Let me be blunt: this planet is overpopulated with this world's greatest predator and consumer, humans. It hurts all the rest of the critters on this planet...and it ain't so good for us, either.
First of all, the reason I say it's overpopulated:
--let's take the estimates that we have, of the earliest protohuman and
human bands, and the turf that they ranged over (their hunting/gathering
turf): I got a number from Ardrey's Naked Animal (? - need to check title),
of 20-50 per band, and a range of 20 mi diameter. Now, admittedly, we are
(mostly) no longer hunter-gatherers, but that kind of personal-range
territory is hard-wired into us.
--Next, let's assume that half the land surface of the planet is habitable (it's not, unless y'all really want to live in places like Siberia, or the northern part of Canada...).
Taking those two numbers, the optimal human population is two billion (US billion, nine zeros), which we reached early in the nineteenth century. Back then, there were always places to go, away from the madding crowd, and lots of wilderness. Now, we're over three times that.
India is facing a deadly danger of famine in the not-too-distant future, between the wearing out of the soil, and shortage of water. Much of the rainforests are in danger...and they provide a major part of the oxygen we breath, right here, and right now. A serious percentage of the western US is incredibly po'd at LA, which is taking their water, from up to a thousand miles away, so that millions of people can live in a sub-desert.
Then, there's the psychological components: parents that ignore or mistreat their young, the growth of violence - and I don't just mean in the ghettos, I mean road rage, and "going postal"...and, for that matter, how do you get along with your folks? Are you also going to claim that you enjoy commuting on the freeways/parking lots, or competing with a ton of others for overpriced housing? A lot of this looks and sounds just like the results that were observed, 20-30 years ago, when they did overpopulation studies on colonies of rats (I b'lieve I read that in an early Psychology Today).
In addition, there is the fact that the US uses, what, 60 percent of all the energy usage on the planet? What do you think gas prices would be if, say, India, which is over 800 million people, suddenly used as much gas and oil as the US does?
In addition, I haven't even considered how much actual land it takes to support our current lifestyle - all the food we eat has to get grown, and processed, and transported, and sold somewhere, and all our furniture and toys need to be made from raw materials, transported to factories, and built, and then transported again to stores....and that isn't even counting our homes, and the places we work at, and were our trash goes when we put it out, or when we flush the toilet....
Time for serious birth control, kiddies, and it ought to start in the sixth grade, when the general attitude is, "yuck! grownups do *that*?! Gross!", before it becomes of "prurient" interest. When it can be taught long enough to get internalized.
Now, the *only* people that I've seen, in the media or on the Net, who push "teach abstinence!!!" are self-proclaimed Christians. (Go on, show me some URLS, or point to some large-circulation newspapers or other media articles, by self-proclaimed non-Christians!) In fact, most tend to refer to themselves as fundamentalists. So, for the US audience, do y'all think that they have the right to shove their beliefs, based on their religious beliefs, down the throats of the rest of us? Seperation of Church and State, in the Constitution, certainly says, "NO", loudly. I have read, by the way, that 60% od US Catholics, use methods of birth control other than rythym, the only "approved" method.
I constantly see, as a reply to the above, that "abstinence isn't taught", or that "sex ed in schools is only about mechanics". First of all, what I know of the serious courses in sex ed, the ones that the Religious Reich fights, tooth and nail, talk about relationships. Second of all, all of the sex ed courses I've ever heard of include mentioning abstinence...but is it really their place to push that? Isn't it your place, as parents, to teach your kids that? Wouldn't that be an invasion of your parental rights?
Stop trying to reverse the argument - if your kids don't follow your rules, and your beliefs, whose fault is that? I know, anyone else's than yours, esp. since that would mean that you flunked as a parent. Right? Oh, and by the way, I have four kids (one adopted), and they're all pretty close to my morals, and I think I'm fairly close to my late folks' morals...so I guess I can say I did it right.
To tie into another rant, I'd rather have my kids seeing two people having joyful sex, than some people shooting each others' brains out... but then, I'd rate films X for violence, not nudity and sex.
"war...to slaughter bloodily our sons,
To give ourselves a room"
- Country Joe McDonald, from a poem by Robert Serviss .