Please add your blog post responding to the readings on birth control as population control here.
Also, I’d like each of you to prepare one discussion question from the readings for next week’s class. I will collect these questions at the beginning of class and we will use these to drive the direction of next week’s discussion.
I didn’t realize what a four letter word “Malthusian†was at least according to Betsy Hartmann. I was taught the population myth she talks about, over population was always emphasized as the problem, not governments, policies or poverty and at the time I was learning this doctrine I was too young to question it. I was in elementary school when the subject was first introduced, in geography or social studies perhaps. Since then I learned a little about Malthus, that he was a political economist and he stated that reproduction is balanced by the struggle for existence. I didn’t tie his theory up with current practices worldwide to tackle over population. I may be getting this backwards but I thought that Hartmann said that the worse a situation became for a population then the more the population increased, and in better economic climates populations tended to reach an equilibrium, which is what I interpreted Malthus as saying. I think she means that if the economic climate is changed, for example by eliminating poverty, then the “over-population†issue will sort itself out without targeting women as reproducers.
I thought this week’s readings on population control were very eye-opening. Almost all of the articles pointed out how skewed the distribution of resources is on our planet and how on a global scale, there is no shortage of food, however, where that food is placed leads to overabundance and gluttony in places like the U.S. and severe food shortage and starvation in several Third World countries. As Betsy Hartmann states, “The problem is not one of absolute scarcity, but one of distribution and the main problem is that too few people monopolize too many resources.”
It was interesting to find out just how abundant food is on a global scale; since this is the case, “Malthusian logic” is quite off target and chillingly ignorant. While reading about the “Malthusian Orthodoxy”, it seemed to me that Malthusians view human beings only as mouths to feed and as abstract numbers. This inhumane and illogical school of thought is leading people to believe that Third World countries are to blame for the problems of environmental degradation when in reality it is countries like the U.S. which devour the majority of the world’s food and use most of the world’s energy and natural resources! In many of the world’s poorer countries, families rely on having many children so that the family can survive at all. In countries where living conditions are so unstable and child survival rates are significantly lower than those of more developed nations, it is essential to empathize with the decisions of many families in poorer nations to have many children. Essentially, it is important for us to understand that not all people live in the same basic social environment- this goes along with the concept of intersectionality and can be applied on a global level to assess the conditions which produce such hardship in developing nations and such luxury in developed nations. This also made me think of how much different the world could be if people would alter their lifestyles, even slightly, to improve the human condition- for instance if the wealthy elite in developing nations could change their focus from making as much profit as possible from exporting goods to helping the struggling citizens of their own nation make a living and improve their economy.
On a different note, attempts at population control reminiscent of Nazi eugenics are being made in the present day, as is demonstrated by Patricia Hill Collins in her article, “Will the ‘Real’ Mother Please Stand Up?”. Collins makes many good points and shows that the “Ideal American Family” is one that is white, heterosexual, and has their own biological children. This “family ideal” is familiar to all of us since the overwhelming majority of media examples of families (tv shows, commercials) mold to this description. It was very interesting and frightening to learn that sterilization is actually promoted among working class African American women while infertility among middle class white women is viewed as a national tragedy. Also, the fact that poor working class white women are encouraged to give their babies up for adoption to infertile middle class white women (the women who “should” be having babies according to the American “Ideal”) while working class African American women are altogether discouraged from having children was disturbing. I think it’s deplorable to try to tell any woman what to do with her own pregnancy- especially if the advice is being given based on the mother’s race or class! The narrow minded view of a “real” mother as one who is white and middle class is is highly illogical and hurtful- being a good and capable mother is never going to be an issue based only on race or class. To say that an African American woman or a working class woman is somehow incapable of being a “real” mother is ignorant and elitist and contributes to the backwards thinking of those who believe in racial or classist superiority.
The article on population environmental programs struck a nerve with me. I guess what annoyed me when I read this article was that some international organizations are touting ecological concerns in their benefit to promote population control. As the article states, this type of generalized assumption about the impact of a growing population on the natural environment should not be the basis of population control. One can easily argue that they are trying to slowly shrink the population in low income countries and not merely for ecological concerns. These organizations seem to be imposing their own agenda’s rather than on the interests of those they are seeking to help. It has been shown that environmental degradation is largely impacted by the consumption of resources. This consumption is mainly by rich and industrialized countries and not low income countries. The example this article cited where reproductive health classes were a requirement for the women to participate in a project that was aimed at empowering them is disturbing. It is a conflict of interests in my opinion. Who is responsible for making such decisions? Also discussed are the health concerns on the long term effects of using some of the contraceptives provided. We all know that there isn’t such a thing as one size fits all in the world of contraceptives. These initiatives seem to isolate women in the name of benefitting the whole community. It does not make sense how population control can be used in one part of the world and in another urging women to have more children. The article on Old Roots, New Shoots: Eugenics of the Everyday highlighted reasons why the Malthusian doctrine may play a role in those organizations. The themes wealth and privilege constantly came up in the examples given of current eugenics. The blame is always on the poor and not those that perpetuate this inequality.
This week’s readings were very powerful. I personally enjoyed reading the “10 reasons to rethink population” the most. As we all know that there are many problems that affect the world today. I believe that over population is one, if not the biggest problem of the twenty-first century.
I didn’t agree with the 1st reason where it was stated that overpopulation “explosion” is over. There are still countries like China and India where the population is hitting over 1 billion and due to the high peak in lack of education, people especially in India think that child birth is a good source of income. India was the first country in the developing world to initiate a state-sponsored family-planning programme in 1952 and official figures suggest a measure of success. Since independence in 1947, the fertility rate has been cut from six births per woman of child-bearing age to 3.5. But efforts to encourage family planning among poorer Indians suffered a setback in the 1970s when the government sponsored a mass sterilisation campaign, in which illiterate people were duped or paid to have vasectomies or removal of the fallopian tubes.
