Outremont environment flyer causes fuss
Outremont borough distributed a flyer recently with suggestions for fighting climate change, and people are unhappy that one of its suggestions is to have fewer children.
It’s undoubtedly true that each kid you produce adds an environmental footprint, but for a long time it’s been nefas to suggest that people limit their ventures into reproduction.
Also, although this is not mentioned in the item, consider which families in Outremont tend to have a lot of kids.
dhomas 19:44 on 2023-05-24 Permalink
Without immigration, we have declining population in Quebec. I don’t think people in Quebec having fewer children is going to help climate change.
DavidH 20:14 on 2023-05-24 Permalink
I don’t remember any flyer or junk mail being part of our thought process when we considered having our kids.
steph 03:34 on 2023-05-25 Permalink
@ dhomas, a declining population would help climate change. Yes a declining population is bad for capitalism, but we need to start adopting sustainable models.
I’m happy these types of information are being shared. Even as a post-factum scandal, the digital flyer is being seen by more eyes. I consider the ‘thought process when we considered having our kids” is terribly distorted and biased. There’s a good reason that educated people have less children.
JaneyB 06:42 on 2023-05-25 Permalink
Population growth is at less than replacement throughout the rich countries. The problem is the consumption lifestyle that has emerged with globalization. Growing up in the 70s, I recall most families in Canada had 3-5 kids each. However, the overall carbon-use and even garbage generation was far, far less than it is right now, when people here have barely 2 kids if any. The consumer goods, the excess packaging, the international transport of goods and people, the precarity of work and constant demenagement, the social isolation, the light pollution, the commuting, the financialization of the economy into commodity speculation etc, etc, …these are the causes of our climate crises. The problem is not number of kids.
walkerp 10:19 on 2023-05-25 Permalink
The butthurt here is just infuriating. They get one outraged citizen who has too much time on their hands and who actually says “When you suggest that having one less child per family, [well] which of my kids is too much?” Yes, that’s right, Outremont is suggesting a program of euthanasia for families who have violated the new upcoming One Child to Save the Planet policy. Going to be difficult to choose which of your children have to go.
Stupidity + self-righteousness + what about the children’ism. And it gets an entire article and the borough actually reacts. Just nuts and depressing.
Meezly 11:23 on 2023-05-25 Permalink
The article does lightly touch on it: “though the borough’s population represents 1.4 per cent of Montreal’s total population, Outremont is home to more children under the age of 14 than any other borough”
People with less education about birth control tend to have more children and for a non-Hasidic Outremonter who has probably never experienced religious or racial discrimination to take personal offense to the idea of having fewer kids and to suggest this can lead to discrimination is pretty rich. Like what exactly is she going to be discriminated from…?
As long as global capitalism keeps people poor and uninformed, esp. in countries that were exploited by colonialism. More and more people will be displaced by climate change and will need to emigrate to more stable countries. But rich countries only want educated and economically promising folks, even though population growth is at less than replacement throughout the rich countries, as JaneyB pointed out.
In the end, the flyers are working in that it’s creating a dialogue at least! And I agree with Barrington-Leigh’s points about not over-emphasizing the role of the individual in the fight against climate change, saying that it shifts the burden of responsibility and guilt away from larger players like fossil fuel companies.
“The solutions to collective action problems are through legislation, through changing the rules to changing incentives, not through berating people into feeling guilty”