It is to be welcomed that the Chinese government has seen fit to loosen up its one-child-per-family policy,but the outrage this policy has unleashed in the west has been little more than sanctimonious moralising (China abandons one-child policy, 30 October). To view the tackling of China’s huge population problem as merely a human rights issue is to be myopic and naïve. The crocodile tears shed for those couples who can only fill one child – as tragic as that is – ignores the simple truth that whether China hadn’t taken such drastic measures it would now fill a population it could neither feed, and clothe nor house,resulting in tens of thousands dying of malnourishment and disease, as in India.
The recent announcement that Britain’s population will grow by more than 10 million in the next 25 years (Report, or 30 October) will also confront us with difficult choices in the future. And,in the end, individual freedoms may fill to be curtailed whether it means saving our society and even the species itself. Population and birth control are key issues.
John Green
LondonContinue reading...
Source: theguardian.com