Showing posts with label overpopulation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label overpopulation. Show all posts

Thursday, January 30, 2014

Does the Global Elite See Humans as a Plague Upon the Earth?

The God of Useful Pandemics: oil on linen, carved
wood, 23k gold leaf, dried blood, gunpowder, pigment
Well, in a word, yes. Does this mean the one-percenters--more accurately, the top .01%-- are not human? Not necessarily, but they most certainly see themselves as a different and superior breed of human.

Moreover, they view overpopulation as the underlying reason for all of our problems from so-called "global warming" to poverty to  war, etc., despite the fact that the entire global population could fit--albeit not very comfortably (1,000 square feet per person)-- into the state of Texas.

That's according to Dr. Dave's  calculations:
"Using the square milage you gave for Texas: 1 square mile = 5280 x 5280 square feet = 27,878,400 square feet. So 268,581 square miles = 7,487,608,550,400. For simplicity say 7.5 x 10^12. That divided by 7 x 10^9 is indeed over 1000 square feet per person. So if we made one giant one-story compound over Texas, land, water, and all, we would each get a 1,000 square foot unit."
The initial calculation was done by Thomas Sowell in 1984, when the world's population was 4.4 billion.
“In 1984, it was proven by the economist Thomas Sowell that the entire world population (4.4 billion at the time) could live comfortably in the state of Texas. He wrote “Every human being on the face of the Earth could be housed in the state of Texas in one-story, single-family homes, each with a front and a back yard. A family of four would thus have 6,800 square feet- about the size of the typical middle-class American home with front and backyards.”(Carter 99) According to more recent research on the topic, all of the world’s 1997 population (5.84 billion) could fit on the small Island of Bali in Indonesia.(Stiefel 98)
Granted, squeezing the world masses into Texas is not the ideal situation, however,  it does prove a point, that overpopulation is not a problem and most of the globalists know this is true, but they don't like us, so this is what they have to say :
“Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of.” Supreme Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
“We are a plague on the Earth. It’s coming home to roost over the next 50 years or so. It’s not just climate change; it’s sheer space, places to grow food for this enormous horde. Either we limit our population growth or the natural world will do it for us, and the natural world is doing it for us right now” --UK Television Presenter Sir David Attenborough
“In order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day. It is a horrible thing to say, but it is just as bad not to say it." - Jacques Cousteau,
“the resultant ideal sustainable population is hence more than 500 million but less than one billion." - Club of Rome, Goals for Mankind
“I believe that human overpopulation is the fundamental problem on Earth Today" [and] "We humans have become a disease, the Humanpox." [and]“ "My three main goals would be to reduce human population to about 100 million worldwide, destroy the industrial infrastructure and see wilderness, with it’s full complement of species, returning throughout the world." [and]
“The Aids epidemic, rather than being a scourge, is a welcome development in the inevitable reduction of human population... If [it] didn’t exist, radical environmentalists would have to invent [it]."- Dave Foreman, Sierra Club, co founder of Earth First!
“All of our problems are the result of overbreeding among the working class”"The most merciful thing that a family does to one of its infant members is to kill it." - Margaret Sanger

“Eugenic sterilization is an urgent need ... We must prevent multiplication of this bad stock." - Margaret Sanger

“Eugenics is... the most adequate and thorough avenue to the solution of racial, political and social problems." - Margaret Sanger

“We don't want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population." - Margaret Sanger
“MAINTAIN HUMANITY UNDER 500,000,000 IN PERPETUAL BALANCE WITH NATURE" anonymously commissioned Georgia Guidestones
“Society has no business to permit degenerates to reproduce their kind" - Theodore Roosevelt
“If I were reincarnated I would wish to be returned to earth as a killer virus to lower human population levels."- Prince Phillip, Queen Elizabeth’s husband, Duke of Edinburgh, leader of the World Wildlife Fund

“A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal" - Ted Turner, founder of CNN,  a billion dollar UN donor

Turner’s wealthier pals were/are on board, too.  Warren Buffett discussed plans for a foundation to distribute his money to world peace and population control, while billionaires Bill Gates and George Soros have funded eugenics population control projects for decades.

