Thread:Goddess Ilias/@comment-23999472-20151020074331/@comment-26419174-20151021114015

Goddess Ilias wrote: How are they forced into putting lots of effort into the offspring they do get? Who makes them look after their kids? This is a rhetorical question because the answer is "No-one at all". r/k selection theory doesn't apply when the races aren't honed by evolution into a particular maximal survival strategy, and are instead magical Frankensteins monsters created by wacky species-splicing and barreling straight towards no-males extinction anyway.

I don't deny that getting pregnant is a great source of joy for monsters. But getting pregnant is not the same thing as "And then after birth, engaging in intensive maternal child-rearing in nuclear family units until maturity".

Spiders don't rear their young. Therefore I would not expect arachnes to, because they are magic-spliced from gibbering-horde-monsters and evolution hasn't had time to replace their r-type gibbering-horde childrearing instincts with new pseudomammalian k-type childrearing instincts.

BUT ANYWAY, to finally answer Pat's question: my instinct would be that miscarriages and stillbirths would be very infrequent (regardless of whether they'd be a big deal when they do occur). Because are literally of supernatural constitution, and the monstergirl womb is pretty much the most resilient, magically-souped-up organ in existence. Demonic energy is a general anti-disease silver bullet, so you're not going to have infection-induced miscarriage.

And even if it happens, monstergirls are (a) flighty, (b) looking for any excuse to have more bareback sex, and (c) probably don't get that attached to their children anyway as theorized above, so I don't think they'd be especially traumatized. "How are they forced into putting lots of effort into the offspring they do get? Who makes them look after their kids?"

No, it's not a rethoric question, because there is an answer. Their own instincts as described here and here make them cosider their children as "crystallization of the love they share with their husband".And  there is more in those links. the second one literary starts with  "Every monster mother deeply loves her children",  this paragraph stays pretty much flat out that for most monster species children stay with the family at very least until they are sexually mature that is for around 10 years, etc.

"Spiders don't rear their young. Therefore I would not expect arachnes to, because they are magic-spliced from gibbering-horde-monsters and evolution hasn't had time to replace their r-type gibbering-horde childrearing instincts with new pseudomammalian k-type childrearing instincts".

That's a "nice" argument you got there. First, you state that evolution doesn't apply because  the monsters are "magical Frankensteins monsters created by wacky species-splicing", and then you proceed to make an argument based on evolutionary theory that, according to your own words, is not applicable. Secondly, you then make an analogy between the mg and the RL animal it is based upon, wihout taking into account the differences they have due to the whole "wacky species-splicing" thing, differences such as sentience and low fertility. Thirdly, you then proceed to take that already flawed and questionable analogy, make it into a broad generalisation and apply it insdiscriminatly to all the mgs, including those that are not based on animal of any kind or indeed those  whose RL counterparts DO rear their young (bears for example). Due to those facts, as well as the setting information referenced in my first paragraph, I have to say that I do not find your argument compelling.

With that in mind, I do agree with the part of your post that claims that miscariages and stillbirths are rare. However, I do believethat the reaction to one of those actually happening would be the very opposite of what you claim it would. In short, I think it would be a personal tragedy.