Tonight, we are told, Australia will reach a new milestone with 23 million people. Most of this is due to immigration, with Australia’s birthrate hovering around 1.9 children per woman, still below the replacement rate of 2.1. While this is an event to celebrate for many, not everyone is pleased.
One alarmist group has already commented on this milestone: “Population growth rate soars to unsustainable 1.7 per cent”. Unsustainable? Sez who? So what pray tell is a sustainable rate? And who decides this? And how exactly is it calculated? This group lists as some of its objectives:
“-To promote policies that will lead to the stabilisation, and then to reduction, of Australia’s population by encouraging low fertility and low migration.
-To advocate low immigration rates while rejecting any selection based on race.
-To help promote policies that will lead to the stabilisation, then reduction of global population.”
Vague goals, but how will this all be achieved? Will these folks be leading by example here? Will they be bumping off family members and loved ones so that we can have a “sustainable population”? I eagerly wait to see them set the standard here, and show us the way.
Of course plenty of other alarmists and humanity haters have made the same – or worse – draconian calls. As but one example I have elsewhere mentioned media mogul Ted Turner. He is most clear on what he thinks on this issue. We are far too overpopulated and radical action must be taken immediately to deal with all this.
He actually believes the global population of seven billion must be reduced by at least 95 per cent! This is what he said back in 1996: “A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal”. And more recently he was still pushing this moonbattery, but at least now he thinks maybe 2 billion is OK.
So there you go, we only have to figure out how we eliminate 5 billion people now. And to see what a real human-hater he is, Turner was recently asked by Piers Morgan what he thought about the fact that more American soldiers commit suicide than are killed in combat. Morgan said it was shocking, but Turner answered: “No, I think it’s good.”
Nice guy. Real nice guy. But contrary to this doom and gloom brigade, plenty of experts have been warning about our population implosion. They are arguing that our real problem is a birth dearth. These demographers state that we are in bad shape, and desperately need to start having babies, or many nations will simply suffer massive shrinkage over time.
This global plunge in population will have all sorts of major ramifications, not least of which is how the shrinking pool of the young is going to pay for the social security benefits of the growing pool of the elderly. For those who are interested in more on this, I here offer a dozen highly recommended books on this topic:
Beisner, E. Calvin, Prospects for Growth: A Biblical View of Population, Resources, and the Future. Crossway Books, 1990.
Cromartie, Michael, ed., The Nine Lives of Population Control. Eerdmans, 1995.
Goldman, David, How Civilizations Die. Regnery, 2011.
Kasun, Jacqueline, The War Against Population: The Economics and Ideology of Population Control. Ignatius Press, 1988.
London, Herbert I., Why Are They Lying To Our Children? Stein and Day, 1984.
Longman, Phillip, The Empty Cradle. Basic Books, 2004.
Mosher, Steven, Population Control: Real Costs, Illusory Benefits. Transaction Publishers, 2008.
Simon, Julian L., Population Matters: People, Resources, Environment and Immigration. Transaction Publishers, 1990.
Trombley, Stephen, The Right to Reproduce: A History of Coercive Sterilization. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988.
Wattenberg, Ben J., The Birth Dearth. Pharos Books, 1987.
Wattenberg, Ben J., Fewer: How the New Demography of Depopulation Will Shape Our Future. Ivan R. Dee, 2004.
Whelan, Robert, Whose Choice: Population Controllers’ Or Yours? Committee on Population and the Economy, 1992.
But let me finish with one brand new book, What to Expect When No One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Disaster by Jonathan Last. While dealing primarily with the American situation, he certainly takes into account the global situation.
His thesis is this: “The ‘population bomb’ never exploded. Instead, statistics from around the world make clear that since the 1970s, we’ve been facing exactly the opposite problem: people are having too few babies. Population growth has been slowing for two generations. The world’s population will peak, and then begin shrinking, within the next fifty years.
“In some countries, it’s already started. Japan, for instance, will be half its current size by the end of the century. In Italy, there are already more deaths than births every year. China’s One-Child Policy has left that country without enough women to marry its men, not enough young people to support the country’s elderly, and an impending population contraction that has the ruling class terrified.”
The facts are quite clear: In 1979 the global fertility rate was 6.0, and now it is down to 2.52 and still falling. All Western nations are already below the 2.1 replacement level. Says Last, “Today only 3 percent of the world’s population lives in a country whose fertility rate is not declining.”
On present trends, and without a big influx of immigration, countries like Italy will shrink by 86 per cent, Spain by 85 per cent, Germany by 83 per cent, and Greece by 74 per cent. In Japan the population peaked several years ago at some 127 million: “If Japan’s fertility stays where it is, the country will contract by more than half – to 56.8 million – by the end of the century.”
Contrary to the alarmists, we are in a bad way – but because of a population implosion, not a population explosion. So if you are in the mood, pop out the champagne tonight as we welcome on board our 23rd millionth Australian. We should be celebrating life, people, and humanity – not hating them.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-04-23/australia-to-top-23-million-today/4644974
http://www.population.org.au/
http://www.infowars.com/ted-turner-i-think-its-good-u-s-troops-are-killing-themselves/
http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/video-ted-turner-reduce-population-by-five-billion-people/
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