Antinatalist Advocacy seeks to protect sentient beings from the harms of coming into existence. We advocate refraining from creating new sentient beings and improving the lives of those who exist now and will in the future.
Whilst many people are working to do good in the world, we believe many have an ethical blindspot: an antinatalist blindspot. Harm to an individual can be mitigated once they exist – and doing so is important – but the only guaranteed way to ensure a being is not harmed is to simply not create them in the first place.
Our Aims
1
Supporting the antinatalist community to adopt an evidence-based, impact-driven approach to doing good.
2
Redressing the antinatalist blindspot (above) in communities that seek to do good in the world.
Humans
The lifetime of every human typically contains a significant amount of suffering and the guarantee of death.
Nonhumans
Billions of nonhuman animals are created, exploited, and killed each year in agriculture. Many trillions more live and suffer in the wild.
Artificial Sentience
Humans could soon create sentience in a new form and few are thinking of the ethical implications for the ones who will be created.
Our Ideas
Antinatalism
Antinatalism is the view that it is morally wrong to create new sentient beings. Before a being exists there is nobody to want to come into existence, but once someone exists they will experience suffering (perhaps lots) and will be vulnerable to the possibility of extreme suffering. All of this is done without being able to consult the individual being created. Creating a being can also result in great harm to others and presents an opportunity cost where the time and resources used to raise that being could have been used to improve the lives of those who already exist.
Effective Altruism
Effective Altruism is an idea and community that seeks to use reason and evidence to do more good than we otherwise would. We support this core idea in Effective Altruism without agreeing with a variety of other popular views within this space. We support the critical examination of somewhat popular pro-natalist beliefs in the community.
Our Values
action-oriented
We want to be proactive in finding workable solutions to the issues that sentient beings face.
anti-speciesist
We believe all sentient beings should be taken into consideration in moral decision-making, regardless of their species membership.
honest
We are committed to truth and believe dishonesty, even in the pursuit of noble aims, should not be encouraged.
humble
We accept that we do not have all the answers and welcome constructive criticism.
impact-driven
We seek to be evidence-driven in achieving a high impact, and wish to help others in pursuing this same aim.
understanding
We recognise that each of us has different capacities and want to help people of all capacities to engage in doing good.