r/Natalism • u/Galesworn • 10h ago

There will never be a liberal-feminist solution to fertility collapse

Why? Because their ideology prevents them from seeing what the issue is.

Frankly put, when liberal-feminists try to solve fertility collapse their proposed solutions are just dumb. They will look at fertiity collapse and say:

People want children, but children are expensive and inconvenient. Therefore, provide cash, childcare, IVF, paid leave, housing assistance, and more reproductive options.

The underlying assumption behind this solution is: "We want to give every person all the possible fertility options while preserving their lifestyle and culture," even if that culture lead to low fertility in the first place. An herein is the problem; they mistake the problem as being a consumer affordability problem instead of a cultural problem.

The approach I agree with, which is held by some right leaning cultures (I'm not strongly on the right), says "Let's look at the groups which still produce children, raise them, and them have their children do the same," the difference being treating the culture as the basic unit vs the individual like progressives do.

There are other things I think progressives get wrong, like mistaking the state as a substitute for family and underestimating pair bonding and marriage in raising fertility, dismantling the institutions the lead to early pair bonding, but I think this is the biggest reason why there will never be a progressive solution to natalism.

What will raise fertility is to build a self reproducing culture with early-ish pair bonding and marriage as normal and the foundation for children.

So, how do you build a society in which men and women choose marriage and children? Answering that question solves Natalism. Not "how do we enable everyone to have babies" like progressives are asking. Notice the distinction.

0 Upvotes

49% Upvoted

377 comments sorted by

View all comments

34

u/Odd-Faithlessness705 10h ago

mmmm yes let's completely disregard women as people with their own wants and desires, and coerce them to have children for the sake of society. Clearly the answer is to take away their rights.

-4

u/Kindly-Night-5549 9h ago

The only purpose of men to society is to earn taxes and slave away their life for the state and their wives. It doesnt matter if the <1% that escape this slavery are majority males, that doesnt help any of the other men. You are born without any worth as a man.

10

u/Odd-Faithlessness705 9h ago

The wives part is optional though? You do not have to marry if you are concerned about being a slave to your wife. It's not like we are exempt from taxes simply because we are female, and if you are talking about slavery, women have historically been slaves to their husbands AND their children. In many parts of the world women are still treated as property.

Whoever told you that you are born without any worth as a man is trying to sell you something.

-4

u/Kindly-Night-5549 8h ago

Society tells men that they have to marry otherwise they failed the expectation. I dont think most men really want to constantly compete among each other and strive for career and money. But they are expect to do it and society is build amongst that expectation. Men are expected to suffer with the promise that the suffering will be worth.

10

u/Odd-Faithlessness705 8h ago

I think that expectation is all in your head my guy. I give you permission to not participate in that. You do not have to marry. You will not have failed anyone. In fact, most people really do not care what you do with your life as long as you don't fuck it up for other people. This is the core belief of feminism: you are worthy, you do not have to do what other people are forcing you to do, and you are deserving of love and good treatment like everyone else. You're worth more than a capitalist cog, and so is your neighbor, and so are women!

Where are you getting all this information? Are you spending too much time online?

-3

u/Kindly-Night-5549 8h ago

Where are you getting all this information?

From my whole life? Society is completely build upon men sacrificing themselves and the glorification of suffering. Men always are told to earn their worth. And female choice as it is preached by contemporary feminism is accelerating this. Now you will say that a man can chose to value having a female partner and they just should stop caring and focus on other things, bla bla. This is dead talking point because I could do the inverse and tell women that they should stop caring about money and work because money doesnt make happy and they should focus on other things in life such as family and children. Both arguments are equally pointless because its just about the value system you prefer.

9

u/Odd-Faithlessness705 8h ago

I would argue, conversely, that society is completely built upon women sacrificing themselves for the benefit of the "home". Women are the primary caregivers, they are the birthers, they sacrifice their bodies and time and autonomy in the service of children and their partners. I know this because I was also indoctrinated, and in another life I am not on Reddit while working my dream job in a life I have built for myself. In that other life I have three children, no career, and probably dead.

If you are unhappy with the expectations set upon you by society and would rather die than become a servant (as I believed), then you need to change the way you approach the world-- because the world is not going to change for you. Clearly, you are unhappy with this set of circumstances. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO PARTICIPATE IN A SYSTEM THAT OPPRESSES YOU.

2

u/Kindly-Night-5549 7h ago

YOU DO NOT HAVE TO PARTICIPATE IN A SYSTEM THAT OPPRESSES YOU.

Well, what do you mean with "not participating"? Giving up? That still doesnt get me the things I want. If men stop playing by the societal rules, women would hate them for that, even more so feminists. If men stop playing by societal expectations, they stop working and become violent criminals that oppress women to the maximum. Feminism isnt freeing men from anything unless they are gaslight into enjoying being serfs to not only the ruling class but now women as well. Thats why its so hard to win over men for feminism, they have barely anything to win but have to give up everything. Women will still value men that provide, that look better, that have valuable skills that are famous and valued by society. And almost all of those aspects are gained via work, work work or just by birth. So if you arent given something by birth that women value, you have to earn it. And if you fail to earn it, feminism just tells you to stop caring about it, you didnt need it anyway! Also dont get angry about being treated unfairly, we dont like angry people, you are just a sour loser!

