We can’t complain about traffic or over population if we subscribe to modern society. It’s a sticky wicket to discuss but government and especially western society pay people to have more children.
China is probably the only country that has it close to right. If every family in the world had one child, human population would gently fall from seven to one billion people in 100 years. No war or die off, the strangle hold on other species would slowly be released allowing the Earth to begin to regenerate. (Photo: Members of the Ren clan gather in eastern china for portrait to commemorate the completion of detailed family tree: Zhou Jiandao/Sipa Asia/Rex/Shutterstock)
We Pay People to Have Children
In the west we pay families to have as many children as possible through free food, shelter and education. “Have as many kids as you want, education and food is free.” That is noble in a way to attempt to educate an entire society. What kind of programming people receive is another matter to discuss later.
Ideally society limits families to one child. We are not the only species on the planet and have to stop treating the Earth like it is our possession to do with as we please just because we can. Modern society adults behave like a bunch of elementary school children on the play ground. “I want my latte.”
If you want to put a western free market spin to it, give the first child a free ride through college. Any additional children the parents are obligated to pay for school, food, shelter directly like child support. Give everyone a 12 month notice so you think twice before acting. Make all forms of birth control accessible and free.
It’s Population Stupid
No matter what your cause it is a lost cause unless our future population is reduced. This includes both environmental and social justice causes.
It is a conundrum. A regenerative population level that can make its livelihood from the wild is probably only 200 million. We overshoot that level exponentially through domestication and by turning all wild into commodities from timber to coal. It is ironic that most of humanity would die in the ditch to protect humanity but could care less about the chicken they are ripping apart on their dinner table.
A good alien invasion eating people or consuming buildings in the suburbs and cities would teach humanity a humbling lesson. That would be weird but you get the point.
I know the argument that, “It is my life, let me procreate if I want.” Sorry, your wrong.
Yes, we have the right to do what we want with our lives for the most part but when it affects others, we draw the line. This is blunt, but procreating people is murdering other species and exploiting other humans in the future. Grow up “all about me” modern society.
Another way to look at it is: if every family was limited to a fixed number of acres to make their living from and you could not steal from someone else or send the kids away, as they added more children they would get that crowing is a problem.
I can’t have enough respect for the Native American peoples who tended the wild here for 10,000 years. They created a garden of eden from sea to shining sea with burgeoning biodiversity and fecundity. They had abundant resources but did not overpopulate or despoil it. Ho Hey!
Share these ideas person-to-person. Don’t just read these essays and close the page. Post links to essays that resonate with you, on your social media. Our speech is not free if dissenting messages are hidden by search engines, and mainstream media. You found these ideas, now share them with others!
Chuck Burr is author of Culturequake: The Restoration Revolution. Revised Fourth Edition. 10th Anniversary.
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Post Editor, Beth Brown — Beth is a lifestyle writer and former assistant news editor of the Easley Progress. She graduated from Columbia College with a focus on Writing and Public Affairs. She is also a singer/songwriter/musician, yogi, activist and Love Warrior for Mother Earth.
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