The Need to Breed

[Cinjin]

From what I've read, the majority of environmental scientists/researchers and their many population/environmental models all come to the same conclusion: At our current rate of population growth, the earth will run out of resources in no more than 150 years. Some predict that we will start seeing severe shortages in as few as 20 and that inside of 40 years, full scale wars will be fought for control of food and water rights. Meanwhile our population size ensures that greenhouse gases (the real planet killer) will continue to go uncontrolled.

Mohammad Basheer ... is not able to fill the monstrous bellies of 8 children. In patriarchal cultures there is one primary earner in a family and a number of mammoths dependent for food, shelter and education on him that results in ultimate impoverishment. An energy crisis, food crises, inflation, deteriorating fossil fuels and decrement in the value of human life are all gifts of population explosion.

Every minute, on an average, our population increases by 6 people. Moreover urbanization is taking place, cities are congested and many civic problems have been created. Less population means less pollution, decreased energy utilization, better hygienic conditions, belittled inflation, good job opportunities and superior living conditions.

Reference Link

Meanwhile, China's strict population controls don't seem to be anywhere near enough.

Implemented in 1979, China’s One Child Policy does just what its name would suggest: forcibly limit couples to have only one child. The policy was enacted in response to China’s purported overpopulation. Through excessive fines, forced abortions and sterilizations, the policy is strictly and violently enforced by China’s Family Planning Commission. [The] preference to have a male child has led to the deaths of tens of millions of unborn girls. The society-damaging consequences of their deaths, however, echo even further... According to a recent study, the number males under the age of 20 exceeded the number of females by more than 32 million in 2005.

Reference Link

So what do we do as a species? Is it obvious to you that we all need to stop breeding? It seems to me that if we don't "keep it in our pants" when it comes to procreation, that we're going to grow ourselves out of existence. Because of this, it seems that the conspiracy theorists may finally have one theory become probable: the idea that the governments of the world will have to inflict the human race with an epidemic that will make the Black Plague look like a Sunday picnic. Is that what it will take? And if it is ... is it the right choice to kill off a few billion people in order to save the planet from horrific war and possible total extinction due to ever increasing pollutants?

I'm not totally sure where I stand on this, but I do think it is completely irresponsible and even selfish to produce 4 or more children simply because you can and then dump the responsibility of over population onto some other country. I do firmly believe, we HAVE to stop breeding and if we don't that it may very well become someone's job to "thin the herd."