We Need to Talk About Birthrates - Stephen Shaw | Maiden Mother Matriarch 77

[@mr.mayhem7402]

Louise Perry misunderstood the findings of the Mousetopia. Universe 23 wasn't overcrowded. As Stephen Shaw pointed out - the population peaked long before it reached capacity. It appears that when the mice were given everything they need, they lost a sense of purpose, and that's when things became very bad before collapse.

[@ARR409]

Particularly true for young guys then. Like, Stephen said, the most fertile rates, the young males just hung around in groups and didn’t bother with anything not too dissimilar to how you’ll see some young men in poorer neighbourhoods just smoking weed in groups and not doing anything productive with their lives or trying to lift themselves, their friends or their families up from those circumstances. All the basic necessities like food, water and shelter are covered and they can titrated doses of sex through porn and titrated doses of adventure, conquering and careers through video games. And brotherhood and male friendships are even commodified like this with online gaming as if you’re in a group of guys going to war. Real crazy how technology that was primitive only 30 years ago now completely sedates us. Scary stuff.

[@Stoddardian]

Organisms need struggle.

[@stevesmith3990]

Yes exactly, 'A Sense of Purpose' is what is missing in the modern world'.

[@alexandraiacob8359]

Suffering is still there. We just drown it out with dopamine.

[@effexon]

@@ARR409 there is key.... as kids and family are group effort, even if one person is driven , very very difficult as without purpose cant get others to go along.... we know how that looks, politics etc people start arguing over little things and cant get anything done in collaboration so doing things alone is left but that is harsh life nobody wants. same applies to money/job.... either there is too little to starve or too much and already bought every single appliance and overpriced house and then only thing left is mundane grinding to pay everything. addictions seem to give people that struggle, albeit with heavy risk and cost, thus lot of people choose them.... one guy in california street was asked and he dont want to quit using. I take that was lack of purpose, ie no good alternative to being there, that lifestyle.

[@nc5337]

Men used to be able to be fathers late in life without much concern, but there’s been an increased recognition that it’s not just older mothers more at risk of passing on birth defects, but older fathers as well.

[@TGP109]

Yes, a client's Grandson, who just turned 40 is extremely frustrated that BOTH of his children have autism. NO ONE tells would be fathers that their sperm undergoes senescence!

[@NormieNeko]

​@@TGP109I was one of the lucky few. My dad was 52 and my mom was 38. Genetics are a gamble. I was 1 of 10 children that made it to adulthood (between 3 marriages and a casual relationship). I'm the second most intelligent child (youngest of all) after a brother (a middle child and youngest male). His mother was still under age 30 when he was born, but our dad was almost 40. My mom's first batch from her first marriage resulted in 3 simpletons, not due to Asperger's, they're just low IQ. Being a younger mother did not help because her family line and the husband's family line were prone to addiction and stupidity. I find that being an older intelligent parent is worth the risk compared to having young idiots breeding. I know that sounds harsh, but I have personally witnessed the misfortune that results in being simple. There's no way to fix that without using authoritarian methods. I just believe it's better to have older reasonable parents eventually have children than relying on the birth rates of the less reasonable people. Children with Asperger's are generally intelligent. Obviously, there are other more severe disorders that would not be as easy to surmount.

[@stinkystu1]

Men used to be allowed to be fathers. Not anymore and we don't give a shit if society fails.

[@ScorpioSunset-ux8mv]

What is the age of the mother? You can cherry pick the age of the father and ignore the mother's, but not quite the opposite since women's fertility window is much shorter

[@nc5337]

@@ScorpioSunset-ux8mv There’s no cherry-picking. Older parents, whether male or female, have a greater risk of passing genetic mutations onto their offspring. A 70-year-old man can still produce sperm and father a child, but the risk of defects is higher than for a man in his 20s, 30s, and 40s.

[@purpleflows5680]

People, particularly men, can often underestimate the importance of support systems when raising children. Practices such as uprooting from community for self-exploration or even a job may play a role in non having support systems when it comes time to have a family. I’ve also noticed that financial calculations around supporting a family seem to be off in the calculations of some on this thread saying how easy it is to afford children. These two issues go hand in hand imo. Without support systems, having children is more stressful and more expensive for all involved. Perhaps people (again, particularly men) of certain generations have been disconnected from multi-generational living to fully understand (and respect) that a community, or lack thereof, plays a role in how safe people (especially women) feel having kids. Many of the young women I know simply don’t feel safe having children. It’s a very vulnerable situation to place yourself in as a woman, which is why some are opting out. We’ve taken practices such as marriage and producing/raising children outside of the safety of any kind of communal context. It’s not surprising that many feel suspicious of or overwhelmed by the current cultural, financial, and communal contexts when it comes to these practices.

[@elisabethtalavera9664]

This is so true! I love the way you’ve worded it. I feel that a lot for myself. My fiancé has lived away from his family since 18 for school and work and has no need to go back. I’ve made it very clear that I need to have family and community around when having children, we are not supposed to do it alone. Thankfully he’s doing his best to make that a reality for us.

[@effexon]

I can agree... it is tough to be far from parents and they are far from their parents , ie my grandparents.... having to move to study and especially find job is expected but it creates this problem. For women it is even more important when they think having kids or not, but for men also it matters to have some support network(relatives) nearby.

[@eshabahal]

This is so relatable honestly. I grew up in a joint family as a child, with both my maternal and paternal grandparents around, regular interactions with plenty aunts, uncles and cousins and I honestly believe that growing up in a joint family is an essential ingredient for a robust and healthy childhood. I do lament the possibility that when / if I become a mother, I might not be able to gift my child that as I may live far away from my family geographically…

[@MrXaphus]

Moving for employment is a relatively new phenomenon. For most of human history people lived and then died less than a mile away from where they were born. Not so in our "globalised" world, where everyone is encouraged by the economy to leave their hometown in search of a better living - and losing their entire support network and community resources in the process.

[@effexon]

@@MrXaphus yah, in history maybe top 1% or 0.1% moved and it made sense as they were very special people asked by king... also often no family. eg today world, someone so valuable they are willing to pay 200k€ or more per year would be similar position... and it is still tough as stories from soldier families and sports people tell, moving every 2 years is very tough these kind of people may do for career/job opportunities. and people traveled much less on daily basis. nowadays commute and jobsite elsewhere far from home adds to this.

[@asecmimosas4536]

I think that the big lie is that it has anything to do with cost of living. I'm a mid 20s male. I make 85k a year, give or take, maybe a bit more after bonuses but not substantially more. I know for a fact that I could sustain a family on my single income. And I live in a top 20 most expensive city in the US. You hear so many unrealistic studies saying you need 150k to live, 200k to live, they're all wrong. You need that much to live without any semblance of self control. I know families that make do with less than I do and live comfortably. I also know single people who make substantially more than I do who still live paycheck to paycheck. The math is really simple. If you make 7k a month before tax, 5k a month after tax. If you spent 1-2k on housing, another 1-2k on food/daily living, cumulatively probably 3k a month, you end up with 2k left at the end of the month. That's more than enough to pay any reasonable car debt, more than enough to pay any reasonable student loan debt. It's not more difficult than that, it takes a bare amount of financial literacy. If every month you go to Vegas, run up a tab at the bar every weekend, you have 20 subscriptions that you don't even use, you Amazon everything, you doordash all your food, you only eat out, you buy fancy new cars or other luxuries with big loans then yeah life can be pretty unaffordable. But that's not a societal issue. And when people say kids aren't affordable that's what they mean. They don't want to give up traveling, buying expensive luxury items, cancelling subscriptions they don't use. They don't want to give up buying everything on amazon that they see and think is cute. They don't want to cook at home, buy a sensible used daily driver car, take trips more infrequently, and enjoy low cost entertainment. And that's fine. If that's how you want to live, more power to you. But don't blame "cost of living."

