Basman

This is just a kind of post-modern style of ethics, where moral intuitions are presented as both relative and inherently valid regardless of how they compare to various measure. Much of the same criticism that applies to post-modernism applies here as well, namely that just because you can have a moral intuition doesn't automatically mean it's true, and if its not true its not grounded in any sense of realness. Then it's literally fantasy. Also, if you are going to assume a relativistic stance, you have to acknowledge that anti-natalism is merely one possible perspective and that pro-natalism is equally correct as a perspective. Ultimately, you are not really saying anything substantial besides "this perspective exists". For anti-natalism to be a valid perspective it has to be true, at least by my standard (or at least parts of it). If it is not based in reality then its just hot air. What is missing is substantial proof that life disavows itself which doesn't rely on speculation and whataboutism. It's impossible to make a serious logical deduction based on for example the after life because it is impossible for us to know what it even really is. It's philosophically a dead end.

The "usual suspects" you mean, who would take a break from celebrating Charlie Kirk's death and bashing US hegemony to call you "weird" and "problematic" for wanting a hot chick an accuse you of being some phrase which ends with -ist or -phobe. They'll somehow make it about women's rights and being trans.

I didn't know how to swim till I was a teenager in high-school in a country where it is common to swim from a young age. One semester my class had swim lessons and I was literally the only one who couldn't swim. I was splashing in the kiddie pool while the rest of the class where doing exercises in the deep pool. However, I could remember one lesson from when I was very little that swimming is just doing the same motion as a frog. So I started practicing trying to float and swimming like a frog and I eventually figured out how to swim. At the end of the class I told the teacher that I can swim now so he told me to swim to the other end of the deep pool. So I dove down and swam towards the other end. The girls who sat and watched along the edge audibly "wowed", including the girl I had a crush on at the time. The teacher later that day complimented me for pushing through despite it being embarrassing to be the only one splashing in the kiddie pool for a high-schooler. He noted I could've just skipped class if I wanted to. It's actually a proven fact, no cap, that people will like you more for overcoming a deficiency than if you are perfect from the get go. They will at least respect you for it. What will make people, women especially, dislike you is cowardice, not trying, etc.

What stopping you from staying genuine, for a lack of better phrasing?

People got upset over this?.... That's funnier than the post itself.

You can't rape somebody without it being a consent question by definition. Consent is a material factor when the conspiracy to rape you does materialize unlike being born, which is not possible to consent for or against. The subtle logic here in relative to natalism is that being concieved is something that happens to you (in the negative sense), but for something to happen to you technically requires a past self which is changed negatively by being concieved. You don't exist prior to conception therefor conception can't be an infringement in of itself since you have nothing to compare it to.

I'd be very careful with characterizing ethical beliefs as instrumentalizing as it can quickly become a kind of charicature. They might be influenced by certain factors, but that doesn't mean that their values aren't genuine necessarilly. Its more important to look at the validity of their arguments.

Future generations cannot possibly consent for or against anything, therefor it is a matter of responsibility. Consent isn't a question if it is not a viable form of communication in the first place.

No one is really upset that they where born. Those rare exceptions who wish they weren't born have more so an issue with the extreme suffering that they might be experiencing rather than existing in of itself. The moralization of suffering to the degree to which where other experiences that are inherent in life become tertiary (like love or beauty) isn't fully justified in my opinion and is arguably the result of how we tend to judge ethics by giving suffering primacy. Something is ethical because it consciously minimizes suffering. But you could also argue that the deprivation of inherently positive and meaningfully charged experiences is a kind of responsibilty in of itself which we can't ethically deny or leave unacknowledged. How do you decide what is best for others? That is the crux of the issue. I find the anti-natalist approach to be overly simplistic and essentially deterministic, treating life as if defined by suffering. Responsibility is the strongest argument of anti-natalism, but the magical degree of primacy given to consent consequently treats humans beings pessimistically, as if humans don't want to live, outside of rare cases of extreme suffering. Anti-natalism fails on this point because it can't prove that humans dissavow life by nature. There's also a degree of concept creep present here relative to concent. It is not really a consent issue but one of responsibility. Consent is between existing parties who can reasonably communicate with each other. Animals and future generations can't consent because the former lacks the intelligence to communicate on human terms and the latter doesn't currently exist. When parties can't consent it becomes a matter of responsibility. The whole discussion has actually nothing to do with consent directly. Future generations dealing with the consequences of past actions isn't a question of consent but of responsibility. With the kind of magical primacy which consent is being treated with you could think it reasonable to complain that you didn't consent to being rained on today.

Certain aspects of anti-natalism are true, like most would agree to not concieve children under uncertain conditions or if you can't give a child the love it deserves (because you genuinely don't want kids for example). IE. children should be born with the best shot at life, and falling short of that is arguably irresponsible. Where anti-natilism falls short on my opinion is that it is biased against suffering while discounting pleasure. It treats suffering as more core than pleasure. It is inherently nihilistic, negative and even deterministic to a certain extent. Why is it that just because you suffer that then life is not worth living? Most people want to live even if they suffer, so what is the problem? There's a misanthropic quality to how anti-natalist tend to treat the topic as well. The human experience is treated as reprehensible because it is not perfect. It is a view that the average person would find extreme and strange. The underlying issue is that suffering is conditional and not a constant. It is also a matter of degree. You should avoid unnecessary suffering, which is anti-natalisms strongest point in a generel sense, being conscious of one's choices, especially relative to conception. But suffering is just part of life. It doesn't define it. Anti-natalism is a bit edgy in that sense. I feel that the current wave of anti-natalism is in part to being more informed with the internet but also due to economic exclusion and feeling pessimistic about the future.

The environment has been optimized to suit business needs, with an oversupply of workers, inflated real estate value, among other. Credentialism is largely just coping with a highly unequal relation between workers and employers relative to leverage over available jobs. Add to that we simply need less workers now than in the past due to technology, but our system is built on everyone getting payed for their contributions. Then you can wonder who is going to keep a consumerist economy going if people don't have a job? Economic exclusions makes the rich richer, but alienates trust in institutions among the rest.

The LP course can help you seek out life experience consciously and frame it in a constructive way. It is not a given that you need life experience. I do think there could be more content aimed at if you lack experience specifically though within the course. I remember hitting this wall myself and unsure of what to do.