“Out of the full spectrum of the human personality, one-fourth is elected to transcend and one-fourth are destructive, defective seeds. In the past they were permitted to die a natural death. Now, as we approach the quantum shift from the creature-human to the co-creative human – the human who is an inheritor of god-like powers – the destructive one-fourth must be eliminated from the social body. Fortunately, you are not responsible for this act. We are. We are in charge of God’s selection process for planet Earth. He selects – we destroy. We are the riders of the pale horse, Death. We come to bring death to those who are unable to know God… The riders of the pale horse are about to pass among you. Grim reapers, they will separate the wheat from the chaff. This is the most painful period in the history of humanity“- Task Force Delta psychologist Barbara Marx Hubbard, supported by Rockefeller Fund (nominated for Vice-President at the 1984 Democrat National Convention)
“And advanced forms of biological warfare that can "target" specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."- The Project for a New American Century, Rebuilding America’s Defenses, p. 60, Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz
“Many ecologists (myself included) would just as soon see huge areas of land kept off limits to human activities of any kind."- Noss, R. 1995. Maintaining Ecological Integrity in Representative Reserve Networks. World Wildlife Fund Canada Discussion Paper. p. 12.
“Whatever the price of the Chinese Revolution, it has obviously succeeded not only in producing more efficient and dedicated administration, but also in fostering high morale and community of purpose. The social experiment in China under Chairman Mao's leadership is one of the most important and successful in human history."- David Rockefeller Banker, Honorary director of Council on Foreign Relations, honorary chairman of Bilderberg Group & founder of Trilateral Commission. Member of Bohemian Club
“Eugenics is the study of the agencies under social control that may improve or impair the racial qualities of future generations either physically or mentally."- Francis Galton, first cousin and associate of Charles Darwin, circa 1883
“the most important, significant... genuine branch of sociology which exists, namely eugenics."- John Maynard Keynes. Eugenics Review. 1946
“Every one of you who gets to survive has to bury nine." and "[Disease] will control the scourge of humanity,"- Eric Pianka
“If the youth is content to abandon his previous associates and to throw in his lot whole-heartedly with the rulers, he may, after suitable tests, be promoted, but if he shows any regrettable solidarity with his previous associates, the rulers will reluctantly conclude that there is nothing to be done with him except to send him to the lethal chamber before his ill-disciplined intelligence has had time to spread revolt. This will be a painful duty to the rulers, but I think they will not shrink from performing it." - Bertrand Russell, "The Scientific Outlook", 1931
“I do not pretend that birth control is the only way in which population can be kept from increasing. There are others, which, one must suppose, opponents of birth control would prefer. War, as I remarked a moment ago, has hitherto been disappointing in this respect, but perhaps bacteriological war may prove more effective. If a Black Death could be spread throughout the world once in every generation survivors could procreate freely without making the world too full. There would be nothing in this to offend the consciences of the devout or to restrain the ambitions of nationalists. The state of affairs might be somewhat unpleasant, but what of that? Really high-minded people are indifferent to happiness, especially other people's."
Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), Philosopher
“The big threat to the planet is people: there are too many"- Sir James Lovelock
“The extinction of the human species may not only be inevitable but a good thing." --Christopher Manes, Earth First!
“Childbearing should be a punishable crime against society, unless the parents hold a government license. All potential parents should be required to use contraceptive chemicals, the government issuing antidotes to itizens chosen for childbearing." - David Brower, first Executive Director of the Sierra Club
“I wish very much that the wrong people could be prevented entirely from breeding" - Theodore Roosevelt