[@l.3626]

maybe you have more money, but others do not, also men in the US earn more than the same professions in other countries + taxes are lower in the US. Birthrates are also still higher in the US compared to low birth countries like japan

[@baltasarnoreno5973]

Thanks for sharing with us that you know nothing about data. You are a single data point. You are an anecdote. You are an outlier. You are not a representative example of the average twentysomething male or female in the rest of the developed world. Yet somehow you feel qualified to think your life is the norm for millions of other adults your age around the world. Please stop making the mistake of thinking that life in a US city is the same as life in other cities and countries in the rest of the developed world. Try living in Europe as someone in your mid-twenties. You will almost certainly NOT be earning the Euro equivalent of $85,000. Average graduate pay in Europe is around half of that, and there are HUGE differences in average pay if you go on a country-by country basis. And you will see a far higher proportion of your income taken away in taxes and social security charges, in some cases almost half of what you earn, even at quite low income levels. Housing is extorsionate. And the general cost of living is substantially higher. And it might pay you dividends to look into the meaning of the term 'mileurista'. It's a 'thing'. And the average twentysomething in Europe is not buying fancy new electric cars with a 50,000 price tag, or burdened with bank loans, or escaping to Vegas every month. The average twentysomething European sees about half of his or her after-tax salary taken away by rental costs if your job obliges you to live away from the parental home. He or she drives a second hand car, or has done away with a car altogether if he or she lives in a city with a decent public transport system.

[@diazigy]

You assume that your wife will be a SAHM with 2-3 kids. Unless you have a lot of family supoort, she will go out of her mind and want part time daycare. It costs at least 5k per kid hospital fees, with insurance. Healthcare premiums will go from 200 to about 650 a montth. Add in cost of food for 4-5 people, add in 401k savings (SS will run out before we ever collect), add in savings for an emergecy fund, add in savings to buy a house, unless you are content to rent forever with a family, or already bought a house. Sure your 1 car is fine... but you need a buy a used minivan, and those go for 20k at 8% APR...so add $600 a month. This all adds up, and now you are at -20k a year and struggling with CC debt just to stay afloat. Now rents increasing 20%, and your LL would rather rent to dual income no kids couple (less wear and tear), and the threat of being homeless starts looming.

[@asecmimosas4536]

@@diazigy I'm not assuming anything. If she wants to SAH she can, if she wants to work, she will easily make more than the cost of daycare. Childbirth does not cost 5k, the average in my state is a bit over 2k. I pay 48 a month in healthcare for just me. If I were to have the same plan but include a wife and children it would be 295 per month, which is a lot but a far cry from the 650 you are describing. Food costs would double or even triple but that is very manageable. And you don't need a minivan for one child. By the time I would have a second kid, I would almost certainly make more than I do right now.

[@asecmimosas4536]

@@baltasarnoreno5973 I mean...I know a lot of Europeans, Austrians in particular. A lot of them are younger than me and have bought their own flat already and have a nice beamer. Even though we talk a lot about the cost of living in Europe and they complain a lot, none of them are struggling even slightly.

[@Peter-vn5jq]

Thing is, "increasing birthrates" is something only women and men who already have families, or can have families, are worried about. You're worried about what sort of world your children will inherit, quite understandably. Thing is, more and more men are completely priced out of the dating market and reproduction in general, so they have no horse in the race anymore. In some places the percentage of those men is reaching 60% of men under 40, South Korea is a good example, Japan is getting there, Poland and certain other European countries will be there soon as well. Good luck getting them engaged in solving your problems, you can't offer them anything of value. Or won't, same difference. Honestly, there's more things you should be worried about than just declining birthrates. That ratio is absolutely damning. You can't have stability of any sort with 60% of men having no stake in the future of society, not long term.

[@lucindabreeding]

It's only part of the issue, but yes, I think a lot of women are deciding not to repeat or perpetuate a system that they think is punitive to themselves and to men.

[@inexpertxennial6067]

@@lucindabreeding This entire system was made only possible because of unpair labor or sl ave ry. Let it all rot.

[@Peter-vn5jq]

@@lucindabreeding You think you know what you're talking about, but you really don't. Women aren't doing this out of any political reason, but due to their very nature. At any rate, what women think will become completely irrelevant in the near future, one way or the other. I suspect China will be the first place to outright enslave its women, as the Chinese never cared about human rights to begin with. It's going to get brutal.

[@ReturnOfTheJ.D.]

Ultimately however, if you offer nothing to the average person, when the fertility rates collapse, which is getting close to 50 years ago in some countries, doesn't the pendulum swing back the other way eventually? Because there's less people born over a multi-decade timeframe, doesn't that mean there's eventually going to be more value in a human life? Take the Black Plague in Europe that killed 25 million people - half its 14th Century population - it put an end to feudalism and ushered in capitalism, with wages tripling for previously everyday jobs due to the sudden scarcity. I know that today we fill the gaps with mass immigration but we also have a massively aging population to support, which is unprecedented in human history. Someone has to do all the work to maintain their upkeep, whereas in the past they were proportionately quite a small slice of the population pie relative to the working age cohort.

[@dogsandyoga1743]

I agree. I'm a bit of a misanthrope (putting it lightly) and honestly, if I didn't have my 2 sons, I'd be okay with humanity riding off into the sunset. We had our run...good riddance. But, the thought of my sons (and or potential grands) living in a hellish dystopia kinda bothers me. I mean, I honestly think it's inevitable, but the fact that I may have descendants means I have skin in the game, unfortunately 😔

[@RedFishBlueFish-si9he]

The real issue, that is common to East Asia, Europe, South America, North America, etc., is not the pill or housing or work life balance. The issue is more biological, and transcends cultures. That’s why it happens everywhere. Once women are responsible for gathering their own economic resources during their fertility window, they make choices that result in delaying marriage. My hunch is that women are less able to obtain the security/safety they need on their own precisely because its on their own (not with a partner), and so they keep trying harder and harder to succeed. Chasing economic stability that they cannot obtain because biologically, they cannot (at scale, not every woman) overcome their own evolutionary psychology for safety/security. Delayed marriage results in fewer marriages, which results in fewer children. That happens in every culture. It seems to be that we cannot have both a system that incentivizes female economic independence and a growing civilization. It might be a limit on our biology.

[@SJ-xg3rv]

Great comment.

[@effexon]

yah I remmeber that joke that couple should go to action move to feel adrenaline to bond... doing everything alone is sure some way fulfilling but totally lacks that aspect... there is full control of your choices and actions but also less surprises and unknown to make it interesting.... with 2 people or more life becomes more interesting and feels less grindy. it is of course tradeoff, a bit less freedom to account for multiple people to make it work.

[@MrXaphus]

I'm not so sure that biology drives behaviour to the extent you suggest, though you may be right. To me it seems to be a distinctive shift in cultural attitude brought on by the world getting more affluent, and with that the desire to preserve a lifestyle takes increasing prominence amongst women, as it's increasingly a self-made lifestyle for them. The proof in the pudding that I'd point to is when young women are polled about wanting to have children they usually say "yeah, some day, but the cost of having children is too exorbitant right now to do so". But when you then ask them to wave a magic wand so the financial obstacles in the way of family creation are eliminated tomorrow, would they now make plans to have a child? The same women polled then suddenly say it would impinge upon their freedom and lifestyle too much to have a child. The conclusion is that young women, en masse, increasingly just don't really prioritize or, perhaps, want to have children anymore if it means sacrificing or compromising on their self-acquired comforts. The affluent world has become too easy for people to contribute nothing of tangible value to the world of tomorrow, unfortunately.

[@devilmaycry9969]

The elephant in the room is that not many women want children. Once a woman has economic freedom; why would she get pregnant and have the burden of giving birth and raising a kid? I've heard so many depressed mothers in the past and present. They tell me never have children. They looked haggard and the fathers are usually not around.

[@lucindabreeding]

​​@@devilmaycry9969I am two generations from women who had no birth control, and therefore had nine, 12, and 15 children. In every culture where women can control their fertility, they control their fertility. And they almost always opt not to have a dozen children. My mother-in-law is one of 13. Her son had two children. One of her daughters had one child. Her two other daughters have had no children. Want to know why? The older girls ended up doing an awful lot of parenting. When you've been caring for children since you were 10 or 11yo, being pregnant and breastfeeding for the next 10 years is not all that exciting. For most women anyway.

[@fool1124]

Society bashing motherhood belittle women with multiple kids thinking they are dumb.

[@ohthankg-dforthebourgeoisi9800]

Traditional culture is being undermined and destroyed by wokeness which is really the current guise of Marxism trying to “disrupt” dismantle and ultimately destroy society and culture.

[@skylinefever]

It would do so less often if these multiple children weren't from random trash men.

[@gloriathomas3245]

Nobody is bashing motherhood but at same time it shouldn't be forced. Most women who choose not to be mothers are doing so because of the trade-offs that have to be made to facilitate that life. At least these women don't have to face the regrets some women face after having children.

