David Attenborough - Humans are plague on Earth

[The Evil Overlord]

I think we'd all agree on overpopulated, but there's no solution available at the moment that everyone can agree on

[seta-san]

I think we'd all agree on overpopulated, but there's no solution available at the moment that everyone can agree on

my solution is simple and no one should have any qualms about it. Let nature take it's course in the third world. Let disease do and famine do it's own thing like it was supposed to do. Europe, much of asia, and north America are in population free falls at the moment. It's mostly just the third world that is the problem.

[dknm]

I have a plan! Let's go colonise these resource rich countries. The inhabitants can barely provide for themselves, so it makes further economic sense to maybe give them visas and citizenships. Golly look at our cheap labour developed economy!! Fast forward and we run out of money: Please go back to your rock and let's forget we ever met. We engaged with those people either for charitable or ulterior motives, it is a moral duty to at least provide them a chance to basic healthcare: soap and vaccination go a long way.

Is population control by means of prevention (education, condoms, more condoms I say !) a sensible idea? YES. There will always be issues with selecting an arbitrary number for fertility rates, but a seven fold increase will soon prove unsustainable.

Now, it's beyond the scope of my comment to prove you wrong; however any pollution metric you will pick

• deforestation
  
• waste contaminating water/soil
  
• oil spills
  
• air pollution - coal/car exhaust/ petrochem plants
  
• plastic landfill
  
• idiotic fishing policies
  

will tend to consistently peak in any other place than Africa, with top offenders being (in no order): America, Europe and China.

The harsh truth is that each and every one of us sitting with a laptop in our lap will have contributed in our lifetime to making the environment a bit worse than it was before us. It adds up.

[He's Dead Jim]

I have a plan! Let's go colonise these resource rich countries. The inhabitants can barely provide for themselves, so it makes further economic sense to maybe give them visas and citizenships. Golly look at our cheap labour developed economy!! Fast forward and we run out of money: Please go back to your rock and let's forget we ever met. We engaged with those people either for charitable or ulterior motives, it is a moral duty to at least provide them a chance to basic healthcare: soap and vaccination go a long way.

Is population control by means of prevention (education, condoms, more condoms I say !) a sensible idea? YES. There will always be issues with selecting an arbitrary number for fertility rates, but a seven fold increase will soon prove unsustainable.

Now, it's beyond the scope of my comment to prove you wrong; however any pollution metric you will pick

• deforestation
  
• waste contaminating water/soil
  
• oil spills
  
• air pollution - coal/car exhaust/ petrochem plants
  
• plastic landfill
  
• idiotic fishing policies
  

will tend to consistently peak in any other place than Africa, with top offenders being (in no order): America, Europe and China.

The harsh truth is that each and every one of us sitting with a laptop in our lap will have contributed in our lifetime to making the environment a bit worse than it was before us. It adds up.

So, as individuals, should it be the case that we are required to address this fact in a responsible way, by deliberately going out of our way to "consume less", or to "recycle" where we can,

Or, should we make more laws and taxes around the consumer capitalist society letting goverments tell us what we should be paying our tax on...

:)