Antinatalism or anti-natalism is a family of philosophical views that are critical of reproduction — they consider coming into existence as bad or deem procreation as immoral. Antinatalists thus argue that humans should abstain from having children. Antinatalist views are not necessarily limited only to humans, but may encompass all sentient creatures, claiming that coming into existence is a harm for sentient beings in general.
There are various reasons why antinatalists believe reproduction is problematic. The most common arguments for antinatalism include: Life entails inevitable suffering. Death is inevitable. Humans (and all forms of life) are born without their consent—no one chooses whether or not they come into existence. Although some people may turn out to be happy, this is not guaranteed, so to procreate is to gamble with another person's suffering. There is an axiological asymmetry between good and bad things in life, such that coming into existence is always a harm.
Etymology
The term antinatalism (in opposition to the term natalism, pronatalism or pro-natalism) was used probably for the first time by Théophile de Giraud in his book L'art de guillotiner les procréateurs: Manifeste anti-nataliste. In scholarly and literary writings, various ethical arguments have been put forth in defense of antinatalism, probably the most prominent of which is the asymmetry argument, put forward by South African philosopher David Benatar. Robbert Zandbergen makes a distinction between so-called reactionary (or activist) antinatalism and its more philosophical, originary counterpart. While the former seeks to limit human reproduction locally and/or temporarily, the latter seeks to end it conclusively.
History
Antinatalist sentiments have existed for thousands of years. Some of the earliest surviving formulations of the idea that it would be better not to have been born can be found in ancient Greece. One example is from Sophocles's Oedipus at Colonus, written shortly before Sophocles's death in 406 BC:
From Ecclesiastes 4:2–3:, 450–180 BC:
From Seneca's De Consolatione ad Marciam, written around 40 AD:
From Giacomo Leopardi, Operette Morali, Remarkable sayings of Philip Ottonieri, 1827:
From Gustave Flaubert, The Letters of Gustave Flaubert 1830–1857, 1846:
From Schopenhauer's Parerga and Paralipomena, 1851:
From Heinrich Heine, Morphine, 1856:
Arguments
In religion
Buddhism
The teaching of the Buddha, among other Four Noble Truths and the beginning of Mahāvagga, is interpreted by Hari Singh Gour as follows:
The issue of Buddhist antinatalism is also raised by Amy Paris Langenberg, she writes among others things:
Buddhism was understood as antinatalist by Jack Kerouac. Masahiro Morioka argues that ancient Buddhism was both antinatalist and anti-antinatalist:
Christianity and Gnosticism
The Marcionites, led by the theologian Marcion of Sinope, believed that the visible world is an evil creation of a crude, cruel, jealous, angry demiurge, Yahweh. According to this teaching, people should oppose him, abandon his world, not create people, and trust in the good God of mercy, foreign and distant.
The Encratites observed that birth leads to death. In order to conquer death, people should desist from procreation: "not produce fresh fodder for death".
The Manichaeans, the Bogomils, and the Cathars believed that procreation sentences the soul to imprisonment in evil matter. They saw procreation as an instrument of an evil god, demiurge, or of Satan that imprisons the divine element in the matter and thus causes the divine element to suffer.
Shakers believe that sex is the root of all sin and that procreation is a sign of the fallen state of humanity.
Augustine of Hippo wrote:
Gregory of Nyssa warns that no one should be lured by the argument that procreation is a mechanism that creates children and states that those who refrain from procreation by preserving their virginity "bring about a cancellation of death by preventing it from advancing further because of them, and, by setting themselves up as a kind of boundary stone between life and death, they keep death from going forward". Søren Kierkegaard believed that man enters this world by means of a crime, that their existence is a crime, and procreation is the fall which is the culmination of human egoism. According to him, Christianity exists to block the path of procreation; it is "a salvation but at the same time it is a stopping" that "aims at stopping the whole continuation which leads to the permanence of this world."
Segments in the Biblical book of Ecclesiastes express antinatalist thought: