Goodreads review: War Against Population

The War Against Population: The Economics and Ideology of Population Control by Jacqueline Kasun

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


A host of issues such as poverty, hunger, AIDS, and Global Warming have been attributed by many to the general ill effects of overpopulation. But when the particulars are looked at case by case, no causal connection can be shown. Consider a certain famine, and you find its primary cause is a civil or regional war. Examine an epidemic, and you find that it resulted from widespread sexual promiscuity. Another devastating crisis is seen to come via a combination of political greed, incompetent management, and uncontrollable natural forces. Show me, if you can, a specific, serious human problem that is demonstrably caused by Too Many People. To date, I haven't seen a single instance.

Is there something in the human psyche that demands simplistic answers? ("If we can just solve the overpopulation problem, everything will be OK.") Or do we find dark delight in news of impending doom? Or a secret self-loathing, that readily embraces the notion that we ourselves are the biggest problem? It is interesting to note that population control advocates have nearly always been members of rich, industrialized nations.

A more sinister explanation to consider is that some people are deliberately beating the overpopulation drum to further their own agenda. One extremely well-researched book that explores this possibility is Dr. Jacqueline Kasun's 1988 (later updated) book, The War Against Population. This is not some nutty 'conspiracy theory' work. It is well documented in showing that some very powerful elitists view population control as a key to their political and material interests. To really control people (and their stuff), control their numbers. One well-exposed example is the Nixon Administration's 1974 National Security Council Memorandum 200 (NSSM 200), a.k.a. the "Kissinger Report", and subtitled "Implications of Worldwide Population Growth For U.S. Security and Overseas Interests". Consider just this one citation among many from NSSM 200:

Whatever may be done to guard against interruptions of supply and to develop domestic alternatives, the U.S. economy will require large and increasing amounts of minerals from abroad, especially from less developed countries [See National Commission on Materials Policy, Towards a National Materials Policy: Basic Data and Issues, April 1972]. That fact gives the U.S. enhanced interest in the political, economic, and social stability of the supplying countries. Wherever a lessening of population pressures through reduced birth rates can increase the prospects for such stability, population policy becomes relevant to resource supplies and to the economic interests of the United States. (NSSM 200, CHAPTER III - MINERALS AND FUEL)

In addition to exposing an anti-population agenda, Dr. Kasun presents a formidable quantity of evidence to debunk the myth - and groundless fear - that we humans are too many in number, or anywhere near too many. Do you find this important? Are you willing to perhaps question the scientific neutrality of many population studies? In the interest of intellectual honesty, I highly recommend The War Against Population as an excellent starting point for such questions.



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Thanatos antidote - 2

The previous 5 posts have comprised a thread, a progression of related thoughts. The link between contraception, abortion, population control, and the irrational fear of human procreation has been pointed out by minds much greater than mine. Pope Paul VI, for example, in his 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae, prophetically foretold the dire consequences that would result from an easy acceptance of contraception and the cheapening of human sexuality. Or, take the terse profundity of JP II's phrase 'Culture of Death'. Or, as reported a couple posts ago, Jacqueline Kasun's massively researched work. I would only like to add these additional thoughts:

I ended the last post by asking if the clamor for population control were driven by pride, or hatred of God's sovereignty, or by fear of an imminent calamity which population stresses may threaten. If you who read this are in favor of population control, and if that conviction is driven by pride or hatred, then I have nothing more to say to you (but, beware - God may have a word or two with you one day, and more than mere words!)

But if imminent calamity is what concerns you, consider this little thought: People per se don't stress the biosphere; wasteful consumption of resources and reckless production of toxic wastes do. And then consider this: It lies within the human genius to find better alternatives to waste and toxicity. People are the solution, not the problem. We have no inherent need to waste or to poison; the 'ism' in the word indicates that 'consumerism' is a belief system. And belief systems are voluntary; they can be changed.

