Culling The Herd

Culling The Herd
By Sheila Samples

"Everything you can imagine is real"~~ Pablo Picasso

In 1974, a year after orchestrating a mass terror bombing of Cambodia -- after being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize -- Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and his National Security Council completed “National Security Study Memo 200: Implications of Worldwide Population Growth for U.S. Security and Overseas Interests.” This document, whose sharp edges are dulled by page after leaden page of how to reduce over-population in the Third World through birth control and "other" population-reduction programs, was classified until 1989, but was almost immediately accepted as US policy, and remains the US blueprint for ethnic cleansing today.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18914.htm

"Don't look at it as conspiracy, look at it as a pragmatic and profitable policy!"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Sanger


Not to say that the notion of birth control is wrong; I think access to contraception is the difference between a happy life and hell for all women.

Obviously, Kissinger's enthusiasm for population control through war and famine is sickening, and his exclusive focus on the Third World is racist. But let's not throw the baby (or the diaphragm) out with the bathwater. The fact is that underdeveloped countries are running on a treadmill if they try to improve their people's living standards while population continues to grow. Gains in GDP are offset by higher population, so GDP per capita doesn't grow (often even falls) and the poor remain poor.

How can poor countries avert famine and plague? Part of the answer has to be reducing population growth; then eliminating it to stabilize population; then, in many cases, seeking overall population reduction (through lowered birth rates, not through reducing life expectancy).

Of course, the same is true of the United States. This country is overpopulated. We don't face the immediate critical dangers that poorer countries do, but if our population keeps growing, eventually we'll get there. We have to stop growing sometime. Right now would be a good time.

There's the additional factor that, because of our high resource consumption, the overpopulation in the United States contributes disproportionately to environmental destruction, here and in the countries we exploit for resources. Yes, changes in our lifestyles, to consume less per person, would help, but there's only so much that can be accomplished through that approach. We still need to stabilize and reduce our own population.

Pointing out that Kissinger had bad motives, and that some population activists decades ago were interested in eugenics, is legitimate as far as it goes. Nevertheless, it shouldn't be allowed to tarnish all population-control efforts. There's no realistic scenario for, say, 2050 in which population growth has continued and the world is one that progressives can look on with satisfaction.

And rich countries bring overconsumption to the table to boot. Why does nobody mention that all of the genocidal warfare going on in the world right now is all about access to resources?