Be Fruitful and Multiply: Time to Reject the Malthusian Lie of the Population Planners

By Dr. Frederick Liewehr
3/25/2013
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

The Lord commanded us to, 'Be fruitful and multiply'. To borrow the title from the 1960's television show, 'Father Knows Best'.

To hear what calls itself the Left these days, talk, one would think that children were a form of sexually transmitted disease, like AIDS, against which science and society must join together to fight. How in the world did we ever get to this point? The West is at a critical juncture due to its failure to procreate, and our Social Security System is failing for exactly this reason.Although wrong, dead, and gone, Malthus is not forgotten

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RICHMOND, VA (Catholic Online) - To hear what calls itself the Left these days, talk, one would think that children were a form of sexually transmitted disease, like AIDS, against which science and society must join together to fight. How in the world did we ever get to this point?

It is hard to know when offspring stopped being a blessing and started being a burden, but it certainly was not in the early days of our country. We were an agrarian nation, and there was work to be done, so the more hands available, the better. Children performed chores around the farm and thus were economically productive members of the family. As long as and wherever these conditions persisted, children were and are considered a boon to the lucky parents.

In 1798, however, Thomas Malthus published his treatise An Essay on the Principle of Population. He wrote to reject the idea of some of the Enlightenment philosophes that society was improving, and instead said that in good times, such as they were experiencing, man would overpopulate beyond the capability of the earth to produce food to sustain the growing population, leading to misery and starvation. He explained, "We will suppose the means of subsistence in any country just equal to the easy support of its inhabitants. The constant effort towards population... increases the number of people before the means of subsistence are increased. The food, therefore, which before supported seven millions must now be divided among seven millions and a half or eight millions. The poor consequently must live much worse, and many of them be reduced to severe distress."

How would all of this come about? It wouldn't be pretty. "The power of population is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race. The vices of mankind are active and able ministers of depopulation. They are the precursors in the great army of destruction, and often finish the dreadful work themselves. But should they fail in this war of extermination, sickly seasons, epidemics, pestilence, and plague advance in terrific array, and sweep off their thousands and tens of thousands. Should success be still incomplete, gigantic inevitable famine stalks in the rear, and with one mighty blow levels the population with the food of the world".

But never mind; he had some answers to this problem: positive checks, those that increase the death rate; and preventive ones, those that lower the birth rate. Positive checks include hunger, disease and war; preventive checks include abortion, birth control, prostitution, postponement of marriage and celibacy.

Since this treatise was written over 200 years ago, you may be wondering when we are going to experience this cataclysm. The answer of course it that we have not experienced it, and we do not have to experience it. Malthus was prey to zero-sum thinking, the same thinking that is prevalent in much of leftist thought today, "If you make more money than me, it is because you are taking it away from me", not because your economic activity created more wealth. In this case, if the population increases, why would the food supply remain the same? Why wouldn't more land be cultivated, more seed be planted, better seed be developed, more efficient farming methods be employed, and on and on? In 1800, the world population was about 1 billion people; today it stands at over 7 billion. Indeed, a major problem for us, and for much of the developed world, is obesity, not starvation.

"But," you say, "starvation DOES exist; we see starving people on the news all the time. Yes, it does, but it is not due to a large population. The USA population density is 28 people per square kilometer, Japan's is 340, the Netherlands' is 404, and Hong Kong's is 6396, and Singapore's is a whopping 7,301. These folks are not starving. Libya has a population density of 3.1, Somalia's is 12, the Sudan's is 15, and Ethiopia's is 60, not anywhere approaching that of most of Europe or Asia, yet with a chronic and recurring problem of starvation. Clearly population density is not the problem.

The real problem is that famine is caused by governments - civil wars and corruption that interferes with the distribution of food. Absence of property rights, price controls and other socialist schemes starve millions unnecessarily every year. Some will claim that the problem is the environment of the country, that lack of arable land or too much or too little rainfall or some other natural limitations produce these recurrent problems. No country has a monopoly on good or bad climate or other natural resources; man has the ingenuity to overcome natural obstacles - the Dutch have been using dikes and windmills for hundreds of years. One has only to compare Haiti to the Dominican Republic, two halves of the same island, to see the effect of corrupt ...

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1 - 10 of 11 Comments

Erika
1 month ago
@Josephine Brown: Environment issues are a big problem, but I think it's not an issue of population but what that population is doing. I believe I've seen stats in many places saying that the U.S. disproportionately (based on population) contributes to greenhouse gases. Over-use of cars and other lifestyle choices are causing environmental damage, not the number of people. If we all could run off of energy that didn't emit environmental contaminants, I think we could have an even larger population and still get along better with our planet.
Robert LePage
1 month ago
The problem with the "facts" in this article is that they do not take into account that for countries like Singapore to survive with their 7,301 per square kilometre, they are taking the food from another country where famine is the norm.
Only on an infinite flat earth can an perpetual growing state exist. Ask the people from Easter island.
Michael
1 month ago
The stated reasons for their Malthusian positions are simply pseudo-scientific justificatory distractions for the average person to run down that rabbit hole. Their true motivations are anti-human and satanic in origin.

www.principalitiesandpowers.org
Ruth
1 month ago
What many fail to see is that many of the 'enviromental/overpopulation' supporters hate humans. There is no inherent dignity in human life and no sacredness given by God. We ARE called to be stewards of the earth and we are responsible for not damaging the enviroment but that is a far cry from wanting to destroy families and babies.