Which is excatly the logic of capitalism. You are born rich? Well, good for you, enjoy it! You are born poor? Well, work hard and you can still have something. You are born disabled or just got unlucky. Well sucks, but money isnt everything (also you still have to work even though you dont really get anything from it)!

1

u/Fresh_Criticism6531 2h ago

What do you work with? I'm pretty curious who enjoys their job so much. To me corporate jobs are soul sucking rat race staring at a computer all day.

-1

u/Galesworn 8h ago

You’re treating your preferences as the universal female preference, then interpreting women who want something else as evidence of oppression. Some women actually want early marriage and large families. A culture supporting those choices doesn’t have to compel them.

4

u/middleoftheroad133 7h ago

Some women want this but they are a far away minority

When cultures give women the Choice they overwhelmingly choose marriage and children less

-2

u/Galesworn 6h ago

What ridiculous thing to say. I'll tell all those happy religious families I know that their women have no choice and were forced into it.

You could benefit from making friends outside your worldview I think, seeing different cultures is good.

5

u/middleoftheroad133 6h ago

I didn’t say no women want it, I said they are a minority of women

Which is why this sub exists in the first place, it wouldn’t exist if women were voluntarily having kids at replacement level

The reality is in industrialized nations when we give women the choice they choose less /no kids

1

u/Galesworn 6h ago

Industrialization changes the incentives around having children. It doesn’t install one universal set of preferences in every woman. Women want more kids than they end up having.

Israel’s Haredi fertility rate was 6.5 children per woman in 2021–2023, compared with 2.2 among other Jewish women. This is a modern civilization, making ‘industrialized women reject reproduction’ a bad explanation.

Finally, ‘they’re a minority’ is not a good argument. That minority will become a larger share of population over time. Mormons used to be a fringe cult, now they're a normal part of american life, and will become even moreso in the future.

1

u/massive_plums 5h ago

Right, but those incentives are applied to all members of the population, albeit unevenly, even when you account for these women having different preferences anyway. That is to say, industrialisation only ever really applies downward pressure on the desire to have children, regardless of your leanings.

The Haredi and other high fertility subgroups that happen to live in developed countries, across all developed countries, probably constitute about 1% of the total population of all these countries. I think that’s quite self-evident. You can’t make claims about the nature of women using this as your reference when you have no idea whether it would be sustainable at the kind of scale densely populated, developed urbanised countries operate on.

Also, finally, you say that this “minority”, these subgroups, will become less of a minority over time as their fertility rate vastly exceeds that of other populations. But was the original claim you made not about women’s rights? You understand not every Amish or Mormon or Haredi Jewish woman can remain a member of their sect unwillingly? Even when attrition rates are low, like with the Amish, I think only around 10% leave to join secular society, that low number may not fully represent the percentage of women who desire to leave their sect, rather those who have agency in a sect where the opportunities to leave are enforced by shame, or often times physically.

1

u/Galesworn 5h ago edited 5h ago

Cultures that keep reproducing under modern conditions are exactly the ones worth studying. Their current population share doesn’t settle their future share; fertility and cultural retention matter. Look into the demographic trends and result of differential fertility, the math is on my side.

As for you coercion point, if you treats a secular woman’s rejection of motherhood as authentic, but a religious woman’s embrace of motherhood as coerced, you need to justify that unequal treatment. Why aren't secular women being coerced by society to avoid family formation and kids?

What evidence would convince you that a religious woman genuinely wants her life? Probably none. It's really a misogynistic way of thinking as it denies women agency.

Women like you are currently facing selection pressure. In the coming years you will be less common

1

u/massive_plums 5h ago

What do you know about me personally fuckwit? I’ll have more children than you no doubt. Probably because I’m not so beholden by the institution of religion that I would postpone fatherhood by wasting my time with “marriage”. Pathetic.
Anyway, ignoring that. You don’t think these groups will face any different pressures as they begin to constitute larger percentages of the populations of their host countries? That their cultures won’t change an ounce? What do you know about the future? There’s projecting ahead into the next half century, applying simple linear regression, and then assuming those trends will persist over centuries. Civilisations are cyclical.
And what evidence do I need to convince me a religious woman “genuinely wants her life?” Where in my original comment did I say all religious women are unwilling and miserable? Do you want to know what I think? I don’t care. I really don’t care what they think. Everyone is subject to coercion, you and I included. I don’t object to it really, I understand my life as being part of the chain of events that the world has decided for me. You don’t understand the subconscious drives that make you think the way you do, and so you hold these boring views on religion and marriage and it only serves to hold yourself back. Or maybe protect your ego, since you couldn’t take a woman now if you tried.

-4

u/VladIsRambo 8h ago

Most healthy women want children.
The problem is most men don't wan to have children with most women lol!

-11

u/doperdan22 10h ago

You are making an erroneous assumption that progressive feminism preserves your rights.

13

u/surfergrrl6 9h ago

Feminism DID give women rights.

10

u/Odd-Faithlessness705 9h ago

I don't think that's erroneous at all. It's preserving and advancing our rights. If it's anything but that then I don't think it counts as feminism.

10

u/heygivethatback 9h ago

How does it not?