BREEDER vs. BALLER: If You Don't Have Kids, You're A Selfish Asshole
Effed in Park Slope | Thursday, December 11, 2008 at 9:19AM 
Each week we will attempt to bring you the unbiased, unedited points-of-view of a bonafide, ginuwine Park Slope Breeder (mom/dad) and a real deal, smokin, sexin, drinkin Park Slope Baller (child free-n-lovin it) on a variety of topics. Identities will remain anonymous, of course, to protect the soon-to-be lynched.
BALLER:
The decision to have kids or not was not was fairly easy for me. It went something like this: Dear Self: am I giving, loving, rich, patient, selfless enough to take on 100% caring for another little human being? (no) Ready to nurture, teach, and love 24/7, 365 days a year, even when said little human being is being really, really fucking annoying and crying and pooping? (no). Willing to pay for all their shit (instead of minez), giving up travel, and expensive haircuts and shopping at Dean & Deluca so I can buy organic baby food and a $900 stroller? (no). I'm too fucking selfish.
Really that's it.
Choosing not to have kids is, considered by many, to be an incredibly selfish act. A virtual fuck you to society-at-large.
Whatevs, dudez...I get that the "children are our future"-n-shit, but that's all you, dawg. Good luck with it! I'll be chillin' at a random Brooklyn house party with Bill Murray.
It literally just hit me one day a few years ago...like those "aha moments" that Oprah is blabbing about all the time. Finally, one day it just flat out occurred to my ass that I don't *have* to have a baby. And not only do I not have to have a baby, its totally 100% ok if I don't want one. I DON'T WANT A BABY! WOOO HOOOO! It honestly, was that freeing...it felt like I was on that Batman ride at Six Flags or bungee jumping in Mexico on some makeshift, uninsurable bridge.
The selfish accusations started soon after. I believe my grandma (this sweet, unassuming, Long Island Jewish bubby) was the first to say "NO KIDS? Isn't that a little selfish?" At first I was kind of dumbfounded...like I didn't even quite know how to respond to the remark, so I just changed the subject.
After you get married, its pretty near impossible to avoid this conversation with well meaning busy bodies family members and friends. People get married, and then they have kids. That's just what's done. Conveying the fact that you don't want kids (REALLY don't want kids) is an art all unto itself. It's no easy task getting across, in a friendly and non-judgmental manner, the fact that you have zero desire to do what, in all likelihood, almost every human being you know has already done and/or will do at some point. This is touchy...and, not-surprisingly, this whole idea of being selfish actually comes up pretty often.
Usually its in the form of half-hearted, passive agressive judgments like this one: "No kids? Wow? Well, that will be nice...everyone has different priorities, I guess" (READ: You're a selfish asshole and I'm a loving, caring human being because I've made the decision to breed. Yay me).
Or this one: "No kids?! That's really great...really. Though, I just can't imagine how unfulfilled my life would be without [insert annoying SILTH baby name here]" (READ: You're a selfish asshole and you are gonna regret this decision when you're old and you have no one to take care of you. Yay me).
The thing is, while I don't appreciate the back handed judgments, I do agree that selfishness played a major role in my decision. I made the ultimate life choice: to tend my own damn garden, go after all my own dreams, eat chocolate cake for dinner, keep porn on my tivo, travel, keep all my money for me and my husband, do everything I want to do exactly when I want to fucking do it. BOOM!
So, yes: choosing not to have kids is totally fucking selfish...and I totally don't fucking care.
BREEDER:
Baller, I don't think you get it.
Unlike you, I would never publicly judge someone for the life decisions they make, as long as those life decisions don't hurt other people.
What you wrote is beautiful, and I'm glad you're happy. No retort.