[@skylinefever]

It belittles it when someone takes cream pies from various deadbeats and squeezes out random undisciplined idiots.

[@skylinefever]

Maybe they shouldn't bake cream pies from random sperm donors.

[@derek4412]

My wife and I are 36 years old and we are pregnant with our third child. We would hope for at least a couple more kids, but getting pregnant in our late 30s has been harder than our early 30s. To any young person watching this, get married young, and start having your kids earlier than you plan to!

[@ideaWorld403]

Yes! This comment is spot on! It would be interesting to see stats on mothers aged 50+ who regretted not having had MORE children. The regret I consistently hear from older friends and even elderly women is that they regret not having had "one more" child.

[@c.f.okonta8815]

How was it harder in your late 30s than your early 30s

[@derek4412]

@@c.f.okonta8815 In our particular case it has taken us more months of trying to get pregnant. Our friends are having more miscarriages as they age, and one of our friends had an emergency c-section followed by a hysterectomy at age 36, so she's no longer able to have more kids at all. Age just catches up to you by your late-30s, and while getting pregnant is still possible for most people, it's not possible for a significant minority of women.

[@c.f.okonta8815]

@@derek4412 oh wow

[@larcm3]

Its still not too late for you. My wife is pregnant with our 4th child and she is 38. Good luck on your pregnancy

[@keyboarddancers7751]

This issue is ever so gradually entering mainstream public discourse but I still don't think it's being taken seriously enough. Louise Perry and Stephen J Shaw are two of the anglophone world's most important commentators.

[@Jules-Is-a-Guy]

Interesting factoid: the anglophone was invented shortly before the telegraph.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

How pay for new baby

[@jedensnow1084]

It's not that it isn't being taken seriously enough.... It's there isn't a clear workable or acceptable solution. The Japanese and Korean governments have had to deal with population decline over at least the past 10 years and they haven't found a solution yet either. The problem is that there isn't a clear solution.

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

​@@jedensnow1084Or not one that is acceptable in a democratic society.

[@TheNanoNinja]

I tend to find that most people I talk to about birth rates, don't really get the social economic consequences. Personally I'm indifferent to population decline itself, but I do understand that our collective economic outlook must change. You can't have economic growth with declining population. You can still have technology and health improvements without economics. How that is achieved can't be done under the current economic structure.

[@MichaelaSkuba-bo9ip]

I would love to add to this discussion the massive decline in sperm count/testosterone levels in men over the past 50 years. And the massive increase in women diagnosed with endometriosis (myself included). We are poisoning ourselves with our personal care products full of xenoestrogens, parabens, and other “forever chemicals,” plus everything is packaged in plastic, plus all of our food is sprayed with pesticides, plus animals being given antibiotics and growth hormones. This is making the fertility window even shorter! My husband and I got married at 21 and 23, and we are now 27 and 30, trying for over 6 years and no kids. And this is NOT an uncommon story. So even marrying “young” doesn’t necessarily solve this problem.

[@kevinurben6005]

The recently-departed Swedish statistician Hans Rosling said that birth rates start to fall when women have access to both education and birth control.

[@mrfarenheit9159]

$

[@NikkiCro]

44:45 I REALLY wish people would stop saying men are not needed anymore. They are SO needed and SO important and I cringe every time I hear anyone say it.

[@mstorgaardnielsen]

You miss a negation i suppose.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

Independen women don't need men

[@mr.mayhem7402]

The data from the dating apps show that most women don't want most men. The men they do want are not going to want most of them so will end up childless.

[@NiinaSKlove]

No shit Sherlock.

[@annmarieknapp]

How are they needed? Other than as a sperm donor, what do they do? My ex-husband completely abandoned our child. I reared my profoundly disabled son alone and that was NOT my choice. I am sadly far from alone, as many women get stuck in my situation en masse. Men keep telling women to choose better and women are now listening. Many of us are now 4B, which is we are completely opting out of whole thing (no dating men, no relations with men, no marriage, and no children) because women are done with being put in these situations. I am a well educated woman who was,married when I had my child. We were middle class as well. What is happening is not just to single women without education or in low SES groups. Men of all education levels, financial status situations, ethnicity,and country are deadbeats and women have simply had enough. It is quite expensive to have children and I wouldn't wish having to go it alone on anyone. If I could go back in time, I would never have become a parent. I don't blame women who are fed up. And with lack of nationwide access to abortion in America women are closing up shop.

[@nnbaldwin]

34:00 "...drifting into unplanned childlessness." That's a really good way of describing it.

[@bensanderson7144]

I don’t disagree with what Ms Perry says. I only have one question: what is the uppermost population limit you’d like to see in the UK? 65 million, to me, seems like an awful lot of people on the island of Great Britain. How high do you want to go? 100 million? Just curious

[@digitalskeptic]

I don’t know what the RIGHT number for the UK is, but under current birth rates, sub 2.0, leads rapidly to a regime in which there are too few young people to support the elderly at 65 million people to too many elderly to support at 55 million to … 40 million … 20 million … .At some point, a higher fertility subgroup will be revealed, like rocks in a receding tide and, at least for a time, population will increase again, but the lost knowledge base and technology base will leave one in an era of substantially more pain and suffering.

[@bensanderson7144]

@@digitalskeptic that’s my understanding, also. Long term, less people, more elbow room, more space, less traffic .. is a good thing. But in the short term, lots of pain getting there

[@skylinefever]

I often joke about having zero population number change. However, the change will be a much smaller number of low quality people and a higher number of high quality people. I would love if the Idiocracy quit breeding so damn much.

[@patcartier8171]

Thank you, KZbin algorithm. I love seeing Louise Perry preach against individualism and the sexual revolution, for Christianity and family values, with great intelligence, even brilliance. I love Stephen Shaw preach for natalism, also with great intelligence, even brilliance. And what makes this preaching truly enjoyable is knowing that they preach to the choir, and make no difference whatsoever. The right is never better intellectually than when it seeks to explain the reasons of its defeats.

[@skylinefever]

Whenever someone blames the amount of erotica in Japan for the birth rates, I just have them explain how South Korea and Singapore have bans, yet lower birth rates. I love when people point out that such simplistic arguments don't work. I think about how there is less erotica in the MENA region. How much of the sex is consented to? I often argue that contraception reveals just how much sex drive and how much reproductive drive people have. There are still people who have access to contraception, but refuse to use it. Maybe if time goes on, it will select for people who genuinely want children.

[@gordo6908]

have to agree. really enjoyed shaw adding context and detail to the typical conjectures. given the relative stability of children per mother, i wonder what proportion of childless people 'snuck' into existence with the post industrial drop in child infant mortality

[@skylinefever]

@@gordo6908 I always find Jolly Heretic Dutton's discussion of the industrial revolution and reduced child mortality. What I never imagined was that there would be downsides to it. He argued that if half the children didn't reach adulthood, it meant the weakest half did not reach adulthood. He argued that industrialization makes people sicker and stupider because of it.

[@grannyannie2948]

My daughter just came back from Japan. She said it was actually an incredibly child friendly place, she was travelling with children.

[@CGAPU]

Pornography is banned, but it is not enforced in those countries. It's almost as easy to access as in the Western world.

[@CGAPU]

They ban pornography, but they don't enforce it. It's almost as easy to access, as is here.

[@spytechchronicles]

Our climate is becoming worse but we are not trying to fix it. Our children are committing suicide but we are not fixing it, our species has limited intelligence and cannot identify which issue to work on first. Things were much easier 200 years ago

[@cattywampusmcdoogle]

just as easy now... we are working on climate by putting more carbon into the soil with regenerative farming, turning the deserts green again as they are doing in India, Mexico, and even in the Southwest of America

[@herbayum76]

As a historean i dare to doubt your statement..

[@chingunanderson8229]

I really enjoyed this interesting conversation. I disagree with Shaw about men's vs women's window of finding suitable partners due to their fertility windows. The average age gap between husband and wife is around 2 to 3 years old. There is a significant minority of couples where the age gap is at least 4 years. That clearly tells you that men can delay marriage longer than women. Most men who want to get married/have kids, should be worried if they are in their mid-thirties and still single. They are not doomed of course but they should get moving!

