NPR gets it right....but who is listening?

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This is an NPR article that is stating the obvious: having children massively increases a person's carbon footprint.
It also states that rich nations need to do away with tax breaks for reproducing. The childless (his term) don't need to justify their lives, the breeders with multiple kids need to justify their lifestyles on this planet.

It's what we've been saying for a long time now. Maybe the author creeps Bratfree


Good read.

Very cool! You're right, though; it won't get the widespread attention it deserves.

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At the New Hampshire meeting, 67-year-old Nancy Nolan tells two younger women that people didn't know about climate change in the 1980s when she had her kids. Once her children were grown, "I said to them, 'I hope you never have children,' which is an awful thing to say," Nolan says, her voice wavering. "It can bring me to tears easily."

She adds that of course people are driven to procreate, and you can't really tell them not to.

One woman looks a little stunned. She's not a climate activist — just tagged along with a friend — and says she had no idea that deciding not to have kids because of the climate was even a thing.

1. Nancy Nolan is a disingenuous idiot. There was definitely talk about overpopulation and environmental concerns associated with it, even in the 60's and 70's. People just did what they are doing now----stuck their fingers in their ears. LaLaLaLa...I want a baybee; it wont' be like that for my chyld.

2. You can't tell people not to procreate? Why not? (Of course, it would be better if people weren't stupid and could figure it out themselves.)

He caved to his wife's baby rabies, so he's just a fucking hypocrite.

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Shauna's like a gluten-free Jim Jones for dumb, lifeless middle-aged women. I swear, this bitch could set fire to a orphanage and they would applaud her for bringing them light. ~ Miss Hannigan

While he did cave and have one, it was only one...for now anyways. I like the one n' done concept. Two kids for every couple that has their own is still too many in my opinion. I just don't understand why breeders need more than one kid, they fulfilled their need to reproduce. '

I posted the link of the article on my fakebook and got this steaming pile as a response "I hope that ALL the "climate activists" will take note. Maybe then, in a generation or so, common sense may start to make a comeback in the gene pool. SMH."

My ass is on blast because I said my carbon footprint will be much smaller even if I never live green and drive a hummer all my life than anyone who breeds. I got told to kill myself several times...because I'm taking up resources. I approached it logically in the most non-inflammatory way I could manage...

One of the arguments the green types have for breeding, and something the NPR article didn't address, is that having two children is merely "replacement" for the parents as a couple. "Our two kids simply replace us. It's only too many if couples have three or more kids."

The problem with that argument is that it's rubbish. Two children replace the parents only if the parents suddenly drop dead after having the second child. Without that, now there are four people instead of two.

Then presumably the parents will still be alive when the grandkids arrive, etc., which is the source of the population explosion.

An Australian academic, Dr. Barry Walters, proposed in a medical journal in late 2007 requiring parents of more than a certain number of children there to pay a carbon tax. He was critical of the "baby bonus" Oz was then paying breeders, which was ended a couple of years ago. In a later response to criticism of his proposal, he pointed out that we all share the same air and resources, so encouraging breeding in some countries while calling for others to limit population growth was hypocritical.

http://www.news.com.au/national/baby-tax-needed-to-save-planet-claims-expert/story-e6frfkp9-1111115071784

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squigglysquid
My ass is on blast because I said my carbon footprint will be much smaller even if I never live green and drive a hummer all my life than anyone who breeds. I got told to kill myself several times...because I'm taking up resources. I approached it logically in the most non-inflammatory way I could manage...

Let me guess, breeders suggested you kill yourself? Wonder if they will say the same thing to their children or a sibling if they decide not to breed? It is beyond rude.

I really wish these idiots would comprehend that we don't advocate killing of anyone. We advocate prevention of bringing additional baybeez into the world through use of some sort of birth control. Birth control isn't murder except to certain crazy fringe fundies.

Just for shits and grins, I posted a couple of times in the comments under my real name. Yeah, I'm like that. I argued that breeding isn't so much a biological imperative as a social one. Also pointed out to the resident liberal-haters that all the people I know with huge families are conservative. Idiocracy seemed to be coming to pass. Anyway, NPR is doing away with the comment sections on news stories on August 23. So if you want to add to the mix, you have a couple of days

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He caved to his wife's baby rabies, so he's just a fucking hypocrite.

