Be Excellent To Each Other

Over selective breeding, yes.

Everytime.

Much depends on whether we accept the idea that industrialisation of food production is more important than environmental protection. With the rapid growth of population since the Industrial Revolution, it seems that we have, on the whole, been able to provide enough crops.

I read somewhere that most famines in recent history have been man-made, and not due to lack of crops. I might see if I can read up on this idea, as if it is true (and it sounds plausible) it's a rather terrifying thought.

While perhaps not deliberately man-made, I would be properly shocked if the amount of available food stuffs couldn't be stretched to cover famine-ridden areas, were the desire in place and the logistics possible.

What about a blanket restriction? No more than two kids per couple, regardless of anythign Eugenics-based?

No, because I believe that that would be the state interferring in the lives of citizens and also, it would cause massive problems what with abortions, sterilisations etc.

But the state does interfere in every other aspect of your life. Why not kids?

Because I honestly believe that saying "2 kids, that's it" is abad thing as it will lead to abortions and sterilisations and that is an interferance too far.

Super, you pay for it.

I'm not asking for "2 children per couple".

I AM asking for (at the very very least) a max of 2 children to be paid benefits.

What's that got to do with the impending food crash of Malthuian proportions?

FWIW, Mrs A's older sister has 5 kids and is currently gestating a 6th.

Surely it's more a case of changing attitudes than changing rules.

If we can get a majority of the population to believe that having a 4x4 is a bad thing, then we can work on persuading them that having excessive children is a bad thing? Given that a person has a much greater environmental impact than a 4x4 across its lifetime, natch.

WILL SEVEN BE ENOUGH BOB?

Restrictions on the number of children do throw up all sorts of problems, but if the alternative is 90% of the children dying before they're five, it's what I'd go with.

Also: Six, MaliA? One is bad enough.

But such policies will more than likely on exist in restrivive second world countries anyway. I don't think, for a moment, that a woman, on finding out she's up the duff, is going to whip out the gin and a knitting needle for the sake of the environment, do you?

And dropping benfits will also be a major negative thing, as poorer families tend to have larger families, so they'll get doubly fucked over.

For about the last 30 years there's been no excuse for someone to 'find out they're up the duff' unless they'd been trying for kids. Except rape. Contraception education is paramount.

Aaargh! smash the nest!



I imagine they'd introduce it on new kids rather than retrospective ones.

Contraception doesn't work 100% of the time. The only way to stop getting pregnant is through abstinence, and that isn't a viable alternative.

Just spotted this. Sorry if you thought I was trying to score points. While I don't think people should stop having children, they should damn well stop after having one. Like what I'm going to do.

The number who get unexpectedly up the duff through laziness, not caring, or not knowing any better vastly outnumbers the number who get unexpectedly pregnant through failures of contraception.

Why do they have larger families? Is this to do with lack of education as to what makes babies, or a desire to ruin the world?

I dunno, I'm not a sociologist.

I don;t think having a large family ruins the world, at all. And i'm not really keen on kids.

Because my only problem is that we continue to subsidise the creation of something we already have too many of.

Why do you think we have too many of them?

'Ruins the world' was exaggeration on my part.

It still does nobody any favours for families to have tons of kids and make the population of the world continue to grow. We've got finite resources, and stretching them further seems unnecessary. Especially if you don't have the means by which to support them, but just think, 'well, the STate will give me more money, it'll be fine'.

Just relying on someone to give you handouts because you're irresponsible seems like a horrible way to live life.

The birth rate is currently less than 2 per woman though. With that in mind it seems a bit daft to be talking about new welfare rules. Also people have no choice in whether or not they are born, condemning them to a life of poverty and perhaps damaging their chances to make a useful contribution doesn't seem like any kind of answer.

Across the whole world, we have a birth rate of 20 babies per 1,000 people, and a death rate of 10 per 1,000 people. That seems rather a few too many to me.

[edit]A few too many babies, obv.

Across the whole world yes, but I don't really see how messing around with the UK benefits system is going to have much impact on that.

Changing attitudes. And a general improvement in quality of life for everyone, particularly existing children, who won't be shoved into increasingly overcrowded, understaffed schools and learn fuck all as a result because it's easier to just turn them into exam-passing automatons than to try teaching 30+ kids at a time.

I look at this not just as an overcrowding issue, but as a sociological one, too - most people are not very good parents, and a lot of people are fucking atrocious parents. More kids means more fucked up kids, who grow up into fucked up adults (if they survive, obv), who suffer and often cause suffering for everyone else as well.

