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A Word for Stephen Colbert - Overpopulation
02 Jul 2012
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Nonsense About Sustainable Population Advocacy
23 Jul 2012
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Irrational Fear of Population Decline
13 Jul 2012
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Endangered Species Condoms
27 Jun 2012
Date posted: July 08 2013
World Population Day 2013 is coming up later this week (July 11), so we’re counting down the Top 10 Reasons to Choose a Small Family. Reason #4 is: Have You Ever Seen a Quiet Kid in a Movie Theater, Restaurant or Airplane? We actually love kids. That’s why we’re working hard to ensure we leave our children a planet worth inheriting.
It’s good to have a sense of humor even while saving the planet. Today’s reason for choosing a small family reminded me of this fun commercial from Belgium:
We know the scale of human activity on Earth passed into overshoot several decades ago. The coming crises are so severe we must make drastic changes in both our consumption and our reproductive behavior. We can humanely and voluntarily get world population back to a sustainable level within a century, if we are genuinely committed to it. What is required is that every couple be aware of the ramifications of their decisions about family size. We all want good lives for our children.
The current population level and state of overshoot are two very good reasons to choose to have no children, or perhaps just one. Even stopping at two will help. Adoption is a good option for those who desire more.
Please share this thought with your friends and children. Subscribe to our updates to get the rest of the Top 10 Reasons to Choose a Small Family!
Dave Gardner
Director of the documentary
GrowthBusters: Hooked on Growth
Date posted: July 07 2013
Since the focus of World Population Day 2013 is adolescent pregnancy, this inspiring story about one woman’s heroic effort to do something about this problem she saw reducing opportunities and quality of life for young women not ready to be mothers. What if every community had a program like this?
My compliments to Claudia Haltom and the members of her community who got behind what became A-Step-Ahead Foundation, which makes long-term, reversible birth control available to the women who need it most. The foundation works on much more than accessibility, however, as this story reveals. This is a great effort and a positive story, AND it’s about efforts in the U.S. Yes, teen pregnancy is a huge problem in the U.S., not just for the individual lives impacted and the costs to society, but for its contribution to U.S. overpopulation. Overpopulation is not just happening in developing nations.
Date posted: July 03 2013
In the run up to World Population Day 2013, we’re counting down the Top 10 Reasons to Choose a Small Family. Reason #5 is: Each child adds over 9,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide to a parent’s carbon legacy.
We know the scale of human activity on Earth passed into overshoot several decades ago. The coming crises are so severe we must make drastic changes in both our consumption and our reproductive behavior. In considering climate change, we tend to focus on how we heat, cool, feed and transport ourselves. But we seldom consider how many need to be heated, cooled, fed and transported. Research conducted by Oregon State University reveals our decisions about family size will have a much greater impact over the long haul than whether we drive a hummer or ride a bike. Grist Senior Editor Lisa Hymas wrote beautifully about this in her column a few years ago. Lisa wrote from the perspective of someone who has chosen not to conceive any children, but the logic is just as useful in determining whether to have one child vs. two, or two vs. three. The 400+ comments posted to this column give us a hint about how fascinating and challenging this conversation can be.
We can humanely and voluntarily get world population back to a sustainable level within a century, if we are genuinely committed to it. What we lack is the will to acknowledge the problem and to strongly recommend to all our children that they limit the size of their family.
The current population level and state of overshoot are two very good reasons to choose to have no children, or perhaps just one. Even stopping at two will help. Adoption is a good option for those who desire more.
Please share this thought with your friends and children. Subscribe to our updates to get the rest of the Top 10 Reasons to Choose a Small Family!
Dave Gardner
Director of the documentary
GrowthBusters: Hooked on Growth