Yup, and he's also proof positive you can have a PhD and still be dumb. .

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After many conversations, he and Sadiye ended up convincing each other. Travis decided you can't deny someone the hard-wired human fulfillment of creating a child.

In other words, what wifey wants, wifey gets. If he's that smart, why didn't he find someone who didn't want baybees to marry?

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bell_flower

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After many conversations, he and Sadiye ended up convincing each other. Travis decided you can't deny someone the hard-wired human fulfillment of creating a child.

In other words, what wifey wants, wifey gets. If he's that smart, why didn't he find someone who didn't want baybees to marry?

How ridiculous.


People aren't "denied" anything. People make choices. Everything has an opportunity cost, but unfortunately women were sold the "you can have it all" bill of goods a couple of generations ago. And that narrative is simply not true.

If Sadiye wanted to have kids so badly, she should have found a partner who had the same desire. I'll also point out that her reasons for having a baby, according to the article, revolve entirely around her.

Instead of going the traditional route with having a kid, I'd like to ask Sadiye if she ever volunteered to coach a youth sports team? What about working with Big Brothers, Big Sisters, Boy Scouts, or Girl Scouts? What about tutoring kids after school? What about working in a daycare? What about running an arts & crafts program?

There are many ways to connect with children, and I think that so many people think it's all sunshine and rainbows, when it's not. Some kids don't like their parents, are depressed, have issues in school, and some just don't fit the mold that their parents want them to be in.

What say you, Sadiye? I'd predict the response would be similar to what she said in the article: "To go through pregnancy and everything, that mattered to me a lot."

In short, humans don't care. A vast majority of them are too near-sighted, selfish and narrow-minded to think that far into the future - all they care about is getting personal satisfaction as fast as possible, no matter who it fucks over. So yeah, dumb people will breed the planet into a 150-degree shithole and then bitch about how hot it is in 20 years. It's not enough for a handful of us to not reproduce because there will always be the retards who have seven or eight kids and make up for what we aren't doing. This has to be a worldwide effort, but most people just plain don't care because a shitty climate isn't roasting them alive yet.

I read something yesterday about someone who suggested that we need to reduce the population by about 4 billion and that a five-year worldwide ban on breeding would result in 1 billion fewer people - not ideal, but a good start. In spite of our planet's future as a gigantic oven, nobody wants to get off their ass and outlaw breeding because people think that having brats is a "basic human right" and OH NO we might offend people by telling them they can't respond to their biological urges! Well, how about the more important biological urge of surviving? We won't be doing much of that because we're reached the point where we as a species care more about fucking than we do about living.

People don't care what kind of a planet their kids will grow up on in 40 years. All they know is "ME WANT BABBY NOW!" And since people are living longer and longer thanks to advances in medicine and science, people stick around on the planet and take up space/resources longer than before. Infertility can't be relied on as population control because we have ways around that.

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It should be a combination of factors. Primarily, get people to quit goddamn breeding and do whatever it takes to achieve this: place a limit on the number of kids they can have, fine/jail/forcibly sterilize them for each subsequent child, no tax incentives for having kids... hell, I'd say to quit stocking stores with baby supplies to discourage breeding. Maybe when wanna-Moos don't have the luxury of pre-pureed baby food and disposable diapers, they'll think more than two seconds about whether or not they should breed. Make contraception of some kind a requirement. Meanwhile, reward people for not having kids. Basically, make not breeding the far favorable choice and make breeding as difficult as possible.

Also, put a cap on how much medical intervention people can receive, regardless of age. No more keeping Aunt Judy on life support for 25 years so the family doesn't have to cry. No more saving brain-dead babies so Mommy can attention-whore her broken loaf online for ass pats. Moving more toward electric cars is good because it'll decrease the use of fossil fuels, but the biggest way you can wreck the environment is by reproducing. Another human life taking up space will do far more damage to the environment than driving a gas-guzzling vehicle or not recycling.

The solution is pretty simple: stop breeding. Honestly, I think the only way this is going to happen on a global scale is to either forcibly sterilize people or straight up kill them. People are far too selfish and too in love with their own loins to voluntarily refrain from breeding for any amount of time. Even if you make reproducing as socially/financially difficult as possible, people will still breed and then complain about how haaaaaaard and unfaaaaaair it is.