[@diazigy]

You could raise a family in a comfortable middle class setting with a high school education and 40 hours a week of labor. Now you need two people with college degrees and 80 hours of labor a week. If you are one of the lucky ones to find a partner, pay off college debts, save up for a house... you are already in your mid to late 30s, and only have time to have 1-2 kids. Most people I know want more kids, but start gaving kids at age 32-34, have to space them apart 4-5 years due to cost of childcare. To have more kids, we need to massively increases wages for people who didnt attend college, while massively decreasing cost of housing and health insurance. Not sure how that will be done... my bets on population collapse across the entire western world simultaneously, and the diastrous economic effects it will bring, until we reach a new steady state population around 2100. Historians will view the 1940-2020 stretch of time as an atypical and unsustainable exponential burst of growth.

[@TheNanoNinja]

Do we really want more people? At some point, declining population is inevitable.

[@diazigy]

​@@TheNanoNinja I have two completely different minds about it. On one hand, you can't have exponential growth on a finite planet forever. It doesn't seem that the planet can support 10 billion people if they all want to eat meat, drive cars, and have air conditioning. On the other hand, how does a country or a culture maintain a high standard of living or even sustain itself if its shrinking? What happens when there's 1-2 elderly people for every working aged adult? Population equilibration or mild decline is probably okay, but population collapse is a crisis.

[@TheNanoNinja]

@diazigy that's why I think the economic mindset needs to change. To what, I'm not sure. But I know the current one won't work.

[@diazigy]

@@TheNanoNinja We need robot workers, butlers, and nurses. Eventually immigration won't even be an option, birthrates across central and south America have mostly dropped below replacement levels. The only place with a growing population is Africa.

[@TheNanoNinja]

@diazigy If you have robot workers or automation, who is going to pay for it when there are fewer people working and earning an income. Automation and technology will not address the fundamentals. Also your counting on the unknown. No one knows what the future will or will not bring.

[@CJB333]

It definitely feels like a hopeless situation. Especially when the best idea i have is the terrible dating apps to meet anyone

[@laura44135]

With the mouse study, it's not about overcrowding. It's the lack of meaning and challenges to face. The mice became lazy and uninterested. The female mice spent hours grooming themselves. The mice weren't reproducing but there was homosexuality and even pedophilia. Even animals need a reason to live and thrive into the future.

[@searose6192]

I find it interesting that he is detaching the trend of dropping from big families to small families, from the trend of dropping from small families to childlessness. It seems more like an ultimate culmination of the same cultural changes that devalue natalism.

[@skylinefever]

The industrial revolution and its consequences.

[@wisdomandy9361]

I think this whole conversation starts with the change in moral standards and the tolerance broadly to leave behind the moral standards we've always respected. Something like shaming bad behaviors kept people from making big mistakes. And people who did make mistakes were left as examples for others to learn from. We've become too empathetic towards people to do anything they want without much of any social damage. And because progressivism has culturally won, it's making this "be degenerate and find yourself" narrative the most common trope. All of this sounds like a complete lack of parental guidance and ignorance to moral standards.

[@inexpertxennial6067]

You just want to take away women's rights.

[@skylinefever]

@@wisdomandy9361 People see the value of FAFO.

[@ideaWorld403]

Im late 30s mother of 3 kids (all under 10). I often say to my husband if I was 3 years younger I would absolutely have another child, but physically i just feel like it wouldnt be good for me (im not one of the lucky women out there who had comfortable pregnanies and births). I suspect this is an area that should be explored more- women starting fsmilies later, therefore pushing up against age and forgoing the extra child they otherwise would have wanted. Part of it in my mind is actually when peiple are getting engaged and married. Not to beat up on men, but so many are taking waaay too long to propose to their girlfriends. My husband took 5 years to propose as an example, which i think is 2 years too long based on our ages at engagement- me 25, he was 28). This is very common amoungst my friends- 4, 5, 6, even 7 years+. If people got married earlier i truly think they would have a 'bonus' baby in their mid to late 30s. Also women need to be encouraged to have kids earlier and to not prioritise career over family. I was married for 4 ywars before feeling it was the appropriate time to have a baby. Stupid me! Ive lived and learnt that no amount of career achievement holds a flame to my joy at raising a family. Should have started years earlier.

[@devilmaycry9969]

That is good and all but....I have seen a lot of former stay at home moms who prioritized their ex husbands and children in the past and are now in their retirement age working a low wage job in a section 8 housing. Ex husband abandoned her and her children when a hot college girl doing an internship at his job place went in between...This is very common and its why so many mothers and grandmothers tell their daughters to prioritize education before a man. Men only care for you as long as they are attracted to you and you can give something of value to them (sex).

[@dirtdog1097]

I as a man never got why it would take so many years to propose. I also don’t get why women would put up with that. Why not say after 2-3 years hey are we going to go through with this or not?

[@j.s.c.4355]

So, he’s acknowledged that there was a trend toward smaller family size that sort of completed by the time of Gen X, and then after that, there was a trend toward childlessness. I find it really hard to believe that there aren’t more families having one child who would have had two or three if all the cards feel that way. This guy gets interviewed all the time and he is never challenged on his assertions. I’d like to see his data, or at least his graphs, one of these interviews.

[@eod9910]

He's confusing correlation with causation. He sees that the oil shock occurred in the 1970s, which is true, and concludes, 'Ah, that's the cause of the decline in birth rates.' However, he's not considering that, starting in the 1920s, females achieved political, economic, and sexual emancipation. This all culminated in the 1960s, so that by the 1970s, emancipation was completed and cemented into law. At that point, females no longer needed males, and when they no longer needed males, their behavior changed, and birth rates started their long plunge into the abyss, where they are today. It wasn't the oil shock; it was the emancipation of females. Birth rates will never return to pre-1970 levels as females and males have evolved to not need each other.

[@effexon]

oil shock to economy meant people lost jobs and some didnt get it back or got much worse ones.... this is factor for men especially. so you are right it aint only factor and culture seems to override economics often.. eg dont want married -> use economy or "poor men selection" as reasoning when it was decided already. Scientists study brain and it can do decision and just report it to us like that, then we argue and make up reasons for it.... though Id say that is like ancient people thought "god spoke to them" and brain is just special computer and dont need to obey it.... thus community is key, without it we are on whims of that brain computer. How many times some friend or family member made you think second time and change your mind and realize how wrong your thought was? In individual life that rarely happens. Of course catch here is other people can abuse this influence they have on you. It happens less though if communities are longterm and more stable that people dont move and changeover their life every 2-3 years that is quite common now.

[@hugo3665]

You are only wrong in saying males and females evolved to not need each other, they were indoctrinated to think so.

[@truth-uncensored2426]

Yep, eventual economic shocks are only "trigger" points, the real center of the issue is female emancipation.

[@julianskinner3697]

It was urbanisation which enabled women to free themselves and make their own money. They voted with their feed because the old set up was shut for women.

[@inexpertxennial6067]

@@julianskinner3697 31% of women in 1865 in New Hamspire was childless. This trend is old. That's why they started to pass the first abortion laws because of this fear even back then. It's a joke America population is fine.

[@marriagecausesdivorce7540]

39:50 The Coolidge effect is a biological phenomenon that describes when males regain sexual interest in a new female is introduced after having already mated with the same female multiple times in the past.

[@carlosespinal17]

I didn't know Louise had a podcast... I was about to give KZbin up for good but I guess I'll stay a little longer

[@patcartier8171]

And an exceptionally good podcast it is, too. The religious right is never so brilliant and entertaining than when it puts intelligence, knowledge and energy into explaining why its traditional pro-family values are losing relevance in the modern world. Louise Perry is possibly the very best in this regard, and she has the knack for finding and inviting truly awesome guests. This episode with Stephen Shaw is one of the very best, but you should also check out the interview with Tom Holland, seven days ago.

[@Kate-rv6kx]

This is the first time I've seen the actual reason discussed that my friends and I, who have always wanted children, don't have them. I've never found a man who wanted children and lived a lifestyle where it would be possible. I was ready when I was 21. How do you find a partner?

[@chad6252]

Go to church

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

​@@chad6252Not many men in church.

[@chad6252]

⁠@@rejectionisprotection4448find a different church. If you want a man who wants children it’s the best place to find him.

[@ohthankg-dforthebourgeoisi9800]

@@rejectionisprotection4448 Yes that is the problem in general with church. It’s one of the reasons the traditional churches are doing better than the mainline denominations. Plenty of men in the Cowboy church and the orthodox Christian church. Quite a few in the Catholic Church as well.

