So Much for 'Mother' Earth
According to radical environmentalists, the biggest threat to the earth isn't CO2 emissions or climate change--it's children. A new paper by Optimum Population Trust (OPT) contends that kids are "bad for the planet" and if couples had one less child, they could "cut their family's carbon dioxide output by the equivalent of 620 [cross-Atlantic flights]." Rather than follow their own dreams of having a family, John Guillebaud, co-chairman of OPT, said that potential parents should first consider the environmental consequences. Another eco-militant, Paul Watson, founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, is calling for a green genocide. In a May 4 editorial, Watson says mankind "is acting like a virus" and appeals for the world to decrease its population by more than five billion. In the past, Watson has come under fire for claiming that humans are "the AIDS of the earth."
Rhetoric like this, fueled by profound pessimism about human possibility, is driving demographic collapse in much of the West, where sub-replacement level fertility is on a collision course with pension liabilities, especially in Europe. Even Al Gore, who this weekend spoke to the American Institute of Architects, resorted to calling the alleged bio-threat a "spiritual crisis." In this he is half-right as the key to this eco- pessimism is despair. The "green" campaign, elevated to a fever pitch by Gore and others who advocate a stronger hand for government, is paving the way for the dire messages of organizations like OPT and Sea Shepherd.
I have to ask, if we take their advice and quit having children, just who exactly would we be saving the earth for?
(Tony Perkins' Washington Update; Family Research Council; 5/7/07)
