Contextualize it. For the sake of your argument being in Japan, it's worse than pointless, but a detriment considering the cost of living.
This is gobbledygook. Unintelligible. What's worse than pointless?
contributing labor is only beneficial if you manage to solve the problem of raising said labour in the first place, as stated by my prior post
This is false, especially for Japan. We know that they need their citizens to have more children to contribute to the supply of labour so that they aren;'t swamped looking after the rapidly ageing population. If their total fertility rate does not rise then living standards will go down which will be much worse for everyone. So by far the better outcome is if their citizens in general feel obligated to have 2 or more children each than if their citizens continue to on average have about 1.1 children each and their population continues to collapse. If people continue not to have kids then future generations of Japanese will experience worse living conditions than the generations who are currently in their fertile adult years. So the current fertile adults have benefited and continue to benefit from good living conditions made possible by a supply of labour , but if they choose not to have kids then they'll not be doing their part to contribute to that supply of labour and thus those living conditions continuing into the future for future generations to enjoy. Benefiting from something without doing your part to contribut towards it continuing in the future so that others can benefit from it is selfish.
your argument falls apart when countries that actually have high birth rate end up having high child mortality rates.
Totally illogical. High child mortality rate isn't caused by having a high birth rate. High child mortality is caused by your country being poor and not technologically developed. Israel has a high birth rate and low child mortality rate because it's technologically developed. If Japan's birth rate rose, it's child mortality rate wouldn't start rising too, it would continue to have a low child mortality rate because it is a technologically developed country like Israel.
You're being so evasive I have no idea what it your actual response is to the argument, so I'm going to have to just ask you again explicitly.
1) Do you deny that it is selfish to benefit from something then not doing your part to contribute towards that beneficial thing continuing in the future so that other people can also benefit from it?
2) Do you deny that if you're hiking somewhere and you're not sure of the way and you ask someone for directions and they show you the way to where you want to go, then on a later occasion someone in the same place asks you for directions to the place you went and you don't answer them , that this would be an example of you being selfish?
I don't think you can deny either of these things without removing all of your credibility since they obviously count as being selfish to any normal person.
But if you agree that 1) and 2) count as selfish then you're committed to conceding that that the following is also selfish:
3) you benefited from growing up in a nice society with a high standard of living because there was enough supply of young labour , but by not having kids, you're not doing your part contribute to that supply of young labour in the future.
Since it's an example of the exact same principle as in 1).
If you want to get our of this and deny that 3) is selfish then you have to show how it is not an example of the same principle as in 1) and 2)
Which obviously you can't do which is why you didn't address the argument directly.
e.g. Suppose you're hiking and someone forcibly tells you to walk a treacherous path that would require much more preparation, and even though you insist it's not feasible, they still tell you it's the correct path and you end up lost in the woods.
This is non-analogous to having children or giving directions after being told drections because walking a treacherous path presumably does not benefit other people , and you presumably have not benefited from other people having walked the treacherous path.
But , if we change your hypothetical to make it analogous, so that you have benefited from others "walking the path" , and others will benefit in the future if you "walk the path" or be deprived of that benefit which you enjoyed if you don't "walk the path", then yes it would be selfish for you not to also "walk the path"
In the exact same way that if you benefit from someone telling you directions then its selfish for you not to give people directions in the future.
that benefit is marginal at best because growing up in that living standard still requires you to work in the office and go home tired.
No, because your living standards would have been far worse if the generation shortly before yours didn't have enough kids to contribute to the labour supply to establish the infrastructure and services which bring about the standard of living you enjoy.
So actually you, i.e. Japanese people, benefited immensely from the generation shortly before yours having kids, and the same reasoning applies to future generations.
Kids are a heavy burden if society will not contribute to raising them. It takes a village to raise a child, and Japan does not show such a village.
This is false. Having in children in Japan today is one of the easiest times to raise children in Japan's history. Child mortality is far lower than it was in the past, there is almost no risk of starving , Japan is safer than almost any time in its history. It's not that there are obstacles making it difficult to having children, it's that people are more selfish and choose not to.
But more importantly , even if it was true that it was more difficult to raise children today than in previous generations, that would make no difference. You still benefited from it so it's still selfish of you not to do your part to contribute towards that thing in the future so that other people can benefit from it.
Similarly, suppose when you were hiking, got lost and you received directions from someone with good social skills who found it easy to talk to strangers so it wasn't much of a burden for him to talk to you and give you directions but you personally felt shy so it would be more difficult for you to give directions to someone else in the future if you came across someone who was lost, it would still be selfish of you not to give directions to that lost person in the future .
You're basically saying
"I had a a nice life with a high standard of living
Because other people before you contributed to society's supply of labour by having kids which developed and ran the services and infrastructure which caused the high standard of living in society you enjoyed
and I have contributed to the economy well enough,
No, because you haven't contributed to the supply of labour in the future by having kids. You've only benefited yourself, not future generations.
, but they're trying to make me do more labor for the benefit of their own society
For the benefit of future generations, in the same way that you personally benefited from people before you contributing to the supply of labour in their future by having kids.
and letting me shoulder the burden of raising them."
In the same way people before you shouldered the burden of raised their own kids and you benefited as a result of the high living standards you enjoyed that was caused by them having and raising their kids
in the exact same way that if you benefit from someone else "shouldering the burden" of giving you directions while hiking then its selfish of you not to "shoulder the burden" of giving directions to someone else who is lost while hiking.
That society is very selfish and immoral. Parasitic to its citizens.
lol calling helping people other than yourself "very selfish and immoral" is actually the pinnacle of selfishness and immorality