Krasch

Not necessarily. Getting knocked up as you put it is largely due to engaging in sex (presumably willingly) and for the most part not caring overmuch whether or not you get pregnant, assuming that as the scenario suggest you're not actively TRYING to get pregnant.

If everyone was actively trying NOT to have kids, getting knocked up is far less of a possibility, and the odd exception or so wouldn't likely be enough to keep society going.




I'm not suggesting FORCING anyone to do anything. If you or anyone else don't want to have kids, that's your choice and more power to you.

That being said, it IS a choice to ignore the responsibilities to society to make new members so it can continue to exist, and the reason you have the freedom to do so is because someone else, like that person with 5 kids and another on the way, are doing what you don't wish to.

But you cannot deny that if everyone made that same choice, we wouldn't be screwed. Hell, look at China. By enforcing a one-child-per-family law and by families choosing to keep sons over daughters, even their own people are starting to admit they've got a looming crisis with not nearly enough women for all the men and the problem is only getting worse as we speak.

Now imagine if that wasn't just China, but everywhere. And imagine if it wasn't one-child-per-family, but none. How much faster would that crisis arrive?

As an article on Lifeissues.net (http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/b...tioncrisis.html) explains:

"To achieve ‘zero growth’, that is, a static population that is neither growing nor declining, every woman should produce 2.1 children. In the Third World (e.g., Mali, where 1 child in 5 dies under 5 years) the replacement rate has to be higher.

Today, in developed countries the situation can be described as catastrophic. In Italy in 1998 the female fertility rate was a mere 1.19. The Wall Street Journal called the Italian crisis ‘apocalyptic’. In Spain, the situation is even worse: the average is 1.18 children per woman. In the United Kingdom and France the rate is around 1.75. Not too bad? Better than Spain and Italy (not to mention Greece and Germany). Nonetheless the next generation will be 20 per cent down on the present one. Spain and Italy will be 40 per cent down. But does ‘less worse’ mean ‘all right’?

The European Union as a whole has a 1.4 child/woman rate. Do we really think that the EU has a bright future?

Now look beyond Europe. Canada’s rate is 1.6 (Quebec’s much worse). Even the US has only 2.0 and this largely because of Hispanic immigration. And on the other side of the Pacific is Japan, ‘desperate for a baby-boom’, and China, where the law restricts each family to one child per woman - with enforced abortion and sterilisation and female infanticide resulting in a society which has some 120 boys for every 100 girls. So much for women’s liberation. And what will this lead to - polyandry (women having several husbands), sex wars?

Between the Pacific and Western Europe lies enormous Russia - which is shrinking fast thanks to a female fertility rate of a mere 1.3 (in 1997). The situation is even more serious in some parts of the former Soviet Empire - like Latvia and Lithuania.

Developing countries are heading towards a similar crisis. For example, Thailand’s female fertility rate has dropped from 2.2 in 1993 to 1.9 in 1997. In Peru the birth-rate has fallen by 50 per cent in fifteen years, thanks not least to a sterilisation programme that is being pushed hard (the target for 1998 being 150,000). As long ago as 1979 the bishops protested in a pastoral letter about UNFPA’s involvement in population control and I myself have been told by a distinguished cleric that food aid included powdered milk, laced with some unknown but powerful chemicals, which seemed to ‘castrate’ the young. Is there a future for Peru? And what about Brazil, where there has been an enormous female sterilisation programme?

There is no need to continue with this catalogue. The crucial fact is this: in 1996, 51 countries were already falling below the replacement rate, often dramatically. These included almost all industrialised countries and a growing number of key developing countries.

There is now some concern about this in high places. For example, in November 1997 there was a UN-sponsored meeting in New York of experts on ‘Below-Replacement Fertility’. Professor Antonio Golini (La Sapienza University, Rome) spoke about the grave demographic situation in Italy: a fertility rate of 1.2 for the whole country; a staggering 0.8 for Bologna. The Pope has appealed to the prime minister for a pro-family policy, but little is being done and attempts to remedy the situation in Sweden have failed. "

Queso

Like I said, there are far too many people in the world as it is. There's not enough resources to support everyone, and you're saying a falling population is a bad thing? Fewer people means more resources and more jobs. The average unemployment rate in the US is 5.5% right now. If there were fewer people in the country that rate would drop. I see a falling population as a good thing. It will never drop to zero as there will always be people having children so what's the problem? But we've gotten off topic, so I digress.

CD

What you say is true... but you bring up a retarded point. The chances of EVERYONE stopping to have children is statistically zero. You'd probably have a better chance of being struck by lightning while being attacked by a shark.

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Krasch

And?

It just proves my point that those who choose to not have kids can only afford to do so because others are picking up their slack. Unfortunately, they're not picking it up enough according to fertility rates.

It in no way obviates the inherent selfishness of that mindset nor the shirking of the responsibility to society.

cm8

I believe it is between a man and a woman. I am firmly against it as it goes against what the Bible say. I know, the Bible also states, thou salt not !!!! and we all have broken a few of them in our lifetimes. One day we may know why God declared it a sin. I think I understand why he made all of the Ten Commandments, I see those in my every day life.

CD

So a man and a woman who both agree to not have children shouldn't get married if they love each other? What about my responsibility to society? Every time I cum, does that sperm belong to a girl's unfertilized eggs? I'd hate to waste any that could be used to create a legion of mini ClemsonDevils.

I get what you are saying, but you realize that this planet is overpopulated, right?

