Bringing Up the Issue of Population Growth

[alp227]

Source: NY Times

Major American environmental groups have dodged the subject of population control for decades, wary of getting caught up in the bruising politics of reproductive health.

Yet, virtually alone, the Center for Biological Diversity is breaking the taboo by directly tying population growth to environmental problems through efforts like giving away condoms in colorful packages depicting endangered animals. The idea is to start a debate about how overpopulation crowds out species and hastens climate change — just when the world is welcoming Baby No.7 Billion.

“Wrap with care, save the polar bear,” reads one of the packages. “Wear a condom now, save the spotted owl,” says another.

Kierán Suckling, executive director of the center, a membership-based nonprofit organization in Tucson, said he had an aha moment a few years ago. “All the species that we save from extinction will eventually be gobbled up if the human population keeps growing,” he said.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/01/science/earth/bringing-up-the-issue-of-population-growth.html?pagewanted=all

[ZombieHorde]

1. Like most problems, increasing access to education, and the quality of education,

will significantly help the situation.

[Warpy]

3. Loans to older women with no education are a means to this

With a business to look after, the older woman takes that birth control. She also makes sure her daughters are educated.

[Warpy]

2. After years of expecting a third world woman whose womb is her only real asset

to jump at the chance of taking birth control pills, they're finally starting to realize that the way to stop runaway population is to raise women's status.

Funny how that just never occurs to men until everything else has failed.

Brazil has taken a really novel approach, showing the most powerful women on soap operas with only 1-2 kids and no one with over 3 kids. This has happened in concert with improving services even in the favelas and widening opportunities for younger women.

If it is happening in Brazil, it can happen anywhere. Those days of valuing a woman by how many male children issue from her uterus are numbered. The way is clear: free women from virtual slavery and the fertility rate drops like a stone.

[mike_c]

4. education and empowerment are solutions to MOST of the world's problems...

eom

[mopinko]

9. +1

and imho, thus proving the reverse is also the case.

[saras]

13. Starting to? We've known this since the Seventies - we just don't ACT on it

[earthside]

5. For the right it is 'reproductive' issues ...

... for the left in the United States it is illegal immigration.

More people aspiring to the carbon/consumption footprint of the American lifestyle is a killer for the planet (even during our recession).

The U.S. has probably twice (if not more) the population in can sustain.

We need a lower birthrate and an draw-down in immigration (legal and illegal) if we are going to do our part to combat global warming and the exhaustion of the earth's resources.

But bringing-up immigration in this context is pretty much taboo in left/liberal circles, just like 'family planning' is taboo in this context in right-wing/conservative circles.

[alp227]

15. how will locking the US borders solve WORLD population issues though?

[msongs]

6. nature will eventually solve the over population of humans in its own way, as usual nt

[Odin2005]

7. In some circles supporting population control is equated with supporting genocide.

A lot of people in the 3rd world, for obvious historical reasons, are extremely paranoid about the population control issue and are quick to think up anti-West conspiracy theories.

[PurityOfEssence]

8. Once again, the true villain is religion

Taking all arguments after returning from trick-or-treating with the kids...

[cstanleytech]

12. No, the problem is not religion

as its not a person and it doesnt make the rules but rather the real problem here is human beings who either are ignorant of the problem either by choice or by being uninformed of the problem.

[PurityOfEssence]

14. Oh yes, it is. It's not the only issue, but it's HUGE.

"Be fruitful and multiply" sayeth most major religions in some way or another. The primitives needed many offspring to keep the heathens on the other side of the hill at bay and keep civilization moving forward.

Now, many religions are on a deliberate breeding bent to serve their desires of dominance, literally exhorting their flocks to produce at a sociopathic rate. Many religions refuse to deal with any form of birth control. Again: using the supernatural to spur people on to such activities trumps all other input, and such appeals simply can't be argued against; religions give people the belief that proclamations from their faith need no justification and negate ANY other influences, which is what makes them dangerous in general.

Yes, people gain much solace and comfort from their religions, but they don't have the right to kill the rest of us for their bliss.