I agree with all the other reasons mentioned in this article, it is very easy to blame others for many different reasons but when it comes to us we have no explaination. The government and many political authorities can easily blame poverty as the biggest effect of overpopulation. We often forget to reflect that we all have different ways of living. For example, when i used to live in India, I was taught in my school that India has two types of population. “urban” and “rural”. Rural Indians depend on unpredictable agriculture incomes, while urban Indians rely on jobs that are, at best, scarce. Here, we can say that rather blaming on poverty and enquality , we should rather find solution on how to help these developing nations without any political consents.
Moving on, I totally agreed with the statement that over-consumption and greed is the primary cause of environmental degradation. If there were less Americans, including less wealthy Americans, there would be less environmental degradation, so overpopulation is part of the problem. However, the fertility rate of America is not related to the current over-consumption problem. America is already overpopulated, so even if there was zero population growth in America, this problem would still be here. Furthermore, the issue of environmental degradation is not needed to make a strong argument for planning a decrease in human population. A global desire to universally increase everyone’s quality of life and to reduce malnutrition is sufficient.
It’s not the immigration of colored people into the U.S. that Americans fear as much as it is the immigration of poor people who will work for low wages, tolerate exploitation, and thereby lower the incomes of America’s working class. Immigration is more of a poverty issue than a race issue. Conventional views of overpopulation in America are informed by Christian marketing that portrays birth control as evil, so yes, I agree that conventional views of overpopulation get in the way of understanding and solidarity. Birth control is not evil.
In the end, i would want to say that We don’t need to rethink population… we need to think about overpopulation. Population is overpopulation in todays world. Better yet, what we need to think about is population reduction planning that is respectful of people of all races, genders and classes and without letting people of one religion dictating what everyone not of their religion should be forced to do.
This week’s readings were very powerful. I personally enjoyed reading the “10 reasons to rethink population” the most. As we all know that there are many problems that affect the world today. I believe that over population is one, if not the biggest problem of the twenty-first century.
I didn’t agree with the 1st reason where it was stated that overpopulation “explosion” is over. There are still countries like China and India where the population is hitting over 1 billion and due to the high peak in lack of education, people especially in India think that child birth is a good source of income. India was the first country in the developing world to initiate a state-sponsored family-planning programme in 1952 and official figures suggest a measure of success. Since independence in 1947, the fertility rate has been cut from six births per woman of child-bearing age to 3.5. But efforts to encourage family planning among poorer Indians suffered a setback in the 1970s when the government sponsored a mass sterilisation campaign, in which illiterate people were duped or paid to have vasectomies or removal of the fallopian tubes.
I agree with all the other reasons mentioned in this article, it is very easy to blame others for many different reasons but when it comes to us we have no explaination. The government and many political authorities can easily blame poverty as the biggest effect of overpopulation. We often forget to reflect that we all have different ways of living. For example, when i used to live in India, I was taught in my school that India has two types of population. “urban” and “rural”. Rural Indians depend on unpredictable agriculture incomes, while urban Indians rely on jobs that are, at best, scarce. Here, we can say that rather blaming on poverty and enquality , we should rather find solution on how to help these developing nations without any political consents.
Moving on, I totally agreed with the statement that over-consumption and greed is the primary cause of environmental degradation. If there were less Americans, including less wealthy Americans, there would be less environmental degradation, so overpopulation is part of the problem. However, the fertility rate of America is not related to the current over-consumption problem. America is already overpopulated, so even if there was zero population growth in America, this problem would still be here. Furthermore, the issue of environmental degradation is not needed to make a strong argument for planning a decrease in human population. A global desire to universally increase everyone’s quality of life and to reduce malnutrition is sufficient.
It’s not the immigration of colored people into the U.S. that Americans fear as much as it is the immigration of poor people who will work for low wages, tolerate exploitation, and thereby lower the incomes of America’s working class. Immigration is more of a poverty issue than a race issue. Conventional views of overpopulation in America are informed by Christian marketing that portrays birth control as evil, so yes, I agree that conventional views of overpopulation get in the way of understanding and solidarity. Birth control is not evil.
In the end, i would want to say that We don’t need to rethink population… we need to think about overpopulation. Population is overpopulation in todays world. Better yet, what we need to think about is population reduction planning that is respectful of people of all races, genders and classes and without letting people of one religion dictating what everyone not of their religion should be forced to do.
It is difficult for me to consider birth control being used as a method of population control. Choice is a basic human right and all individuals should be able to exercise this right. It is important to consider what factors would prompt individuals, groups, or even entire populations to consider such harsh methods as sterilization.
Fear plays a large role in population control. Many people still worry of growing populations, which may lead to lack or food and resources. These beliefs are still current because there has been a lack of media attention to the state of the current population. Fear surrounding overpopulation was best described by Betsy Hartmann, in Reproductive Rights and wrongs and the Global Politics of Population Control. She mentions that the myth of overpopulation prevents constructive thinking and active reproductive issues, while also making it apparent that this type of ignorance breeds racism and turns women’s bodies into political battlefields.
In the past, I have thought of my own choice to have a child. I would often consider what age, or when in my career would be the best time to start having children. I never considered this a privilege. To me, it was a human right that every woman should be able to take part in if they choose to. What I think bothers me the most about what I have read is that the health of women who have been forced or persuaded to use forms of birth control such as Depo Provera is often ignored. It is difficult for me to grasp, that in some countries, population control is set at a higher standard than good health care.