“The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes," --Years later, the Nazis at the Nuremberg trials quoted Holmes' words in their own defense.--Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes - writing the majority opinion in Buck v. Bell - stated: "It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind" - 1927 the U.S. Supreme Court heard an appeal of Virginia's decision in Buck v. Bell ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote, language that closely mirrored that of Hitler's Mein Kampf
“The Puerto Ricans are the dirtiest, laziest, most dangerous and theivish race of men ever inhabiting this sphere... I have done my best to further the process of extermination by killing off eight and transplanting cancer into several more." - Dr Cornelius Rhoads (1898-1959) | Rockefeller Institute, Rhoads also headed two large chemical warfare projects, had a seat on the AEC (Atomic Energy Commission), and he headed the Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research
“I have studied with great interest," he told a fellow Nazi, "the laws of several American states concerning prevention of reproduction by people whose progeny would, in all probability, be of no value or be injurious to the racial stock." - Adolf Hitler
“While we were pussyfooting around...the Germans were calling a spade a spade."- Whitney, executive secretary of the American Eugenics Society, declared of Nazism
“The Germans are beating us at our own game."(referring to sterilizations) - Joseph DeJarnette, superintendent of Virginia's Western State Hospital, 1934
“From an historical point of view, the first method which presents itself is execution . . . Its value in keeping up the standard of the race should not be underestimated." "Applied Eugenics" also devoted a chapter to "Lethal Selection," which operated "through the destruction of the individual by some adverse feature of the environment, such as excessive cold, or bacteria, or by bodily deficiency."- In 1918, Dr. Paul Popenoe, the Army venereal disease specialist during World War I, co-wrote the widely used textbook, "Applied Eugenics"
“Instead of recommending cleanliness to the poor, we should encourage contrary habits. In our towns we should make the streets narrower, crowd more people into the houses, and court the return of the plague.- Thomas Malthus
“Thus even though it is quite true that any radical eugenic policy will be for many years politically and psychologically impossible, it will be important for UNESCO to see that the eugenic problem is examined... and that the public mind is informed... so that much that is now unthinkable may at least become thinkable"- UNESCO ITS PURPOSE AND ITS PHILOSOPHY by the founding Director-General of UNESCO Sir Julian Huxley. This is from the original founding document of the UNESCO, THE UNITED NATIONS EDUCATIONAL, SCIENTIFIC AND CULTURAL ORGANISATION, 1946
“Once the full implications of evolutionary biology are grasped, eugenics will inevitably become part of the religion of the future, or of whatever complex of sentiments may in the future take the place of organized religion"- "Eugenics and Society" (The Galton Lecture given to the Eugenics Society), by Julian Huxley
“we have to take away from humans in the long run their reproductive autonomy as the only way to guarantee the advancement of mankind." - Francis Crick
“The first task is population control at home. How do we go about it? Many of my colleagues feel that some sort of compulsory birth regulation would be necessary to achieve such control. One plan often mentioned involves the addition of temporary sterilants to water supplies or staple food. Doses of the antidote would be carefully rationed by the government to produce the desired population size."- Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb
“There is a single theme behind all our work–we must reduce population levels. Either governments do it our way, through nice clean methods, or they will get the kinds of mess that we have in El Salvador, or in Iran or in Beirut. Population is a political problem. Once population is out of control, it requires authoritarian government, even fascism, to reduce it…”-- Thomas Ferguson, former official in the U.S. State Department Office of Population Affairs
“WE need death panels. Well, maybe not death panels, exactly, but unless we start allocating health care resources more prudently — rationing, by its proper name — the exploding cost of Medicare will swamp the federal budget.” -- Democrat strategist Steven Rattner