[hamsterjill]

30. I agree!

I think we're seeing a resurgence of just what you describe. AND...it is being romanticized on television through reality shows like The Duggars.

[antigone382]

34. That's an oversimplification.

From an anthropological standpoint, the values of a religion generally grow out of what has adaptive value within a culture, given its ecological and social context. Having lots of children makes sense in an agrarian, labor-intensive society, particularly one with lack of access to healthcare--leading to high infant mortality rates, and poorer health in old age--and an absent social safety net--meaning that adult children act as one's social security in old age. The fact that many religions encourage this practice relates to the fact that religion is, quite frankly, a very effective way of organizing social life. Religion is like any other human institution in that sense. Changing the situations that make high birthrates advantageous--by improving the social safety net, increasing access to healthcare, and providing viable educational and economic opportunities (particularly, but not exclusively, for women)--is a much faster and more effective way of bringing down the global birthrate, than attempting to overthrow the highly varied, complex, and deeply embedded human institution known as religion.

I say this as an atheist.

[Gregorian]

10. I'll be damned. It's getting some attention.

Better late than never.

Now all we need to do is spend a decade or two talking about whether it's an issue or not. Then when we reach 8 billion, and things are in a virtual emergency, maybe we'll start talking about what to do about the most important issue of any. Population growth.

[defendandprotect]

11. Global Warming is breathing down our necks and thousands of years of "go forth and multiply" ...

was suicidal thinking pushed by organized patriarchal religion --

Patriarchy in its war on women espeically sought to control reproduction and thereby

control females -- and destroyed much of the knowledge -- WICCA -- and plants which

provided the means for reproductive freedom for females/families.


Reproductive enslavement has done great harm not only to women but to the planet --

but the destructiveness of patriarchy and its ignorance is simply suicidal on many

levels!!



"Americans are really smart about really stupid things -- "


Said by a native woman from the Bikini Islands as her island was about to be bombed with

atomic weapons in tests by US -- !!







Patriarchy -- and its underpinning =

Organized Patriarchal Religion -- and it's economic invention =

Capitalism =

The Unholy Trinity

[Yo_Mama]

22. Kind of idiotic considering that much of the Christian world

has a birthrate below replacement values!

Think again. It's those Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and so forth that are going forth and multiplying. Spend some time with these Wiki lists:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_growth_rate

[defendandprotect]

25. That's only since the pill -- but nearly 40 years of effect ....

In fact, the Pope -- the one after the Polish one, I think -- was BEGGING the

Italian government to "make Italian women have more babies" -- !!

Did he cite his love for children? Did he recommend more help for women and

families be extended -- more financial aid -- NO!

Certainly he gave his reasons -- i.e., that LABOR was needed to provide business growth!


On the other hand, don't fail to consider "conversions" --

The RCC is finding its new fortunes in China and Africa and wrote off America,

Canada and Western Europe decades ago.


RCC's biggest enemy is democracy and freedom of thought -- though Pope John XXIII

with Vatican II tried to make the RCC a democracy, acknowledging members right to

free thought and free personal conscience -- even re such issues as birth control!

Naturally, almost immediately there was a murderous RW coup within the Vatican!


Remember when the internet used to have information -- now there's every effort

being made not to supply it or to fudge it. Lots of old and sloppy figures on

internet now on religious numbers --

but some are saying 1.5 "registered Catholics" and quite a few less who "practice."

Some are saying 2.2 Billion Christians which includes Catholics.


940 million Sunni Muslims -- remember that we killed more than 1 Million Muslims in Iraq!

And will probably be killing many more with our "crusade" wars--!!



These are ALL organized patriarchal religions --

[Yo_Mama]

27. Well people like sex, so good BC is a requirement to lower birth rates

But Italy didn't suddenly go from a Catholic to a secular country, did it? Yet the birth rate dropped massively when the population got access to effective birth control.

When effective birth control requires celibacy, humans breed pretty fast.

[defendandprotect]

32. No one said they didn't .... !! What I said was RCC has been blocking access to birth control -- !!

Not only for Catholics, but for all of us !!