I was most interested in the issues brought up by Betsy Hartmann in “Old Roots…,†especially in regards to eugenics & anti-immigration groups. I’m currently working on my thesis about Somali immigrants to Lewiston, a small economically-depressed mill town in Maine and their relationships with healthcare providers in the area, but with a focus on birth practices. Coming from a reproductive justice framework, I think that reproductive rights are not limited to not having babies, but include being able to have a baby the way one chooses. Many of the people that I have interviewed for my project (white doctors) mention large families & a low use rate of birth control for married couples in the community. As Maine is a very white state, the influx of African, Muslim refugees has made quite a few heads turn. Many newspapers have featured editorials of native Mainers deploring the Somali community because of their large families which will use up precious resources. However, there is no talk of poor white women refraining from having babies and using up resources—the emphasis is on the new Somali population, or “unfit mothers†to use Collins’ phrase. By framing the issue in terms of resources and economics, xenophobic ideals are masked as quantitative evidence for stalling the influx of new immigrants. It’s interesting to compare that situation to that of the Population-Environment projects as it is not the systems that are being re-examined, but the people themselves who are demonized. Nobody mentions any of the reasons deeply founded in neoliberalism that has made Lewiston so economically depressed; All of the attention surrounds the towns new community members. Before these readings, I hadn’t really looked at this issue in terms of population growth, but I see that it’s quite relevant.
The Malthusian belief that if unchecked the world’s population will outgrow the environment’s ability to sustain it’s numbers contains many fallacies of logic as seen in the Betsy Hartmann article. If one doesn’t really consider what Malthus and disciples of this field of thought are eschewing it seems like an easy way to look at population in comparison to environment. If people keep having children then we’re going to use up our environment’s resources and leave nothing for the next generation right? Wrong.
Hartmann put forth a lot of information that needs to be considered. It’s easy to blame third world countries and to believe that the people in third world countries and poor people in developed countries are ignorant and that if they were just smarter they would stop having so many children. It’s even easy to convince yourself that this way of thinking isn’t racist. Rather, it’s totally blatant racist and classicist logic which is made even worse because there are prominent figures who openly think this way.
I think overall people in the United States have no idea what sorts of things our government is funding. One only needs to look at examples like the Iran-contra affair to see how the United States violates its own policies in order to receive a political gain. One can also look at examples like those in the Hartmann article to see how we put capitalist gain before the welfare of people. When you think about it that way, Hartmann’s example of the civil war in El Salvador in the 1970s isn’t appalling, it’s obvious. The United States supports the rule of political dictators in countries where our economy has something to gain from political stability (at the price of civil rights) even while pushing forward democracy and forcing out dictators in other countries pretending that we want everyone to have those civil rights (do I even need to say the name Iraq?)
I could go on about the political aspect of Malthusian theory instead I want to focus on an aspect that I didn’t even consider. I quote here from the Hartmann article ” male dominance in the family, patriarchal social mores, the systematic exclusion of women from the development process, and the absence of decent birth control services combine to force many women into having more children than they want. The social environment leaves them little or no reproductive choice”. Women in third world countries have children for many reasons which do not include ignorance. Hartmann points out that women have a lot of children to help them out in the fields and to provide for them in old age. Children can provide an economic benefit to the family because they contribute to work. Even if this wasn’t the case and women didn’t have to have children for these reasons they might not know (or might not be allowed to explore because of their husbands and society) reproductive choices. If Malthusians think that population growth is just a case of ignorance then maybe they should think about who is preventing women from becoming educated and understanding reproductive choices which would help them limit the number of children they have. Malthusian’s promote forms of birth control method like the IUD that take family planning out of the hands of women and put control in the hands of doctors in order to limit population growth. This prevents women from learning about methods of birth control like condoms which are easier to come by and understand. If women don’t understand a form of birth control then why would they want to use it?
All of the articles this week seemed to point to an underlying problem. As a society we don’t think that the poor and undereducated can be educated about reproduction and family planning so instead we have to control their reproduction for them for the good of society. This is the underlying assumption of both eugenics and Malthusian theory. Really ignorance is not the fault of the individual but rather the fault of a society that doesn’t educate it’s most vulnerable citizens and then blames them for not being educated.
Very rarely, do I believe that something may be too paranoid and to the left for me to completely agree with. But the readings from Hampshire College’s Publications of the Population and Development may be among the rare. They may some interesting points about over population fears; their points lessen my fear but did not nullify them. I have taken a couple history courses on Reproductive Rights. I have learned about the horrors of Sterilization, eugenics and Depo-Provera problems. But I have never read anything about Envirmentist groups with malicious eugenic intensions. Also their theory about “natural culture purity worries†seemed of base. The poor beach boys were misquoted I feel. Songs such as express cultural unity, not necessary exclusion. You can find them in all sub cultures. However, they had a point that arguments about local population control tend to focus on poor women. But I would be very interested to learn, what the stats of income and birth rate are by geographic region before making an opinion. And I would of liked more examples of these groups and their effects.
Through several undergrad classes I’ve been introduced to the various uses that the theory of eugenics has been put to; from both the overt task of enforcing ethnic purity, to providing the framework for Malthusian arguments, as we saw in this week’s readings. These discussions/critiques however were usually not about current practices, and while they may have concerned the recent past, they were always historical in nature.
While I’m aware of radical fringe groups, including factions of “environmental” groups who still use the argument of “population pressure” as the cause of the downfall of “civilization,” I was not aware of the continued use of these arguments in “serious” discussions.
So I was quite surprised while reading an article in the New York times this weekend to see these very arguments put forward.
Andrew Martin’s article, “So Much Food. So Much Hunger.” http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/weekinreview/20martin.html, seems to start off well, in my opinion. He talks about how the Green Revolution has improved the World’s food supply and about existing structural impediments to the equitable distribution of this food, including how US farm subsidies negatively affect the food security of developing countries. He then veers off for several paragraphs presenting the Malthusian argument for the cause of hunger, particularly in Africa.
From this week’s readings and the NY Times article, it’s clear that the idea of eugenics, however cloaked in science, remain salient not only in the public mind but in the mind of those who fund and implement “Woman’s health” programs.
