Italy needs babies.

[Rocketboy1313]

As for what's my problem... I'm pro human, you apparently aren't. Who the fuck cares if the life on earth survives if the human species dies out? Right, progressive morons that put other forms of life above their own kind. I'm in the climate change is real camp, but I'm only interested in solutions to this problem because of what the future can mean for the human species. You and other progressives seems to be in it for some irrelevant moral reason.

"Pro-human" is a new one. Is that why you specified the "white people" part earlier?
There are billions of people on the planet and you think progressives are what? Trying to get rid of everyone? Not the far more logical, fewer people using fewer resources is more sustainable?
Even with the shrinkage, Italy still has 10,000,000 more people in it than it did in the 1960's.
Never mind the whole, a big reason birth rates shrink in developed countries is access to birth control and people having the ability to chose not to have children as a labor source for family farms.

EDIT. also, next tine you want to comment on a ridiculously long quote box, maybe don't add to it yourself. Plus, it's not my fault chuck went with shitty forum software that doesn't automatically truncate quote boxes at some given point.

Yeah, I was making fun of you two going back and forth, not the boxes themselves.
Each of you stating a single sentence and inferring the other being stupid/racist is not useful.
Write out more complete thoughts and put forth questions.

[Riedquat]

You might want to reread Riedquat's post again.

Of course because he was talking about white people.

Yep he basically said its a blessing because more whiteys are dying.

Did I mention race? No. Don't be a bloody idiot trying to drag race into it. My position is simply that most places would be better off with fewer people, and the world in general certainly would. A falling birthrate nicely achieves that, no morally and ethically unacceptable means involved. It's only a problem if the rate is too rapid to adjust to. If Italy is facing a reducing population then I'm envious. Less resources needed for Italy, less pressure on housing, public services, infrastructure. More to go round, overall improved quality of life.

You're screwed up if you interpreted that as having anything to do with race.

[Riedquat]

Reidquat can go have tee with Malthus for all I care.

What do you want, more and more people? Just what's your problem here?

[Rocketboy1313]

Reidquat can go have tee with Malthus for all I care.

What do you want, more and more people? Just what's your problem here?

The Malthus reference doesn't even make sense.
Malthus' ideas were about people having a population collapse due to lack of resources, and was used as justification for denying public aid to people suffering famine due to mass crop failure.
Italians have lots of resources, they are just choosing to not have children.

[Riedquat]

Reidquat can go have tee with Malthus for all I care.

What do you want, more and more people? Just what's your problem here?

The Malthus reference doesn't even make sense.
Malthus' ideas were about people having a population collapse due to lack of resources, and was used as justification for denying public aid to people suffering famine due to mass crop failure.
Italians have lots of resources, they are just choosing to not have children.

Good point too.

The world can probably support a greater population than it currently has (although obviously not infinite, so you've either got to stop at some point, or start colonising space). I see nothing desirable in increasing though, and benefits from fewer (although again obviously you don't want that to continue indefinitely either). I'd be against any compulsion to force people to not have children, China-style, but a reduction without compulsion, it's beyond me how anyone can get worked up about welcoming that (unless they rely on selling more and more stuff to more and more people).

[Antiboyscout]

You might want to reread Riedquat's post again.

Of course because he was talking about white people.

Yep he basically said its a blessing because more whiteys are dying.

Did I mention race? No. Don't be a bloody idiot trying to drag race into it. My position is simply that most places would be better off with fewer people, and the world in general certainly would. A falling birthrate nicely achieves that, no morally and ethically unacceptable means involved. It's only a problem if the rate is too rapid to adjust to. If Italy is facing a reducing population then I'm envious. Less resources needed for Italy, less pressure on housing, public services, infrastructure. More to go round, overall improved quality of life.

You're screwed up if you interpreted that as having anything to do with race.

You say that like intentional social engineering was not involved.

