A recent article published by The Guardian which suggests that having fewer children is the best thing one can do to fight climate change has sparked righteous indignation among many. The liberal website has once again offensively imposed its political views on it’s audience, seemingly contradicting articles previously published. The tone many felt through the article was that of condemnation for families with multiple kids, or those who even wanted kids, emphasizing that children leave a huge (and apparently unpardonable) carbon footprint. Basically, white, middle class westerners are considered to be selfish for choosing to have children!
There’s a multitude of problems with the anti-child, anti-family views expressed by The Guardian, as noted by the National Review:
If the Left’s view becomes widely accepted as a desirable or necessary course of action, there is no limiting principle to prevent it from becoming a government-enforced mandate against over-reproduction. And if enough people become convinced that overpopulation is quickly killing the earth — which, by the way, it’s not, despite the endless paeans to the thoroughly discredited Thomas Malthus — a regime of legally limited reproduction could even be considered a routine part of the government’s duty to protect its citizens.
The poisonous ideas of Thomas Malthus are referred to as Malthusianism, which The Federalist elaborates on:
Malthusianism is the discredited belief that populations grow exponentially while the food supply grows arithmetically, leading to food shortages and poverty. It crops up every once in a while despite it being false, and the more fringe environmentalists, pro-abortionists, and eugenicists carry the flag of Malthusianism to this day, as we see here.
The Guardian isn’t the only liberal source hailing the halt of procreation, Cosmopolitan’s senior political writer Jill Filipovic took to Twitter to share her support of the article, “Having children is one of the worst things you can do for the planet. Have one less and conserve resources.”
https://twitter.com/JillFilipovic/status/885022422872858626
According to Motherboard:
In the US in 2016, the birth rate was the lowest on record, with 62 births per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44, down one percent from the year before. Canada’s seen a similar trend, as have European countries, and Australia.
These countries are ones specifically attacked by The Guardian, and yet they have some of the lowest birthrates in the world, ever. It appears that Westerners really aren’t having that many babies at all. Maybe the answer to climate control isn’t telling millennials to reconsider having children. Maybe there’s more to reducing carbon emissions than meets the eye, and perhaps the west is not the one to blame. When a political group promotes anti-baby and anti-procreation ideas in the name of environmentalism, it’s time to rethink priorities.
