On being childfree

Posted on 28/12/2018 by Dr Bob Rich

Please read my answer to a man who considers being childfree.

The graph shows Earth Overshoot Day, 1st August in 2018.

About Dr Bob Rich

I am a professional grandfather. My main motivation is to transform society to create a sustainable world in which my grandchildren and their grandchildren in perpetuity can have a life, and a life worth living. This means reversing environmental idiocy that's now threatening us with extinction, and replacing culture of greed and conflict with one of compassion and cooperation.
This entry was posted in Climate change, environment, philosophy. Bookmark the permalink.

4 Responses to On being childfree

  1. Dr Bob Rich says:
    29/12/2018 at 9:14 am

    Permaculture is like solar electricity, electric cars, recycling, etc. All necessary band aids, but don’t fix the problem. We need to reduce ++, not just supply in a different way.
    This is why my wife and I decided on voluntary poverty in 1978. Every dollar you earn, every dollar you spend, is stolen from the future. Well, we are now that future.

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  2. patricknelson750 says:
    28/12/2018 at 8:45 am

    Hi Bob have you any new years resolutions planned?

    There is another factor to this question of course, which is what sort of person the questioner is because if someone is a hunter gatherer in the rain-forest then their children are not likely to have a negative environmental impact. Likewise if someone is fully engaged in permaculture and lives a sustainable lifestyle and just so long as they are going to bring their children up to do so as well, then they will most likely become net carbon deductors.

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    • Dr Bob Rich says:
      28/12/2018 at 12:16 pm

      Thanks for visiting, Patrick.
      I don’t bother with new year resolutions, but do my best to live in this moment. The past is history, the future a mystery. I give you a present.
      As I said in my answer, environmental impact is number of people by their footprint. A hunter-gatherer is a part of nature, and is in fact an agent for survival of the local ecosystem. And children are a necessary part of that continuity.
      But then, I doubt a hunter-gatherer has access to the internet.
      I am less sure about permaculture. It’s a good thing, but still part of the industrial society that’s destroying everything.
      🙂

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      • patricknelson750 says:
        29/12/2018 at 5:51 am

        I think permaculture with local trade systems has the potential to let people escape the consumerist industrial shipped goods system, but as with earthships the thing that holds everything back are a plethora of rules and regulations from an outdated paradigm.

        I couldn’t agree more about new years resolutions : )

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