It's going to change attitudes across the whole world? How?

As a country we aren't really in the midst of a population explosion. The population would be in decline were it not for immigration and they are even seeking to curb that. For the reasons I just gave I don't see how changing the benefits system is going to make people into better parents.

Seriously?

All right, let me turn it round.

We should only subsidise stuff that we have too few of and no prospect of increased supply without intervention.

Don't tell me that's kids.

You do understand that children turn into adults and that in general over their life make a net contribution?

Contribution to what? Pollution, overcrowding, depletion of resources?

A financial contribution. Dudley was talking about monetary subsidies.

I once had a mild argument with the gf of one of my mates, who, in her incredibly tiny mind, couldn't see why we just couldn't remove immigration controls and let absolutely everyone who wanted to, live here.

I tried to explain, in vain, how a benefit system that didn't obligate people to work, combined with an immigration system that didn't require anything at all, would be very very bad for the country as a whole.

The system needs to be changed so people can't afford to just sit at home and squeeze out kids while having no other ambition. I do try not to comprehend the state of the world, because even if I was a vicious serial killer, the sheer scale of the problem would render even an indiscriminate killing machine such as myself, ultimately ineffective.

Debatable.

Imagine you work in a small shop with 2 other people, and you get your meals from the local burger van. Imagine your shop is the economy and the burger van is the world's resources. Now imagine 200 people work in your shop but have to be paid out of the same pot and eat from the same small van. More money to pay you and more food to feed you isn't going to come out of nowhere. The fact that the 200 of you could do something productive doesn't offset the fact you're an unbalanced drain on the world.

Shrug. All that boils down to is people worrying about pension funds and healthcare bills. "Having more babies" isn't, to my mind, a good short, medium nor long term solution.

Hmm, not sure about that. What's a "net contribution"?
[edit]Sorry, a bit slow on the posting today.

All very well but in your analogy the situation would be:

"Imagine you work in a small shop with 2 other people, and you get your meals from the local burger van. Imagine your shop is the economy and the burger van is the world's resources. Now imagine 2 people work in your shop but have to be paid out of the same pot and eat from the same small van."

But I'm not talking about having more fucking babies, I'm talking about having the same amount if not slightly less.

Um. No, it was "now imagine 200 people".

But he's not talking about having more fucking babies, he's talking about having the same amount if not slightly less.

Where do the "two children per woman" stats come from?

Fair enough.

The point people are making about the "subsidy", is, I think, that it encourages the growth of a particular demographic.
Thin, tabloid flavoured ice here?

Just a google search for "uk birth rates". There's the almost impenetrable national statistics site but also newspaper articles taking their figures from there and putting it at 1.8 per woman of child bearing age. However people are taking longer to die and more people come to live here than leave.

But you said "no excuse", not "no excuse in the majority of cases". The former is obvious bollocks and undermines your otherwise decent point that contraception and contraception education are things the world needs more of.

(I'm not totally convinced by the "vast majority" thing either as it goes, but that's not especially relevant to what you're saying).

I'd like to point out that nothing I've said in this thread has been anything to do with the UK, or with benefit claimants, or anything.

It's purely a planet vs. 6bn people thing, for me.

According to wiki, the population growth rate for the UK is 0.42%. That means the population would double in 166 years, at that rate.

The rate for the whole world is 1.17 which means it would double in only 59 years. Soylent Green anyone?

I'm not certain of the exact numbers, but the chance of failure of modern contraceptive methods, combined with the chance of that then resulting in successful fertilisation, is near as damn it statistically insignificant, as far as I understand it.

However there is no expectation that it will continue at that rate. It will peak due to the low birth rate, people might be living longer just lately but they probably aren't going to live forever.

No no, didn't say it would. I wouldn't have said the birth rate is particularly low at the moment though: at 12 per 1000 we're right near the top of the list of european countries - some of those have falling population.
And if you're of the opinion that a lot of problems are caused by there being too many people (either on a world or national basis), reducing the growth would seem like a good idea.

I take your point that immigration policy would be a more sensible first resort if a given country appeared to be full, however.

Having clarified you're talking on a global scale, I agree even more strongly with what you're saying regarding contraception education.

That said, my brother was born while my parents were taking precautions. My wife's been pregnant four times whilst using contraception, once despite using condoms AND the pill. These are intelligent, educated women who did everything they were supposed to do. Either I know some of the unluckiest people on the planet or your numbers are out.