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What kind of Malthusian shit is this?
I'll tell y'all what: if overpopulation is really such a problem to you, then be the change you want to see in the world; 'cause ain't nobody I've ever seen talk about "overpopulation" has ever stopped to wonder if they're the problem. Nooooo, it's always the browns out of the Malthuses and the Tsakraklides of the world.
Well, I think it's important to recognize these problems without going in the fascist direction. Overshoot is real and a problem. The solution isn't melting the poors and 'useless eaters', when the rich are disproportionately the problem.
We also need more collective cooperation to course correct yesterday, similar to climate change but this shit is more holistic.
Especially for Monbiot, the usual argument is that the problem is not all humans, but only the rich humans. As a biologist I can tell you this argument is invalid, because rich and poor humans are identical biologically, therefore they have the same natural propensity for overconsumption, destruction and waste, given the chance. Aside from that, “poor” humans are equally wasteful to rich humans, when you consider their huge number compared to the rich. The contribution of poor people to the climate crisis and ecological collapse on this planet is immense, despite the fact that on an individual basis it is negligible compared to rich people. What matters is total impact on the planet, not per capita.
rich people are the ones making all of our general economic and societal decisions
of course, I'm just quoting from the dog shit essay in the OP to show how wrong it is
so why should i care what they have to say about these topics
When you're attempting to conflate the rich with humanity and then using that as an argument against at least the depopulation of the rich, it might be best to not reference a biologist that clearly has no idea what they dont know that they don't know. Even a climatologist would be better.
I'm not agreeing with the text lol I've clearly said I think it's total dogshit
idealist malthusian nonsense. "natural propensity" my ass. this is pre-marxist thought and verging on crypto fascist. dogshit
This article is dogshit. Absolutely extremely terrible. I'm going to argue against one tiny piece of it, a single paragraph, because I think this paragraph encapsulates the issue I have with the article.
Here's the paragraph:
We need to have far fewer smartphones, because we will never be able to manufacture them sustainably. We need to use less energy, because the energy transition and renewables revolution have already failed. And for these things to happen we need to have fewer humans, because it is the only way which absolutely guarantees the reduction of our impact on the planet.
I agree that we need to produce fewer smartphones and we need to consume less electricity. That far, I'm with the author. But the conclusion, that only by having fewer people will we have fewer smartphones and less usage of electricity, is patently ridiculous. Just, incomprehensibly wrong. Let me give one extremely easy, like, embarrassingly easy, counterargument for each of these claims.
For smartphones, the counterargument is that we "need" so many smartphones because of planned obsolescence, because phones are specifically made to be replaced in a year or two so that smartphone manufacturers can sell expensive pieces of equipment to people every couple of years.
For electricity, data centers use like 10 times as much electricity as everything else combined. Just get rid of data centers and electricity is significantly less of a problem. Oh no, we'll no longer have access to so-called "AI" or cryptocurrency. Oh no.
This article fucking sucks. The earth could easily support as many humans as currently exist, probably even more, but not if the wealthy insist on continuing to amass capital to the detriment of literally everyone on earth.