Francis Galton described the "science" of bettering human stock and the elimination of unwanted characteristics... and individuals proposed societal intervention for the furtherance of "racial quality," maintaining that "Jews are specialized for a parasitical existence upon other nations" and that "except by sterilization I cannot yet see any way of checking the produce of the unfit who are allowed their liberty and are below the reach of moral control."


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Friday, February 08, 2013

Myth of Overpopulation, Demographic Decline and Agenda 21

For years, we have been warned about the looming danger of overpopulation: billions of people scrambling for space on a planet that’s running out of oil, food, land, water, etc. Guess what? It's all a big lie. The staggering truth is that people are having too few children, gradually slowing population growth. That's right. The world’s population will peak at about 9-10 billion in the next 50 years, and then begin shrinking.

John Lennon: "I think it's a bit of a joke the way people have made this overpopulation myth. I don't really believe it, you know, I think whatever happens will balance itself out...I think we've got enough food and money to feed everybody. There is a natural balance. I think there is enough room for us. I don't believe in overpopulation. I think it's kind of a myth that's thrown out to keep your mind off Vietnam and Ireland, and all the important subjects."

Dick Cavett: "I think you're wrong."

John Lennon: "Oh, I don't care."
According to the Economist, since 2007, thanks to the weak economy Americans are having fewer babies than even the French and the British, not enough to maintain the size of the US population without immigration. The US birthrate right now is 1.9 births per woman when 2.1 births per woman is necessary to sustain the population on its own.  It's only because of immigration that the birthrate is still growing.  Furthermore, according to Pew Research, in the 18-34 year old demographic, one in four adults have returned to live with their parents since the economic downturn.

Not too long ago, children were desirable simply because the more you had, the more you had to work the family farm therefore, each child had a positive economic value. Today, each child is financial burden. The cost of raising a child from birth to age 17 is $300,00 according to the Department of Agriculture, $1.1 million to raise a child if you're a middle-class couple.
“In 1970, the global average was 6.5 children per woman. Today it’s 2.5. The replacement rate, that is the average number of children the average woman needs to have in order to keep the population constant, is 2.1. As a result, he said, 97 percent of the world's population is in countries where fertility rates are in the negative numbers, and as a result, a “demographic disaster” is looming." -- Jonathan Last, author of “What To Expect When No One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Disaster“
As college costs and student loan debt soar--college tuition has increased 1000% since 1965--and unemployment rises, college graduates, crushed by student loan debt, are deciding not to have kids. In recent years, student loan debt has skyrocketed from $100 billion to nearly $1 trillion, creating another potential debt bubble burst for the American economy.

So what is Agenda 21 (Sustainable Development, including: Smart Growth, the Grand Boulevard Initiative, Climate Action Plans, Carbon Taxes, Cap-and-Trade, etc) and what does it have to do with overpopulation and demographics? It is the United Nation's vision for a centrally managed global society under the noble banner of saving the earth. Buried in the pages of this proposal are measures that can be taken to insure a world with less human resource depletion and "sustainable development" of which the key element is population control which basically promotes a culture of death, not only at the beginning of life, but towards the end as well.  What with euthanasia and the push for the legalization of physician-assisted suicide taking place in at least three states: Connecticut, New Jersey and Vermont...hey, it's a great way to take care of the aging population now that the baby boomers are reaching their twilight years.
“Effective execution of Agenda 21 will require a profound reorientation of all human society, unlike anything the world has ever experienced a major shift in the priorities of both governments and individuals and an unprecedented redeployment of human and financial resources. This shift will demand that a concern for the environmental consequences of every human action be integrated into individual and collective decision-making at every level."
- excerpt, UN Agenda 21
Under the guise of protecting the environment, "sustainable development" has become the rage in land use planning, zoning, and in virtually every other facet of daily life. The scary part is that it's taking hold in local communities all across America in the form of "stakeholder" councils to advance Agenda 21 to transform cities and towns into "sustainable communities." The primary tool used to spread this agenda is the "consensus process," which is used to gain the appearance of public support. This process is designed to take the public policy-making function away from elected officials and replace it with councils of non-elected officials, while giving the appearance of broad public input into the decision-making process.