I’ve got one more comment on this article (to continue the discussion from last week). Mr. Martin ends the article with a quote from Dr. Norman Borlaug when he accepted his Congressional Gold Medal in 2007 for his work as the leader of the Green Revolution. Borlaug, speaking of world hunger says, “It is within America’s technical and financial power to help end this human tragedy and injustice, if we set our hearts and minds to the task.” This quote, to me, is another example of emphasizing the primacy of science and technology in dealing with a problem without acknowledging the central role of the power structures within which most problems are situated.
The concept of overpopulation in our society struck a nerve for me this week. It seems that the government and higher authority blames the fact that people are not living in prime circumstances on the fact that the society is over populated. This is in some way is blamed on the women for being able and wanting to ‘breed’. There should not be any blame placed on women for wanting to have big families. There should be more emphasis on the health care that we are providing for those that may not be able to afford the right care or food for their children. There are areas of the world that limit families to having one child so that they do not overpopulate the world. They enforce this my making sure that women get abortions and making sure that guys become sterilized. There is also a preference towards having a son so that the family will be able to continue their name.
Along with the fact that women are considered ‘breeders’ there is the issue of hunger around the world. This issue should not be blamed on the amount of people, but it is because there are not enough resources for people to grow their own food and sell it to other vendors. The government has failed to realize that food security has become a large issue not only in the US but more throughout the world. The governments around the world should not be punishing people for having too many children or not being able to supply food for their families, but they should be educating people on the ways that they can improve their economical status. They should also be improving the food supply and ways of providing for a large family. These issues are not just going to go away, but they are going to get worse if the government does not take control and realize that they need to do something about these issues.
I enjoyed reading “10 Reasons to Rethink ‘Overpopulation'”. I think that this article brought up 10 very good points about how the world views this problem incorrectly. The number of births per mother definately has gone down significantly in the past 40 years or so. The need for having many kinds has decreased because they are not needed to work on the family farm and such other chores. At least in the US this has decreased the predicted explosion of population. At the same time, I dont think that means that we dont need to worry about a high population. If all of the “baby boomers” had 2.7 children then that still adds up. I thought the statistic that 1.2 billion people worldwide earn less than $1 a day. This is causing it to be very difficult for parents to feed their children. The supply of food is great enough for everyone, in fact they stated that the richest fifth of people eat 66 times as much as the poorest fifth of people. This is a huge problem. So we know that we can not restrict birth rate in an area based on availability of food because it certainly is available. I certainly disagree with making certain women give up their babies or force them to have abortions just for the sake of population control. This is not fair at all to human rights. There are more important things to worry about rather than controlling the number of kids a women is allowed to have based on wealth, race, age, or any other factors. It is devasting to hear that people are more concerned about limiting the population than they are about providing health care. They said that, “just over 10% of the world population lives in sub-Saharan Africa, it is home to over 60% of all people living with HIV”. This is a shocking statistic. It is not ok to worry more about the population of their country than their wellbeing and knowledge to protect themselve from disease! We definately need to emphasize the importance of healthcare over the idea of overpopulation.
After examining the article, “10 Reasons to Rethink ‘Overpopulation’â€, it made me start thinking about the negative way that people in the world usually talk about the population and how it is starting to overpopulate. I never really think about the worlds population very much, but I do remember learning about it and thinking that there must be a different side to overpopulation. It is amazing to me that governments have become involved with women’s fertility. One example of this would be the one-child rule in China, where there are fines set up against having more than one child. Another part that struck me was the fact that they said that “hunger is not the result of ‘too many mouths’ to feed†because the world has more than enough food to feed everyone in it, it’s just that the resources are not there. The mouths that are supposedly hungry could have food; it is not readily available in certain parts of the world where they are. If people were to rethink overpopulation and the effects of it and get rid of the negative thoughts surrounding population in general it might be possible to regain some of the rights that women have lost.
The article, “10 Reasons to Rethink Overpopulation,†made me reconsider everything I have been taught. I have never really learned about reproductive rights and being a woman, I find many new things regarding it interesting. There were two points that made me think of related issues: environmental degradation and restricted reproductive rights.
It made me realize the harm that large wealthy nations, like the United States, is doing to poorer nations. In particular, the environmental issues are mainly caused by our overconsumption of resources and not caring about the waste products and I believe it’s mostly for economical reasons. We are able to buy more resources but will not spend the money to become “greener†when producing products. With our waste production so high, we are essentially killing the lands everyone needs with global warming, causing the starvation of other countries.
I agree with what someone said early about women having a basic human right to reproduce. I think back to times when many children made a family successful and self sufficient. They were able to produce their own food and make their clothes with their children’s labor. Today, it may be harder and more expensive to have more children because most of the population is being educated, which is costly. Also, there are less family and local farms to be self sufficient. I work at a family owned ice cream shop on a farm in Hadley and think it is amazing that this one family has worked on the farm for 100 years and has made a majority of their own food.
I think that if overpopulation is a problem today, many of the issues concerning it need to be thought out better. Making controls on reproductive rights are inhumane. In addition to educating women and mothers, the politicians need to be educated on the effects that their decisions are having on our female bodies.
I had never really thought about why there is this heavy focus on women’s “reproductive health†as opposed to any other health concern until I synthesized some of our readings. Reproduction stretches far beyond biology and into the realms of politics and social environment. Women’s reproductive capabilities are thus the essence behind debates on both overpopulation and eugenics, and it becomes clear that women’s bodies have become very political.
The politics of women and reproduction is discussed in Patricia Hill Collins’ article, Will the “Real†Mother Please Stand Up? She relates women and motherhood and “notions of “real†motherhood†to an “American national identity†(Collins 441). The relationship between “mother†and the “state†is expressed via American ideals of the dominant, nuclear (white) family and is the basis behind the argument of “fit†and “unfit†mothers in society. I encountered this notion of the “ideal†American mother in my Black Women, Work, and Family course last semester, but I had never thought of it in terms of eugenics and population control until now.
