BellaOnline Forums Religion and Spirituality Atheist Poll - Birth control

Current world population is 6.6 billion people (that's an average of 33 people on every square mile of the Earth's surface!) If present trends continue, it will top 9 billion by 2050. With shrinking water, energy, and land supplies this will almost certainly be an unsustainable number of people, leading to Malthusian crises of unimaginable proportions. The U.S. (pop. 560 million) will be better off, but not for long!

The threshhold fertility rate for a stable population depends on a number of factors, including the death rate for people of child bearing age compared to mortality of people who can no longer have children. In developed countries (like the United States) the replacement fertility rate is about 2.1 children per couple. In third world countries it can 3 or more children per couple. Worldwide the average is about 2.33.

Poll Question: In general, do you consider it immoral for an American couple to have more than two children? Feel free to comment along with your vote.

[Thanks to GreyDrakkon for inspiring the poll.]

Birth Control single choice
	Yes!
	No!
Votes accepted starting: 02/07/08 03:13 AM
View Results

I can see both answers as being appropriate -- after all, what if, in their attempt for child number two, a couple has a multiple pregnancy? Do you feel they should reduce the pregnancy, despite no indications of problems?

Add to that the fact that I'm a third child -- and the only one of my siblings to have reproduced. (And only one child of my own, for that matter.) -- the net effect on the population is, despite my parents having had three, being a result of one "replacement" for my two parents. (The odds of me having another child are low enough to be approaching zero. Flukes do happen, but it is highly unlikely. And one brother who I am in touch with is single, not dating, unemployed... and over 50, so very unlikely to have a child, either.)

Otoh, when my ds was young, maybe 6 or 7, I was reading the paper on the day they reported the estimate of the population hitting the 6 billion mark. I mentioned that I remembered what a big deal it was when I was a kid and it hit 4 billion. He leaped out of his chair, and said, "What are we going to do? What are we going to do?" I asked him what he thought we should do -- and his suggestion was a Mars colony... always the big thinker.

I forget who said it, but someone once said, "If the population keeps growing like this, we are going to be hip-deep in horse manure." Obviously, that hasn't happened -- it's always hard to envision what the future will hold. (Heck, I have a hard enough time envisioning my son at older ages, much less technological innovations.)

But I do think that societal pressure for one size family or another can alter things. It won't eliminate larger families, but may reduce the number of them.

Yet another concern, though, is that it is currently almost exclusively the more intelligent people who are having smaller families. Intelligence is at least partly genetic -- and we are dumbing down the gene pool as a result. "Majority rules" becomes scary to me as a result.

Can you tell I have a hard time with black/white yes/no questions? ;-)

Intelligence eh? I might agree with socio-economic conditions, cultural norms and standards, religious pressure and educational levels. But intelligence?

I don't think it is immoral to have more than two children but I do think it is not prudent. I have two children who are young adults now. When my children were young, I worked full-time at a professional job for a number of years and also stayed at home for a number of years. So I've experienced both ways of raising children. What I have to say is that it doesn't matter if you are a working mother or a stay-at-home mother, having more than two children would make it extremely difficult to give them the love and attention that is required to ensure their healthy emotional growth. I cannot imagine how a parent could give a child what they need if they must share their time and affection with a whole house full of children. I also feel that having more than two children can extend the mothering years beyond what is healthy for the parent. Raising young children is extremely hard work and if the parenting years are prolonged indefinitely, it tends to place stress on the couple and doesn't allow the them to focus on other areas of their lives once the youngest children are grown. The period of my life I spent as a mother of young children was undoubtedly the most precious and meaningful period of my life and I feel deeply satisfied with what I have given them but there is a new kind of life waiting for both my husband and me and we are anxious to pursue that as well. As humans in the modern day, I think we no longer need a huge family to help us accomplish the chores on the farm; we can devote ourselves to raising emotionally sensitive and contributing members of society if we choose while maintaining our identity as husband and wife.

Skeptic, you are correct -- those factors DO tend to influence family size, as well. But yes, as a whole (and of course, there are exceptions) intelligent people DO have smaller families.

And there are many highly gifted people who do not make much money. Some, of course, are fortunate to have the happy combination of interests and business sense that make them a lot of money, but many either are driven to a field in which the pay isn't great, or get bored and tend to move from one job to another.

And certainly religious pressure causes some to have larger families than they can comfortably raise.

Diana -- I think that some parents CAN adequately love and guide more than two children. However, some can't adequately guide and love even one. I'd rather see those who would be abusive parents not become parents at all, those who just let their kids grow without raising them, guiding them, not have them. Parenting, as you obviously know, is more than just donating DNA.

All this said, I still can't figure a way I can, in clear conscience, vote either Yes or No on that poll!

Ms A -- I agree with you that some parents can't adequately guide and love even one. It would be great if we could control who could become parents since it would prevent a lot of suffering in the world but I can't think of a fair and effective way to do that. And it strikes me as a violation of a basic human right. Do you have any ideas about this?

Also, I don't think intelligence is genetic except in very rare cases. I think all humans are basically equally intelligent but it is those that are raised in emotionally healthy environments that reach their full intellectual potential.

Skeptic: I might agree with Ms. A that more intelligent couples may have smaller families but I don't have any statistics to prove this. And it's hard to define intelligence. I think you may be on the right track that it is actually people with more education that have smaller families but again, I don't have any numbers. Do you? Perhaps this is just a stereotype.

