Defying Common Sense

In a world devoid of misconceptions, ignorance and superstition, this website would be unnecessary. It would be common knowledge that shitting where you eat never leads to good unless you’re producing a movie called “Jackass”.

Yet, the over population epidemic is little known and often ignored. Species go extinct before they’re ever named, pristine habitats are permanently transformed to extract resources, and the planet warms as we suffocate ourselves with the byproducts of growth and prosperity.

Instead of addressing the root of the problem — over population, we’re inundated with a host of causes for the degradation of the planet we call home: globalization, big industry, over-indulgence, deregulation, etc. The fact remains, there wouldn’t be nearly as much emphasis on going green if there weren’t nearly 7 billion (7,000,000,000) of us. So why in this world of finite resources is the world population projected to exceed 9 billion by 2050?

There are three main contributors that enable population growth to continue unchecked and ignored: religious entitlement, tradition and a disconnect between cause and effect.

Without broaching specifics, religion provides a narrative to explain existence, death and everything in-between with an air of absolutism and inevitability. Unfortunately, devout religiosity is marked by faith and turning a blind eye to fact, reason and rationality. But strangely, while scientific findings are subject to extensive testing for validation, questioning of irrational, unsubstantiated religious beliefs is considered taboo. The merits of global warming are debated endlessly by politicians, but the assertion by religious people that the earth is 6000 years old and so evolution is a myth because it does not fit with this explanation of the world is largely ignored.

Because religion is off limits to public debate and scrutiny, behaviors justified in the name of religion go unchecked. Irrational wackos like the Duggars who have 19 brats believe that every child is a gift from a higher power instead of simply the product of a biological process called sex.

Government bodies, the media and other outlets with the loudest voices will never speak out against large families because that would be contradictory, and so could offend, the religious beliefs of the majority who denounce birth control and embrace babies as “God’s Will”.

Traditionalists cling to the past. Today we live in a post-industrial era, where a lot of manual labor has been automated by gadgetry. Where once dozens of laborers were needed to make a plot of land productive, now machines pick and shuck that corn automatically. In earlier generations large families were needed for survival. In turn, descendants of large families feel compelled to have large families of their own because that is where they’re most comfortable. These traditionalists hold that having less than three children is an unnecessary sacrifice.

Both traditionalism and religious entitlement are fed by the disconnect between cause and effect. Drilling is desired in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to fuel growing populations. Food prices increase because population rises faster than supply. Roads are congested because aging infrastructure cannot keep up with growing populations. Greenhouse gas emissions increase because of improved quality of life for growing populations.

As the world flattens, and the billions of inhabitants of developing nations like India and China make quality of life improvements on par with America, the increased consumption will reach a pinnacle from which quality of life will begin to reverse. Air quality will decline, storm intensity will increase, and finite commodities will jump in price dramatically. Yet aging populations require the support of a larger, younger population to maintain their qualities of life in retirement. It’s a Ponzi scheme and a catch-22 in a world of finite resources. Eventually, the bubble will burst

If population growth continues unchecked, eventually there will be a scramble for diminishing resources coinciding with a painful population correction. Like the Titanic heading for the iceberg, the collision course we’re on may not be reversible, but the least we can do is make people aware of the issue and try to mitigate the consequences instead of ignoring the problem.