Codex Alimentarius (Latin for "food code")--now enforceable through the World Trade Organization (WTO)--is inextricably linked to Agenda 21. It is a set of regulations that aim to outlaw health information and supplements, limiting access to natural therapies on a worldwide scale--basically anything that doesn't profit Big Pharma. Behind the Codex Alimentarius Commission is the United Nations and the World Health Organization working in conjunction with the multinational pharmaceutical cartel and international banks.
“The Codex Alimentarius Commission was established under heavy influence of the pharmaceutical industry in 1963 following resolutions passed at the Eleventh Session of the Conference of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in 1961, and at the Sixteenth World Health Assembly in 1963. (More on the history of codex here) From its very beginning CAC's clear intention was to protect corporate interests in the global pharmaceutical and food markets.
The bottom line is that despite the doomsday predictions of Malthus and his Malthusian theory being proven a colossal failure, his ideas are still being taken seriously and still being hyped and promoted by the elite multinational powerbrokers, financiers and billionaires who run our country behind the scenes, and who benefit from the idea that there are too many useless eaters using up the world’s resources.  In other words, the clear message   is "the real enemy then is humanity itself."
“Malthus indicates another kind of apologetic use for the population principle. If an existing social order, an elite group of some sort, is under threat and is fighting to preserve its dominant position in society, then the overpopulation and shortage of resources arguments can be used as powerful ideological levers to persuade people into acceptance of the status quo and of authoritarian measures to maintain it. The English landed interest used Malthus’ arguments thus in the early nineteenth century.

And this kind of argument is, of course, even more effective if the elite group is in a position to create a scarcity to demonstrate the point.

Links:

Demographic Intelligence

Last Word on Overpopulation

The Negro Project: Margaret Sanger's Eugenic Plan for Black Americans




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Monday, October 22, 2012

The Overpopulation Myth: The Biggest and Most Dangerous Disinformation Campaign in History.

From Bill Gates, to Bill Maher to Ted Turner, celebrities, journalists, talking heads, politicians, corporate CEOs, and most of all, our public education system endlessly proclaim the world is overpopulated--or will become overpopulated--leading us, if not checked, all to the brink of extinction, or as Paul Ehrlich, Al Gore's mentor, said in his book, "Population Bomb", "We will breed ourselves into oblivion," a belief that Chris Hedges feels compelled to remind us lest we forget.

Moreover, our national and international governments are, by law and by international agreement, committed to reducing the worldwide rate of population growth.  Why? What else? Profit and power. Not only does this ideology oblige taxpayers to fund population control programs, and carbon trading investment and ponzi schemes, capitalism thrives on shortages: shortages of land, food, oil, water, money...you name it.  If it has  monetary value, there must be a shortage, so suffice it to say, it's in the capitalist class' best interest to proclaim, "Shortage!" "Overpopulation!"

This myth is, perhaps, the biggest disinformation campaign in history.  It is also very dangerous. Why?  Because that belief justifies genocide, whether, indirect or direct, soft or hard.  One thing is sure, the genocide will target the poor, never the rich.

Of course, it's the wealthy and powerful who propagate this myth. Queen Elizabeth II, head of state of the United Kingdom and of 31 other states and territories, is the legal owner of about 6,600 million acres of land, one sixth of the earth’s non ocean surface.

She is the only person on earth who owns whole countries, and who owns countries that are not her own domestic territory. This land ownership is separate from her role as head of state and is different from other monarchies where no such claim is made – Norway, Belgium, Denmark etc.

Consider this. More than 97% of the earth's land surface is unpopulated! Not to mention, the entire global population could live comfortably in the state of Texas alone. All you have to do is take a long drive outside city limits, through the countryside, to see the vast uninhabited land.

Here are ten myths about overpopulation:

MYTH 1: The world is overcrowded and population growth is adding overwhelming numbers of humans to a small planet.

In fact, people do live in crowded conditions, and always have. We cluster together in cities and villages in order to exchange goods and services with one another. But while we crowd together for economic reasons in our great metropolitan areas, most of the world is empty, as we can see when we fly over it. It has been estimated by Paul Ehrlich and others that human beings actually occupy no more than 1-3% of the earth's land surface.

If you allotted 1250 square feet to each person, all the people in the world would fit into the state of Texas. Try the math yourself: 7,438,152,268,800 square feet in Texas, divided by the world population of 5,860,000,000, equals 1269 square feet per person. The population density of this giant city would be about 21,000 -- somewhat more than San Francisco and less than the Bronx.

