Population implosion, not explosion, is the real problem

From the blog "Drawing Lines":

Solving Population?

by "Petrufied"

I borrowed R's January 2011 issue of the National Geographic because the cover page is attention grabbing, not for its photo (which is the common assumption) but for the cover blurb. "Population 7 Billion: How your world will change." At first glance, the magazine screams, "Doomsday alert! Control the population or die." When you read what's inside, however, it's another story.

The article, penned by Robert Kunzig, points out that while the number is alarming, the fertility decline poses greater effects than the population itself:

The end of a baby boom can have two big economic effects on a country. The first is the “demographic dividend”—a blissful few decades when the boomers swell the labor force and the number of young and old dependents is relatively small, and there is thus a lot of money for other things. Then the second effect kicks in: The boomers start to retire. What had been considered the enduring demographic order is revealed to be a party that has to end. The sharpening American debate over Social Security and last year’s strikes in France over increasing the retirement age are responses to a problem that exists throughout the developed world: how to support an aging population. “In 2050 will there be enough people working to pay for pensions?” asks Frans Willekens, director of the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute in The Hague. “The answer is no.” (p.48)

It's a population implosion, not explosion, and it's happening in most developed countries in the world. Imagine, China's fertility rate went from 6 kids per woman in 1965 to a low of 1.5 per woman today. True, the Chinese people still make up a fifth of the world population, but has anyone paused to consider that their land is equally large too?

But let's forget the numbers--I bet this has been discussed over and over already. Truth is, it isn't the issue on implosion vs explosion that bothers me. It's the attitude most people have over the idea of accommodating more people in the planet that I find disturbing.

Kunzig writes that in India, people have been, for 60 years now, battling with overpopulation. Their weapon? Sterilizations. Can you tell me what's wrong with this picture?

The Indian government tried once before to push vasectomies, in the 1970s, when anxiety about the population bomb was at its height. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and her son Sanjay used state-of-emergency powers to force a dramatic increase in sterilizations. From 1976 to 1977 the number of operations tripled, to more than eight million. Over six million of those were vasectomies. Family planning workers were pressured to meet quotas; in a few states, sterilization became a condition for receiving new housing or other government benefits. In some cases the police simply rounded up poor people and hauled them to sterilization camps. (p.60)

In their fear of a number, I think many people forget that the number is made up of people like themselves. You don't round up and haul your fellow men or give them incentives to let you mutilate them (and pretend it's for their health when it's really just for your fear of a number). People deserve to be educated to be independent and productive citizens. I think much of the government money would be put in better use if it is invested in the field of training workers, educating kids and producing better livelihood than it would ever be in vasectomy/tubal ligation factories. Let's not forget the dignity of the individual person--just think: what if it was you?

Almas Ali of the Population Foundation says it better: “The goal should be to make the villages livable.... Whenever we talk of population in India, even today, what comes to our mind is the increasing numbers. And the numbers are looked at with fright. This phobia has penetrated the mind-set so much that all the focus is on reducing the number. The focus on people has been pushed to the background.” (p.61)

I bring up this point because the same fear seems to be creeping into our own shores. You read it in the papers, you see it on TV, you hear it over the radio. Have you heard that radio spiel from the Popcom in which a kid complains, "Ano? Mag-aaral ako pagkatapos pa ni Ate, ni Kuya at ni Junior? 'Nay naman!"

First of all, I agree that we should raise families with prudence; however, when, despite all efforts (even with artificial contraception, conception can happen), a baby is given, is it even logical NOT to try to earn more money to send all the kids to school? It's a misplaced kind of prudence at best; it's just a lazy attitude that is not heroic at all--giving only the minimum you have to give, and taking the easiest solution to a problem, never minding if it isn't the right solution...

....

How does the RH bill promote irresponsible parenthood?

From the blog Drawing Lines:

When ignorance becomes deadly
By "Petrufied"
(Originally published in The You, Inc. Chronicles)

Ever heard of the term “reproductive rights”? It sounds very nice, doesn’t it? In fact, it is a very nice concept, on the condition that by “nice” you mean “foolish” as the word meant in Old English.

Why is that? “Reproductive rights” basically points to the right to do anything with one’s fertility and body because it is one’s own. A woman with reproductive rights can kill her unborn child without being called a murderer. A husband with reproductive rights can get a vasectomy without informing his wife. A teenager with reproductive rights can have an IUD inserted without telling her parents. The big deal is, it’s their body; let them do with it as they please.

Not even the poor deserve to be spayed or neutered

Another response to the "Salve" tearjerker from the Philippine Daily Inquirer:

Yet still more discussions...

"Petrufied" of Drawing Lines

The Philippine Daily Inquirer last Thursday came out with a front page story that detailed the life of a poor woman and her husband struggling to raise their eight children in poverty. I'm not linking the article here because I believe it's one of the worst the Inquirer has ever done, and it puts their motto, "balance news..." in jeopardy. I didn't take up journalism but I recognize a title seeping in bias when I read one. And on the front page with a miserable photo, too.