Given that we currently have a comparatively free system (though it seems like that is getting eroded on a regular basis), people will continue to have the choice to make poor decisions. The alternative -- mandating family size from the government -- has been tried in China, with the result of many girl babies being killed, because the culture favors boys, and if you only have one child allowed, why not just have those boys.... (Makes no sense to me, since the generation that has only boys has no future!)

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I seem to remember that years ago (and may still be, for all I know) that in Russia, the birth rate dropped below replacement rate. And iirc, isn't that the case currently in Japan, with the result being that they are concerned about a labor shortage?

The only thing I can think of is some form of societal change, to make smaller families and opting to not have children more socially acceptable. Won't stop some from large families, any more than the pressure to not drive drunk or smoke has eliminated those activities -- but it has reduced them.

As for intelligence -- there are both hereditary and environmental factors. I know a someone who is profoundly gifted, was adopted into a family with abusive, alcoholic parents. If it were just a matter of nurturing native intelligence that we all have, she wouldn't be all that bright...

Then there is my son -- he is definitely brighter than I am. (And a number of years ago, there was some article I remember reading that said that much of intelligence is on the X chromosome -- I must have given my son the best of my pairing!) I feel that my parents nurtured me well -- and I've used my own mother as an example of how to nurture with my son. (A measure in which, I think, I probably come up lacking, but I'm not my mother, either.)

But back to the topic -- no clue how to change things so that children are only born to parents who are able and willing to care and nurture their children.

What an interesting series of posts! I�ll respond to a couple of points:

(1) In spite of the discredited beliefs of the �eugenics� movement of the mid-twentieth century, as well as more recent attempts to link intelligence with race, there is no reliable evidence for a correlation between intelligence and any identifiable genetic marker. Skeptic has it right: birth rates correlate with socio-economic factors, not with intelligence (assuming this is a valid scientific concept in the first place, which is not at all well established.)

(2) Barring other factors the replacement fertility rate would be exactly 2.0 children per couple. The fact that some people do not have children, while others have more or less than the �ideal� number is already reflected in the actual rate (for example, 2.1 in the United States). Thus the rationalization that it�s okay for a couple purposely to have more than two children, because this will be �balanced� by childless couples is invalid.

(3) Relying on technological advances to offset various limits to growth is a risky policy, although one often favored by conservatives. The famines predicted by Thomas Malthus haven�t occurred, thanks to advances in agriculture and food preservation; but they haven�t been prevented, merely postponed. Meanwhile the margin between safety and disaster has narrowed. As recent famines in Africa have demonstrated, social breakdown is often manifested very quickly as hunger and starvation. Even absent dramatic demonstrations of overpopulation relative to food supply, our current situation is far from satisfactory. According to UNICEF statistics, each year six million children under the age of five die due to hunger and related illnesses. Our own food supply here in the U.S. isn�t necessarily that secure either (See my post in the thread on Animal Rights -BellaOnline ALERT: Raw URLs are not allowed in these forums for security reasons. Please use UBB code. If you don't know how to do UBB code just post here for help - we will help out!

Regarding #2 -- I don't think I was suggesting (certainly wasn't my intent) that it's okay to have more than 2 children because some might be having fewer. I was just pointing out that there are instances in certain societies in which the birth rate is lower than the replacement rate. Examine the causes, and you might be able to figure out ways to change the attitudes. And that there might be attendant challenges with that reduction. (Not insurmountable, just to be aware.)

#3 -- You have a crystal ball that predicts the future? Because, although I think it is LIKELY if the population continues its exponential growth, I certainly won't say it is inevitable and merely postponed. Too many potential factors that are unpredictable. At least, without precognitive abilities that I'm sadly lacking. (Or maybe gratefully lacking; Grandma never liked it, and it was usually bad stuff.)

#4 -- Child rearing is too individual to assess what a couple can properly do. And number of years between children makes a difference. People have been debating optimal spacing but there is ideal -- it differs. If a couple had two children in 2 years they would have very different demands on their energy and time than if they had two or more over a period of 20 years. And, as I said, some would be far better to have no children. (I remember a case, very hard for me to deal with, as I was dealing with infertility issues, in which a woman had 9 children. She was finally charged with the death of the youngest -- none lived to be 5, and they now realize she killed them all, one by one. If that could be id'd ahead of time -- big if! -- and prevented, far better, imo.)

And what about families who choose to go beyond 2 by adopting? Adopting means a child who otherwise would NOT have parents suddenly has a home, and a much better potential outcome. Are you suggesting that children should be adopted only to people with fewer than 2 children?

#5 -- rights, ooh, that is a very tricky topic. People currently have a right to pollute the air (called driving), which also effects others, the earth, etc. Technically, the parents do not, in this country, have a right to abuse and neglect children -- but the law has not been able to adequately enforce that. And to be honest, I don't think, even if families were limited to a max. of 2 children, that they would then. Whether a couple has 2 children of 5, if they are going to be abusive, they will be, so, until the number of reproducing adults is lower (at which time, the number of people available to enforce the laws will likely be lower as well) the number of families with abuse will be a constant.

These are indeed difficult issues to try to find solutions to.

Adopting's a different issue entirely. I agree with you that anyone who can provide a home for a child that would otherwise have none is doing a wonderful thing. Besides, adoption doesn't affect the birthrate.

I don't think a case can be made that child abuse is related to family size. I meant to address instead a more basic issue: should anyone, regardless of qualification, be allowed to create a human being? Right now any sadistic monster can have a child. Society doesn't intervene until it's too late and damage is done. Can this be justified?

People don't have a "right" to pollute. They're granted the privilege of driving by the state (a very different thing from a right!) in spite of the fact that this produces pollution - and the time may come (very soon) when this is no longer feasible!