What frightens us most today? Most of us are not always certain what we are frightened most about, just that we feel fear about something, whether it be a fatal disease like Alzheimer’s, a nuclear attack, another 9/11, having a Republican win the next national election – or perhaps something a little less frightening, like a stroke. Any of these can be more than a little terrifying. But what is perhaps worse and more pressing than any of these or even all of them combined is something we give little or no thought to: over population.
Was that a misprint? No, that was not a misprint. We need give the matter only a little thought, like never before, and we may come to a speedy agreement that over population will eat us up sooner than AIDS will engulf us. Let’s consider a simple law of nature: barring a sudden epidemic Black Death to sweep across the world overnight or rigorous intelligent birth control, human growth is exponential. If we look at a few numbers [statistics], we can see how this has worked since ancient times, no farther back than Greek and Roman times. World human population was still only considerably less than 100 million people. In spite of man-made wars and plagues, we are now in the billions. [We tend to pooh-pooh such numbers when we refer to people but bellow bloody murder if it refers to the national deficit.]
Today [April 2011] the world population is, specifically, at 6.91 billion. We were barely over a billion in 1800. By the year 2050 [within the lifetime of those born in the last 25 years and their children], scientific predictions have us at over 7.5 billion and more likely flirting with 10.5 billion. [That is still only pocket change for what Bernard Madoff ran off with to rent for himself a nice place in federal prison.] Well, no doubt, as far as most people are concerned, these are still only numbers, nothing to worry about. It might do well, though, to look at the matter from another angle.
Not very long ago, there was a fellow by name Adolph Hitler, and he complained that Germany needed more lebensraum. Very patriotically, he led his country and went out to obtain that extra “room” or space. We call that noble effort World War II. Not enough space, he said. A few years before Hitler, there was another war. We have proudly called it The War of Independence, the making of the American nation. At that time there were only “thirteen colonies” settled in the far Northeast, Yankee land. To the west was a nearly “boundless” land, totally unexplored by the white man but inhabited by a few million [handful of] “savages” [whom we kindly set aside to make room for the white folk.] It was long said that from that Northeast corner, there were such thick forests that a monkey [not the Yankee, of course] could swing from tree to tree across the entire land right up to the Pacific Ocean. How many of us, or at least a good, athletic African monkey, would be able to swing on trees today from coast to coast without our feet touching ground?
The fact is that we have cut down millions of acres of trees in scarcely over two hundred years. Why? To house millions of people who have covered our erstwhile virgin lands. How about the asphalt and concrete we have poured on them to build our streets, highways, and parking spaces for our cars and trucks? At the beginning of the 20th century we had less than 100 million population. Today we are climbing at 311,191,000 and counting, what with our practically open immigration policies. Where will we be in 2050, especially if we continue to let all the Asian peoples, who are dying to come to the “land of opportunity,” come rushing through our well-oiled revolving door? China is bulging at 1,343,520,000; India 1,210,193,422; Indonesia 238,400,000; Pakistan 175,791,000, Bangladesh 164,425,000; as well as Africa with Nigeria enjoying 158,259,000 [only one of the countries in Africa] and Ethiopia [the poorest country in the world] with some 60,500,000. Already the face of America has darkened considerably since the Civil Rights bills of the ‘60s, which allowed for our nearly open-door immigration policies. Who or what is going to put the brakes on the free flow of poor countries from flooding what remains of our diminishing spaces? Logic tells us that with our current fiscal deficits and rampant immigration of the world’s poor, it will not take many more generations to qualify as one of the “third world” nations. And we, too, like Hitler, will be screaming our lungs out for more lebensraum. Unthinkable? What odds are you laying on your bet?
For those who have not kept up with foreign news might want to know that Brazil [population 194,529,000] has been cutting down millions of acres of its Amazon jungles for years for building roads, infrastructure, industries, and homes. Sound familiar? The Amazon jungle once provided vital oxygen to our atmosphere, but it is now being transformed into carbon dioxide and other pollutants. Let us not forget that they and we are only getting warmed up in our mad determination to destroy our world, which includes not only our air but also our waters [oil spills contribute marvelously to the madness; after all, we do need more oil for more people, do we not?], marine life, animals, vegetation, etc.
Communist China, whatever else we may think or say about it, adopted a policy to control excessive population growth a few years ago: reward those who participate in birth control and ignore the others. Couples having no children reap the greatest tax and financial benefits; those with one child a little less; those with two even less; and so on. Preaching never produces positive results. Money always does. As soon as possible, we should seriously invest in such a practical program here as well as in poor countries, and close the door to free immigration into this country. [We can already anticipate interested parties reacting vehemently against such a policy, but it is not a matter of permitting any and all relatives and friends to come live with us, but a matter of survival for legal tax-paying Americans.] As our worthy politicians say in their political charades “let’s take back our country,” we should take back our land, the natural world around us, and our future before we reach the point of no return. The handwriting on the wall is writ large enough for a blind man to see. When are WE going to see it, read it, and act on it sensibly?
China's "practices" you are so laudatory of has caused their populace to kill baby girls at the drop of a hat. That's the example you want to use?
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