Sure you can. The parent was describing a heuristic they apply. If I don't know you, but need to quickly judge whether or not you're likely to care about future over immediate-term, you being a parent is... not the worst proxy I could use.

FWIW, I don't exactly agree with the poster on this. I feel that parents are biased towards near-term almost by definition: caring and nurturing children is an immediate job. Whether or not a typical non-parent is likely to be a "fuck you, got mine" kind of person, I find that parents tend to become more of a "fuck you, my kids got theirs" kind of people. Not out of ill intent - just more of "concrete needs of my kids today trump abstract speculative needs of their generation a few decades from now".

I think it's a bit more than that. The person upthread goes a bit farther than just whether or not someone cares about the future or not. It sounds like they've basically judged all childless people as hedonists who would gladly burn down the world as long as we get in one last round of golf.

Maybe that person doesn't really believe that, but if so, should probably be clearer about their position and not resort to veiled personal attacks.

Been stewing on this comment. You are right, I think, for roughly half of the parents in my peer group. They do indeed act with a "fuck you, my kids got theirs" attitude. But I think the heuristic still works, because the near term things that those parents care about tend to be highly correlated with what makes sense in the long term. Another comment, in this dumpster fire of a thread that I started, noted that becoming a parent makes you crazy. Alas, I think becoming a parent makes you normal. After all, everyone has a parent.