Fears of “racial suicide†(Collins 444) from falling birth rates of dominant whites has led to an increase in promoting middle-class, white women’s fertility. Collins explains that “white women allegedly fulfill the symbolic function of mothers of the national family†and they exhibit “racial purity†for a white supremacist society (Collins 444). In this sense, white motherhood is glorified in our society, and the divine role of white women as mothers becomes essential to our idealized political and social system. By contrast, mothers seen as deviant from this ideal motherhood, such as lower-class, white women, and both lower and middle class black women, are heavily criticized as mothers in society. Negative stereotypes of lower-class black women as lazy “welfare queens,†whose reproduction is seen as out of control and causing the state and its people heavy financial burdens, contributes to societal notions of ideal motherhood. By declaring these stereotyped women to be “unfit†mothers in society, political motives have been aimed at controlling their reproduction and fertility. This idea of political and social control over groups of women outside of the dominant middle-class, white population, is not only dehumanizing, but is also detrimental to the function of our diverse society as a whole.
Interestingly enough, I had a conversation about the overpopulation in China – and the lack of sufficient public health care – this weekend with my family. Our reading, 10 Reasons to Rethink ‘Overpopulation’ really interested me, because it proved that there is more to the issues of hunger, the lack of energy and fuel, and poverty than just the idea of overpopulation. I had never put much thought into this, but I now wonder if the idea of overpopulation is simply an excuse that is used by the government for the reasons as to why there are not enough resources. The truth is, our concern should be on the amount of resources we each use, not on the amount of people who are taking advantage of the resources.
Instead of focusing the problem of a lack of unending resources on overpopulation, which can translate into women’s rights, abortion, family health care, and children’s health care, we should be showing our attention to the idea of our individual carbon footprint, and the affect that it can have on our environment. If we are not concerned consumers, we will be furthering the problem of the ratio of disappearing resources to increasing population. The second page of this article speaks to this idea exactly, and I think that it makes many important points, such as the fact that “the richest fifth of the world’s people consume 66 times as much as the poorest fifthâ€. I wonder if this is another aspect of public health – one that we often hear about but rarely address. I really enjoyed reading this article because of the different points it brought up, and the different dimensions of public health it addressed. I would love to read articles with these types of subjects more often, as they often interplay with other aspects of public health.
This weeks readings were very eye opening for me. The “10 reasons to rethink population†stuck out to me the most. The first statement where the author mentions the population “explosion†is over is an understatement. There are still third world countries suffering from many problems due to the over populations. Third world countries are not educated enough to know the negative effects of what will happen if the population increases at the rapid rate it is right now. Education on different contraceptive methods needs to be spread to help some of these people who are not aware of the consequences.
The other reasons mentioned were very true in my opinion. The second reason mentions placing the blame on other people with less resources and power. There is to big of class differences around the world and the wealth is not evenly divided. This makes it harder for the more poor countries and people. Another point that stuck out to me is when birth control is considered as a method of reducing population. I feel like having children is women rights and should not be controlled by the government or any other higher power. For example in China, the women are limited to one child per family. I completely disagree with this and believe it is unjust. This should be up to the family and no one else.
This article touched base on some really good points that pointed out misinterpretations on the population problem today. I feel that everyone should plan to reduce the population as a whole and not divide it by countries or class ranks. Healthcare also needs to be a large part of helping the population problem.
Before this week’s reading, I truly never thought about population crises. I learned about it in several classes here and there, but it was never intensely studied or examined. I have to say after reading these articles my eyes have been opened.
I suppose it was just wishful thinking but I never thought there was so much controversy around the population. Yes, I know there are the issues of eugenics and carrying capacity but the Malthusian perspective is completely new to me. It makes me shutter to think that people are still adamant about a man’s (wrong and outdated) philosophies from the late 1700s and early 1800s.
The point I found most profound was made in both ‘10 Reasons…’ and ‘Reproductive Rights and Wrongs…’ – “hunger is not the result of ‘too many mouths’ to feedâ€. There is plenty of food on this earth for every human being. However, the issue is access to resources for obtaining that food. How can someone eat if they do not have money to buy food or land to grow food? Personally, I never worry about how dinner will reach my plate. Unfortunately this is not the case for the rest of the world.
While I found the other Hampshire College articles on eugenics interesting, it was hard to grasp the main idea from them. I did not think the author was promoting eugenics, nor do I think it was just a report, but I was unsure what the author was trying to get across in the article.
I previously thought about eugenics only in terms of Nazi Germany and the United States up until the end of segregation. “Will the ‘Real’ Mother Please Stand Up†surprised me more than any of the other readings this week because the author related issues like the extreme focus in society on infertility back to the idea of who should be valued as a mother and who should be allowed to give birth to and raise children. The idea that there is a hierarchy in terms of who is valued as a mother is not at all a new concept to me. In our society we value as mothers, in order, middle class white women, working class white women, and then women of color of all classes. However, I never thought of the fierce struggles against abortion and social welfare programs as a way of controlling who gets to produce and “mother†children. Collins presents the idea of policies restricting abortions as a way of getting working-class white women to carry white babies to term while at the same time not giving social welfare benefits to such women as a way of getting working class white women to give their babies up for adoption to middle class white women who would better be able to “mother†them. This allows for more babies of the supposedly dominant white race to be born and raised in a middle class existence that those in power hold to the greatest esteem. It almost seems shocking how much care has been put into creating a social system that at the same time tries to increase the population of middle class white people, increase births in working class white women and then encourage them to give up their babies to parents more “fit†to raise them, and also to prevent women of color from having or raising any children at all after there was no longer a need for people to exploit as cheap, plentiful labor.