The reason I brought this up is that it was the core of a discussion my mother and I had that day; she thinking that in cases such as those, the RH bill should be beneficial, and I--very inarticulately--insisting that that woman does not need a freebie ligation but help in the form of better livelihood and education. I learned one thing from Mama that day, too; I learned that for some people, the RH measure is acceptable because it is hard to believe that the poor will ever change.

One of the things we can easily forget is that a person is a person no matter how much he makes, where he lives, how many limbs he's got, or in what stage of life he is. He has a heart, he has a mind, and if you're Christian, you know he is a child of God, therefore that he possesses the same dignity as any of the "better" folks out there.

No one, not even a poor person struggling to raise eight children, deserves to be neutered/spayed, because that is only done to cats and dogs. You do that to cats and dogs because if you don't they just multiply and get galis and spread diseases. People are not like that. People are better than that. We people can be taught, and we have a will, and besides, all of us at some point in our genealogy, were once dirt poor, too.

RH is not a solution to help people in poverty. It is a license to solve poverty by eliminating the poor. Not convinced?

FVR: “I think the philosophy of RH bill is that we must learn to produce quality people in this world instead of producing people who only end up as, say, beggars on the streets, scavengers, or sellers of cheap or prohibited items. This, I think, is the real valid argument in favor of the RH bill.” (May 18, 2011, PDI)

Makes you wonder what "quality people" are.

The contraceptive mindset: the inability to say "no".

Not openly against the RH Bill, but the message is quite relevant. - CAP


'Hindi umaayaw'
By "Petrufied"

If you listen to AM radio, you must've already heard the advertisement for vitamins that uses the title of this post as a tagline, and you know that their image model is no other than Robin Padilla. The whole point of the ad is to say that Robin can do all that he does (and even be locked up in jail) because he never backs out, or if you take the tagline literally, he doesn't say no. And he doesn't have to say no to anything because his vitamins give him the energy to do it all! Hooray!

I get the point of not wanting to back out of anything--especially when it comes to work. The ad is talking to people in blue collar jobs and appealing to their yearning to easily put in more hours at work so they can have more income to bring home. In that case, not backing out is a good thing.

I brought this up because I want to focus on something quite the opposite, which is being able to say No. It's ridiculous to go, I never say No. Sure, that's obvious when it comes to things that can get you in trouble, land you in jail, etc., however, there are also other less obvious things that merit saying no to; and because we are thinking people, we should know when these occasions are.

Have you ever heard anyone say: "You can afford it, why not?" or "It's your right to do what you want," and other phrases of the same line of thought? In this get-everything-you-want-NOW kind of world, that seems to be the dominant philosophy. Dominant, though, doesn't necessarily equate to "good for you," and no matter how much of a right you have to drown yourself in junk food, junk media, or junk philosophies, you realize sooner or later that you are not happy drowning in the same after a while. All this yes-ing can get tiring; worse, you come out of it not learning anything at all.

That's one of the things I find wanting in a contraceptive mindset. It's all yes-ing without stopping to think about what's good for anybody, let alone what's good for the self. People can go on harping about their rights as if there's such a thing as rights without responsibility, but it doesn't change the fact that each one of us needs to learn to say No, too.

I find it puzzling how some people applaud the Japanese for their great self-mastery and selflessness, and then trumpet their support for some bill that teaches the Filipinos to throw to the winds those very same virtues. My think: why is self-mastery considered noble when you're in a crisis of Ondoy proportions, but not very valuable in the bedroom?

It's the same virtue: if you can say No in the privacy of your home--say No to lazing around, say No to your vices (you know what those are), say No to putting off spring cleaning to another day, say No to comforts (chocolate?) once in a while--then you will be able to say No when you step outside: hold back that rage when an impudent taxi driver cuts you on the road, avoid succumbing to a BIG SALE that you don't need to be in, call a rain check when your friends are not being prudent about their time and yours....

You may be thinking: how KJ naman to have to say No to so many things! But keep in mind that every No to one thing is a Yes to something else, and something better for that matter. You say No to laziness, you say Yes to accomplishing things. A No to one more bar of chocolate is a Yes to good health, and perhaps to sharing that extra bar with someone else, too. No to the BIG SALE means Yes to saving up for a style piece that you'll get more wear out of later on.

And of course, every well-thought-out No is a brick in that house called character, which constantly needs fortifying, given the fickleness of our "open-minded" world. You gotta learn to say No conscientiously. You gotta think well and hard before you give your Yes to anything. That's good character. That's self-mastery.

...besides, whoever takes "hindi umaayaw" as a compliment better brush up on colloquial Filipino--isn't that the description right next to "Utu-uto"?