Jump to content

Does anyone get a little annoyed with the: "Our main purpose of life is to reproduce" statement?


TheKindredSoul

Recommended Posts

TheKindredSoul

I am not sure if it is just me who gets annoyed with this, but every time I hear or see this statement, I clench my teeth.

There is so much more to life than just mere reproduction, and reproduction is not for everyone. The urge is not even in some people!

My purpose in life has nothing to do with reproduction, so I hate hearing that biology says so or something like that. Biology does not determine

my purpose in life at all, and I am not passing on my genes. There is no purpose, and I prefer not having a carbon copy of myself roaming the Earth.

It would feel strange having something that came out of me looking at me and calling me "mother", because I am not supposed to be female. Also, sperm does not belong in my body in any way. Whether through intercourse (which is NOT happening) or artificial insemination (which is also NOT happening), sperm does not belong inside me.

It belongs where it originated. Pregnancy, forget it. I also identify as Neutrois, so the very thought that I can get pregnant is strange. I still cannot believe I am capable of getting pregnant. That should no way be a thing. I am just not interested in having children, and that is fine. I am not a child hater, just someone who prefers to live child free.

With having children, there is a lot more responsibility.

I am no selfish for being this way either. I know some people believe that not having children is selfish, but in my opinion, it is just as selfish as wanting children.

Think about it, we never choose to be here and there is no way to ask your child (who is not even yet conceived) if he/she wants to be born. That just never happens.

Sorry if I offended anyone, but you are just as selfish as I am.

So anyway, does it bother anyone else when someone says this statement?

Link to post
Share on other sites

That kind of statement is just someone's opinion, so it is annoying to hear it spoken as though it's The Truth. Everyone gets to decide what their purpose in life is, and I think it's fine if you don't think there's any particular purpose.

Link to post
Share on other sites
NotAllHere

My sister has three kids, loves kids... and hates that statement. her response is 'Well, my purpose was not to reproduce. My purpose was to be happy and having children just increased that for me.'

If my main purpose was to reproduce, why do I come with functional arms and legs and brain and such? Shouldn't I just be a big uterus with breasts? I think that means that my main purpose is whatever I decide to do with myself. Whether that is having children or having kitties or traveling the world sans commitments to anything.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Touchofinsight

I just stopped caring what people think life "is supposed to be about" we have our opinions and beliefs but beyond that we are all equally ignorant. There is no use getting upset over something you can't and shouldn't have control over. That's not to say your feelings are incorrect or not valid. Its just a matter of how much am I going to allow other people's opinions to influence me.

I think the closet thing that annoys me is when people say "You'd be a good father", yea you don't know me or who I really am and if you did I'd hope you would have the good sense to realize I am not parental material. This can bug me mostly because there are a bunch of parents out there who have kids and they don't have the attitude or mentality to raise an adult and this kind of ignorant babble helps create parents who aren't fit for the job.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Yes. I'm a sentient being, damnit (Shut up, tigers can be sentient) and I'll choose my life's purpose

Link to post
Share on other sites
I'd rather be in band.

It bothers me as well. Whenever a teacher of any sort of science has brought that up, I have had to stifle an agitated sigh. Some people just are obsessed with the thought that passing on one's genes is the only way to accomplish anything. To be honest, I despise children and the thought of intercourse. It is simply repulsive to me.

Link to post
Share on other sites

People like that seem to me like they're just trying to justify their sexual desires....

For me to have kids, especially right now, would be a terrible idea since I know I can't support/take care of them well enough, even if I wanted them. There're already more than enough people around and contributing my far-from-perfect genes will help no one. What I can contribute though lies somewhere in the entertainment industry. I can also fix numerous computer problems which is still a much needed skill. With the money I earn from skilled labour, I can use some of that to help charities, research and development which can help many others in ways I can't even begin to do on my own....with some lasting generations. For each person we help, we improve their chances of helping others and improve many more lives overall. That to me more than a good enough reason to live.

There are far more ways we can help the survival of our species than procreation.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Hmm, in today's world, "Our main purpose of life is to reproduce", is to me, like saying, "let us become a cancer to the earth".

Link to post
Share on other sites

I agree so much.

A person's purpose in life can be a very personal thing that is different for everyone. Saying that everybody has the same purpose, and that that purpose is just to have children is kind of dumb. Even from a biological standpoint it doesn't make so much sense to me; humans are the dominant species because we are social and intelligent, not because we have the ability to reproduce.