Allow your belief system (and behavior) to be changed. Be converted. Do not accept the 'consumer' moniker (as if you were nothing more than a complex alimentary canal). You are much more than a consumer; you are a person. You have an eternal destiny. You are much more than an alimentary canal; you have a brain with which to think, a body with which to do productive work, a heart with which to love, and a spirit with which to worship and trust in God. Employ all of that, your entire being, in creative and productive ways, and cease to accept the degrading label of 'consumer'.

Start with something modest. Walk to work or to church instead of driving. Plant a garden. It lies within you to do good, rather than wring your hands over evil. Be on the lookout for little ways to shake off the shameful moniker. And don't expect the government to do anything remotely useful in this regard. Those folks live within their own little institutions; most of them couldn't think their way out of a paper sack if you pointed them toward the open end. Goodness, they seem to think that outlawing light bulbs and fireplaces is the way to go. So, don't wait for bureaucrats; do it yourself, start now. The same applies to you bureaucrats; rather than institute more and more heavy-handed programs and restrictions for other folks, shake the cobwebs from your skull, and do something good yourself. Let's improve the world, one person at a time. Above all, just know that you need not be a consumer, but a free and beneficial person, created in the image of God.

Population control (or - David's sin)

The 21st chapter of 1 Chronicles tells the intriguing story of King David's worst sin. Judging from the punishment it drew, this crime was, in God's eyes, even more serious than the Bathsheba/Uriah incident. The sin? David took a census of the people.

Huh?

What made this such a travesty was that it was an act of immense pride on King David's part. Not just the pride of a self-inflated ego, but of usurping Divine sovereignty and province. In taking a census, David was arrogating to himself an authority that belongs to God alone, an authority over human life.

From the beginning, God has given to man dominion and authority over all other life on this Earth - over all the animals and plants. This authority is explicitly given in two places: to Adam & Eve in Gen. 1:26-30, and again to Noah after the flood in Gen. 9:1-3. Two things are noteworthy here. Both passages include the command to "be fruitful and multiply", and neither passage grants man authority over himself.

Human life belongs exclusively to God. Murder is a crime against a human victim. But even more, it involves a sin against God's sovereign authority over the victim's human life. Suicide is a similar sin, since no man owns his own life; it belongs by right to God alone. And so the crime of population control is likewise a sin of unmitigated arrogance, of assuming control over human life itself.

Two posts ago, I asked who or what ought to be controlling human population. Individual families? Governments? A world government? A population control agency? The answer, from the above, is: God alone.

Which leads to one more question. Why do Bill Gates and Warren Buffett and Planned Parenthood and UNFPA and other rich and powerful folks clamor for world population control measures? Is it pride? Is it hatred of God and of His sovereign claims? Is it fear of some calamity resulting some day, somehow, from (gasp!) Too Many People? Is it, perhaps, fear or loathing of the people themselves, and of demographic threats to their affluence?

Thanatos - 2

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is the official U.N. facility for seeking to reduce human fertility worldwide. This means pressure on developing nations to legalize abortion (of course), and also entails incentives for sterilization programs, often coercive ones.

The latest "Friday Fax" from C-Fam details how most of the funding for UNFPA is coming, interestingly, from rich nations whose own population decline is an obvious problem for their future prosperity. The current manifestation of Thanatos, then, is apparently quite evangelical. The same folks who are bent upon their own extinction want to proactively spread their neurosis.

It would appear from this same C-Fam report that the United States is a sort of battleground nation in all this. Under The Bush Administration and the Kemp-Kasten amendment, the United States is currently witholding funds for UNFPA, while Democrats want to reinstate funding.

Alternate religions

Man is a religious animal. No amount of debate or theorizing or psychological manipulation can change that. It is an indelible part of human nature, just as much as language, music, humor, and apposable thumbs. The illusion of atheism is just that: an illusion. It isn't a question of whether or not you are religious; it is merely a question of whether or not you will worship God, or whether you will make for yourself some other god, an idol.

From the very beginning, man has been torn between the humble desire to worship his Creator, and the proud desire to exalt himself instead. But man has never succeeded in 'turning off' his religious inclinations. If he doesn't worship God, he will find a lesser idol. If he doesn't follow a true religion, he will make one up.

