Childless greens and group natural selection
by Jura Watchmaker, 26 November 2007
The Swedish libertarian writer and Cato Institute scholar Johan Norberg has today quoted from a recent article in the Daily Wail featuring two childless, middle-class, eco-fundamentalist couples.
Toni Vernelli, 35, who works for an environmental charity, and had herself sterilised at the age of 27, displays her profound understanding of the dismal science thus:
“Having children is selfish. It’s all about maintaining your genetic line at the expense of the planet.”
“Every person who is born uses more food, more water, more land, more fossil fuels, more trees and produces more rubbish, more pollution, more greenhouse gases, and adds to the problem of over-population.”
“We both passionately wanted to save the planet - not produce a new life which would only add to the problem.”
I can just imagine Terry Glavin chortling as he reads this.
Johan titles his post “Saving the planet - for whom?”, and makes no further comment. The answer is, of course, “For the rest of us!” If these angst-ridden nihilists choose not to procreate, this will strengthen the gene pool, and we should therefore welcome their heroic and selfless act. It is yet another wonderful example of group natural selection in action.
Monday 26 November 2007 at 15:45
Why don’t they just kill themselves whilst they are at it.
Monday 26 November 2007 at 15:49
the dismal science
It seems cruel to identify an area of human endeavour by its disparaging nickname.
Except when that area of human endeavour is economics.
It is yet another wonderful example of group natural selection in action.
Well, natural selection. The group exists only as a statistical property of individuals in the population. Mind you, individuals are probabilistic aggregates as well genetically speaking so if you want group selection it’s no less a mirage than individual selection.
If I hasn’t just said nasty things about economists I’d ask for a research grant.
Monday 26 November 2007 at 15:52
“Why don’t they just kill themselves whilst they are at it.”
Their likely response… “well let’s not get too hasty” — the same response the green glitterati give when pressed to really commit to energy efficiency. Besides, having children is selfish. Living a rub your nose in everyone’s face lifestyle while still being a burden on the planet is a sacrifice for the greater good.
Monday 26 November 2007 at 16:35
That’s done it. Tonight I’ll be talking to herself about a fourth.
Monday 26 November 2007 at 17:06
I don’t know why this is newsworthy all of a sudden — except for the dead tree media being way, way slow on picking up on stories.
The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (VHEMT.org) has been around for years; and a lot of the couples I know aged about 50 have remained childless by choice, and living frugal lifestyles presumably influenced in part by over-population scares in the 1970s.
Monday 26 November 2007 at 17:15
“rub your nose in everyone’s face lifestyle”
South Park Smug
“I’ll be talking to herself”
Is that a quaint colloquial phrase?
Monday 26 November 2007 at 17:38
SP:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiberno-English
Monday 26 November 2007 at 22:45
Thanks Eamonn. I thought there’d be an explanation somewhere.
SP: No more quaint or colloquial than your own “whilst.”
Monday 26 November 2007 at 22:51
Whither “whilst”?
Tuesday 27 November 2007 at 0:35
Long live Terry Glavin and all his kids. Going for IVF myself. Not quite sure what benefit the planet will derive from a shortage of thinking Europeans…. (and no that’s not racist. Mine will be half-Chinese).
Tuesday 27 November 2007 at 23:23
Thanks Tim. I have Chinese cousins back in Ireland, as it happens. Long story.
愛爾蘭出生的華人的網上日誌!
That means Long Live the Irish Chinese or something.
Cheers,
t
Tuesday 27 November 2007 at 23:31
I have Chinese cousins back in Ireland
Fucking hell :-)
Thursday 29 November 2007 at 19:55
I have Chinese cousins back in Ireland
Did they have trouble with some Catholic Priests a while back?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craggy_Island
Is a small Indian community scattered about Dublin too. And a Chinatown in Newcastle
Thursday 29 November 2007 at 20:10
It’s normally kids who don’t like greens–not the other way around.