Link to post
Share on other sites
SlightlyToxicXmasShrub

As someone who never, ever wants to reproduce (don't particularly care for how babies get in and I most certainly do not care for how they get out) I almost always get irritated when I hear/read that statement.

If a person doesn't want kids, then they don't want kids. End of story. Even if someone thinks that the person who doesn't want kids will change their mind someday, or that it's the "duty" of humanity to procreate, they should keep those opinions to themselves because it's obvious those opinions are unwanted.

My grandfather once told me I'd make a great mother someday (when I was in fifth grade, what??) and I remember thinking something along the lines of "Uh, maybe but probably not."

Just because I'm good at and I enjoy guiding and helping people and I happen to be equipped with child-bearing anatomy doesn't automatically transfer into I'll make a great mother. No thank you.

Link to post
Share on other sites
TheKindredSoul

As someone who never, ever wants to reproduce (don't particularly care for how babies get in and I most certainly do not care for how they get out) I almost always get irritated when I hear/read that statement.

If a person doesn't want kids, then they don't want kids. End of story. Even if someone thinks that the person who doesn't want kids will change their mind someday, or that it's the "duty" of humanity to procreate, they should keep those opinions to themselves because it's obvious those opinions are unwanted.

My grandfather once told me I'd make a great mother someday (when I was in fifth grade, what??) and I remember thinking something along the lines of "Uh, maybe but probably not."

Just because I'm good at and I enjoy guiding and helping people and I happen to be equipped with child-bearing anatomy doesn't automatically transfer into I'll make a great mother. No thank you.

I am often told that I would make a great parent as well. If only they knew....

Link to post
Share on other sites

I guess I'm kind of playing devil's advocate here but I think there is scientific truth in the idea that living beings exist to pass on their genes and propagate to improve the species. Obviously if that wasn't an least one component of the purpose of living, all life would stop.
However, personally passing on genes via reproduction is not the only way to do that. When we teach other people things and help them improve, it impacts future generations and influences their decisions. So I think even if we aren't reproducing we are still passing on something of ourselves, and that is also an undeniable component of life. Most people do not wish to merely exist, have no influence, and be forgotten.

Link to post
Share on other sites
SorryNotSorry

The statement itself doesn't annoy me nearly as much as when others get on their high horse and tell me how I need to reproduce (because I'm the dumbest person on Earth and I constantly need to be reminded of it). <_<

Link to post
Share on other sites
Honey_Badger

I get through it the same way I get through most people's ignorant statements that I can't walk away from at the time: I imagine Spock telling them that they're illogical.

Also, not to get Malthusian on all of you, but we already have more people on Earth than earth can support, so it's actually a great idea for lots of people to limit or forego reproducing.

Link to post
Share on other sites

That statement bugs the crap outta me. The purpose of life is to find ones purpose, whatever that may be (IMO).

Link to post
Share on other sites
words are futile devices

I guess I'm kind of playing devil's advocate here but I think there is scientific truth in the idea that living beings exist to pass on their genes and propagate to improve the species. Obviously if that wasn't an least one component of the purpose of living, all life would stop.

However, personally passing on genes via reproduction is not the only way to do that. When we teach other people things and help them improve, it impacts future generations and influences their decisions. So I think even if we aren't reproducing we are still passing on something of ourselves, and that is also an undeniable component of life. Most people do not wish to merely exist, have no influence, and be forgotten.

I agree with this so much. There are many ways to leave our mark on the world, even if we don't happen to pass on our genes while we're at it. Nobody's worth or potential to make an impact are decreased just because they don't produce offspring. That's an erroneous and damaging thought process.

Link to post
Share on other sites
boxed toast

Why would our main purpose be to reproduce? There are already too many of us. Working on thinning our numbers would be a far better cause.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I remember my biology teacher once told us that we were born in the aim of perpetuating the human specie :angry:

Couldn't agree with you more... Especially with the idea that

we never choose to be here and there is no way to ask your child (who is not even yet conceived) if he/she wants to be born.

I think about it all the time.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Rolling Everforward

The purpose of the species is to reproduce. The purpose of the individual is... less clear.

Link to post
Share on other sites

There are many facets to it all. One common concept is whoever does decide to reproduce (sexually and/or fert assisted), their genes are making up more of the next generation. That is not necessarily true. It assumes that all the offspring get married and have kids of their own. It also assumes that with each generation the "original" parents are passed down evenly - when they are not! What I've followed in genealogy is that it takes just like 3 or 4 generations for an individual's "own" DNA composition to disperse so much you wouldn't have enough bits and peices in the population to say that's individual's unique DNA composition is still present. Let alone whole lineages. The actions of one generation could wipe all traces of whole populations before it.