Well, there is a way to reduce our carbon footprint and population problem - massive worldwide nuclear war. Coming soon to a planet near you.

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"[GFG's pregnancy is] kind of like at the stables where that one dumb, ugly-ass mare broke out of her corral one day and got herself screwed by the equally fugly colt that was due to be gelded the same afternoon."- Shiny

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Miss_Hannigan
Well, there is a way to reduce our carbon footprint and population problem - massive worldwide nuclear war. Coming soon to a planet near you.

I still say Yellowstone is overdue to explode.
I've already got a plan to get to our friends' house with a metal roof, but from what I've read, NEPennsylvania won't get the brunt of the ash cloud. Still, don't want to breathe in flakes of cement to clog my lungs.
DH always argues with me about this plan because of "his parents". They're in their 80's. FIL is SUPER diabetic (can't even eat nuts) and MIL isn't exactly the survivalist type. DH doesn't understand that when the shit hits the fan, you need to get going where you need to go. My compound nutbar friends already said it's just DH and I. (I may sneak a cat in, but she'll have to stay in their garage).

_________________________________________________
"There's always a Plan B."
Amanda Rosewater, Defiance

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Cambion
I read something yesterday about someone who suggested that we need to reduce the population by about 4 billion and that a five-year worldwide ban on breeding would result in 1 billion fewer people - not ideal, but a good start. In spite of our planet's future as a gigantic oven, nobody wants to get off their ass and outlaw breeding because people think that having brats is a "basic human right" and OH NO we might offend people by telling them they can't respond to their biological urges! Well, how about the more important biological urge of surviving? We won't be doing much of that because we're reached the point where we as a species care more about fucking than we do about living.

There will be no "population control" program in the US. Not now, not ever.... at least not in our lifetime. To begin with, Americans won't go for it and I, for one, do not trust our ineffective government to oversee such a program. On top of that it would be draconian and dystopian. Definitely not my bag.

What we can do is level the playing field when it comes to this "basic human right" which is anything but a "right." We need to move away from the idea of The Village (TM) being forced to pay for children, particularly children from parents who cannot provide even the basics for them. Those that bring unwanted children into the world are going to be hit with an uncomfortable reality in the very near future: "The Village" is broke. Their tolerance for taxes has been stretched to the limit. Their credit cards are maxed out. Many are unemployed or underemployed. Some work multiple jobs just to get by.

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Cambion
Also, put a cap on how much medical intervention people can receive, regardless of age. No more keeping Aunt Judy on life support for 25 years so the family doesn't have to cry. No more saving brain-dead babies so Mommy can attention-whore her broken loaf online for ass pats. Moving more toward electric cars is good because it'll decrease the use of fossil fuels, but the biggest way you can wreck the environment is by reproducing. Another human life taking up space will do far more damage to the environment than driving a gas-guzzling vehicle or not recycling.

All of that is coming soon to a nation near you. Insurance companies can't afford to put people on life support indefinitely, nor can the individual, nor can the government, nor can the hospital.

What's not coming is the magical electric car. Electricity can be used to power motors but it is not a source of energy. For energy you need fossil fuels, or nuclear power, or wind, or solar, or geothermal. Large scale electricity generation is done by nuclear or fossil fuels. In some areas, wind turbines or solar do the trick, but not very often. And to make the batteries that power the electric car, you need a whole host of god awful materials, assembled in plants powered by fossil fuels, and the eventual disposal of these materials is... icky, for lack of a better word. You'd be better off driving a gasoline powered car than dealing with the waste created by these batteries.

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the noodler
I've already got a plan to get to our friends' house with a metal roof, but from what I've read, NEPennsylvania won't get the brunt of the ash cloud. Still, don't want to breathe in flakes of cement to clog my lungs.
DH always argues with me about this plan because of "his parents". They're in their 80's. FIL is SUPER diabetic (can't even eat nuts) and MIL isn't exactly the survivalist type. DH doesn't understand that when the shit hits the fan, you need to get going where you need to go. My compound nutbar friends already said it's just DH and I. (I may sneak a cat in, but she'll have to stay in their garage).