[@xiaomoogle]

THIS! I recently met someone who is Christian and even though I’m not, I consider myself agnostic at best, we have the same values. He’s the only person I’ve met that I’d ever consider having children with. I never felt safe enough - every man seemed to be a man child who thought they could put fatherhood off till 40. In the end I decided to become ambivalent and now I’ve met someone who makes me want children again.

[@miriamwells35]

I would have liked 4-5 but could only cope with 2. Some existential fears involved too. We lost a lot of men in my community (Scots and Irish) in WW1 and WW2 and confidence in the future.

[@Jules-Is-a-Guy]

Bro, how you ain't gonna sufficiently incorporate globalization and urbanization trends relative to timeframe?

[@aizensama9141]

They keep saying that the "Childlessness is involuntary." These childless people aren't "planning" to have a child one day. They're "HOPING" to have a child. There's a big difference, words mean something. Planning means you're actively taking steps towards the goal. This isn't what's happening and he framed it as such. You've got people that are just hoping to have kids without any actual plans or actions towards that environment. This situation is completely voluntary, but it requires you to hold people accountable for that to be admitted to. And you've got an entire gender who can't be held accountable for their decisions.

[@bogdanabram9683]

In my opinion, the main reason is that at the moment having children is not profitable from an energy point of view. Previously, families were large because there were certain environmental conditions and a large family was a necessity in order to survive. At the moment, in most countries it is possible to survive on one salary, food has become available and life is comfortable and that's +. Currently, such environmental conditions and no matter what programs the state introduces, it will not greatly affect the birth rate. Such are the environmental conditions, and whoever finds a better strategy will continue to multiply.

[@ReturnOfTheJ.D.]

One of the factors, which sadly will never be discussed, is that if you come from a divorced family, your father's second wife will at least try to swallow up most of your inheritance. So you know that you don't have that to fall back on, because your father was under pressure for decades to hand it all over to her. That puts you in a less financial secure position, over the course of your life - it might not be a good idea to take on too many expenses for example when you have no way of accessing that wealth later on, other than a 5-year-long court case that will divert much of the money to lawyers. This is grossly irresponsible by the Boomers to furnish these women with their children's inheritance, but many of them get brainwashed over decades and believe that to a better place for their money, which is often over a million, than their own children, even if they were halfway through their lives when they started a relationship with them, and that person made no contribution to the asset purchase (it was owned before the relationship).

[@kinnish5267]

Oil shocks and financial crisis are influencers not causes. The US civil war World war I and II and the Great Depression did not have a depressing effect. Birthrates have been falling since 1800s when women use to have 6-8 kids. Materialism, lost of faith and lost of community from industrialization and feminism are the real culprits.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

House to expensive for new family . Old rich people have 4 home As an investment. Increase house prices

[@Scottdomianus]

This is an incredible contrast between the women Who are having a stable average amount of children with a few valuable men that are left and the women who wish the world had more of them. Darwin‘s female finches stopped mating with those that could not adapt a new food source during a time of food scarcity. This created a divergence and formed two different species of finch. Humans won’t diverge, but we will certainly go to war, because that is what divergence looks like in a scarce resource environment. Women are so incredible in that they will deny themselves the only thing that matters, children, if a certain degree of quality of man is not selected for as a result of culture. Biology decreases the birth rate if the culture is shit. It stops producing agents of a species if the species culture is not on a gender equal trajectory. When the birth rate slows it forces the culture to reevaluate. This is how collective femininity is fighting for evolutionary progress

[@Kate-rv6kx]

👏 Yes! The question is always, "why aren't women having more children?" As though women exist in a vacuum and have always been single mothers. I'm glad this podcast actually brought up all the relationships where the woman wants kids and the man does not..

[@devilmaycry9969]

Why should I have children? They are a burden. I want to be economically free. I want a puppy and travel the world, volunteer and then garden. Children would hinder all life's pleasures. I haven't met a mother who is happy. Most mothers are miserable and some even confided in me that they wished they never had children.

[@Scottdomianus]

@@devilmaycry9969 if you can’t find a good man you shouldn’t. If you can and want pleasure over utility you are shallow and uninteresting, which could be the reason you have not found a man you would be compelled to mate with. I say this because I really do care. I know this sounds incredibly rude but I hope your life is filled with the joy children bring. Motherhood is undoubtedly a selfless act and incredibly hard. Same with fatherhood if you are a present father and an attentive husband. If you want experiences a vacation you post is such a thing but it doesn’t compare having two kids and getting four grandkids that that worship you, at least until they become teenagers, become completely self absorbed and say they never want kids. Why wouldn’t you want to tech a child to garden and watch them grow in the process?

[@chriswatson1698]

A child is two dependents: the child himself and the adult who must supervise and/or teach him. In the 1970s, women stopped producing dependents and became taxpayers themselves, resulting in an unusually high proportion of the population in the workforce, paying taxes. So why do we hear people bemoaning the aging of the population? Surely it is just a matter of looking after the elderly instead of babies? Seniors are often self-supporting and even economically active. Children rarely are.

[@melodiiandmymelody]

None of my close friends or siblings had kids when I was first pregnant, and actually, my five oldest friends, one sibling and my closest cousins never did have kids. If I'd been around more young families in my twenties on, I do wonder if we may have started a family sooner!

[@mehitabel325]

Let's be honest: if you are looking for a man to marry and have children with, dating men you meet on apps and don't know anything about is strenuous, awkward and sometimes scary (especially for us introverted folks). At times I think the good old match-maker, followed by an old-fashioned courtship process, would be the solution. Except we all live atomized lives, we aren't embedded in communities anymore, so that makes it hard for a match-maker to know everyone well enough to do her job.

[@jenniferlawrence2701]

Some thoughts in no particular order: I'd be interested to know what percentage of the unintentionally-childless are people who always knew they wanted children, versus the percentage who previously thought they didn't want children but then discovered as they entered their 30s that they really did? Two slightly different phenomena happening at once. Re: Dating apps. It looks like they cause a kind of option-paralysis, especially in young women. On paper it would seem like any technology that made meeting people easier would help, but perhaps it has the opposite effect - producing indecision and complacency in the popular, and despair and self-doubt in the unpopular. For popular young women it might seem like there's always a better option a swipe away. But those dry up with age. For most men and unpopular women, lack of success on dating apps could lead to them giving up on partner-seeking altogether. Finally, we don't talk about duty much these days. The idea that we might have a duty to have children may upset a lot of people, but I'm not sure it is necessarily wrong. Look at Israel - part of the reason they buck the birthrate trend is their people feel some sense of duty to their country/in-group. Perhaps duty should be part of the conversation.

[@patcartier8171]

Nope. Duty should not be part of the conversation. There is no such thing as a duty to have children. Nor is there any acceptable coercion in this regard. Coercion has been tried (communist Romania, national-socialist Germany…): it failed miserably. Everything you mentions meets the wall of reality. You cannot un-invent dating apps, either.

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

Women may seem to have "choices" in the dating apps, but they don't really and are leaving the apps in their droves. The apps are bolstering numbers of "women" by using bots and dormant accounts.

[@devilmaycry9969]

I will let you in on a little secret: Most women are not using apps. Most women are actually celibate. Some haven't had sex in years but you wouldn't know it.

[@truth-uncensored2426]

Yes, but keep in mind that the people that are having children is Israel are the religious orthodox community.

[@devilmaycry9969]

@@truth-uncensored2426 Also Israel is being funded heavily by the US. They don't have the problems the U.S has. At least not the same ones. Their structure is completely different.

[@fiorellamosqueda8507]

Loved the episode! please do an episode about birth control!! ❤

[@shahankhan7685]

The only way to improve brith rate is have a verry good wealth redistribution system.

[@searose6192]

How would that help? The better off people are economically, the lower the birth rate.

[@Enormous866]

Finally some sense

[@jenniferlawrence2701]

Birthrates plummeted in the USSR and Warsaw Pact countries.

[@zeppelin0110]

Won't help. There are many reasons for childlessness. The financial one is just one reason (albeit a very significant one). Another one is the breakdown of relations between men and women. If we lived in a socialist paradise, that wouldn't make women take responsibility for their predicament. They would continue to antagonize men for the sins of their ancestors.

[@truth-uncensored2426]

This is not a financial or economic issue, in many countries families have generous financial incentives to have children and it doesn't work to revert the trend of bellow fertility replacement. It's not an economic issue, it's about lifestyle and women emancipation.

