself, my family, friends, her, etc, that the thouht of devoting a lot of time to children (whom I currently don't even know) is very unappealing to me.
I still want to be able to go wherever I want, or travel whenever I want, etc.
One of my closest friends has two children. A daughter and a son. Both are around 10 years old by now.
He loves his daughter a lot, but despises his son. A lot.
I'm sure he also loves him at the same time in some ways, but literally every time he says something to him or about him, it's complaining, or joking about how he wishes Thanos was real because of the 50/50 chance that his son would be snapped away, etc.
And from some of the stories I've heard, it's not entierly unwarranted. (A few months ago he created a $3000 bill from microtransactions in a mobile game, and last week he destroyed his 6th controller.)
So there's that RNG when you have children since you don't know how they'll turn out. You're hoping for a 5* unit from the gacha, but it might be a 2*.
Anyway, I don't really have the same regard for a 'traditional family' as some people. Because I don't know if it is as important as people thought ages ago when that standard was established. Because back then, there were barely any other options. So that was pretty much the only frame of reference people had.
I was raised by a single mother, while my father had children with 3 different women. Me and my sister were the last ones, but my parents still separated when I was young enough to not even remember all of us living together. Dad would come visit us once every month or so. He was super nice. Never once heard him even so much as raise his voice or even express annoyance about anything. Always calm and collected.
But considering how I didn't really see him more than once a month, if even that, I wouldn't say I had a consistent father figure in my life.
And my sister... was notoriously difficult to get along with. Let's put it that way. To the point where I broke all ties with her when I was 14. We lived in the same house, but I basically wouldn't speak to her ever again since then. And things were a lot better after that.
At the same time I had two close friends who are still my close friends to this day, and we call each other brothers.
They have always been much more of a family than my sister ever was.
I never wanted more of a family than I had. (Obviously, I wanted one less sibling even.)
Of course, I can't really know exactly what I missed out on if dad had been with us the whole time and my sister had a different personality. But I think I turned out fine relatively speaking. At least I know a lot worse people out there, even though they grew up in a staple family.
To me, family isn't something set in stone, and not neccesarily defined by blood either. Or marriage for that matter.
Although I'm not against getting married at all. But I'm also not particularly interested in it. So if it never comes up, I don't really care.
I wouldn't push anyone else to think or live like me. But I would also say that if you don't have a traditional family, I don't think there's anything neccesarily wrong with that.
Not sure if that counts as propaganda to destroy traditional families though.
