Childfree by choice forum

HBC08 wrote: »

What about poor Bert?

It's a +1 for me.

Maybe Bert has 4 legs?

+1 for me.

At the risk of upsetting a load of apple carts, I would think that this:

Faith wrote: »

* To chat with like-minded people socially

is probably the strongest argument against creating such a forum. It's pretty much the very definition of a social media bubble, and contrary to the spirit of a broad-based discussion platform like boards.ie

I'll admit that I'm struggling to understand how anyone who has chosen the child-free life could find themselves so suffocated by children, children, everywhere that they need a safe space to talk about not having children? I am (involuntarily) leading a child-free life at the moment (they grew up and left! :pac: ) and I think my only boards.ie contribution in several months that's referred to them in any way was an oblique reference to citizenship application in the Brexit thread.

Other than that, surely it is overall more positive to have some contrary views on any particular query (child-free hotels, child-free trains, child-free restaurants, child-free festivals ... ) that help to guide one's decision-making? There's a question in the Entrepreneur forum today about the practicalities of adding a vegetarian café to an arts-and-crafts business. I would say that's a far better place to get balanced, realistic advice for that particular query than in Vegetarian forum.

And I'd agree with osarusan: putting childfree-by-choice discussions into the same category as can't-have-children conversations is seriously disturbed logic!

Faith wrote: »

Again, it's missing the point to suggest that it would just be a forum for recommendations about child free XYZ, and I would respectfully suggest that interpretation stems from not recognising the complexities that can be associated with choosing not to have children - things like social pressures, social isolation, worries about the future, fears about regret, and a multitude of others.

This is precisely the part that, to me, seems particularly inappropriate to "wall off" in a childfree forum. Taking social isolation as an example, especially in (but not limited to) the current context - it's entirely possible to be struggle with social isolation even if one does have children: they might be stranded somewhere else, they might not care about you, they might be dead ...

and if social isolation is really that much of a problem, is it because you have no other friends or neighbours, you're working from home and don't meet work colleagues, you're struggling without your weekly round of pints ... ?

Even if a thread was kept to "social isolation affecting child-free people, you're still looking at young adults who haven't yet thought about having children, or the guy whose faithful bethrothed is be stuck on the far side of the world and he can't make them alone, or the career-oriented woman who child-free by choice.

For any given topic, chances are you can take the "child" bit out of the question, replace it with some other adjective and find a thread on it in Personal Issues or Work & Employment. On those threads, by and large the contributors will completely respect any poster who indicates that they don't have and don't (immediately/ever) want children, and the simple fact of having children doesn't make their advice irrelevant. This is why I'd ask: what is the advantage of hiding any such questions in an obscure corner of the site?

+1

As someone who has never wanted kids, it's been a struggle to keep some friendships alive when they have kids, so a social online space of like minded people is a great idea.

cee_jay wrote: »

+1

As someone who has never wanted kids, it's been a struggle to keep some friendships alive when they have kids, so a social online space of like minded people is a great idea.

If that's the purpose, well this idea is on a hiding to nothing. Notwithstanding the fact that this forum, if it comes into being will end up being a bitter old ghost town, defined by a negative, relationships in online forums through pseudonyms are never going to replace quality in-person friendships.

+1

MrMusician18 wrote: »

I didn't abuse anyone, thanks.

This site has so many sub-forums it's ended up that any conversation can now be categorized as more rightly belonging in some dead corner of the site. It's one of the reasons the site is dying. For example take tattoos and piercing forum, which in sure someone thought was a great idea, like this one. If I wanted advice on this topic I would have to go in that zombie forum, or would be moved there by a zealous mod (as you are not allowed to post for traffic), killing the discussion.

Normally for the creation of sub-forums there is consistent production of threads in another forum that could be considered to fall under that topic. Aside from this thread, I haven't seen any childless by choice threads, anywhere on the site, so there certainly isn't enough to fill a forum. Can you show us, as the proposer, say 10-15 threads created in the last six months that would've ended up moved to your new forum?