[@SaLonegyal2812]

Thanks for this fascinating conversation

[@hipreference]

Why not look at the countries who's birth rate is in fact still above replacement rate IN SPITE of still experiencing the same triggers and trends causing other countries to succumb to childlessness. Perhaps there's something to be gleaned there. One example might be the Philippines.

[@jenniferlawrence2701]

Another is Israel, and the reason seems to be that they feel a duty to have children for the survival of the country.

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

The Phillipines is a very strongly Catholic country which has banned divorce.

[@truth-uncensored2426]

@@jenniferlawrence2701 People that are having children is Israel are the religious orthodox community.

[@julianskinner3697]

Phillipines has a total fertility rate of 2.5 babies per woman and dropping.

[@Jules-Is-a-Guy]

Contaminants are a bigger factor for some ppl than others, especially relevant in early life, or even moreso when mothers are pregnant. Definitely a contributing factor. (One thing I try to avoid is heated plastics containing food/drinks, that's the worst, although I should probably also get Shanna Swan's patented water distiller).

[@grannyannie2948]

Does explain why people aren't coupling up in anticipation of children.

[@nickbarber2080]

As Alex Jones notably said "They've turned the frogs gay!"

[@MichaelaSkuba-bo9ip]

No, but it does at least partially explain why people (like me) are being diagnosed with endometriosis and all kinds of other hormone disregulating, immune disregulating, inflammatory diseases that have lead to a skyrocketing infertility rate. Also, read the book “Count Down” for how all of these environmental factors and toxic exposures are causing sperm counts to plummet to absolute abysmal rates compared to just a couple of generations ago. I got married at 23, having been trying for kids all along, and I’m about to turn 30 (over 6 years) and no kids. It’s an enormous problem.

[@zeppelin0110]

Great interview

[@charlesbrown1365]

“Barry Commoner believed that poverty is the primary cause of the world's population crisis, which is the result of rich nations exploiting poor countries. He argued that the only way to end the population crisis is to "redistribute [wealth] among nations and within them". Commoner believed that "returning to the poor countries enough of the wealth taken from them to give their peoples both the reason and the resources voluntarily to limit their own fertility" is the only remedy”

[@mikepotter5718]

The problem is overpopulation. They're finding our antidepressants in polar bears,the oceans are starting to fill with the garbage we can't cope with,we're driving species to extinction for palm oil. The list of problems just goes on and and on ... . We need to regroup with a lower population and find a better path forward than the current stressed out system.

[@m3po22]

Unplanned childlessness is nothing but a consequence of reduced parental instinct. He's focused on outputs, not inputs.

[@callicordova4066]

No, we DON'T need to talk about birthrates. LEAVE PEOPLE ALONE!!!!!

[@sitka49]

She's got that wrong it was an enclosure that could hold 7,000 mice comfortably but when the Mouse population got to 2000, that's when problems started in the mice became disinterested in each other or are they formed groups some became depressed some started showing signs of anxiety and they discontinued producing baby baby mice. This was well before the population came to an apex for the amount of mice that the mouse utopia could hold.

[@hipreference]

Here's the realpolitik of it, free of any value judgements, prescriptive measures or whatever. Bottom line is that humans are a biological organism and like any biological organism, they must adapt to changes in their environment. Ultimately it only takes a few generations for the problem to correct itself however. Think about it. If half a generation of humans fails to reproduce due entirely to coordination errors, then the following generation will be made up solely of the offspring of people who did not succumb to those errors, and so on and so on. The same can be said at a societal level. Societies or civilizations that are incapable of replacing each previous generation will ultimately all die out. Now whether or not the natural consequences of that fact comports with current aspirations in the so-called "Western" or "Modern" model regarding gender equality, individual liberty, what constitutes a "happy" or "meaningful" life, now that's another question... but in light of the way things are going, in the grand scheme of things it might be an entirely irrelevant one. In the end there will only be survivors and casualties.

[@searose6192]

The biggest problem is that the solution is down to individual action, and at both the individual level and to societal level, we are anti-natalist through and through. Go read the way women on pregnancy forums talk about the common experience of guilt and shame when they finally become pregnant. So many feel ashamed and the phrase “feel like a guilty teenager” is a very common one. These are married women, often in their late twenties and early thirties and yet they have been so thoroughly brainwashed that baby=bad, dirty, failure that their joy at becoming mothers is shrouded in a cloud of shame. There is no fix for birth rates beyond radical cultural shift towards natalism. Towards babies being a good thing in their own right. This can exist in the modern west. Hawaii is a great example. They have hung on to their natalism and every pregnant woman and new mother feels it from every corner, every stranger, every acquaintance exudes a joy and welcome over the new life for its own sake, as well as for the brightness it brings to the parents. My guess is if you looked at the birth rate by state, Hawaii is no doing so bad, despite being so wildly expensive.

[@skylinefever]

Sounds like what I experienced when the God Squad gave me a bunch of hellfire and brimstone bullshit. Even after I did all that confession shit, I was still paranoid and couldn't not believe I'd be burned in hell. Screw the Southern Baptist Convention and their adjacents.

[@morthim]

'do people want to be parents?' i dont want to be a parent generally. i want to have a quality relationship with a good woman. i've not encountered any good women. it isn't even a friends of friends thing. i wanted to do it when i was just out of highschool. my preffered number of children was the traditional 10. women are meanwhile wanting to settle down late in life. i've heard many 40 year olds thinking they are still able to push it off.

[@spicole2937]

Yea its not shipping all muscular jobs overseas and propping up women in white collar jobs clean air act 1984 chevron doctrine regulated factorys till the move out epa

[@skylinefever]

The Made In China business is a literal cancer. I often ask how much Chinesium imports would cost if they weren't made in cancer villages with death trap machines.

[@charlesbrown1365]

“Commoner believed that environmental problems, including overpopulation, are effects of social causes inherent in capitalism and colonialism. He called the wealth produced in the colonies “a kind of demographic parasitism” that prevented the colonies from going through the same process that led to increased living standards and lower birth rates. Commoner argued that pressinguring poor countries into reducing their birth rates without improved living standards enables lower death rates and infant mortality is a “gigantic and questionable experiment”.

[@wordswords2094]

Evolution is not specific to a single species. There is competition, etc. We are being edged out. Evolution is working against humans as it did dinosaurs, etc.

[@ARR409]

The dinosaurs got taken out by a natural disaster that no one saw coming, that giant meteor. Evolution has nothing to do with that.

[@Jules-Is-a-Guy]

Mouse utopia significantly decreased mouse-tality salience. Confucius say: (underlying and accompanying mortality salience) when men don't have man stuff to do and women don't have woman stuff to do, they each start psychologically turning into their own significant other (that's why male mice groom themselves and female mice take charge of shit,) because we all have our own inbuilt opposite side of psyche, it's just a matter of finding someone irl who can plug in well enough to your preloaded opposite sex character avatar. Edit: Confucius also say; this is also why ppl turn trans at the end of late-stage empires.

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

"It's just a matter of finding someone irl who can plug in well enough to your preloaded opposite sex character avatar". That's a brilliant way of putting it. I wonder how people would react to seeing that on a dating app. LMAO.

[@Threnodist1]

What about obesity and health? What if everyone is just fat and gross and unappealing and no one wants to have sex?

[@mrfarenheit9159]

You must be a Californian too!...don't forget repulsive tattoos as well😅

[@adadubuisson8581]

Why do these people refuse to talk about the real reason behind this? For better or worse, women are making more money than a lot of men now. The majority of women do not want to marry and have children with a man who makes less money than them. This essentially leaves a huge percentage of women only being interested in a small portion of men to settle down with and have children. Clearly the math doesn’t add up. Considering most women would rather grow old and die alone rather than “settle” for a man they find to be beneath them, this problem will only continue to get worse.

[@Ruth-os4mi]

What about the so-called maternal instinct?

[@searose6192]

The issue is not economic, it is cultural. We all live in the same economic stew and yet Hawaiians and Pacific Islander Americans have increased their birth rate by 5%, Hispanic women have also increased their birth rate by 4% while white Americans have decreased their birth rate by 2%. You certainly can’t make a case of economic abundance leading to the ability to have kids looking at that data, but the cultural difference is stark. Among the subcultural groups in America, Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders are right at the top for natalism, Hispanics come in second, and white Americans fall squarely into the anti-natalist camp, with the birth rate reflecting that.

