{"id":64953,"date":"2023-02-09T06:00:56","date_gmt":"2023-02-09T11:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?p=64953"},"modified":"2023-02-05T17:56:29","modified_gmt":"2023-02-05T22:56:29","slug":"the-high-tech-pronatalists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2023\/02\/the-high-tech-pronatalists\/","title":{"rendered":"The High Tech Pronatalists"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

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We used to be told that overpopulation will destroy civilization.\u00a0 Now that we are seeing dramatic plunges in birthrates, the new fear is that a collapse in the population will destroy civilization. Tech moguls and future-oriented researchers are turning to \u201cpronatalism,\u201d meaning literally \u201cpro-birth,\u201d looking for solutions to the problem.<\/p>\n

The good news, especially in our pro-abortion and anti-family society, is that culture-shapers and policy makers are recognizing the importance of having babies.\u00a0 The bad news is that many of them are looking to technology to make that happen.<\/p>\n

Sharon Kirkey has written an article for the National Post entitled The new push for more babies: How tech elites think it will save the planet.<\/a><\/p>\n

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As an example of the new pronatalism in Silicon Valley, she cites Elon Musk, who has 10 children<\/a>\u00a0with various mothers.\u00a0 He tweeted<\/a> that \u201cPopulation collapse due to low birth rates is a much bigger risk to civilization than global warming.\u201d\u00a0 Population collapse, \u201cnot overpopulation,\u201d he says, is an \u201cexistential problem for humanity.\u201d\u00a0 That is to say, it threatens humanity\u2019s very existence.<\/p>\n

Pronatalists fear that ever-fewer children being born will mean an aging population with fewer workers to support them.\u00a0 Fewer workers and fewer consumers will mean economic contraction.\u00a0 Living standards will decline, governments won\u2019t be able to fund their social programs, and innovation will stagnate.\u00a0 Civilization, says Musk,\u00a0\u201cwill crumble.\u201d Musk has also said,\u00a0 \u201ccivilization will indeed die with a whimper in adult diapers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kirkey also quotes Malcolm and Simone Collins, the founders of pronatalist.org<\/a>, who warn that \u201chumanity has a very real chance of experiencing an extinction event.\u201d\u00a0 On that website, they warn of \u201cGenocide Through Inaction\u201d: \u201cWithout intervention, ethnic groups like the Koreans and the Emirates will approach near extinction<\/a> within a few generations. At current birth rates, there will be six great grandchildren for every hundred Koreans. This is equivalent to a disease that wipes out 94% of the population.\u201d<\/p>\n

This new pronatalism is not about right wing conservatism and religious zealots intent on oppressing women by forcing them into child-bearing, as the feminist and population-bomb critics are saying.\u00a0 The Collinses are definitely leftwing secularists.\u00a0 The Collinses lament that it\u2019s the more \u201cauthoritarian\u201d and more religious cultures are having the most children.\u00a0 \u201cEssentially, every world culture that does not have strong religious convictions and low egalitarianism is being \u2018weeded out.'\u201d<\/p>\n

What they want is to find a way for progressive societies to breed more, without sacrificing \u201cwomen\u2019s rights\u201d and \u201cfree\u201d lifestyles.\u00a0 \u201cProgress the world has made in terms of women\u2019s rights, freedom of speech, environmentalism, racial equality, gay rights, etc. runs the risk of systematic erasure if we fail to intervene.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the Pronatalist<\/a> website, they promote \u201cthe five child pledge,\u201d but they also promote single parenthood and \u201cnew family structures.\u201d\u00a0 And, in tune with our current cultural mindset, they put their trust in technology.\u00a0 For example, egg, sperm, and embryo banks:<\/p>\n

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We work with families to approach the often-daunting task of freezing sperm, eggs, and embryos\u2014a process that enables people to have large families of their own despite postponing childbearing in order to first pursue ambitious careers or create an optimal scenario for child rearing.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Kirkey reports on the Collinses bigger ideas:<\/p>\n

What could save us, they say, are artificial wombs that would make childbearing truly egalitarian, or a reproductive process, currently being tested in mice, that could permit the creation of human embryos using skin, muscle, liver or blood cells that have been coaxed into behaving like egg and sperm cells. Embryo screening and selection also figure into their plans.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This reminds me of the \u201chatchery\u201d in Aldous Huxley\u2019s Brave New World<\/a>, a factory in which babies are genetically engineered, fertilized, incubated, \u201chatched,\u201d and educated to meet the society\u2019s need for various kinds of workers.\u00a0 All without the encumbrances of marriage, parenthood, and the family.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Kirkey says that a quarter of the world\u2019s countries have implemented pronatalist policies, most of which are geared to helping families and supporting children.<\/p>\n

This includes China, which ruined itself demographically and morally with its \u201ctwo-child\u201d law, with its forced abortions.\u00a0 Now China has a \u201cthree-child\u201d policy, which it pursues by limiting the availability of birth control as well as offering free fertility treatment and longer maternity leaves.\u00a0 Russia is offering a \u201cMother Heroine\u201d award of one million rubles ($21,600) to any woman who gives birth to 10 children.<\/p>\n

These heavy-handed governmental programs and dehumanizing technology are no substitute for the real solution: to build a culture of life that truly values children, not just as workers for the economy but for their intrinsic value.\u00a0 This will require a renaissance of the family.\u00a0 \u00a0And what some pronatalists insist on decrying, even as they admit its effectiveness:\u00a0 \u201cstrong religious convictions.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Illustration:\u00a0Population Down by\u00a0j4p4n<\/a> via Open Clipart, Public Domain<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We used to be told that overpopulation will destroy civilization.\u00a0 Now that we are seeing dramatic plunges in birthrates, the new fear is that a collapse in the population will destroy civilization. Tech moguls and future-oriented researchers are turning to “pronatalism,” looking for solutions to the problem, some of which are problematic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":65103,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,27,42,44],"tags":[5576,809,906,12993,3859,12990,12996,5574],"class_list":["post-64953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-family","category-life-issues","category-social-science","category-technology","tag-artificial-wombs","tag-family-2","tag-genetic-engineering","tag-population-collapse","tag-population-demographics","tag-pronatalism","tag-pronatalist-policies","tag-reproductive-technology"],"yoast_head":"\nThe High Tech Pronatalists<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"We used to be told that overpopulation will destroy civilization.\u00a0 Now that we are seeing dramatic plunges in birthrates, the new fear is that a collapse in the population will destroy civilization. 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