You can tell because women are unhappy having entered the corporate space while feminist insist it's what they really want and are scared they may return to traditional gender roles and find actual fulfillment

[LittleRaven]

Would you PLEASE find a less ominous way to phrase these threads?

Holy crap, a wild Fuzzy appears! Hey man, good to see you! Been a while.

But I'm not TRYING to be ominous here. My title is literally 3 words long. Sergio Mattarella is admittedly being a little ominous with his whole "very existence of our country" bit but it's no good shooting the messenger.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

EDIT. also, next tine you want to comment on a ridiculously long quote box, maybe don't add to it yourself. Plus, it's not my fault chuck went with shitty forum software that doesn't automatically truncate quote boxes at some given point.

Yeah, I was making fun of you two going back and forth, not the boxes themselves.
Each of you stating a single sentence and inferring the other being stupid/racist is not useful.
Write out more complete thoughts and put forth questions.

Well it is true that it was really long and you just made it longer.

Would you PLEASE find a less ominous way to phrase these threads?

Holy crap, a wild Fuzzy appears! Hey man, good to see you! Been a while.

But I'm not TRYING to be ominous here. My title is literally 3 words long. Sergio Mattarella is admittedly being a little ominous with his whole "very existence of our country" bit but it's no good shooting the messenger.

Considering where the topics go in these threads, the title is quite regular.

[LittleRaven]

Very depressing when this is regarded as a problem instead of a blessing.

That's easy to say if you're not Italian.

But if you are....then this is super depressing news.

Let's put aside all of the existential fear about extinction stuff for a moment. In pure economic terms, Italy is staring down the barrel of a loaded gun, and it's Germany that has their finger on the trigger. I can't exactly blame Italians for being nervous about that. The EU is pretty cool in a lot of ways, but it's an economic suicide pact when it comes to unproductive states. Here in the US, if Alabama starts losing people or slipping economically (in practice, of course, one generally equals the other) then it's not so bad, because Texas and California and other rich states will end up picking up a lot of their tab, so there's a pretty hard floor on exactly how bad things will get. That floor can be depressingly low...just visit the back end of Tennessee or West Virginia...but it's not "civil servants will not get paid for months on end" like we saw during Greek financial crisis. Of course Italy doesn't want to find themselves in that position - even today, 10 years after the crisis, Greece has some of the highest taxes in Europe with one of the weakest government safety nets. No sane person would want to go down that path.

I know you're committed to the idea that there are too many people and that the world would be better off if there were fewer of us around - but I can't find a single example of that actually working in the real world. As far as I can tell, every time population shrinks in a country, the standard of living drops, people report being less happy, and more extreme political movements start coming to power. I'd love to research a counter-example....do you have one?

[Riedquat]

I know you're committed to the idea that there are too many people and that the world would be better off if there were fewer of us around - but I can't find a single example of that actually working in the real world. As far as I can tell, every time population shrinks in a country, the standard of living drops, people report being less happy, and more extreme political movements start coming to power. I'd love to research a counter-example....do you have one?

Standards of living rose considerably for the average person after the Black Death. In any case just how many cases are there of declining populations where the decline hasn't been brought on by something unpleasant that would leave its own negative marks? We're also looking at this from the point of view of a relatively short period (historically speaking) of unprecedented rapid exponential population growth. Where there have been declines they've either been forced - so things are bad anyway - or they've been the result of things going bad and people leaving for elsewhere, which is a different phenomenon.

Historically good times have resulted in conditions where population increase is more likely, but to say therefore that decrease would have the opposite effect seems to me to be getting cause and effect the wrong way around.

But more to the point - what's the alternative? Continually growing populations? That's hardly viable. And if you can handle a stable population you can also handle a declining one, as long as the rate isn't too rapid. And long-term viability is a hell of a lot easier with fewer people.

The problem is really that economies rely on everlasting increasing numbers of people, the way they're currently set up, but that simply isn't a long-term sensible plan. We really can't just keep so attached to a system that relies on increasing numbers (and where the absolute number is largely irrelevant).