Currently the population numbers in the world are going up mostly through longer living (something Malthus would hate--he thought we should encourage earlier death.) But unless the birth rates start rising, the world is set to see a drop in population in another 30-50 years, slow at first and then rapid. It will be difficult to reverse at this point.

We can all set back and watch China implode for now. Each young couple is now responsible for supporting their parents (4), grandparents (8) and possibly great-grandparents (up to 16) while caring for themselves (2) and their child (1). 15 to 31 people.

The upshot of having few children is a more and more selfish generation. After a couple of generations of a single child policy, one child could be the object of all the hopes, dreams and attention of their parens and grandparents (10 adults).

Even in our own country, I see the current generation of children and their parents obsessing about having EVERY material and social opportunity. Parents move to new towns so that their daughters can make a cheerleading squad or the mother in Texas who took out a contract on her daughter's rival's mother. Their one child or two children just has to HAVE everything.

God's first command to humans in the bible is: Be fruitful and multiply. It is a call to love and unselfish behavior. It is a call to add to eternity. "Nothing that is not eternal is of any use in eternity." (CS Lewis). What is more eternal a gift than a human soul?
Michael Lardelli
1 month ago
I saw a great talk once by Richard Heinberg, the author of "The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies". He shows the growth curve of a yeast culture in wine making. The number of yeast rocket up and, as metabolic waste products (pollution) accumulate and resources (sugar/food) run out, the yeast population reaches a peak and then crashes. Drawing obvious parallels to the human situation he then asked, "Are humans smarter than yeast"? Reading this article confirms to me that the answer, sadly, is no.

The love of God may be infinite but the Earth he/she created is most definitely not so. Our numbers (and consumption) have now become so great that we are already consuming more than the Earth can renewably provide. We are eating into the Earth's capital and the results are disappearing forests, plants and animal species and growing conflicts as food prices rise and people no longer have the means to pay. What do you think sparked the "Arab Spring"? You can ignore the signs that surround you but is there any greater sin than wilful ignorance?
Proteios1
1 month ago
Hey, even us scientists need our version of the Millerites. Aren't those the protestants who are the contemporary 'the world will end on..." group. And every time it didn't end, they just cited a calculation error and et a new date?

Anyways, two thoughts.
1. Apply this faulty logic to other things...oh no, there won't be enough shoes or blue jeans for more people because we will never built more factories or hire some of these new people to make the products.
2. I though global climat change was causing droughts and famines?
Tara Brelinsky
1 month ago
Thank you for this well written and truthful article. I have written about and discussed this very topic many times, but it needs to remain in the forefront until people grasp the reality of the agenda at play. Namely, the culture of death which is based on this idea of de-population.

As an NFP teacher I wholeheartedly agree that NFP can be used to postpone if the couple prayerfully discerns a serious reason to do so, but I can attest that the terms "grave," and "serious" are often disputed and substituted with the term "just." What "just" may have once meant is arguable, but nowadays just can mean we just don't want anymore kids. Sadly, NFP has been tainted and is sometimes sold as a licit means of reaching the same ends, avoiding additional children. I have "argued" at length with NFP teachers over this and if you stumble on a blog that touches on this topic you are likely to read comments arguing both sides. In fact, one method specifically asks couples to state whether they are working to achieve or avoid pregnancy (period) The couple is required to decide and inform a third party (their teacher or doctor). When I informed a teacher of that method that we neither work to achieve or postpone, I got the impression she considered us to be immature in our ability to sexually restrain ourselves!

The understanding that we are called to be generous and trust that Father knows best and will not be outdone in generosity, is laughed at. As the mother of seven wonderful living children, six heavenly and one anticipated, I can attest to the truth that complete surrender to God's Will is a tremendous vocation and one that I will never regret. God has not been outdone and He truly knows what is best for all of us.

Thanks again for this thoughtful piece.
Chris Danze
1 month ago
Excellent article, thank you for writing it.
Josephine Boone
1 month ago
The writer describes one fact that is true: Malthus, Ehrlich and were wrong about the time frame of global carrying capacity for population and their proposed remedies were odious. However, he wrongly infers from this that population growth is a “nonexistent problem”. Over population is a real issue which has more dimensions than simply availability of food. Technological advances “the green revolution” have greatly expanded global food production. Today the most serious pressure comes from availability of clean water and the issue of global warming due to the use of fossil fuels. These are very serious challenges and it is folly to ignore them.
abey
1 month ago
It comes down to just one word "Faith", a total lack of it. To the preventive checks, this article misses out the core aspect to not only as a means to control population but also to the production of sin, that to total destruction coming about Physically & Spiritually portrayed through the "Gay Agendas" not just contradicting but going against the very basic structure of Creation & its Family & against the subsequent natural laws come off God. To say, the gifts of satan are but curses in disguise.

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