The Biggest Reason for Men to Remain Child-Free

Yes, children are expensive, tiring, and limiting, but the biggest reason not to have any children is that they should be raised within a good marriage, and a good marriage is now too rare or too costly. The sad, brutal truth is that you're not likely to be able to provide children with a happy, stable, intact, nurturing, loving, married mother-and-father home in which you are a genuinely happy participant.

We are naturally child-free. We have to do something (and things have to go right) in order for us to have children. The question should not be "Why don't I have children?" but rather "Why should I have children?" You shouldn't, unless you can 1) explain exactly why you want to have children in a logical, coherent, rational, unselfish explanation; and 2) have reasonable certainty you can provide any children you have with a happy, stable, intact, nurturing, loving, married mother-and-father home. Most people can't manage 1. Most people who think they can manage 2 are wrong.

Even if we can be determined to be a good spouse and parent, even if we think we're choosing a spouse wisely and treating that spouse kindly, we can be fooled or fooling ourselves, or our spouse can suffer and illness or trauma that proves fatal to the marriage, or at least the positive environment of the marriage.

The biggest reason for men to remain child-free is to avoid entering into a detrimental partnership with a woman and to avoid being tied to a woman for the rest of his life, regardless of what she does. Stay free.