If the idea is to create a space for like minded people to gather to chat then perhaps a FB group is more appropriate. Oh wait, that exists and is dead...

I don’t imagine the idea or purpose of the proposed forum is intended solely as a place where people who are interested or curious about a lifestyle can go to looking for advice as to how to go about that lifestyle. I would see it as intended as a place where people who live that lifestyle already can relate to each other on just that one single aspect of their lives, while being able to talk about other aspects of their lives or activities without feeling the constant looming of what is literally inevitable for anyone who doesn’t have children - “have you ever thought about having children?”, “you’ll change your mind!”, “I’m here to change your mind!”, etc. It’s frickin’ tedious and it’s not interesting to the person or people who have to explain or entertain or engage with people whom they know view people who don’t want children as having something wrong with them or needing to be “fixed”, or their lives are unfulfilled and they couldn’t possibly be happy until or unless they have children. To use your example - it’s like someone who has no interest in tattoos being constantly bombarded with questions and pressure from people who think tattoos are the bees knees and everyone should have at least one or they’re not normal.

Evidence of existing interest in a forum for like minded people who have no interest in having children is something of an impossibility given the nature of the idea of not having children, it’s almost unheard of as to be looked at as being completely unreasonable, unacceptable. That’s why you don’t see many, or indeed any threads discussing the idea being particularly popular - because often people aren’t comfortable with feeling like they have to justify themselves or their decisions to people whom they know just won’t get it, and have no interest in getting it, those people just want a “debate”, and that’s not the purpose of the forum as I understand it.

There are numerous, and I mean numerous threads debating the whole concept of “children - to have or not to have, or is it better not to have had at all?” kinda nonsense, frankly. Loads of threads across the site in various forums, and it’s only going to become more topical and current given there is a growing anti-natalist movement has attached itself to the concept of climate change to further their ideology. They’re a completely different breed altogether though (forgive the pun) from people who don’t have anything against people with children and don’t have any interest in discouraging people from having children. It’s those people would be directed to the more appropriate forum if they want to have that particular discussion (I’ll be banned from CA for suggesting it’s a more appropriate forum, but feck it :pac:). It’s no different than directing anti-vegans or anti-theists to a more appropriate forum, as the forum isn’t intended nor appropriate for people who are anti-children, and in my experience people who don’t have any interest in having children doesn’t mean they are anti-children. In my experience it’s rather people who have children who are anti-children, though I’ve never entertained them long enough to figure out what that’s about tbh, because frankly it’s not a point of view I find particularly interesting enough to warrant further investigation.

The idea IS to create a space where like-minded people can chat and associate freely without fear of judgement or having to justify themselves to new posters who just wandered in and didn’t bother to read the charter or anything else, and in response to my earlier post, Faith touched on this when they said that it would be a live and let live forum, which is a good thing IMO, and I imagine any of the sort of “conflict creators” who are doing it just for the hell of a “debate”, wouldn’t be entertained, any more than they aren’t entertained in other forums and a stop is put to their behaviour rather quickly. It’s much easier to do that in a community of like-minded people in the format that Boards provides, than it is to do it on any other medium such as Facebook, Twitter or any of the many, many other mediums there are to choose from such as Reddit or blogs or community driven sites - Boards is somewhat unique in that it allows for a smaller, closer-knit community of like-minded people to participate in discussions and engage and enjoy sharing their opinions and their perspectives without being overwhelmed by trolls and figuring like many of the members of the dead Facebook group that it’s simply not worth it to try and use Facebooks platform as a means to meet other like-minded people and chat about everything without having to think about the children.

-1 from me.
Can't see the scope.

+1 from me.

Vital Transformation wrote: »

I've been on boards for 12 years. You seems to have an issue with the size of the site, but it has been that kind of forum for a very long time. If the site has less traffic now than it used to have, I doubt that is the reason. There has always been a vast amount of forums here, more than any discussion website I've seen over the years apart from Reddit.

Boards has always had niche forums; I would consider that a strength of the site, providing a space for discussion aimed at a predominantly Irish audience. By nature some will always be more popular than others. If you do a search you'll see examples of very inactive forums getting closed. It's not like this process doesn't occur already.