Another fact: World population growth is rapidly declining. United Nations figures show that the 79 countries that comprise 40% of the world's population now have fertility rates too low to prevent population decline. The rate in Asia fell from 2.4 in 1965-70 to 1.5 in 1990-95. In Latin America and the Caribbean, the rate fell from 2.75 in 1960-65 to 1.70 in 1990-95. In Europe, the rate fell to 0.16 -- that is, effectively zero -- in 1990-95.And the annual rate of change in world population fell from 2% in 1965-70 to less than 1.5% in 1990-95.

Worldwide, the number of children the typical woman had during her lifetime (total fertility) fell from 5 in 1950-55 to less than 3 in 1990-95. (The number necessary just to "replace" the current generation is 2.1.) In the more developed regions, total fertility fell from 2.77 to 1.68 over the same period. In the less developed regions it fell from more than 6 to 3.3. Total fertility in Mexico was 3.1 in 1990-95. In Spain it stood at 1.3, and in Italy, it was 1.2.
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Official forecasts of eventual world population size have been steadily falling. In 1992-93, the World Bank predicted world population would exceed 10 billion by the year 2050. In 1996, the UN predicted 9 billion for 2050. If the trend continues, the next estimate will be lower still.

MYTH 2: Overpopulation is causing global warming.

The message that is most likely to arouse the fervor of young people is that overpopulation is destroying the environment and the biosphere. On this point, the first thing to keep in mind is that some of the most beautiful parts of the world, with the highest environmental quality, are in densely populated countries such as western Germany, which has more than 600 persons per square mile, and the Netherlands, which has almost 1200 persons per square mile, compared with 330 in China. Several myths promote the belief that we are engulfed in an environmental catastrophe.

For instance, Vice-President Al Gore and some scientists say population growth is causing global warming. But there is much disagreement in the scientific community about this. Seventy-nine scientists issued the "Leipzig Declaration" in 1995 saying "...There does not exist today a general scientific consensus about ... greenhouse warming ...." Additionally, the satellite readings of global temperature, available on the NASA Web site at www.nasa.com, do not show a warming trend. And further, respected climatologists such as Hugh Ellsaesser, Richard S. Lindzen and Robert C. Balling vigorously dispute the notion of a global warming danger.

MYTH 3: Overpopulation causes ozone depletion.

Like global warming, the cause and significance of the so-called ozone "hole" is a matter of intense scientific dispute, although the United States and other nations have agreed to reductions in the use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), which were alleged to have caused it. S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric physicist who participated in the earliest ozone measurements, calls the ozone scare a "misuse of science." In fact, many think the chief function of the CFC ban has been to help big chemical companies establish highly profitable new monopolies on the CFC substitutes which they developed.
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MYTH 4: The world's forests are disappearing because of overpopulation.

This is an important matter because forests are an essential part of the world's environment and, therefore, humanity's well-being. The Psalmists spoke in awe of the cedars of Lebanon. Today we know that trees inhale carbon dioxide and exhale oxygen, which means that they are a first line of defense against air pollution and the specter of global warming. The world forested area, estimated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), currently amounts to four billion hectares, covering 30% of the land surface of the earth. Few people realize this is the same figure as in the 1950s.
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In the United States, vast forests cover a third of the land, according to the US Forest Service. That's equivalent to two-thirds of the amount of land that was forested when the Europeans arrived in the 1600s. This acreage has not declined since 1920. In fact, annual forest growth today is more than 3-1/2 times what it was in 1920. Two-thirds of the nation's forests are classed as timberland, capable of producing at least 20 cubic feet per acre of industrial wood annually. Another fact: Trees are growing 33% faster than they are being cut.

