Anti-Natalism

by Ken Coates

  Admittedly it is quite unrealistic for us to expect Benatar to treat every aspect of anti-natalism, including the propagation of the message of non-procreation. Yet the practice of his philosophy requires further thought as well as research besides the compulsion of arguments and logic. Benatar has laid the foundations of philosophical anti-natalism, i.e. modern rejectionism, and it is up to others to build on it and contribute further to the principles and practice of the same.12 We shall return to this question later (see Ch.5).

  Endnote – Chapter 3

  1. On existentialism see Introduction.

  2. See e.g. Sartre (1948), Camus (1975). On Heidegger see Watts (2001). On Unamuno, Camus and Cioran see Dienstag (2006). See also Ligotti (2010, 47-50).

  3. On the difficulty of getting a grasp on Cioran’s thought see Kluback and Finkenthal (1997, 1-2, 11).

  4. Although Schopenhauer is often described as an ‘anti-natalist’ we should note that what he espoused as the path to liberation was not refraining from procreation but willlessness, i.e. the abnegation of the will-to-live, and his concept of willlessness resembles the Buddhist notion of nirvana. Although Schopenhauer is explicit in his condemnation of procreation, which he sees as the strongest affirmation of the will-to-live, he does not advocate anti-natalism as the way out of existence. On this point see also Ligotti (2010, 30).

  5. Hartmann makes a similar argument regarding our positive bias.

  6. It is interesting to note Schopenhauer’s observation on our positive self-assessment. He believes it is, in part, because we do not want to be an object of schadenfreude.

  7. See e.g. Kierkegaard on Schopenhauer (http://philosophy.livejournal.com/1965165.html) downloaded 8/30/2011. See also Cartwright (2010, 534).

  8. See Basten (2009).

  9. This is referred to in Benatar’s interview on Radio Direko (Radio 702/Cape Talk), 25 February 2009. See http://web.uct.ac.za/depts/philosophy/staff_benatar_betternevertohavebeen.htm accessed on 4/24/2013.

  10. See e.g. Basten (2009, 12-13); Echo Chang et al. (2010); P. Span ‘Aging Without Children’, http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/25/aging-without-children/ accessed on 6/5/2013.

  11. A recent example is that of Jim Crawford (see note 12) who had two children before he became an anti-natalist.

  12. Ligotti (2010) and Crawford (2010) are two recent contributions to the literature of rejectionism. Ligotti’s work is a wide ranging and critical survey of the relevant literature from an anti-natal viewpoint. Crawford’s book is an interesting combination of autobiography and the defence of anti-natalism. Neither of these writers, however, explores the issues raised by the practice of rejectionism, including its dissemination as a belief system. Very little seems to have been written so far on this subject. There is of course a vast and burgeoning literature on childlessness, especially as a choice, from the viewpoint of women’s role and social identity. It does touch on the problems of practice. A recent work by Overall (2012), though not anti-natalist, is a comprehensive discussion of the philosophy - primarily the ethics - of procreation. It is written in a language that makes her book fully accessible to the non-specialist reader.

  Chapter 4: Literary Perspectives

  In this chapter we explore 20th century literary perspectives on the rejection of existence. The rationale for including literary perspectives alongside religious and philosophical ones was outlined in the Introduction and will not be repeated. Put simply, it is an exploration of the rejectionist perspective in modern literature. But why choose Beckett and Sartre?

  Samuel Beckett is perhaps the outstanding writer of the 20th century whose work is, explicitly or implicitly, concerned with virtually all the major rejectionist themes encountered in the chapters above. The gratuitous pain and suffering that existence inevitably brings in its train, the intrinsic meaninglessness and pointlessness of existence, birth as the gateway to suffering and death, love and sex as traps for the prolongation of existence and suffering, the ‘incurable optimism’ of human beings in the face of the misery of existence, all this and more are to be found in Beckett’s writing. Beckett’s oeuvre – plays, novels, short prose pieces, essays – is fairly consistent in terms of its rejectionist attitude although there is a great deal of variation in both form and content (see e.g. Robinson 1969, Hamilton & Hamilton 1976). The similarity between Beckett’s view of life and those of Schopenhauer and ancient Buddhism has often been noted (Buttner 2010; Bloom 2010, 3). Be that as it may, Beckett remains the 20th century writer with the most openly and thoroughly articulated rejectionist viewpoint.

