The two co-hosts advocate for living a child-free life.
They argue that overpopulation contributes to the climate crisis — “The planet was not built for this many people,” BJ quips. “We're overbooked like a New York City restaurant at 7 p.m. for dinner.”
Speaking of dinner, Rosie sees the child-free argument similarly to the nuanced approach to eating meat. Instead of being an omnivore-hating vegan, or a vegan-hating omnivore, a nuanced viewpoint calls for a decrease in meat consumption to reduce pollution.
“We're not saying don't eat meat — we're saying limit,” Rosie explains, “That's what I'm encouraging with the child-free view. You don't have to have five kids, it's not 1950.”
The co-hosts also discuss the role advertising plays in priming the culture to idealize nuclear families.
📚 “How to Win Friends & Influence People,” by Dale Carnegie, 1936.
📺 How the Egg Freezing Industry Preys on Fertility Fear, from “Adam Ruins Everything” on truTV.
📺 George Carlin on politicians using children as rhetorical shields.
📻 Abortion and Crime, Revisited, an update of the controversial study included in a “Freakonomics” chapter.
📚 The Baby Matrix: Why Freeing Our Minds From Outmoded Thinking About Parenthood & Reproduction Will Create a Better World, by Laura Carroll.
📑 “Mothers Who Regret Having Children” article in Marie Claire.
⭐ [Serious] Parents who regret having kids: Why? a Reddit thread.
📚 The Conscious Parent: Transforming Ourselves, Empowering Our Children, by Dr. Shefali Tsabary.
📚 “Adult Children of Alcoholics,” by Dr. Janet G. Woititz EdD.
⭐ NAMI: National Alliance on Mental Illness, a society that advocates for placing severely mentally ill people, not just ones that have threatened to hurt themselves or others, into mental health facilities.
📑 Having Kids Makes You Happier, But Only When They Move Out, an article in “New Scientist.”
⭐ BJ Mendelson Newsletter, Check out BJ's newsletter