Many folks might object to this assertion, citing religion as hypocritical. Indeed, the infamy of religious hypocrisy is commonplace, so familiar and well recognized as to be hackneyed. There is the stereotypical Baptist preaching loudly against sexual immorality while carrying on an adulterous affair. The celibate Catholic priest found guilty of child molestation. And let's not forget the medieval selling of indulgences, the practice of simony, etc, etc.

Yet these examples serve to illustrate even more clearly the original assertion. Think about it. Even when he fails to live by the demands of his religion, man must believe. Rather than break off believing, he makes excuses for his behavior, at least to himself. Others see through his excuses, and rightfully call it hypocrisy. The very cry of 'hypocrite!' presumes that something genuine has been corrupted. Were religion not such a deeply seated part of our human nature, we would not object so strenuously to its misuse.

Substitutes for God - idols - come in many forms. Some people worship money, dedicating themselves religiously to its procurement and enjoyment. Some worship fame or prestige. Some politicians have literally sold their souls in the pursuit of political power and influence. Certain environmentalists worship Mother Earth as their goddess. The list goes on and on.

This last example has special significance for me, personally. I have spent the past 40 years or so maintaining a fairly keen focus on issues of conservation and environmental concerns. Only recently have i come to see that, for many, these concerns have taken on the characteristics of religious fervor. The pursuit of environmental quality based upon empirical data is replaced by a dogmatic and evangelistic zeal, demanding conversion and radical adherence to a sort of Gospel of Ecology.

One public figure has been on a world-wide tour engaging in what can only be called evangelizing or preaching. His sermons are emotion-laden pleas for repentance, on moral grounds, of the sin of producing greenhouse gases. Nor is religious hypocrisy lacking here. The same public figure, willing neither to reform his own grossly consumerist lifestyle nor to abandon his religious environmental fervor, makes excuses for himself in the form of 'carbon offset credits'. Others see through this hypocrisy, while he and many of his co-religionists apparently do not.

There are grave spiritual dangers inherent in weaving a new religion out of global warming alarmism. Idol worship and false religions always end up degrading and destroying their adherents. (Besides that, in the long run rigid dogmatism could well erode the credibility of true research on the subject of global warming, and thus counter-productively retard reasonable corrective measures.)

As much as fanatical environmental alarmism interests and troubles me, there is another wave of alternate religions that is much more pernicious. Various sects within this religious trend - denominations, if you will - advance different emphases. There is first of all the creed of Feminism, with legal abortion as its main sacrament, and artificial contraception as its minor one. That this is a religious sect is clearly seen by the howls of protest and righteous indignation that arise whenever these sacraments are threatened or challenged in any way. According to the creed of Feminism, patriarchy is seen as the Original Sin, and, accordingly, marriage and the traditional family are abhorred.

Then there is the Population Control sect, which accepts the same two sacraments, but offers its own version of Original Sin. Namely, these believers would trace virtually every social and environmental ill back to the cardinal sin of human propagation. The Gay Rights religion, with its built-in rejection of propagation, meshes well with these two, while adding its own emphases on hedonistic pleasure and redefining human sexuality.

There is, of course, much common ground between these different denominations. They all focus on a revamping of human sexuality, morality, and propagation. There is general agreement among them over the virtues of legalized abortion and of the condom. There is in all of them a strict dogmatism and evangelistic fervor that can only be characterized as religious. With some exceptions, neither they nor outsiders may think of these folks as being religious in the usual sense, but they most assuredly are. Indeed, as asserted above, we are all religious, in one way or another.

Here's my point: At the very center of your being is an exalted spot, a place esteemed above all others, a throne, as it were. The question is: Who, or what, sits upon your 'throne'? Do you bow before some other human? Is your pet ideology your all-consuming desire? Do you worship yourself? Or does God sit upon this throne?

The person who refuses or neglects to believe in and worship God is likely to believe in and devote himself to almost anything else.