Although I have a small survivalist streak in me, I am not a full-fledged "doomer." However, I do see the potential for a lot of social disorder and unrest in the US in the coming decades. We've seen it already this year, when on multiple occasions (Baltimore, St. Louis, Milwaukee) riots broke out, cities burned, and "intellectuals" defended it on cable news.

What's going to happen when we have another bad recession or currency deflation? How will these people react when Uncle Sam just can't print any more money? When the food stamps don't show up? When the one bodega in their neighborhood closes for good, due to repeated and constant uncontrollable violence and looting?

Putting the poor aside for a moment, what about the college-educated crowd? What the hell are we going to do with this huge number of Social Justice Warriors, who have absolutely no applicable skills, and as an unintended result are now demanding that "the system" provide them with "free" healthcare/food/shelter/smartphones/everything else? What happens when their student loan bubble bursts? These are the neo-Communists. They protest against free enterprise, free speech, free expression, and if you disagree they'll smear you as a bigot and attempt to ruin your career or life on social media. When will YOU show up on their defamation agenda because you are [right-leaning, a gun-owner, a 1st Amendment supporter, simply not willing to side with them on any particular issue]? Where are these people going to be in 10 years? Eventually the student loans aren't issued and need to be paid, and they can't live in Mom's basement forever. What kind of grievance will they hold against their creditors? How will they treat you, a person who actually developed a marketable skill? Remember... they believe that "justice" is taking your stuff and redistributing it in a way that they deem to be "fair." Are you willing to let them have it?

And what about the Baby Boomers? They've been catered to by Uncle Sam since they've been born, but the programs designed to sustain them (Medicare, Social Security) are quickly going bankrupt. Oh... and by the way, this is the same group that repeatedly voted for politicians who promised to cut, cut, cut taxes and entitlement contributions throughout the 80s and 90s, when they should have been planning ahead and paying more, not less. How are the Boomers going to react when Gen X, Y, and Millenials are the majority population and won't be eager to fund programs for which they themselves will never benefit from?


Again... I am not trying to be a downer but I see the potential for a lot of darkness and disorder in the coming decades. And I haven't even mentioned what is shaping up to be a worldwide conflict between Radical Islam versus everyone else.

And knowing all this, I must ask prospective parents, "Are you SURE you really want to bring a child into THIS world?" I believe that's a perfectly legitimate question.

Buckle up, folks.

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At the New Hampshire meeting, 67-year-old Nancy Nolan tells two younger women that people didn't know about climate change in the 1980s when she had her kids. Once her children were grown, "I said to them, 'I hope you never have children,' which is an awful thing to say," Nolan says, her voice wavering. "It can bring me to tears easily."

Bull-fucking-shit. My parents were concerned enough about overpopulation in the 70s that they preferred adoption to reproduction.

I don't have much respect for people like the author who know all this and still decided to breed. Give me a real hero like Stephanie Mills.

Hell, in the 80s, global cooling was the concern, and it was brought up in my elementary school, along with facts like how the temperature will always swing back and forth, and global warming will eventually be a problem too. Back then they meant it would be a problem in 500 to thousands of years, but they were mistaken about a lot of things.

Like, my teachers actually taught things like nuclear is the word for bombs, and nucular is the word for cells. The nuculus of the cell is where the DNA is.
So wrong.

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Bell_Flower
In other words, what wifey wants, wifey gets. If he's that smart, why didn't he find someone who didn't want baybees to marry?

There are several factors here. But the one the you listed is the main one. I used to have a GF who wanted to breed - I said NO and walked away. While what I did was a right thing to do in my own mind, our society does not see it that way. In some way, men who say "No" to breeding when a woman wants to breed, they are not viewed favorably, especially by women. Did the guy have a good job where his wife's friends worked? He could have lost it. Would divorce do more damages to his finances than a child would? Maybe or maybe not. In my opinion, the guy should have found a way to not breed. Screwed up finances are better than screwed up life.

I do agree with the other posters that the dude is a hypocrite. He is telling people not to breed all while he bred himself. I think he would have been able to build a stronger case if he stayed CF and let the wife walk away if she had a problem with it. Right now, he looks like a gutless pushover who tells people to do as he says and not as he does.