  With Sartre we are in a very different situation. He was not only a novelist and playwright but also a philosopher and a political activist. Moreover his world-view changed a good deal in the course of his life. From a somewhat anarcho-solipsistic writer in the 1930s he morphed into an existentialist philosopher in the 1940s, claiming that existentialism was a humanist doctrine which emphasized individual freedom to choose and to act in accordance with this choice. Later he became a left-wing activist and a communist fellow-traveler and later still, in the 1970s, almost a Maoist revolutionary. To some extent his writings reflect these changes. However his first published novel Nausea (1938), is a remarkable work on the rejection of existence, an encounter of human consciousness with material existence which the former finds, to put simply, quite intolerable. Nausea is the experience of feeling existence - one’s own and others’ - as a sheer contingent presence without any rhyme or reason. Its principal theme from our viewpoint is the absurdity and superfluity of existence but it has other rejectionist themes as well such as suffering and boredom, as well as the various justifications for existence that human beings employ. We begin, however, with Beckett.

  Samuel Beckett: Literature of Rejection

  Existence and Suffering: The basic theme underlying Beckett’s perception of the world is the pointlessness and futility of existence. Because of man’s consciousness, his thinking ‘self’ – the ‘I’ – is aware of being tied to and being subject to the determinism of the laws of nature. Birth, maturity and eventual death, the compulsion of sexuality, the ravages of time – all these are aspects of existence that our consciousness makes us aware of yet over which we have no control. Moreover existence subjects us to all forms of suffering. Is there any point to it all? Why should human beings be thrown into the world and be dragged through this process – the business of ‘living’ which seems to have no purpose other than its own perpetuation through time? In this context birth and death seem equally ‘meaningless’ events. Some of Beckett’s characters, e.g. in his novel Watt or his play Waiting for Godot (WFG), look for some significance or meaning to human existence but their quest comes to nothing. Beckett pours scorn over the idea that a Christian God or religion could confer meaning and reveal the mystery of existence. Nonetheless Biblical and other Christian allusions– myths, beliefs, symbols – occur frequently in Beckett’s work and the counterpart to the notion of contingency is the absence of God.2

  WFG, by far Beckett’s best known work, which brought him instant recognition presents many of his concerns and themes. A tragicomedy, it is a poignant expression of man’s anguish in conditions of meaningless existence. The play has little by way of action. It is primarily a dialogue between two tramps – Vladimir and Estragon – who are waiting on a country road for a character called Godot. Who is Godot or what he represents is left unclear. But the tramps are hoping for something like ‘salvation’, something that will confer meaning or significance to their existence. However Godot fails to arrive on the first day of their wait but sends word that he will surely come tomorrow. But the same thing happens the next day. Once again Godot fails to appear and sends word that he will definitely come the next day. That is where the play ends implying that the waiting will go on, as it has gone on in the past, although Godot will never come. In short man’s quest for meaning, for finding an answer to the riddle of existence has gone on through the ages and will go on in the future. The hopin
g and waiting is as certain as its futility.

  However while the tramps wait for Godot time will have to be passed and the boredom of existence contended with. Much of the play is about this. But they have done away with society and its usual trappings which provide most people with a ‘meaningful’ existence. ( see especially Zapffe & also Benatar above ). Having seen through the ‘game’ and refusing to play it Vladimir and Estragon are left on their own resources. They use language as a game to pass the time. They tell each other stories, pick quarrels, hurl abuses at each other. At times they think of suicide but do not take that way out and prefer to wait for Godot.