Again, as I pointed out to you, Catholics ignore the Pope and church teachings --

and just as many Catholic women as any other women have abortions.

RCC wrote off America, Western Europe and Canada as far as the church and its teachings

are concerned --

Democracy is the enemy of male-supremacist religion -- and Vatican very well knows it!!

[PurityOfEssence]

31. Yes, and what to people exhale? Carbon Dioxide, the big bugaboo greenhouse gas.

We are, in every way, the problem.

[lunatica]

16. I remember after a campaign against population growth in the 60s here in the US

reading that we had actually reached a population growth of zero. It was for a short time because the education campaign wasn't continued. But it can be done. I guess it must of been another one of Reagan's victims. Who needs population stagnation when they want the largest standing military force the planet has ever seen. Empires need cannon fodder.

[defendandprotect]

26. +1 --

[happyslug]

17. But the birthrate of people LIVING in the US is at a NEGATIVE rate.

The population increase in the US has been, for the last couple of Decades, been from immigration NOT new born. This is also true of Europe and Japan. China and Russia (and the rest of the old Warsaw Pact Nations) have also seen negative population growth, but no new immigration so their population is dropping.

Now, the third world has seen population growth, but all of the third world has seen the RATE of population increase drop since WWII, this drop is more noticeable since the 1960s.

My point is saying population control will help the environment in the US and the rest of the 1st and 2nd world (The "2nd world" was a cold war term for the old Soviet Union, China, North Korea, North Vietnam and the various members of the Old Warsaw Pact) is nonsense. The facts do NOT support such a position.

Now, there is some evidence that it MIGHT help in the Third World, but with the general decline in the birth rate in the Third World that is less and less a factor.

Side note: While much of the population increase is in the "Third World", the growth rate varies by country. For example Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and the rest of the "Asian Tigers" have a low population increase compare to the rest of the third world (They birth rate closely matches the rates in the First World). Northern Mexico and Mexico city birth rate resembles the First World, but even Southern Mexico and Central American have much lower birth rates today then they had in the 1960s (Most illegal immigrants into the US is from Southern Mexico and Central America NOT Northern Mexico).

My point in this side note is population of the world is peaking and is expected to peak somewhere between 2050-2070 then drop. The main problem is environmental degradation has less to do with population growth then the switch from a subsistence economy (Which most of the Third world had till the 1960s) to one aimed at the demands of the West for goods (including food). The chief reason for the recent increase in immigration from Southern Mexico and Central America has been do to NAFTA and other "Fair trade" agreements with the countries of Mexico and Central America. These agreements permitted the US to ship its surplus of grain into those countries, dropping the price of corn so much that the subsistence farmers of the area had to quit farming and move to the US just to earn enough money to feed themselves and their families. Another problem was the shift of the Agriculture in those nations to items for the US and European Markets as opposes to feeding the local population (i.e. More Bananas, more Beef, more Coffee, less Corn). This one two punch on local population has been the "Push" behind people moving from Southern Mexico and Central America to the US in search of Jobs. Yes, immigration and environmental degradation are inter-related, one leads to the other. This switch in what is being planted and harvested in these areas are causing the environmental degradation NOT any increase in the local population. The various environmental groups see this and view the demand for populations control as a solution to the problems with the environment as false, and worse an excuse to divert attention from the real cause of environmental degradation, the switch from subsistence farmer to huge industrial level agriculture production for items wanted in the West.

[muriel_volestrangler]

19. But that's not true; the US birth rate has been higher than the death rate all that time

See, for instance, here: http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004395.html (bottom line)

[happyslug]

20. Wikipedia and the CIA disagree with you

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2127rank.html

The fertility rate of less then 2.1 is below the replacement rate, the US is 2.06 according to the CIA.

Part of the problem is the baby boomers were born about 1947-1964 (Traditional dates for the Baby boom, peak year was 1957), they tend to have children about 25 years later (on average), thus the "Echo Boom" was from about 1972 to 1989, and tend to die off after about 75 years on this planet, for from 2022 to 2039.