From a brief glance, even forums like the LGBT one look pretty dead right now, and I don't think you could question the likes of that forums inclusion on this site, given the amount of people it can potentially cater for.

As it stands it seems the proposed forum has a good bit of support so far. It should be given a chance if that keeps up at least and we can see how it gets on from there. I wouldn't argue against its closure if it becomes as inactive as you predict.

I've been around boards just as long, from before it's heyday, the hack and to the site we have today. A huge problem the site has is that the structure is for an awful lot more posters than we have anymore. You could compare it to the church, an organization with loads of buildings but fewer and fewer people. All these zombie forums give the impression of a dead site, when what we actually have are although much fewer, but still plenty of posters, all spread thin. When people wander into these zombie forums, they see that the last active threads have a handful of posts and the top threads were last active months ago and don't post. Who would bother posting a question in a dead forum?
On a broader point, sub-forums that have little activity should be quickly closed and merged with a complementary forum. It really doesn't happen fast enough but that's a discussion for another day.

If there is a genuine appetite for this topic I would suggest that it should go in a rebranded humanities and lifestyle forum. The two or three childless by choice "mega threads" could go there as well as discussion on other lifestyle choices.

CelticRambler wrote: »

There's one phrase that's being used to support the creation of this forum:

Here's the thing, though: if the only attribute that defines this like-mindedness is a confirmed desire to have no children, so much so that it weighs on one's everyday life, either (a) that's a very poor basis on which to form a community; or (b) it's an open invitation to the "anti-natalists" to which OneEyeJack refers.

(a) You don’t explain why, in your opinion, you see it as a very poor basis to form a community, when that’s precisely how any community is formed - they are borne out of shared world views and values and attitudes among people of a similar mindset.

(b) I also mentioned that while it will invariably attract people of that particular mindset, they can be directed to the more appropriate forums if they wish to prosletise their particular ideology.

CelticRambler wrote: »

I would say you don't see many threads on the subject because being child-free (by choice or not) is in fact very common; and because for the most part, having or not having children is irrelevant to the vast majority of topics that affect the vast majority of people. The taste of SuperValu sausages? Irrelevant. Ordering from UK Amazon post Brexit? Irrelevant. ITV on Virgin Media? Irrelevant. MS Paint? Irrelevant. Circle K scratch and win? Irrelevant. Liveline? Irrelevant. Leeds Utd Team Talk? Irrelevant.

It’s really not that common at all for people who choose not to have children and live their lives accordingly. It’s really not at all as simple as “Don’t want children? Abstain from sex! Easy, job done, end of discussion!”. The decision forms the fundamental basis of a person’s world view and impacts on many or all aspects of their lives to some degree or to one degree or another. They live in a society where they are constantly bombarded with advertising for example that extols the virtues of family values as still being the state of the nuclear family, whereas in Ireland the Family as an institution as it is regarded in the Irish Constitution is not by whether or not one has children, but rather through the institution of Marriage. From the point of view of the State, a married couple is a family, whereas from the point of view of most people in Irish society at least - Family begins when people have children.

It’s not about what is irrelevant to a person or to a community of people, it’s about what is relevant - sure, for you or other people who think like you do, they’re not going to see the relevance of not having children in discussing the topics you mention, but I don’t imagine the forum would be solely restricted to discussing those topics. It’s not even about discussing those topics specifically, the sense of community comes from being able to have discussions that are fundamentally from the point of view of not having children. If you’ll pardon the crudity of the analogy for a minute but it’s the easiest one that comes to mind - I don’t know what it’s like for women that like nothing better than to get home from work in the evening and throw off their bra (I’ve never objected), but I get the idea behind it - that for them it’s liberation from a restriction that they’ve had to put up with all day. While I myself am in possession of a fine pair of moobs (IMO), I don’t imagine I’ll ever need the additional support and restrictions that come from wearing such devices (or more particularly an ill-fitting one that completely defeats the intended purpose). It’s not even interesting to me, but it’s something I know a lot of ladies experience, but don’t talk about in polite society, rather they speak of such issues in hushed tones among themselves. It’s the same with not having children, and when another poster questioned the poster on the rationale of a meet-up group for women only, I figured the simplest explanation is that is it’s intended purpose - a forum or quorum as it were for women who do not wish to have children, they have a commonality which defines their community. There doesn’t have to be any more to it, but there is. I’m not a woman, but I still know of the social pressure that young girls and women experience as motherhood straddles somewhere between an expectation and an obligation - to become what society expects of them, and to fulfill that role in spite of the fact that they may wish to choose a different path in life for themselves. Any girl or woman who deviates from that path is to be immediately viewed with suspicion, if not outright contempt.