  While waiting, the only “event” in the play is their meeting with a landowner called Pozzo and his menial, ironically named Lucky, who pass by. Pozzo decides to stop for a while and chat with the tramps. Pozzo’s treatment of Lucky is cruel and humiliating to the extreme. Lucky is on a leash and is carrying a basket of provisions for Pozzo who wields a whip. Apart from other things Pozzo and Lucky illustrate the theme of man’s cruelty to man. They pass by once more later in the play showing the ravages of time: Pozzo has gone blind and Lucky dumb. This time the tramps mistreat the blind and helpless Pozzo.

  The tramps’ decision to go on waiting, trying to seek an answer to the riddle, is very much in line with Albert Camus’ injunction that man cannot but go on questioning the meaning of existence in spite of the silence of the universe. At least in WFG the tramps endure the agony and boredom of an apparently meaningless existence in the hope of an answer to the “overwhelming question” (see T.S. Eliot’s poem, Prufrock). Moreover in this play the idea of a Christian God and ‘salvation’ is associated in the tramps’ mind - at least in Vladimir’s - with Godot. In spite of frequent allusions to Biblical and Christian sources none of Beckett’s other works suggest the possibility of an answer - not to say look towards a solution- with a Christian connotation They tend to be secular and non-religious or even anti-religious, at least in the narrower sense of the term.

  If WFG expresses the metaphysical anguish and the insufferable boredom of existence with its long wait for death, All That Fall (ATF) (Beckett 1965) is an expression of the physical and emotional suffering and the triviality of existence. WFG is an abstract work, the characters are not realistic. ATF, on the other hand, presents recognizable, real life people of a small rural town presumably in Ireland. Mrs. Rooney, the main character, is a fat elderly woman, childless, having lost her daughter Minnie many years ago. She is walking with difficulty along a country road on her way to the railway station to meet her blind husband Dan. “What have I done to deserve all this, what, what?” she says as she halts. “How can I go on. I can’t. Oh let me just flop down on the road like a big fat jelly out of a bowl and never move again!” (9). The loss of her daughter is constantly on her mind and she is full of self-pity. “Oh I am just a hysterical old hag I know, destroyed with sorrow and pining and gentility and church-going and fat and rheumatism and childlessness…..Minnie! Little Minnie” she wails for her lost child (9).

  The play opens with a reference to Schubert’s Death and the Maiden, the music Mrs. Rooney hears coming from a house as she walks past it. Soon a Mr. Tyler comes along riding his bicycle on the way to the station and greets Mrs. Rooney. Mrs. Rooney asks after his “poor daughter”. She is fair, replies Mr. Tyler, but they “removed everything, you know, the whole…er…bag of tricks. Now I am grandchildless.” Shortly a van passes by with “thunderous rattles” shaking Mr. Tyler up who gets off his bicycle just in time. “It is suicide to be abroad”, says Mrs. Rooney, “but what is it to be at home? A lingering dissolution.” (10-11). Soon Mr. Tyler is heard muttering something under his breath. When asked he explains, “Nothing Mrs. Rooney, nothing, I was merely cursing, under my breath, God and man….and the wet Saturday afternoon of my conception. My back tire has gone down again” (11). Beckett’s plays are largely tragicomedies. The comic effect relies on exaggeration as well as the juxtaposition of the ‘sublime’ and the ‘ridiculous’, the philosophical or the serious remarks with the trivial and the particular. The comic element relieves the unbearable reality of existence as endured by the characters.

  There is a great deal of material along these lines in the play, by way of reference to death, illness and other sufferings of life. The main event of the play is that the train bringing Dan Rooney to the railway station is late, the reason being that a child fell off the train and was crushed under its wheels. Ironically the theme of the sermon announced by the preacher for the next day is “The Lord upholdeth all that fall and raiseth up all those that be bowed down”, the source of the play’s title. Upon hearing the theme Mr. and Mrs. Rooney break into a “wild laughter”. Clearly the child died a violent death and the Lord did not uphold it. The hollow pretensions of religion in the face of the cruel reality of the death of the child underline the irony of the situation. Life is contingent and cruel and there is no one out there to protect the innocent. What is more, the contingency and absurdity of the child’s death is of the same order as the death earlier of a hen that is accidentally squashed under the wheels of a car when Mrs. Rooney was on her way to the station. “What a death! One minute picking happy at the dung, on the road, in the sun, with now and then a dust bath, and then – bang! – all her troubles over….All the laying and the hatching….Just one great squawk and then…peace.” (16).

