Montreal City Weblog

Kate 21:51 on 2019-04-27 Permalink Reply  

• Chris 09:32 on 2019-04-29 Permalink

  “L’augmentation de la population humaine reste l’éléphant dans la pièce.” Good to see this point raised more and more.

  Free condoms and birth control pills, provided globally, to anyone and everyone that wants them, I think would be a much more useful solution than changing light bulbs and all the other crap they’re pushing instead.

• qatzelok 09:53 on 2019-04-29 Permalink

  If we all assume that a lower population wouldn’t be destroying the earth’s environments right now, you have a point. But what if 3 billion people just consumed twice as much? The lower population would be useless.

• walkerp 10:30 on 2019-04-29 Permalink

  The problem is that our entire economy is based on population growth. Free birth control only works when there is not an economic demand for labour (in developing nations) and housing starts (in developed nations). We need to change the entire system so that economic growth is not the fundamental objective.

• Chris 21:07 on 2019-04-29 Permalink

  qatzelok: sure, theoretically, but what’s your point? We should just increase population then? Everyone wants a better standard of living. The Chinese would like to live as cushily as the Americans. It’s just not going to work without population reduction. Better with free condoms than eventual war.

  walkerp: yes, capitalism’s requirement for relentless growth eventually breaks with the reality of a finite planet. This is little discussed.