[@cullenkehoe5184]

All generally Catholic

[@ralfrudiger7276]

Yeah if you look at Israel, a ''western'' country, they have lots of children, with a good GDP. So its culturally!

[@TGP109]

Hispanics have the 2nd highest out of wedlock births in the US too, after blacks. White families generally look down on that.

[@searose6192]

43:02 The world is not crowded Louise. *The entire global population of humanity can fit into the state of Texas*

[@StimParavane]

How is childlessness voluntary from the woman's perspective? They are choosing to have sexual relationships but not to have children. They would clearly prefer to sleep with unsuitable men than actually create a meaningful family.

[@patcartier8171]

Ah… Wouldn’t life be better if women had no agency, and could not choose the way they live their life? 😂

[@julianskinner3697]

That's their decision.

[@btuesday]

How old is the average mother?

[@karlj1564]

primigravida average age is about 30- 31.

[@hipreference]

So basically it's hubris. Pride goeth before the fall.

[@StimParavane]

When TV came to Bhutan women's aspiration changed from wanting a good husband to instead having a series of boyfriends. These are different kinds of men and this will consequently affect the birthdate and the lives of their children.

[@hkaayaakuu]

No !!!!!!!! How can we End on The Barbie Cliffhanger😂! Why Louise

[@maidenmothermatriarch]

Subscribe to the Substack to finish the episode! louiseperry.substack.com

[@grahamashe9715]

Don’t forget the other (darker) side of the Malthusian equation. Ensuring the elderly don’t live too long.

[@spytechchronicles]

Question at 12:20 , short answer men do realise that it is too late to have children.

[@Egg_Apron]

If you believe in the Maiden, the Mother (Matriarchy) and Crone, then you might have to accept that women are the original portal keepers and we're beginning to exercise the ancient power of NO.

[@TV-oc4ml]

Spot the fembot

[@pterodactylman136]

I'm glad I'm already married and me and my wife already have a plan.

[@MA-gu2up]

I think the less sex is driven by availability of explicit material for men specifically and then increasing divide between men and women which can result from having bad experiences with the opposite gender in dating and so on. Of course the extended adolescence has an effect

[@willhogtieyou4752]

If that were true, there would be some correlation between explicit material consumption among men and the amount of sex they are able to have. But what turns out is, there is no correlation. The amount of explicit material consumption cannot be used to determine how much drive an individual man has to pursue and achieve relationships. I don't think men are choosing explicit material as a replacement to real relationships. I highly doubt when given the option, men would choose something virtual over something real. Something that is happening is many young men (around %60) are invisible due to their earnings, education, or physical attractiveness. Many have made the argument that explicit material can warp men's expectations for women, (and there are many young men who recognize this and abstain from the material) but no one talks about how social media is warping women's expectations for men.

[@MA-gu2up]

@@willhogtieyou4752 The correlation there would be confounded a lot. Let me give you an example, if man 1 has a desire that is 2 times man 2, and man 1 watches a lot of explicit material, and that took some of his desire so that he now has 1.5 times the desire of man 2, then man 1 will still be pursuing relationships more even though he is watching explicit material. That is why we need studies that take out the effect of genetics or something.

[@willhogtieyou4752]

@@MA-gu2up that very well could be the case, and I absolutely agree that having studies that controlled for expressed genes would be great, and I hope I live to see the day where that is common practice. Upon further investigation it does seem that for a period of time after viewing explicit material, men lowered their rating of attraction to female peers, so you're theory does seem to hold water. I still wish there was some study performed to show how this experience is parallel for women via social media. I suspect the effect would be comparable or worse given the greater amount of time spent using the medium. Not sure what I said to offend the algorithm in my first comment, but I hope this one doesn't get removed as well 😂

[@PLF...]

It's pretty much everyone being sold the dream of getting a new car, then told to wait until you find a perfect one (while being bombed with stories, true and untrue, about others finding theirs) - and during the waiting everyone becomes mid 30s and new cars are no longer something that exists. Then everyone have already learned to survive on their own and the disappointment in their shattered Disney dreams will never subside to any meaningful distance to where reality can be of any help of offering an alternative. Truth unfortunately is that most people suck, and without social pressures to partner up (in a romantic way) there just isn't much reason to. If you look at it, the reason to e.g. get married are a quite short list. Firstly, it's expensive to live on your own (which is probably the biggest of them, highly unromantic as it is), then it's help doing daily chores, security in having someone around if you get hurt, etc. and after that it's the more soft desires like having someone to talk to (even though that's only some people) and having something to give meaning to your life, be it emotionally or by having kids, or similar. And of course it's just a bonus if you get to fuck this person. But essentially all of those things, if you crave them, can be fulfilled just fine in a lot of other ways - many of them in quite superior ways to having a husband/wife.

[@MA-gu2up]

@@willhogtieyou4752 Yeah, there was a study about attraction or something, but my point here is motivation, specifically , I think explicit material and things that men do with it make men less motivated to be marriageable and a lot of them give up quickly on that.

[@charlo90952]

Religious groups like Mormons, Amish do much better, and Muslims. Also Israel. The Vedic system in India marries girls at 15 and men at 25. One problem is that we marry for love, which is completely the wrong reason leading to our high divorce rate. The increase of homosexuality is another symptom of decline.

[@patcartier8171]

It appears to have escaped your attention that love is not a bug of life. It's a feature.

[@charlo90952]

@@patcartier8171 It's an insufficient reason for marriage though.

[@patcartier8171]

@@charlo90952 Maybe. But the fact remains that when our societies moved from arranged marriage to marriage for love, they moved from the tyranny of having to live according to the dictates of family values to the freedom of everyone being permitted to have their own agenda, including women, including homosexuals. There will be no turning back. Even in places where they hate the West, marriage for love is slowly, ineluctably gaining ground.

[@patcartier8171]

@@charlo90952 Freedom is also not a bug, but a feature.

[@charlo90952]

@@patcartier8171 Freedom to live in childless misery? Maybe we'd be better off with rules to follow.

[@adamwalker2377]

Childlessness is usually not an unplanned outcome. It's the result of a series of choices you think are unrelated. If you're a woman, the first such choice is signing loan papers and enrollment in college.

[@searose6192]

33:46 yes, not only has the pill changed the cultural norm around premarital sex, it also directly interferes with women choosing a suitable partner by destroying their innate capacity to be attracted to men based on their fitness as fathers.

[@aaronvt9980]

It's the sexual revolution at fault. Contraception and abortion enabled it, but frivilous sex outside marriage is the fundamental issue.

[@patcartier8171]

Let’s imagine for a moment that you are right. Let me quote the great philosopher Mark Knopfler, then: “Anyway, what you gonna do about it?”

[@skylinefever]

If you want marriage back, make it appealing. Make it more appealing than sterile sex with various unmarried partners.

[@searose6192]

21:36 Unless these people are celibate, their childlessness is not truly involuntary, it may be unplanned, but it is not involuntary.

[@MoonFae-fb5uu]

What is odds of woman having a child beyond 30, if they are already trying to consive, have right partner and are engaged? We started to trying to consive when i was 26, but i havent gotten pregnant. And now im 28 :/

[@karlj1564]

The statistics will be different for women who have already had children. They are likely to be more fertile.

[@MoonFae-fb5uu]

@@karlj1564 I havent gotten pregnant, thats the whole problem :/ what i understood from this video is women who are single vs women who are trying to consive & have a partner are different statistic and single woman are bringing estamate of whole woman population down. I was just curious of what that statistic is to women who do have a partner and are trying to consive.

[@karlj1564]

@@MoonFae-fb5uu sorry to hear that, don't loose hope yet. I think his website / film will have stats like that. He talks a lot in interviews about making it normal to have kids, and then then do otjer things in life. He talks a lot about unintentional childless women.

[@karlj1564]

@@MoonFae-fb5uu You never know, you might get triplets.

[@aimingisbadno4804]

Hey, at around 17 my mother was told she could never have children due to a medical condition affecting her ovaries with apparently no hope to be reversed. After around 10 years of treatment that were only supposed to avoid things getting worse the condition dissapeared, it took a few years of trying (more than 2... ) but at 35 she managed to have twins on her first pregnancy, even in extreme cases like this miracles do happen so don't give up! I also know a friend who's mother was 45 and father was 57 when she gave birth, statistics remain in the end only statistics, unlikely doesn't mean you can't be part of ones that manage to defy the odds.

[@X99-h6r]

Who would bring children into this misery?

[@StimParavane]

Yes, but feminism does not care about the feelings of men.

