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In a controversial statement, leading environmental campaigner Jonathon Porritt has said that couples who have more than two children are being ‘irresponsible’ by creating an unbearable burden on the environment.
Porritt, Chair of the UK’s high-level Sustainable Development Commission, has urged world government’s to consider adopting widespread contraception and abortion policies as a vital component of strategies to reduce global warming.
Speaking about his views, which are sure to raise an eyebrow or two amongst liberal thinkers, Porritt said, “I am unapologetic about asking people to connect up their own responsibility for their total environmental footprint and how they decide to procreate and how many children they think are appropriate.”
He also told reporters that politicians and green groups should stop avoiding the issue of environmental damage caused by an escalating population.
The Sustainable Development Commission is due to publish a report next month that will say that governments must decrease population growth through better family planning. In a further comment that is bound to ruffle a few feathers porritt said, ““I think we will work our way towards a position that says that having more than two children is irresponsible. It is the ghost at the table. We have all these big issues that everybody is looking at and then you don’t really hear anyone say the “p” word.”
Now where does this leave the poor woman who gave birth to octuplets last week?
Image Credit – Saad.Akhtar via flickr on a Creative Commons license
In the U.S. let’s urge our legislators to remove the federal income tax deduction for children beyond two. Yes, families can have all the kids they want, but the rest of us don’t need to subsidize them.
My spouse and I have given our two children permission not to have children. That’s difficult because we come from strong, bright stock. As devout, progressive Christians, we must care for God’s creation.
Two children is still too many. The world’s population has overshot its sustainable limit by a long ways. Between damage to the environment and resource depletion, combined with globalization we are on the road to systematic collapse. The world can support around 2 billion at a sustainable, high quality of life. We should aim for that. Ironicly most developed countries have birth rates below replacement levels and would naturally shrink if their governments did not have growth policies. Fewer people is the robust solution to most of the world’s problems.
Don’t know about the octuplet-bearing woman, but a good first step would be to outlaw fertility drugs. They create multiple births very frequently, and what would be more valuable than that sort of research is to lower the barriers to adoption.
I’m childfree and pro-Choice; however, Choice goes both ways. When people start talking about “abortion policies” and telling people who can and cannot have children, I get nervous. It’s a slippery slope, and the slide can go to some pretty scary places.