I greatly appreciate The Columbian alerting the public to the UN challenges (“Dark skies: U.N. meeting reveals world in really bad mood,” The Associated Press, Sept. 30), that can be summarized as human suffering and destruction of our natural environment. However, the article fell short of identifying and, thereby, ignoring the major problem that is the seed cause of most of the world’s ills: overpopulation.
Each day, over 233,000 more people are added to the world’s population, and that number continues to climb. That is three more people every second who will need and demand water, food, shelter, employment, transportation, and all the luxuries of life they can access. And they, in turn, will reproduce more people like themselves.
Many demographers claim this growth rate will ease with education, however, there is scant evidence this is true. It is true the least-educated population have the highest birthrates, but education has been trying to reach this population for decades, with minimal success. Religious traditions of Catholicism, Islam, and Hinduism require high birthrates. To the billions of orthodox believers, reproduction is a mandate.
Until we start talking about this ultimate threat to human survival, we are only buying time with the current array of stopgap measures.