I have also always thought of the wasting of natural resources as a problem brought about by the Western world who were willing to exploit the resources of more impoverished nations in order to create more goods without having to worry about laws created to sustain the environment in the Western world. I have certainly heard of people blaming overpopulation of less developed nations on the reason the environment appears to be collapsing, but I hadn’t heard of people wishing to control the birth rates of Third World countries for this purpose. Although I doubt that all of the people trying to help the Third World control population by prescribing long-use contraceptives have such nefarious purposes as trying to curb all Third World fertility out of fear that too many people will ruin the earth, it is necessary to realize that much of what we have all been taught about programs helping the Third World as being done solely for humanitarian reasons may actually have been designed with other purposes in mind.
I was very interested in reading “10 Reasons to Rethink Overpopulation.” I had never really read about the arguments against over population, because, like the pervasive American society since the early ages, I have always heard about how bad it is for the population to grow out of control as it will increase poverty and environmental issues in the country. I have always thought of it negatively in terms of the future of the country. However, this article was interesting to read as all ten reasons to rethink overpopulation made me re think my own opinions on it, and I am not thinking so negatively about it anymore. This article makes some valid points about the population. I had never really considered how the average birth rates have fallen due to women working outside of the home, as opposed to the escalated birth rates per family in the 1960s. The inaccurate causes of poverty and inequality was also brought to my attention, how the blame is inaccurately placed on the poor as oppsed to the government and economy. The third reason, that hunger is not the result of too many mouths to feed, was a very interesting point to bring up, as I never really thought about that in terns of overpopulation. It is simply due to the fact that food has not been made a priority in many countries. I do not agree with poplulatio control programs, viewing women as “breeders,” of too many babies. The number of babies born per woman these days has dropped significantly, and it is every woman’s right to have their own babies, without worrying about abortion and sterilization and other drastic measures to control their pregnanies. The one child policy in Cairo is very mind boggling and disturbing to me. A woman should never be denied her baby and the right of motherhood. However, the services should be there if the woman choses not to have a baby, as long as it is not the decision of society and the idea of overpopulation. Basically, I felt that these were 10 very valid points to be discussed in terms of rethinking overpopulation, and reading this article definately put some perspective into my head.
This week’s articles on the topic overpopulation were very strong and influential. My personal favorites were “10 reasons to rethink overpopulation†and “security and survival.†I believe that the reasons given serve as a good reminder to all of us about how overpopulation has such a drastic impact on our world today. I believe articles such as these open our eyes and help us to consider both sides of the argument instead of focus on what has been drilled into or minds from the media, government, and books.
I agree with Hartmann’s notion of overpopulation being “destructive.†The negative impact of overpopulation being taught to our generation prevents us from thinking constructively and taking action on such debatable issues. Instead of trying to understand the current overpopulation situation of the world and thinking of ways to help those in need, the “higher powers†seem to focus more on how to decrease the size of the population and point fingers at others to blame for this problem.
We’ve been taught that overpopulation leads to an increase in poverty, hunger, environmental degradation and political insecurity. Placing the blame on the population itself is not going to make the problem go away. Instead, it’s going to threaten the safety and welfare of both the people as well as the planet. Such negative notions lead to the development of population control programs and the demeaning of women’s reproductive rights. If these notions continue to be taught to generations to come, racism and promotion of harmful stereotypes of poor and colored people will never end.
For example, China has enforced the one child policy, one child per family policy. Those that have more than one child are fined for every extra child that is born. This policy was introduced to ensure that China’s population has a good standard of living in the future and that everyone is given food security. The government created this policy in order to keep all of its resources while trying to keep the country stabilized. These may seem as advantages, but there are disadvantages to this policy. If one child is born per family, the first generation will not have any siblings and the second generation will not have cousins. This may impact the social lifestyle of the families as well as cause the child to become spoiled. Also in China, women are considered the lower sex. Parents that have a baby girls resort to killing or abandoning their child so they can try again and maybe produce a boy. This leads to an unbalanced population with more boys than girls, with more girls going into prostitution and boys being sold to richer families.
Another overall downfall of this overpopulation myth is that governments become more concerned with trying to decrease the birth rates in populations whereas they should be focusing more on the healthcare systems. If sick people are producing more children, then yes it is a disadvantage for the entire population. Whereas if poor and sick people were being treated and healthcare systems were improving they could produce healthier babes, work, and improve the overall economy. In order to make a difference in this debate, we need to change the mindset of people and what they are being taught and introduce new ideas and be more understanding to these issues.
I was always told and taught over and over again that our world is overly populated and we must control it before we endanger ourselves with scarce resources, poverty and eventually bring down the economy as a whole. Our economy is very unfit for our nation at the moment and many people are unable to afford everyday necessities. Although the United States is the largest food producer in the world, Americans are starving more and more each and every day. By this, we can see that the one to blame for hunger and poverty is the government. The government is more concerned with the economy rather than food security for its people.
After reading “10 Reason to Rethink ‘Overpopulation'”, I realized that the government, military and all other higher-power people are controlling what we have and what we need. They have the ability to help their country’s lack of resources yet they do nothing about it. How are we, as middle-class people, able prevent harm to ourselves and future generations?
Many countries like China and India are working to control population through abortions and contraceptives but I feel that every woman should have the right to have as many children as they wish. The United States has great control of population because more women are educated and have better employment opportunities. If other countries had better education and more job opportunities, I think there would be fewer births.
If we all work together and educate one another about global concerns, generations after us will be able live happily. The government would be able to meet people’s needs equally and the nation’s population would be better controlled.
“The myth of overpopulation is destructive because it prevents constructive thinking and action on reproductive issues” (page 1). This was a statement made in the first reading: Reproductive Rights and Wrongs and the Global Politics of Population Control. I think it’s an interesting thought/statement. Which I was not sure I agreed with until I read through the entire article. I could not fully grasp what this statement meant and I had to reread it several times, but now it makes perfect sense.