The highest volumes of growth occur on privately-owned forest industry land, while the government-owned national forests, where the trees are older, have the lowest volumes of tree growth. The National Wilderness Preservation System grew from nine million acres in 1964 to 96 million acres in 1993. But this is not enough for the environmentalists of The Wildlands Project, who hope to turn fully half of the land area of the United States into wilderness areas inhabited by grizzly bears, wolverines and mountain lions, and make it off-limits to humans. There has also been great agitation about the "destruction of the tropical rainforests." Someone has claimed that an area twice the size of Belgium is now being logged worldwide each year, but people don't realize Belgium could fit into the world's tropical forests 500 times, and in the meantime, the rest of the world's trees -- 99.6% of them -- are continuing to grow. One of the greatest of these tropical stands exists in Brazil, with more than half of the forests of South America.

FAO and Brazilian government figures suggest that logging takes about 0.2% of forest acreage per year, and in 1993, Brazilian forests covered 58% of the country's total land area. Such figures hardly suggest a catastrophic decline. Another thing that's misleading is that FAO figures show a "decline" in forest cover even when forest land is appropriated for use as public parks, and not a single tree is cut down. And if in fact some deforestation is occurring in Brazil, it can scarcely be the result of overpopulation; Brazil has less than half as many people per square mile (31.2) as the world average (101).

MYTH 5: Air pollution is the result of overpopulation, and acid rain, a byproduct of air pollution, is destroying lakes, rivers and forests.

In fact, air and water pollution levels have been highest in the centrally-planned economies of Eastern Europe and China, where population growth is low or negative. Legendary air pollution in Poland and Russia has occurred in areas with thinly-settled populations. In the United States, air pollution is declining significantly. The federal government's National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program recently reported "no widespread forest or crop damage in the United States" related to acid rain.

MYTH 6: Many plants and animals are disappearing because of the growth in human numbers.

There is absolutely no scientific data whatsoever to support this claim. Even a scientist such as David Jablonski, who believes species will decline, says, "We have no idea how many species are out there and how many are dying." Some species, such as blue whales, spotted owls and blackfooted ferrets, have been found to be more numerous than was once thought. Since many species exist in forests and the earth's forest cover is remaining about the same, the claims of massive species extinction appear doubtful.

MYTH 7: Overpopulation is threatening the world food supply.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, world food supplies exceed requirements in all world areas, amounting to a surplus approaching 50% in 1990 in the developed countries, and 17% in the developing regions. "Globally, food supplies have more than doubled in the last 40 years ... between 1962 and 1991, average daily per caput food supplies increased more than 15% ... at a global level, there is probably no obstacle to food production rising to meet demand," according to FAO documents prepared for the 1996 World Food Summit. The FAO also reported that less than a third as many people had less than 2100 calories per person per day in 1990-92 as had been the case in 1969-71.

At present, farmers use less than half of the world's arable land. The conversion of land to urban and built-up uses to accommodate a larger population will absorb less than 2% of the world's land, and "is not likely to seriously diminish the supply of land for agricultural production," according to Paul Waggoner, writing for the Council for Agricultural Science and Technology in 1994.

MYTH 8: Overpopulation is the chief cause of poverty.

In reality, problems commonly blamed on "overpopulation" are the result of bad economic policy. For example, Western journalists blamed the Ethiopian famine on "overpopulation," but that was simply not true. The Ethiopian government caused it by confiscating the food stocks of traders and farmers and exporting them to buy arms. That country's leftist regime, not its population, caused the tragedy. In fact, Africa, beset with problems often blamed on "overpopulation," has only one-fifth the population density of Europe, and has an unexploited food-raising potential that could feed twice the present population of the world, according to estimates by Roger Revelle of Harvard and the University of San Diego. Economists writing for the International Monetary Fund in 1994 said that African economic problems result from excessive government spending, high taxes on farmers, inflation, restrictions on trade, too much government ownership, and overregulation of private economic activity. There was no mention of overpopulation.