  His play Endgame (Beckett 1964) consists of the cruel and overbearing character Hamm, his parents Nagg and Nell and his attendant (who may be his adopted son) Clov. At one point in the play Hamm asks them to join him in praying to God. “Our father which art in heaven”, begins Nagg but Hamm cuts him short wanting them to pray in silence. They soon give up with Hamm exclaiming “The bastard! He doesn’t exist”. “Not yet” quips Clov (38). The entire scene has a touch of parody but Hamm’s outburst, mocking or otherwise, reeks of anger and disappointment at God’s absence. Clearly there is no one out there to pray to. Here the situation is not dissimilar to that in ATF. This is in clear contrast to WFG with its many allusions to the Bible, Christ and other Christian beliefs and symbols as well as the quest for meaning and the hope of ‘salvation’. Yet even in Endgame, Hamm, who wants to exterminate all life, shows interest in finding some meaning or significance to the whole thing. Thus Hamm to Clov, “We are not beginning to…to…mean something?” Clov, “Mean something! You and I mean something! (Brief laugh). Ah, that’s a good one!” “Hamm: I wonder….we ourselves….(with emotion)….we ourselves….at certain moments….(vehemently). To think perhaps it won’t all have been for nothing!”(27) Yet the dominant note of the play is that this farce of an existence should end. If in WFG the phrase ‘nothing to be done’ conveys the principal theme, In Endgame it is ‘why this farce day after day?’

  The play begins with Clov’s statement, “Finished, it’s finished, nearly finished, it must be nearly finished”. Hamm to Clov later, “Have you not had enough? Clov: “Yes! (Pause) Of what? Hamm: “Of this….this… thing”. Clov: “I always had. (Pause). Not you?”(13) And while Hamm thinks “it’s time it ended” his attachment to existence, whether through habit or instinct persists. Thus Hamm , “And yet I hesitate, I hesitate to… to end. Yes, there it is….I hesitate to…..to end.” In fact as Hamm remarks, “The end is in the beginning and yet you go on” (44). Clov to Hamm later, “Why this farce day after day?” Hamm: “Routine. One never knows” (26). Nell, Hamm’s mother asks the same rhetorical question: “Why this farce day after day?”(18). Echoing the Buddha’s question to one of his disciples, Hamm at one point asks Clov, “Did you ever have an instant of happiness?” “Not to my knowledge” says Clov (42).

  Beckett’s characters are often presented as having some disablement or the other presumably as a symbol of human impotence, dilapidation and suffering. Thus Hamm is blind and on a wheelchair while Clov is unable to sit down. As one critic puts it, ‘Sensitivity to suffering is evident on nearly every page of Beckett’s writings…..There is hardly one of Beckett’s
people who is not either crippled, blind, dumb, rheumatic’ or suffering from some other disability or from a combination of them (Hamilton and Hamilton 1976, 31). In a London taxi once Beckett found three signs asking for aid: for the blind, the orphans, and war refugees. His comment was you don’t have to go looking for distress. “It is screaming at you even in the taxis in London” (31). His point was that conditions that we think are exceptional are, nonetheless, very much a part of life. They don’t cease to exist just because we chose to ignore them. Echoing the first Noble Truth of the Buddha and the world view of Schopenhauer, Beckett believes in the centrality of suffering which ‘opens a window on the real’ (Proust, 28). Neither the mind nor the senses can grasp the ‘mess’ of existence, and emotions cannot be trusted as guides through the chaos. Suffering is the one quality of experience about which man cannot be deceived. ‘It is constantly present, and even his ignorant senses and confused mind cannot misrepresent it’ ( Hamilton and Hamilton 1976, 78). Indeed suffering ‘is the one stable point of reference in the Beckettian universe’ (78.).