This article had a lot to say and made many strong arguments. I truly enjoyed reading it. Overpopulation is not looked upon as something good, it is something that we are facing as a nation and the solutions for it, in my opinion, are not right. There are many concerns facing overpopulation. Most of which are whether or not everyone can be fed, poverty numbers increasing, sanitation efforts taking a downfall (although sanitation efforts still have a long way to go), housing, nutrition overall and so much more. The more people, the more sources needed and as is, all the people on the earth right now, are not being provided for and taken care of.
With overpopulation comes many deaths as well. “High infant mortality is primarily caused by poor nutrition” (page 9). Many third world countries are the ones with the highest infant mortality rates and as mentioned, it is usually due to poor nutrition. Third world countries lack access to many things, nutritious foods, education, sanitation, clean water and sewage systems (which is included in sanitation), proper housing etc. These countries tend to be the ones with the highest number of births and therefore have the highest number of deaths as a result. It is very hard to feed between 4-6 children when the parents cannot even feed themselves or are already malnourished or sick that they could pass it on to their child.
There have been “solutions” to some of these overpopulation issues. In many cultures, sons are more valuable, so what some countries governments do is they only allow families to have a certain amount of girls or none at all. If they do reproduce a little girl then many times they need to give them away or they need to kill them. Having a girl would mean another person in this world that would possibly be able to reproduce (adding to the overpopulation issue) but also because females do not have as much “value” to contribute towards the family. Yet on the flip side of this argument that females do not contribute as much children in many third world countries are an asset and produce more than they consume (both males and females). (Reproductive Rights and Wrongs…) This is only one example of bad “solutions” that countries have come up with, again, in my personal opinion.
It is a strong belief of mine and of many others that if there was education and there was more assistance from developed countries that these countries could become developed and have enough sources to provide for all the people that live within that country. Sending volunteers to countries is not necessarily the best solution because volunteers are not a constant nor continuous source of aid. Nor are volunteers necessarily getting to know the background of the country and it’s people specific to each location. Volunteers most of the time are just given an assignment, they do not teach the skills to the locals nor get them involved, they do not research to see what would work best for certain peoples lifestyles. I am not saying that all volunteer groups or volunteers in general are this way, but majority of the time, a volunteer has an assignment and they believe that just fulfilling that assignment i.e. building the house or putting in a new filter system will suffice.
Overall, overpopulation is a major concern, but if people do not understand it, then there is no way to begin controlling it. To know that breastfeeding delays fertility is something one learns or possibly experience themselves after having had many children or having watched others have children. To know that people could live longer lives if their houses were clean or their water was filtered or if they got Vitamin A, could make the world of a difference, but unfortunately this information reaches very few and usually only the privileged. One day we will be able to come together and be comfortable helping each other out and not be selfish enough to keep valuable information and resources to ourselves.
I was under the impression that eugenics died out after the Nazis and the United States ill-fated attempts at sterilization. However, these articles did a pretty good job in convincing me that eugenics to some degree is alive and well in the twenty first century. It was eye opening and somewhat refreshing to read an article that explored the more complex relationships behind problems such as, “food shortages†and environmental destruction. The article really held up corporations and first world countries as the biggest perpetrators of these problems, not women in the third world having to many babies.
I thought the most interesting point that the article made was the fact that eventually the population will level out. That’s something that I have never heard before, because usually when people talk about population problems they talk about them as if the population will keep grown exponentially forever.
Before these readings when I thought about reproductive justice that thought about access to birth control. However, as these readings illustrate it is about so much more than that. It’s about what kinds of birth control and how your decisions are respected. As Collins describes, who is encouraged to be a mother and who is discouraged to be a mother varies greatly depending on the color of your skin and your social class. I thought it was astonishing when Collins described how adaption and lack of welfare tried to control reproductive decisions of poor white and African American women.
How interesting was it to read about overpopulation and the different approaches about it? I have heard about overpopulation before but I never read about the pros and cons and how it really shapes cultural beliefs. The “Malthusians†have such a negative view on overpopulation that even affected me in a way where I really started to criticize overpopulation in the Third World. But I did stop and realized how racist and egocentric they are mostly because they focus on individuals in third world countries and the way they display those individuals. Does overpopulation really affects our resources as far as food etc… from the reading the article it looks as if it really does not. Overpopulation does have its disadvantages and advantages just like many other “problems†that arise. Overpopulation is seen as a good thing because it is in fact creating a whole new generation where people are getting skilled more and more by the fact that they have to cope and eventually adapt to it. Also, overpopulation is giving birth to new agricultural techniques that help with hunger in the third world countries. The “Malthusians†to me seem like rich racist individuals who sit behind their desks writing and blaming people for what they “try†to understand and for what people have been worrying about for so long. Someone always needs to take the lead to scare people who do not know about current events and not “smart†enough to draw out their own conclusions.
It was really interesting to me when they have talked about the purpose of some women in the third world countries to have a lot of children. These women choose to have many children because sometimes they need all the help they can especially when they work in fields and take care of their households that include husbands, children, and most often extended family members. This was a little familiar to me because I also grew up in a third world country where many women are having a lot of children but I have experienced the other side of what the author mentioned which is that they really sometimes have no control over how many children they have. Let’s face it, everyone needs a little “pleasure†here and there and boom, there goes another child. These women are not only uneducated but they also do not have the means to prevent unwanted pregnancies therefore they end up with too many children and eventually end up selling or giving them away to strangers for labor. Yes, I did say sell them. These children, most of them, end up in homes where they are abused and are not sent to school. It is really sad reading this article and I somewhat could relate to it. As far as overpopulation, which was the point of the article, people are over thinking it and eventually building up racist beliefs against people who are in the third world. I guess you could say thank God we have the “Cornucopiansâ€!