Thus one affect is even as birth rate DROPS, Death rates will take anyway from 50-80 years to match up. Thus you can have a increase in population even as it is headed for decline (More birth then deaths today, but number of births do NOT equal the number of people needed to be born to keep the population in balance, so in 50-80 years the death rate will exceed the birth rate and you will see a decline in population even as people start to have more children).

[muriel_volestrangler]

23. That's the fertility rate, not the birth /death rate

Population increase in the USA has continued to have a positive contribution from the natural rate of increase all this time, although you claimed it hadn't. You've even claimed that China's population is dropping, although the birth rate is 12.29, and the death rate 7.03. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ch.html

Yes, if the TFR continues as it is, the US population increase will eventually be due entirely to net immigration (though note that 2.1 is the rough replacement TFR; it's actually reckoned to be slightly lower, for instance, at 2.075 in the UK, for instance; 2.06 might mean a negligible rate of decrease). But that wasn't what you claimed in #17.

[Yo_Mama]

21. That's right

The US would have a declining population if not for immigration, and another factoid most don't know is that recent immigrants are reproducing at a much higher rate than the long-term population. Second generation immigrant births tend to drop a lot, though - it's just recent immigrants.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704216804575423641955803732.html?wpisrc=nl_wonk
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/08/immigrant-fertility-birthright-citizenship

http://www.childtrendsdatabank.org/pdf/79_PDF.pdf (see the graph at the end)

I don't think the US is overpopulated, but if you think it is you would need to cut immigration to quell the trend.

If you look at world populations, population growth is concentrated in Asian countries almost inversely to economic development scores. So I don't think the US comes into it really, nor does Europe, which has a shrinking population. So does Japan.

[muriel_volestrangler]

24. Your factoid is false

The US population would still be increasing with zero net immigration.

[Yo_Mama]

28. No it wouldn't - you have to count births to immigrants plus immigrants

Here's the proof:
http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0080.pdf

Compare 1990 births to 2008 births. The TOTAL number of births for all other segments of the population other than Hispanics is dropping - only Hispanic births are rising. And that's not due to mostly to a significant native-born difference in birth rates - the birth rate among Hispanic second gen population falls very close to that of the general US population - see Pew Hispanic Center.

When total births are dropping, total population will drop without immigration.

Without the immigrants and the Hispanic-assisted rise in birth rates, the US population would now be in decline.

1990 total births to white non-Hisp pop:
2,626,500
2008 total births to white non-Hisp pop:
2,267,817 (-358,683)

1990 total births to black non-Hisp pop:
661,701
2008 total births to black non-Hisp pop:
623,029 (-38,672)

1990 total births to Hispanic pop:
595,073
2008 total births to Hispanic pop:
1,041,239 (+446,166)

[muriel_volestrangler]

29. That shows nothing - where are the death rates? Where are the stats for immigrants?

'Hispanic' does not mean 'immigrant'. And a falling birth rate doe not mean a falling population - it can easily (and does, in this case) mean that the population isn't booming as much as it was.

See #19 for an actual comparison of the number of people who are born and die in the US. The births are still significantly more than the deaths.

[GeorgeGist]

18. Zero Population Growth ...

a meme unheeded from the past. Capitalism demands GROWTH.

[totodeinhere]

33. But if I suggested that we limit immigration in order to curb population growth I would probably

get flamed for that. I might even be called a racist. Yet the fact remains that it is immigration that is fanning our population growth. If we want to get control of population growth we need to talk about immigration.

[antigone382]

35. Immigration does not change global population growth. It is not all about the United States.

Now, you could argue that as people immigrate from a country that consumes fewer resources to a country that consumes higher resources, global resource use will become even more unsustainable than it currently is--a baby born in one of the most industrialized nations uses 20 times the resources, over the course of its life, of a baby born in one of the least industrialized nations; and those who come here from one of those countries will most likely end up consuming far more than they would in their home countries. However, this argument begs the question, why are so few using so many resources, so thoughtlessly, in the first place?