[@searose6192]

43:57 They became narcissists more interested in male company….interesting…..the parallels are stunning.

[@Jules-Is-a-Guy]

I'd be very surprised if financial incentives proved completely useless, I think maybe those studies need to be re-studied. Didn't Hungary sort of find the opposite? Nevertheless, I don't doubt that other variables are more effective and important. One financial/material factor along those lines, is that financial assistance might not significantly increase purchasing power, when things like homes remain so overpriced. (This will only be a 10 yr trend in US, while construction ramps up, but that's obviously a significant timeframe, and it's already been 10 yrs).

[@grannyannie2948]

I personally think they haven't offered the right incentives. My country did offer incentives as a cash bonus, but it was found the same number of children were born, though some couples had them earlier, as the money may solve a problem which was delaying having children. Politically it upsets voters who don't have kids, or had kids before the policy.

[@CGAPU]

Hungary did increase it's birth rate, but it's only slightly higher than the European average, and has stagnated now. Finland and South Korea have been throwing away money to increase it, without any success. You won't get a more generous welfare state than Finland's.

[@SC-sh6ux]

the confusing male behavior, discussed in this video, Sounds a lot like avoidant attachment

[@elizabethallemong1446]

No, Mr. Shaw. The birth rates started to go down in early 50s and it started in Eastern Europe, the Communist Poland, Russia, Czechoslovakia, etc. Those countries lost so many young men in WWIi, that the Communists had no choice but to send women to work. We were “liberated” by the commies. When women have to work, who will take of their babies? This is the main reason, women away from home, working full time, even if they want to work. This trend will never reverse!

[@Neoteny374]

In Canada, so much money is spent on programs designed towards women in the workforce. From female education bursaries, female quotas in classes, to the same female advantages in the form of lowering entry requirements for women, universal daycare , the list is long, and all these cost money. The strange thing is, not one penny is spent on helping a woman stay at home with her children. That would be misogynist and oppressive, somehow.

[@elizabethallemong6951]

@@Neoteny374 I had this idea once that countries should establish some kind of "stipend for young mothers," so that young women could stay at home with young kids, maybe until age 4 or 5, but they would not lose SS benefits. However, this (I was told) is a very "socialistic idea." Americans often mix socialism with some social programs that are actually good for the society. Then I saw an article (maybe in the NYTimes, I do not remember) that stated that motherhood should be a "paid job." The US society is not ready for these payments being handed out to young mothers. But today, in these uncertain economically times, even such stipends might not be enough to convince young people to have kids. I think the world has to get used to having less people, more robots. Maybe this is actually good for our Earth?

[@Neoteny374]

@@elizabethallemong6951 Ever think of not throwing up stumbling blocks for the young husbands and fathers? You guys actually did the exact opposite thing by withholding social assistance to young women until they threw out thier man of the house. Deadbeat dads, right?

[@websmink]

Don’t worry genius Louise. The scary moose lambs will soon populate the earth. Wouldn’t that be awful?

[@spytechchronicles]

We reached 8 billion population, because 200 years ago we were 1 billion happy people. Now we are 8 billion unhappy people. Do not push the numbers artificially. Let the process be organic

[@voccessbg5396]

None from the 1800s would have agreed with you. All previous generations were living through atrocities not imaginable to us. Such comments clearly show the absolute lack of objectivity we currently suffer from.

[@spytechchronicles]

​​@@voccessbg5396 were 12 year old children committing suicides 200 years ago, were men more honorable? , were puberty blockers being given to children? I would say things were much better as compared to today? How manu people opted for euthanasia? How many nuclear weapons were used before 1800? Chemical weapons? Was woke culture there? People aurely suffered but nothing as compared to today because 800k people committing auicide every year.

[@voccessbg5396]

​@@spytechchronicles it is a common misconception for humans to glorify the past and exaggerate their current trials and tribulations. Lets just say anyone from the 1800s would have given anything to live in our current times. We are so lame and ungrateful for all we have available. We take it for granted. We (you) are not objective at all. The fact that you have lived to your age and can complain online from woke and puberty blockers shows how much better lot you have compared to your ancestors. As for the children, a majority did not live to turn 12 so.... I guess it is clear who is better, we or people 200 years ago.

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

​@@spytechchroniclesBut is the amount of suicides proportionate? There are a lot more people so maybe it is. People lived less longer 250 years ago so there were higher death rates through illness, poor hygiene and sanitation, wars etc. There are so many variables here.

[@julianskinner3697]

Happy in 1824,? Really?

[@na21405]

Women are no longer forced by economic necessity to get into and stay in abusive relationships while men are refusing to evolve and be less entitled and abusive. 4B.

[@jupiterthree5228]

Regretful parents subreddit

[@adadubuisson8581]

It still don’t understand how intelligent people can’t figure out why this happening. Lol

[@Jules-Is-a-Guy]

Yeah, age 30 for women is age 35 for men. In 2 yrs and 1 month, I will be selected out. This must be how my ex-girlfriend felt 6-7 yrs ago.

[@bumpercoach]

HEREs the question to research... WAS THERE A KATE BUMP? How many million babies were born because Princess Kate went beyond minimum expectation by having a THIRD baby?

[@rejectionisprotection4448]

I thought they wanted four children, like the Queen.

[@bumpercoach]

@@rejectionisprotection4448 hadn't heard that but definitely more than Diana's "heir and a spare"

[@flobba123]

alot of women are looking for the " perfect husband" sadly he dosent exist so they end up single forever

[@zbasy]

This is absurd. The guy banging about data and failing to mention hungary’s plummeting birthrate. Family friendly policies, my ss. Sheer propaganda this guy is promoting

[@HarleyButler-ox3qn]

Louise used to be pretty, what happened?

[@spicole2937]

Is every man in charge weqk lkke this guy wait till young men with no stake in countrie will see how men from other countries treat women

[@kevinc2821]

I want a wife but no kids

[@akichler]

You guys are funny, poverty has nothing to do with anything.

[@Samuel-vw2wy]

I think there are two solutions 1. Normalize multiple person marriages. In developed countries women want to compete in the labor market and society equally to men, but they don’t want to marry and have kids with men below or even equal to them. And due to various other cultural factors in many ways they outcompete the men, leaving most men undesirable to them. Given that we are only increasing things like scholarships and quotas for women, it can only get worse. But what if we normalized marriage between multiple partners, so let’s say a high status man, rather than only marrying and having kids with one woman, he will now marry three or four women and have kids with each. Studies actually find women find men other women are interested in more attractive due to mate choice copying. Not to mention survey data showing average women standards for things like height, facial attractiveness, or wealth are for above average men. You might ask what about the rest of men, but for one they weren’t getting in relationships anyway, and they can also enter into the multiple marriages. Perhaps a woman marries low status men who support her, but is only having kids with the high status man who does the same with other women. This can raise the birth rate. While it may seem unthinkable now, modern relationship dynamics would look unthinkable to people even just a century ago, these shifts can happen especially if this is the culture that actually persists, plus even a top down approach from say mainstream media could cause the influence kind of like what happened in the 60s revolution. 2. Use technology. The government can grow the new population using artificialwombs in large factory farms, and have them be raised by AI in state nurseries and schools. The AI that raises them can be programmed to train them to view it as a parental figure, national symbol, and religious figurehead all in one, so they will be dedicated to supporting society. This can be combined with other technologies such as embryoselection to choose traits based on assigned roles, like high IQ for administrative positions, high athleticism for manual labor, or neuralink chip implants so the state can alter the populations behavior, either directly with dopamine or cortisol spikes, or indirectly be altering the subconscious influence so they behave the desired way without realizing they are influenced.

[@keyboarddancers7751]

I'm getting shades of Aldous Huxley.

[@billusher2265]

@@Riedebee South Korea and Japan have started payments and it didn’t even make a dent unfortunately

[@skylinefever]

I argue that technology can be used to raise birth rates, but in a different way. There have always been people who wanted to marry and reproduce quickly no matter what incentives urbanization and industrialization presented. If those people could be examined, maybe that desire could be duplicated. I am not talking about people who married and had kids early because they were stuck with people who ordered it. I often joke about IQ raising tech, because the Idiocracy will continue to screw and breed like rabbits. Good luck getting more of the non stupid.

[@mstorgaardnielsen]

This right according to dr Merkwürdigliebe’s wet dream

[@deezed6478]

What a horrible suggestion