That’s why you don’t see many threads where people feel free to admit they do not wish to have children, or where they do not feel embarrassment and humiliation for the fact that they can’t. Merely saying it’s nothing to be embarrassed about, isn’t telling anyone anything they aren’t acutely aware of already.

CelticRambler wrote: »

Amongst several child-free friends, I have one former-work-colleague-become-friend. Over the course of this last week, we have spoken about chainsaws, Christmas decorations, to work or not to work, Brexit, potential new relationships, updates on misc mutual acquaintances, Covid, the weather, gardening, cooking, the practicalities of travelling in continental Europe, music and dance. I think that's more than enough to make us "like minded" ... despite the fact that I'd love to have (more) children and she's become a borderline anti-natalist.

So I'd ask again: what advantage would there be in hiding discussions about the practical problems of real life in a quiet corner of the site, thereby deliberately excluding the people who might have the most relevant experience to contribute?

Who has suggested hiding discussions away? Isn’t the very fact that this forum specifically is being requested, evidence that the people who support the idea of its creation, don’t want discussion hidden away in one mega thread in Parenting or TLL or TGC or wherever? It’s proposed as a forum in its own right under the Soc category at least, same as all the other forums which exist already pertaining to accommodating the many different facets of society. The people with the most relevant experience to contribute? Not sure exactly who they might be (though priests and nuns invariably spring to mind), but I don’t foresee the forum as intending to exclude anyone when it’s been explicitly stated and reassurances have been given already of the forums intended live and let live ethos (minus the prosletysing of ideologues of course), but as long an everyone is on the same page I could see the forum adding value to what Boards offers to Irish society, by providing a space for more people in the community where they can indeed relax without all the additional stress of not having children.

One eyed Jack wrote: »

(a) You don’t explain why, in your opinion, you see it as a very poor basis to form a community ...

Because, as the rest of your post exemplifies, it would be a community founded on a very, very distorted view of the role of children in one's life, to the point that every decision, every discussion, every question is viewed through the lens of whether or not a person who has chosen to have children can be trusted to respect the concerns of someone who has chosen not to have children. That is a hugely dysfunctional starting point for any new community.

If someone has a problem with their mother/sister/aunty banging on about them starting a family, that's a relationship problem.
If someone has a problem with every other woman in their workplace taking maternity leave, that's a workplace problem.
If someone's worried about having no descendants to leave their worldly possessions to, that's an inheritance problem.
If someone wants to find the cheapest flights in mid-July on a plane that'll have no children on it, that's a Travel problem.
Just because someone has children doesn't mean that they're not well qualified to give advice on how to deal with any of those child-free situations.

So on the one hand, we have the proposal to make this forum inclusive and touching several different topics (all of which are catered for elsewhere on the site); and on the other, it's intended to be a place for members whose lives are overwhelmingly infused with their deliberate decision to not have children. Those two states are incompatible.

Out of curiosity, I've just had a look at my own circle - 4 out of my 5 most recent WhatsApp chats are with childless people, 3 out of my 5 most recent texts are to people with no children; and 4 out of 7 individuals that I follow on YouTube are child-free (6 if you include those with grown-up children). I have three 40-50yo female cousins (in rural Ireland) and one male who have no children and it's never been considered abnormal.

Perhaps it would be useful to propose a handful of likely thread topics in this discussion to see what level of engagement could be expected?