"Why would you judge parents' choices to have children if you don’t want your own choice to be subject to the same scrutiny?"

For some people parenthood is not an option and this is a voluntary decision.

We have no shortage of humans on Earth, so this is not a worrying issue. In fact the Worldometer had the global population at 7,404,976,783 in mid-2016, so we’re not going to go extinct as a species for lack of breeding pairs.

Yet, while it's not a survival issue, it is certainly an emotive one. People tend to become polarised in either camp (parents v child-free) and all kinds of nonsensical arguments and name-calling circulates.

I believe most of this comes from the child-free as some have the unfortunate tendency to assert victimhood when they claim they have been called "selfish" or judged for their decision not to have children in some way.

The cherry on the top for some of these child-free individuals is that not having children is a morally superior choice. They do not have children, they say, because it is bad for Mother Earth and the world is overpopulated.

READ MORE:

* Having children is a public good

* Just because we can breed doesn't mean we should

* 'I live in glorious, voluntary spinsterhood'

That’s fair enough and if they stopped there I could probably stomach it, but then many incite a reaction by calling parents nothing more than human incubators or "breeders".

For many of the child-free they were put on this Earth to do greater things than spit out babies from their incubator wombs like robots. Any Tom, Dick or Harry (well, the female versions thereof) can incubate a baby, but it takes grandness and ethical greatness to abstain.

That’s kind of judgmental. Pregnancy and childbirth is often emotionally and physically very gruelling, as any mother will tell you. The baby does not drop unnoticed and painlessly from her mother’s womb in the course of daily chores.

But when all else fails, many of the childfree tell you how revolting babies are and that they never did like babies anyway as they're horrible little sicky things who cry and ruin a decent shot at life. You only live once (YOLO).

I think I have a reasonable hold on the YOLO generation and their rather amusing realisation that their life is to end at some stage. It is a crisis of existential proportions that realises we don’t last forever and we should make the most of it while we can.

But here’s the thing; why would you judge the choices of others to make their lives meaningful through having children if you don’t want your own choice to be subject to the same scrutiny? To me, it seems hypocritical.

Yes, there are definitely some people who have children and do not deserve to have them as they abuse and neglect them, and treat them like an appendage to their own tragic lives. These are not parents, rather these are people who have children – there is a difference.

A parent loves their children and provides for them, often at great cost to their own financial wellbeing and physical freedom. They care for their emotional needs and give the very best they have to prepare them for the world.

And it is not a nice world at the moment. It is full of judgmental people, environmental disasters, breaches of human rights, poverty and animal abuse. I think we need a generation of parents who are capable of educating their children on these issues and helping to make the world a better place - but that is just my opinion.

I hope my opinion does count, even though I am a "breeder" who has given birth to four children who are now adults.

READ MORE:

* 'I won't have children and it breaks my mum's heart'

* The impact of kids on friendships

* I'm childfree for Mother Earth

I might even go so far as to argue, now that my children are grown up and I am able be free enough to think again, that having children has actually made me a better person.

By having children I know what it is like to love with a fierceness and purity beyond reason. Having children is also a great leveller and I have developed a deepened sense of empathy and compassion. I know unconditional love.

My children mean the world to me and are my reason for being. They are the place from which my love of Earth and the world springs. I am not going to apologise for this.

To the childfree: I don’t call you selfish, so please stop calling me a breeder or an incubator; I am a parent, and I am proud of that.