Breeder vs. Baller, SILTH, kids 
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Reader Comments (11)
@Breeder, I think Baller is defending herself against the majority of Breeders who do publicly judge non breeders and treat them like inferior ass-hats simply because they chose not to bring a life into the world that would be less than 100% loved. Besides you just proved her point with that passive aggressive response of not judging like her. Breeders need to stop acting like they performed the greatest thing since the invention of the wheel, simply because they performed their biological function, that they're programed to do anyway. Stop it Breeders! You are not special because you had one to many one special night, fucked, and then did what every other thing in the animal kingdom does.
Danny, are you Breeder? When have you ever in a million years heard a mother telling a non-mother that theyre selfish for not having kids?
This is like, a fictional topic
anon: Seriously? Did you read this? No one was "telling" Baller she was selfish (except for her grandmother)...it's the back handed judgments about her decision. If you think that doesn't exist you are crazy...or more likely a breeder.
umm as a hardcore-die hard married 'baller' I can tell you the judgmental, rude, insulting comments come all the time. Parents, friends, coworkers, bosses, even the friggin plumber who put in a new water heater for us said 'no kids... wow you don't really *need* this house than do you.. someone with kids should have it'.
all my breeding friends say things like "it's criminal that you aren't having kids, you're missing out, you will regret it" etc. etc. etc. and all i can do is smile, and say "i think i'll be fine"
Really Anon? Wow thanks for "like" clearing that up for me. Hey Douchey Mc Douchington, did that comment sound like something a breeder would post captain obvious?
You know what's selfish? Allow me to tell you:
Bringing more people into a world that's already overpopulated and being exponentially raped for limited resources. Why? Because you and your wife/girlfriend are so special that you feel compelled to genetically pass on your specialness for all of humanity to enjoy for generations to come? Get over yourselves you fucking egomaniacs. If you really get off on 'being a parent' and 'sharing love' and all that other shit you talk about then adopt. The vast majority of the world lives in substandard conditions compared to here in the West. What do you think's gonna happen to the world if these people start catching up in terms of lifestyle? Do you have any idea how incapable the planet is of sustaining even a moderate living standard for the 8 billion plus living around the world today?
To me not having kids is the greatest sacrifice a person can make for the greater good. If you want to be a parent, like I said - adopt. If you want to hate on me for my opinion and drop such empty platitudes as: "everyone has a right to pursue their biological imperative!!" Then go ahead. Hate away. Realize though: your great grandkids will die on a flaming dried up ball of shit that used to be Planet Earth drinking their own piss cause there's no drinkable water left while reading bedtime stories to their kids about how there used to be fantastic creatures called "animals" who lived in these used to exist places called "forests".
Who's really being selfish?
amen fool, amen
-another baller
I have come to the opinion that having children (one's own) is the selfish option. Why do people have children? It's because they want to enrich their own lives. I don't think most breeders consider the very real possibility that their children could have less-than-blissful lives. Depression runs in my family, and I've realized that if I breed, my child would be very likely to suffer from the same chronic unhappiness that I have had for nearly two decades so far. If I ever decide that I really want children, I will probably adopt (not that that's easy to do), specifically because by doing so I will avoid saddling my child with the same misery I have experienced. People who really want to be unselfish should adopt an unwanted child who is already in the world, not make their own.
The Fool's comment almost made me jump out of my chair with glee. Someone somewhere finally GETS IT. Thank you.
Listen "breeders" of the world. You want a kid? Adopt one. There are plenty of starving, unloved, neglected, and/or unhealthy children out there - from coast to coast- yearning for a happy life.
And if you want to bring 6 new ones of your own into the world? Then leave your Park Slope brownstone, pack up the Volvo station wagon, and go live completely off the grid in the middle of the woods where you can grow your own food, collect your own solar energy, and NOT contribute to the rapid deterioration of our planet with your carbon-sucking offspring.
Sooner or later, we won't have a choice of which global disaster to make a top priority. Don't bring any more lives into the mix.
Me? I'm just blown away that someone would spend $900 on a stroller, or that someone would include that as an essential quality of parenthood - living in the Slope or not. I'm a little nauseous.
FoOl - you hit the nail on the head - thank you for keeping it real!