The government of the Philippines relies on foreign aid to control population growth, but protects monopolies which buy farmers' outputs at artificially low prices, and sell them inputs at artificially high prices, causing widespread poverty. Advocates of population control blame "overpopulation" for poverty in Bangladesh. But the government dominates the buying and processing of jute, the major cash crop, so that farmers receive less for their efforts than they would in a free market. Impoverished farmers flee to the city, but the government owns 40% of industry and regulates the rest with price controls, high taxes and unpublished rules administered by a huge, corrupt, foreign-aid dependent bureaucracy. Jobs are hard to find and poverty is rampant. This crowding leads to problems such as sporadic or inefficient food distribution, but this problem is caused -- as in Ethiopia -- by that country's flawed domestic policies.

It is often claimed that poverty in China is the result of "overpopulation." But Taiwan, with a population density five times as great as mainland China's, produces many times as much per capita. The Republic of Korea, with a population density 3.6 times as great as China's, has a per capita output almost 16 times as great. The Malaysian government abandoned population control in 1984, ushering in remarkable economic growth under free market reforms, while Ecuador, Uruguay, Bulgaria and other countries complained at the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo that though they had reduced their population growth, they still had deteriorating economies.

MYTH 9: Women and men throughout the world are begging for the means to control their fertility.

Not so, according to reports from such places as Bangladesh, Africa and the Philippines. The fact is, surplus condoms and birth control pills fill warehouses in the less developed world and women flee the birth control workers and beg to have their implants and IUDs removed.
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US foreign assistance law requires countries receiving American foreign aid to take steps to reduce population growth [you can find this in 22 US Code, sec. 2151-1; 22 US Code, sec. 2151(b)]. Far from meeting an "unmet need" for birth control, foreign-supported family planners in India, Bangladesh and other countries must pay, or force, their clients to accept it, according to reports from these countries. Foreign-supported population control is so unpopular in Bangladesh that riots over this issue prevented the prime minister from attending the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994.

Dr. Margaret Ogola, a Kenyan pediatrician, disputed the claim of "unmet need" for family planning at the International Conference on Population and Develop-ment in Cairo in 1994. She said that foreign aid givers have lavished pills, condoms and IUDs on hospitals and clinics in Kenya, but that simple medicines for common diseases remain unavailable. A United Nations survey of abortion and birth control policies throughout the world found that high proportions of women were familiar with and were using "traditional" methods (NFP) of limiting births.

In 1981, the typical Bangladeshi woman was having seven children during her lifetime; since then the number has fallen to 3.4. According to Bangladesh press reports in 1994, the secretary of health acknowledged that "coercion, blackmail [and] abuse of payment provisions" were problems in the population control program. Alarmed by extremely low fertility, South Korea reported to the International Conference in Cairo that it has slashed its government expenditures on birth control. Singapore, faced with below-replacement fertility, reported that it now offers tax rebates to couples with more than two children. Government-supported "family planning" agencies in the United States, such as Planned Parenthood, claim their services save public assistance costs. In fact, published research has shown that states which spend large amounts on birth control subsequently have higher costs of public assistance. Research also shows that states which require parental consent for a minor to have an abortion have lower rates of adolescent pregnancy.

MYTH 10: Overpopulation causes war and revolution.

The most war-torn continent on earth -- Africa -- is also one of the least densely populated, with about half as many people per square mile as in the world as a whole. Bad governments, propped up by ineptly and unjustly managed foreign aid, are more probably the root of strife.

The worldwide movement which promotes population control is not small or weak. It is a powerful alliance of United Nations agencies, national governments, foundations and "nongovernmental organizations." It commands many billions of dollars in resources. Its members include family planning agencies, radical leftist environmental organizations such as the Sierra Club and the World Wildlife Fund, development planners, international financial institutions such as the World Bank, foreign relations agencies such as the US Agency for International Development, and "research" organizations such as Worldwatch Institute. Its ideology increasingly dominates school and college instructional programs and textbook publishing.

Ultimately, however, its power rests on public ignorance in countries such as the United States. For the billions of people who inhabit God's creation, and for the billions more He intends it for, it's up to us to find out the truth about "overpopulation," and to share it with as many people as will listen.

Dr. Jacqueline R. Kasun is an economist and the author of The War Against Population: The Economics and Ideology of World Population Control (Ignatius, 1988, 1998).




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