The purpose of the species is to reproduce. The purpose of the individual is... less clear.

The "individual" is "individual", it diversifies and is separate from the entities that are the populations or societies. Free-willed foot soldier is kinda how I see it.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Philip027

I can't really get that upset with it because it sounds so patently ridiculous, just like any other time someone tries to dictate what the purpose of someone else's life should be.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Janus the Fox

This statement is mostly false to me, it often ignores the bigger picture of life and that's whatever an individual makes of it.

There's hundreds of purposes of life, there's no one purpose.

It don't bug me but, the world isn't going to stop turning if we don't 'fulfil' this flawed statement.

Link to post
Share on other sites

If we were here to reproduce, (forgive this point but...) why don't we reproduce asexually?

Link to post
Share on other sites
SlightlyToxicXmasShrub

If we were here to reproduce, (forgive this point but...) why don't we reproduce asexually?

If I remember my biology lessons correctly, it's because as humans we are too complex.

But I get your point - if our one true purpose was to reproduce, one would think that it would be easier to do so. For example, it wouldn't take nine months and hours of painful labor.

Maybe reproduction is so long and painful because we're actually not supposed to reproduce....plot twist. :lol:

Link to post
Share on other sites
Mona Lisa

The statement that our main purpose of life is to reproduce is terribly offensive, particular to people who do not want to or cannot reproduce. It basically implies that such people are worthless human beings, which is ridiculous. What makes us human, what separates us from plants and microbes and other animals, is that we think, we create, we dream, and we pursue other purposes in addition to surviving and passing on our genes. That we reproduce is merely a reason how we exist, not why we exist.

Link to post
Share on other sites
. . .but there are sounds

**warning, this rambles off into my personal ethics, feel free to disregard **

Maybe this is a weird point of view, but I actually do think that the main 'purpose' of life is to reproduce, but perhaps not in the way folks here are thinking. First, I will draw attention to the quotes around purpose. I believe life just sort of happened, nothing more than an accident of a chaotic universe. Life, necessarily, doesn't have a purpose, as such. As thinking beings that is rather unsatisfying so we dream up purposes for things, but that is really all it is, stuff we made up. I think there is a decent argument for a sort of pseudo-purpose for life though. Life is interesting in a way that most other chemical reactions in a chaotic soup are not in that it contains positive feedback. It tends towards an increase in complexity rather than a degeneration towards entropy. If I can be so bold as to define good at least partially as the opposition to the total destruction of everything and purpose as intention towards good (this makes sense as an abstraction of everyone views themselves as the 'good guy'), then the reproduction of life falls out as the purpose of life. However, this doesn't oblige individual reproduction any more than every cell in a macroscopic organism should need to be directly devoted to reproductive success. Then, someone who fills the role of an educator and thus empowers a future generation to succeed fulfils this purpose of reproduction regardless of actual physical reproduction. Similarly, though perhaps less obviously, any contribution to the well being of one's community or the species fulfils this purpose.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I think the purpose of life is not to die.

That primarily means keeping your body alive.

If we extend that to our legacy one could say children is a way to keep yourself alive longer. You can form and shape a child to have similar morals or interests or just genes.

Another way is to be alive in others memory. It can be through achievements in your work or through the people you know.

If I died today pieces of me will remain that would be looked at, used and helpful to people at least 25 years from now.

That gives me purpose to get up in the morning.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Synchrèse

Yes, I am annoyed. Especially when I hear these words from a politician who is a sixty-year-old, single, childless woman.

My personal opinion is that we have no purpose in life, we all came here by accident and we are the only ones who can make our own purpose.

I have a hard time understanding people who are so preoccupied with reproduction in order to prolong the existence of our species - I'm not really bothered with the idea that one day there will be no humans, because that's how it works...sooner or later we disappear.

Besides I'm allergic to all these statements which are trying to tell me how I'm supposed to function and what I'm supposed to do with my life.

If someone wants to have kids and they give him happiness, it's fine. If someone doesn't want it, it's fine.

Link to post
Share on other sites
helana12_03

I've had people ask me what my "purpose in life" is of I don't want to have kids. The first time it happened I was really surprised... Why would this be my purpose in life or make my life meaningful? Sometime I feel like having kids is more selfish than trying to help those who are already alive and suffering and that not having kids helps prevent overpopulation and gives you more time and resources to help others. So who are they to call us selfish?

And what about those who don't think I'm capable of raising children? They're actually doing the child a favor by not having them! Some people are capable of being responsible parents and some are not.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...