After reading the article titled, “10 Ways to Rethink ‘Overpopulation”, I realized how different other country’s mentalities are regarding contraception, compared to the United States. For example, in the US, television shows a lot of advertisements for different forms of birth control pills (i.e. yaz, seasonique, ortho tricyclen-lo), birth control patches, and Intra-Uterine Devices. We constantly see commercials for condoms such as Trojan or Durex being positively promoted to encourage safe sex to prevent STDs/STIs and also unwanted pregnancies. However the article mentioned that countries such as China will go above and beyond to actually encourage women to have an abortion to keep the population down, in addition to their 1-child per family rule. In America, abortion is a very controversial issue with people taking both sides of the argument. Liberals are generally pro-choice and believe it’s the woman’s decision to choose how they want to take control of their life. Republicans on the other hand, generally believe that life begins at conception, and frown upon anyone that believes otherwise. Overall, although movements such as the Reproductive Rights/Reproductive Justice movement wants legalize abortion and cast the procedure in a positive light… many Americans regard the idea in a negative manner, seeing it as solution to fixing a “mistake”. I know that concept doesn’t apply to everybody, but a majority of the time, it’s how abortion is portrayed. But it is really very interesting and a little disturbing that countries such as China are using abortion as a positive thing because it controls the “over-population” situation, while many Americans frown upon it because they believe a life is wrongfully being destroyed.
I really enjoyed this week’s reading. Overpopulation is a topic that always comes up as discussion is my previous Public Health classes. Before really learning about overpopulation and its positivity; it was stored in my mind that it was negative and a problem in around the world that needed to be controlled. In “10 Reasons to Rethink ‘Overpopulation'”, ten valid accurate points that actually made me rethink overpopulation. One of the points that were given, was #4 Population growth is not the driving force behind environmental degradation. I read that poor people play a positive role protecting the environment, by the farmers being the ‘main preservers of plant biodiversity through cultivating local crop varieties’. Because of this we have certain fruit and vegetables that we’re able to eat. And this also coincides with the fact that hunger is not the result of too many mouths to feed, because the food production is consistent with the population growth. These points were very interesting to me. These are things we may know already, but may not realize that its the truth.
I don’t like that fact that there are many population control programs, that try to control birth and women reproductive rights. I’m sure by now we all have heard about China’s one-child policy. This is something that I do not agree with at all. I know in Africa, it is very common for families to have big families for many reason. These reasons were stated in the Reproductive rights and wrong article. They purpose of the big families were mainly a way of survival. My favorite line in this article was on page 3 “children labor makes them an asset rather than a drain to the family income”. When people hear of a family that has 11 children they think “oh goodness, how are they going to support these kids financially”, but that isn’t always an issue for these large families. Having many kids will is just like having an extra hand. These children fetch water, help in the fields, tend animals, and also help raise their siblings. I have a friend who told me her father is 1 of 13. I was shocked when I first heard, but she explained to me how happy her father’s family was and how they never complained about anything. For the westerners to call the people of Third World countries ignorant and they exercise no control over their sexuality makes the westerners ignorant in my book.
And lastly, something that also caught my attention were high infant mortality and high birth rates. I don’t know if anyone else noticed, but both high infant mortality and high birth rates are caused by the subordination of women. High infant mortality is mainly caused by poor nutrition of women. Where women eat last and least because they are women and when they don’t a great amount of food when pregnant, it affects their health and the health of the baby. For birth rates, the male dominance forces the women to have children, more than they even want. I hope I made sense.
The reading on over population and population control was very interesting to me. I never really took the time to think about population and the way it affects the world we live in. Some interesting factors to me that I noticed that tied into a personal experience for me was how having a large family is either a positive or negative aspect of family life. In the reading “Reproductive rights and wrongs: security and survival and the Malthusian orthodoxy†mentions how both society and culture play a role on the importance of having a small or large family or even the importance of the gender of your child. It discusses how in many third world countries like Asia, Africa, and Latin America, having a large family is very important to their survival. Children labor is an essential part of the family economy. Children help with tasks like taking care of their siblings, doing major chores, working the fields, tending to the animals, etc. Children are more of an asset if anything. This is similar to how my mother’s family viewed the children. My mother was born and raised in Haiti in an area that was very poor and she had a total of 10 brothers and sisters. She would tell me that at a very young age she would do an abundant about of chores and most of the time would take care of her siblings with my grandmother while my grandfather would be working as a carpenter. She mentions how having a large family in her community helped a great deal because they helped each other out in a number of ways. Also the reading mentions how having a large family was also a great means of security for the elders. With a large family “old-age security†is guaranteed. My mother makes sure that my grandparents are taken care of. She will provide for them and my grandparents know that in the end they are secured. This was very interesting me and made me look at population differently.
A common theme in the articles struck me, the subordination of women in patriarchal structures that systematically exclude women from the development process leaving them little or no reproductive choice. We see in the readings examples of forms of oppression that operate on women’s bodies. Some prior responses in this blog discussed, reproductive choices as a women’s right to make informed decisions about their own bodies- which includes the right to choose all decisions around reproduction.
This would mean women would be empowered and participate in all important social decisions.
According to Hartman’s work, the feminist conception of “reproductive rights have different meanings and different priorities in different social and cultural contexts.” This is significant when we look at who is seen as fit to be a mother and who is unfit in American family values. Mainstream media puts forth the notion that white middle class families are seen to have more social status or more value than families of color who fall below middle income range. In India reproduction is restricted because of one’s economic status, related to the expectation that all female children carry a dowry. This is an example of how different priorities and different meanings play out culturally, but it results in the same outcome- women from lower social classes are not as valued in terms of reproduction.
An important part of this discussion is that we see the world’s resource distribution is set up in such unequal ways, where half of the world’s population is without sanitation and death by starvation is still happening and the problem isn’t ‘scarcity of resources’ but a problem of ‘distribution’.