Why Real Anarchists Don't Breed
By Les U. Knight
We anarchists have many reasons to avoid procreation today. Our redundant breeding feeds the very forces we are trying to counter, and prevents us from living as freely as we might.
Capitalism is dependent on a growing population and an expendable work force. Labor gains power when the need for workers is higher. As demands for supplies are reduced, and markets cease to grow, economic changes we aspire toward will more easily be achieved. Sustainable economic systems could replace out-dated "slash and burn" methods when consumers are fewer in number.
Society's institutions are dependent on our producing families. Churches, schools, and social services, all need fresh supplies of human bodies to exist.
Business applauds births. As if to celebrate each new North American life, a multi-passenger vehicle rolls off the assembly line to join it.
Anarchists generally oppose the culture of work, production and consumption. Breeding increases participation in these institutions. Workers with children are more dependent on their jobs and less likely to strike. Anarchists take risks which parents can't.
Thinking about not producing more offspring is difficult for most of us. It's a freedom that we guard fiercely, even though, with the exception of China's government, no one is trying to take it away. The establishment is certainly not trying to talk us out of reproducing. Governments have traditionally been natalist and often subsidize procreation. Disorganized masses are easier to control than small unified groups.
If each of us produces one less pupil for the schools, one less soldier for the military, one less wage slave for industrial exploitation, one less consumer, and one less pawn in the government subsistence trap, we will help the old system fall. And when it does fall, it won't be landing on any children we chose not to create.
Anarchy includes taking responsibility for our own lives. Creating a dependent which "takes a village" to raise, forces others to share responsibility for a couple's free choice. Breeding, especially insisting on extra services for breeding, shirks personal responsibility.
Anarchists eschew hierarchy, favoring interactions among equals. Parent-child relationships are hierarchical, not consensual. Children don't choose to be born, but parents do choose to breed. Creating a dependent child also creates an authority figure for many years. Couples who breed "accidentally," have not taken responsibility for their fertility.
Anarchists and environmentalists understand the biosphere is in danger, and that six billion of us is far too many. Taking personal responsibility, we eschew breeding for the sake of both humankind and the Earth. Earth's biosphere will benefit as every demand humans place on Nature is reduced. Human society will benefit from an improved birth rate, as shortages of food, housing, and resources are potentially lessened. Existing children could be better cared for in the coming weird times if there are fewer of them. By not breeding, we'll have more time and energy for promoting social change.
Anarchists seek neither security nor stability, understanding these states of illusion are not compatible with real social change. Parents seek both security and stability, for the sake of their children. Good parents make bad anarchists.
When thinking about improving our density, many see death as the only means of achieving it. Actually, death has had little effect on global population. A million deaths are compensated for in less than a week. High death rates cause high birth rates.
Giving up the fantasy of raising children which are biologically ours can feel like a major sacrifice to many people. However, if we are willing to risk our social status, jobs, and sometimes our freedom, surely we can consider giving up something that doesn't exist yet.
Some say we need to breed more anarchists, but how many of us come from anarchist parents? You cannot make someone an anarchist: it's up to them to decide. We'll likely have more luck influencing other people's children. Anyway, this would be expecting our children to do what we should be doing, with a 15 to 20 year delay. Anarchy happens right now, if we choose it.
Voluntarily choosing to not add another human to the existing billions is the greatest gift we can give the planet and the most severe blow we can strike against the New World Order.
Real anarchists don't breed.
I decided a while ago that I wouldn't have biological children for ecological reasons. As an African nationalist, I also think it would be irresponsible to create another African child when so many existing African orphans exist.
I think anarchists should take global overpopulation seriously (Earth might not be overpopulated from a resource standpoint but it is from an ecological one). I also don't see how a consistent anarchist can justify supporting human exploition of/authority over non-human animals, I guess that's another topic.
