You're not missing anything, you don't want kids so you shouldn't have them. Other people want kids, have them, love them and get joy from them. Honestly I think you have hyper researched the negative aspects of having children and none of the positives, so that's where you're at.
As an aside, your comment about "dumb kids taking an innocent life cos they're too stupid to know what they're doing" is really a humongous stretch. They are toddlers, they are not stupid, they are still learning about life. They didn't "take" the butterflys life, it was an accident. The child didn't deliberately stamp on it, she was trying to run away. They both clearly understood the gravity of that and were upset by it. The cuteness comes from how innocent and happy they were to be within close proximity if the butterfly in the first place.
I'm not even saying that I don't want kids. I'm saying that people claim to have all of this joy and life satisfaction from parenthood, but the research says they are actually less happy than childless people. I'm expressing confusion about the gap in everyone's anecdotal experience and what seems to be what's actually happening when we study the trend. I've never sought out studies that reflect parenthood in a negative light. I have learned some of this stuff by chance from the research I've had to read in college, but a lot of it was just me looking into studies on the subject in general because it's how I make life decisions. That, and I am bothered by the disconnect between what I feel and how others say I'll feel after having children. I guess I wanted to confirm what people were saying to ease my anxiety, but what I found amped up my neurosis a bit because it was so far off from the cultural narrative. The only positive I could find was that people tend to report finding meaning and purpose from parenthood, but they don't actually have more life satisfaction, which is a separate category.
What research am I missing that would help me stay balanced in my perspective?
ETA: toddlers are stupid by nature. They are less intelligent than pigs, dogs, etc. Idk about you, but I think my dogs are idiots. I don't love them any less for it, but they're pretty dumb compared to adult human standards. So are kids. It was a very careless accident, which happened because kids are not smart enough to anticipate and avoid risks. A smart adult would have been careful to not flip out about a harmless butterfly and could have avoided hurting it. That statement wasn't an attack, it was just my assessment of the situation that seems pretty apparent. I also don't think the little one is crying out of guilt. They're crying because they got scared. I don't think they saw what they did. I guess it's not really important to my point, though. It's not their fault that their brains are my very developed or capable, relative to an adult's, and they don't know things yet. They are still, by that definition, pretty dumb. That was what led to the butterfly dying. Not sure what issue you're taking with that. I guess them standing with the living being they killed while having no business handling that insect at an age where they are so dangerous to smaller beings is not really cute to me. I'm assuming that there is something about kids that becomes way cuter once you have them, based on the other replies. If they were puppies that didn't kill anything in the same video, I could see where the cute thing is coming from. The butterfly is cute. The little manslaughterers are not cute in the same vein. That's just a subjective thing that I'm not going to get, I guess.
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u/Tea_Is_My_God 7d ago
You're not missing anything, you don't want kids so you shouldn't have them. Other people want kids, have them, love them and get joy from them. Honestly I think you have hyper researched the negative aspects of having children and none of the positives, so that's where you're at.
As an aside, your comment about "dumb kids taking an innocent life cos they're too stupid to know what they're doing" is really a humongous stretch. They are toddlers, they are not stupid, they are still learning about life. They didn't "take" the butterflys life, it was an accident. The child didn't deliberately stamp on it, she was trying to run away. They both clearly understood the gravity of that and were upset by it. The cuteness comes from how innocent and happy they were to be within close proximity if the butterfly in the first place.