A fifth of female climate scientists who responded to Guardian survey said they had opted to have no or fewer children
A fifth of female climate scientists who responded to Guardian survey said they had opted to have no or fewer children
Ihad the hormonal urges,” said Prof Camille Parmesan, a leading climate scientist based in France. “Oh my gosh, it was very strong. But it was: ‘Do I really want to bring a child into this world that we’re creating?’ Even 30 years ago, it was very clear the world was going to hell in a handbasket. I’m 62 now and I’m actually really glad I did not have children.”
Parmesan is not alone. An exclusive Guardian survey has found that almost a fifth of the female climate experts who responded have chosen to have no children, or fewer children, due to the environmental crises afflicting the world.
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An Indian scientist who chose to be anonymous decided to adopt rather than have children of her own. “There are too many children in India who do not get a fair chance and we can offer that to someone who is already born,” she said. “We are not so special that our genes need to be transmitted: values matter more.”
The population is actually tipped to massively reduce on the next 100 years due to a large portion of people not have babies simply due to crappy economic conditions, inflation, war the lying flat movement in china and the ever increasing destruction of the middle class into the homeless poor. Aside from rich people destroying peoples ability to have happy lives, there's also the plastic problem that's quite literally made every male living thing have a reduced sperm count and it continues to drop as plastic is in the air, our clothes carpet and oceans. Endocrine disruptors in our bodies are being effected by chemicals found in vinyl products, thermal receipts and Tupperware releasing chemicals when heated in microwaves. These things are so small they enter the bloodstream and pass through the blood brain barrier.. Fuuuck
So if you want to save the future start by sniping off rich oligarchs and ban plastic completely
I knew when I was 12 I never wanted children. I got married at 20. I got fixed at 24. I am almost 40 and have no regrets other than not getting fixed sooner, but finding a doc to fix a lady at 18 is damn near impossible.
1/5th is low, and doesn't appear very different to the general female population.
This really just highlights the underlying problem and why our "efforts" are destined to amount to little more than shuffling deck chairs on the titanic — humans are selfish, and most of us are not willing to make major sacrifices to avert disaster; hell, most struggle to accept minor inconveniences.
I always thought my children, if I'd have them, might die a horrible death due to climate change.
Now, knowing that humanity with climate change in mind, only increased spewing CO2 in to the atmosphere, I think I actually eillmdie a horrible death due to climate change.
The no children thing for the climate is multiple generations too late already.
Also, keep the idiocracy effect in mind. Only the good and caring people decide not to have children, the idiots and selfish assholes will have ten for them.
Ninety-seven female scientists responded, with 17, including women from Brazil, Chile, Germany, India and Kenya, saying they had chosen to have fewer children.
Most of the female scientists interviewed had made their decisions about children in past decades, when they were younger and the grave danger of global heating was less apparent.
They said they had not wanted to add to the global human population that is exacting a heavy environmental toll on the planet, and some also expressed fears about the climate chaos through which a child might now have to live.
Compulsory population control is not part of today’s population-environment debate, with better educational opportunities for girls and access to contraception for women who want it seen as effective and humane policies.
Prof Regina Rodrigues, an oceanographer at the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Brazil, who also chose not to have children, was influenced by the environmental destruction she saw in the fast-expanding coastal town near São Paulo where she grew up.
A study of Americans aged 27 to 45 – younger than the IPCC scientists surveyed – found concern about the wellbeing of children in a climate-changed world was a much bigger factor than worries over the carbon footprint of their offspring.
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Is it climate change, or is it another cover for not wanting to raise little brats? I don't want kids because: 1. "Cost of living." 2. " I never met the right man." (Despite being sexually active). 3. "Nobody pays for my childcare."
Even 30 years ago, it was very clear the world was going to hell in a handbasket.
And 30 years before that. And 30 years before that.
I mean, if you don't want to have kids more power to you. I get it.
But what I'm reading is far more a consequence of a social stigma against having kids without sufficient economic independence. And extraordinary rates of inflation in housing, food, health care, and education make kids utterly unaffordable even if the climate situation looks great.
“We are not so special that our genes need to be transmitted: values matter more.”
I think that's true up until a point. When I see the genocide in Gaza or forced sterilization policies aimed at black and Hispanic women in police custody in the US or caste violence in India or Myanmar or the Bill Gates Foundation's effort to quash population size in West Africa...
What values are we transmitting when we've got a policy of eugenics? What does it say about the western impulse to homogenize and euthanize everything it comes into contact with?
I can very easily see a world in which the impulse towards mass extermination gets us before the heat pushes us all into the upper reaches of Canada and Russia. And I'm loathe to see anti-natalism harnessed as one more tool in the bigot's bag of tricks, to justify why a population with high birth rates is an efficient target for population rightsizing.