by seldom_seen » Fri 10 Aug 2007, 01:53:28
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', 'H')ere's my top ten off the top of my head.
Population Reduction Draft Plan1. A one-child per woman policy
2. Free abortion on demand
3. Free birth control on demand
4. Advocate legal Euthanasia and assisted suicide
5. Advocate the elimination of extraneous measures for life support.
6. Advocate an end to organ transplants.
7. Family planning and education.
8. Ban fertility clinics
9. Free sterilization on demand
10. Pay women not to have children.
http://www.peakoil.com/post139589.html#139589 MQ I don't have a problem with any of these ideas, but I think you're veering way off course from reality. The number #1 thing that could help the US in terms of overpopulation would be to immediately end all legal and illegal immigration...and it's not even on your list?
As Garrett Hardin said: "We are not faced with a single global population problem, but rather 187 separate national population problems."
With all the best intentions, none of your ideas would fly outside of the US. The muslim countries would say that you are waging a crusader war to destroy islamic babies. The latin american countries would say that it's a sinister genocidal racist policy...or some sht like that.
So obviously overpopulation has to be addressed locally, and locally that means to stop importing overpopulation from other areas. Do you honestly think this will happen in the context of our growth for the sake of growth cancer paradigm? If you do please show us how?
What if Oregon said "no more immigrants from any other state or countries?" The feds would send in troops to allow the flow of humans across the Oregon border. If you resist, you will be shot. That's why in the words of John Mayer we're "waiting on the world to change." Nothing much is going to change within the current system. It needs to play itself out, which it seems to be doing rather quickly.
Shannymara is right, even if we did decide to do a 180 tomorrow and take on overpopulation, nature is in the batting box right now and about to step up to the plate.
I know you've read the Hirsch report, which states we need at least 20 years to prepare for peak oil. Humans can live just fine without oil, as we've done for most of our existence. Not 6.5 billion humans though. The underlying message of the Hirsch report is that we need 20 years to prevent a collapse and die-off. We need 20 years to institute your population polices.
William Catton wrote Overshoot
25 years ago, and he makes a compelling and persuasive case that we were in a pretty dire state of overshoot that far back.
It's a little late in the day, and I think your argument is much ado about nothing.
The changes that you hope for will not come from government, or non-profits or do-gooders. They will come when people are disconnected from their fossil fuel umbilical cords and have to climb out of their cozy fossil fueled cocoons and gaze across a stark landscape of scarcity. They will be shocked, scared and startled.
America in its current state is like a heroin junky sprawled out on the couch. You can talk to them all day long about overpopulation and their response will be "pass me that pipe man." Take away the pipe though and they will start to get really uncomfortable. Eventually they will sober up enough to notice that while they were high, someone looted their house and drained their bank account.
So to answer your question about an overcrowded lifeboat with people swimming up to it. If I was really high on heroin I don't think that I would care.