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BackdoorJesus

Well a whole lot of same-sex marriages took place today in California and I think that it's great! If those folks want to be legally married & get the tax breaks that come to married spouses, then more power to them.

Of course they will also have to deal with sticky community property issues during divorce proceedings but I guess they gotta take the bitter with the sweet.

Wonder when we will see the first news story of the first same-sex divorce? Probably not after too long, judging by the 50% divorce rate we've got going for us straight folks...

And of course religious right organizations are protesting this & standing in the way of it as best they can, they even got a measure onto the November ballot for us to all vote it away from the gays, but I don't think it will pass - in fact it is currently losing in the polls albeit by a narrow margin. It's kind of pathetic how hard they are fighting this; why is it that religious folks so quickly forget that Jesus himself said "live and let live"? I'm a kinda religious person myself and that is one of the sayings I try to live my life by...

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Juan.©amaney

More revenue for CA, I guess. The gays have to be VERY careful how they go about celebrating their victories. If the "freaks" come out and act all flamboyant about it, they will piss enough conservatives off to get them to vote no.

I for one don't give a shit either way, as I've already stated. If a ton of people are happier now that they have this, more power to them. I am pissed that judges are trying to implement law. It really should have been a ballot issue and let the people decide for themselves.

I'm proposing to a buddy of mine next week. Then we're buying that appartment complex and flipping it!

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kulotsalot

My main beef with Juan's line of thinking is that it seems to assume three things:

-The main reason people want homo marriages to be legalized is so they can scam the gov't.
-Hetero marriages are never done for convenience, money, immigration, etc. In other words, it is never used to scam the gov't.
-Lawmakers won't have the foresight to block weird "extensions" of allowing homo marriages, such as marrying your cousin, your mother, your cat, etc.

People who want to game the system will do that no matter what. So if your premise is "let's block this gay marriage thing so that we can stop them from scamming the gov't" then why not block all of the other things that they abuse? You can't, simply because, like I said, people who want to abuse the system will find a way to do it, no matter what. But you still have social services in place for those who really need it. You deal with the scammers as best you can.

Likewise, as BDJ said, it's not like being married is all rainbows and butterflies. People assume that they will only get the good, but they will get the bad, too (divorce being a prime example).

Juan.©amaney

Um, that's not my argument. My argument is once it is legalized, it makes it easier for people to abuse it.


Um, that's my point...if it's already a fucking mess, why add more ways to take advantage of it?



Marrying your cousin is already allowed in lots of states. There was an article where one dude wanted to marry his car. If the logic behind the gay marriage is allowing people to be happy, then there is no real stopping anyone from marrying anyone else....but that wasn't really a strong argument on my part, just some insight into the many ways things can go wrong with this.


Really? Tell me how I could get all the benefits gay people are getting now without marrying a buddy of mine and scaming the system? Tell me how I can get a buddy of mine health benefits without marrying him or designating him my "life partner." Tell me how I can decrease my taxable income other than what I do now.

People already try to reduce ways the government is scammed and that's why most departments in institutions have audit departments.

Again, I'm not hating on the gays, I even said if a ton of people are happier, then more power to them. I did already jokingly told a buddy of mine zbout the appartment complex idea. He sounded interested but we wouldn't do anything until after that shit is put on the ballot.

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kulotsalot

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Because you don't just stop doing something because there is a risk that it might turn out badly or it might be used for something bad. You know, explosives are still made in the hopes that people will confine their use to, I dunno, demolishing crumbling buildings instead of blowing up perfectly OK ones and killing lots of people. (weak example but I hope you get my point)

Basically people who want to abuse it will abuse it, so ok accept that fact but meanwhile what about the majority who don't really want to abuse the system but just want to, you know, be married?

By your premise immigration should be unlegalized because it could be abused? It is such a fucking mess now so why add more ways to take advantage of it?

Didn't think so...




I believe the logic behind gay marriage is that marriage is not confined to a specific pairing of sexes, but that really depends on who you ask, I guess.



I don't get this part. Did you quote the wrong thing, because I see no relation between that and what you quoted from my post.



If you are really and truly considering scamming the system just to prove a point that OH HEY PEOPLE CAN AND WILL DO IT... then that is really sad.

Juan.©amaney

Yeah, explosives are made...and they are only sold to those people who have the proper license. Same thing with guns etc. Regulation is built into everything made in the US. That's where people start even more against gay marriage, because by that same argument, people will be fucking high school girls, so why not legalize it. Who are we to stop college guys from going buck wild on some high school cheerleader?

Immgration is illegal from certain places. Cuba for example. You have to break the law to come to the states if you are Cuban. What is wrong with Cuban people? Nothing, they are human, they should have the same rights as other people who migrate.


No, I quoted the right thing. You claim there is a way for me to scam the system and get the benefits that gay people are now getting without marrying another dude and I want to know how.


Who said I was trying to scam the system just to prove I can? I'm trying to get a tax break. With democrats more than likely heading the country in this upcoming election, one can only anticipate taxes to go up, and gays to get more rights. So, when in Rome...

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kulotsalot

Um, yeah, I don't get where I supposedly said that you could get the benefits of a marriage without getting married.

The whole point of my posts is that just because something can potentially be abused, doesn't mean we should stop doing it.

With the stigma attached to being gay, do you honestly think that there is a large number of people who will use this just to scam the gov't? Large enough for it to be a concern? I mean, if all someone wanted was a marriage for tax reasons, then wouldn't it be waaaaaaay easier to do a hetero marriage of convenience? So I would be more concerned about the hetero scammers, to be honest.