Depopulation conspiracy theory

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==Negative effects==
 
==Negative effects==
  
Supporters of this theory often fail to understand the negative effects of depopulation and low populations. Less people will mean less people to maintain a strong work force, less soldiers to have a strong military and generally less people to keep the government structure stable. Those are things any rational government wants to have to remain strong.
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Supporters of this theory often fail to understand the negative effects of depopulation and low populations. Fewer people will mean fewer people to maintain a strong work force, fewer soldiers to have a strong military and generally fewer people to keep the government structure stable. Those are things any rational government wants to have to remain strong.
  
 
It's also worth noting that economically there would be consequences as well. As many developed countries use capitalism, an economic system which is dependent on human growth, then heavy depopulation would mean financial disaster resulting in a volatile market. Adam Smith famously established that it is an imperative for economies, especially those using capitalism, to maintain stability.<ref>[http://geolib.com/smith.adam/won1-08.html Chapter 8 in the Wealth of Nations,] [[Adam Smith]]</ref> This is provably true in places like Japan whose negative population growth is contributing to its current economic woes.<ref>[http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/popdecline/Katsumata.pdf The United Nations is especially concerned with Japan's low population. Ironic considering many theorists believe they're part of the conspiracy.]</ref>
 
It's also worth noting that economically there would be consequences as well. As many developed countries use capitalism, an economic system which is dependent on human growth, then heavy depopulation would mean financial disaster resulting in a volatile market. Adam Smith famously established that it is an imperative for economies, especially those using capitalism, to maintain stability.<ref>[http://geolib.com/smith.adam/won1-08.html Chapter 8 in the Wealth of Nations,] [[Adam Smith]]</ref> This is provably true in places like Japan whose negative population growth is contributing to its current economic woes.<ref>[http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/popdecline/Katsumata.pdf The United Nations is especially concerned with Japan's low population. Ironic considering many theorists believe they're part of the conspiracy.]</ref>

Revision as of 11:43, 10 December 2013

Some dare call it

Conspiracy

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Secrets revealed!
The revealers

Conspiracy theories about depopulation of the Earth come in a number of flavors. The general theme running through these theories is either that there is an imminent plan to reduce population using an overpopulation crisis as the pretext, or a secret eugenics plan cover-up. The elite thus need to kill off the "useless eaters" so, in the first case, they survive the crisis and, in the second, they can create some kind of new race of super-humans.

Contents

Useless eaters

"Useless eaters" is a term often bandied about by conspiracy theorists. This is supposedly what the heads of the New World Order/Illuminati/Bilderbergs/Reptoids/whatever[1]call us in their meetings in smoke-filled rooms while they light their cigars with $100 bills. It is also sometimes used by survivalists and wrongly attributed to Henry Kissinger.[2]

Means of execution

The genocidal depopulation plan generally involves poisoning or sterilizing people through the use of chemtrails or water fluoridation. Agribusiness transnationals like Monsanto are often implicated in some sort of scheme to monopolize the world's food supply so it can be easily tainted with deadly toxins. Just about anything that can be said to involve "chemicals" can be implicated in this nefarious scheme: vaccines, alleged covert geo-engineering schemes, genetically modified food, etc.[3][4] Variants of the theory include those with an anti-abortion tinge who incorporate conspiracy theories about Planned Parenthood, and AIDS conspiracy theorists who believe AIDS was concocted in a laboratory for the purpose of reducing the population. Another variant, largely attributable to Lyndon LaRouche, has worldwide nuclear war as part of the conspirators' alleged plan along with a deliberate economic collapse and de-industrialization to force the world back into a "new dark age."

Anti-environmentalist theories

A number of these theories have an anti-environmentalist bent. They posit that environmentalists are conspiring as some kind of mass Gaia cult to kill off the useless eaters. There is a very tiny grain of truth here when it comes to the really nutty ecoterrorists, Pentti Linkola, or movements like the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, which provide generous amounts of fodder for conspiracy sites to use as a means to paint the entire environmental movement as a mass conspiracy. This usually ties into some form of a global warming conspiracy theory or the idea that fears of overpopulation are being used as a tactic to implement the depopulation scheme.[5] The Club of Rome and their book The Limits to Growth, and Paul R. Ehrlich and his book The Population Bomb are the convenient punching bags here.

Negative effects

Supporters of this theory often fail to understand the negative effects of depopulation and low populations. Fewer people will mean fewer people to maintain a strong work force, fewer soldiers to have a strong military and generally fewer people to keep the government structure stable. Those are things any rational government wants to have to remain strong.

It's also worth noting that economically there would be consequences as well. As many developed countries use capitalism, an economic system which is dependent on human growth, then heavy depopulation would mean financial disaster resulting in a volatile market. Adam Smith famously established that it is an imperative for economies, especially those using capitalism, to maintain stability.[6] This is provably true in places like Japan whose negative population growth is contributing to its current economic woes.[7]

These effects pose a big question: why would a government seek to heavily depopulate the planet when doing so is provably harmful to its interests and a healthy existence? If they really do desire this then the answer would have to be that they're gluttons for punishment.

Consider the following

Governments (intelligent ones) have implemented policies and practices to encourage population growth or discourage it. In America for example, the more children people have the more benefits the parents are entitled to.

Theorists will likely counter by pointing to places like China citing policies that they claim part of the depopulation scheme like the infamous one-child policy. In this case, theorists show ignorance of the policy's history or others like it which is, more often that not, a way to regulate population growth.

In China's case, the policy was enacted due to, rather humorously, the government of Mao Zedong encouraging its citizens to have as many children as possible. Their strategies often included discouraging the use of birth control to the point they, a move worthy of a Theocracy, banned the import of contraceptives. Eventually overpopulation reared its head. By the 1950s China's food supply was struggling to maintain the influx of new children. This is one of the main reasons behind the famous 1962 famine that resulting in the deaths of approximately 30 million people.

The event resorted in the government pretty much going "shit, guess the 'have as many kids possible' thing wasn't smart after all" and began to try to use propaganda to urge citizens to stop having so many children. Naturally, given human nature, many of its citizens gave the government a huge middle finger and continued to procreate without restraint. Tired of being blanked, the government, desperate to end its ailing population problem which it had inadvertently caused, enacted the one-child policy to forcefully bring its population back down to a stable level. [8]

Apparently that level has been reached as the government is beginning to do a 180. In response to a lack of workers and low male ratio, the one-child policy has been revised enabling people some more leeway in having more than two. The People's Republic of China has dropped suggestions it will go further in its revisions to encourage more children. [9]

If places like China wanted to depopulate the planet so badly then they would remain adamant as to not changing their policies? Answer: such actions show governments will switch between encouraging and discouraging children as needed to ensure stable populations. Too many or too little people is harmful to their livelihoods.

To those still unconvinced

Governments have taken other extreme measures to combat low populations proving that they want to maintain stable population growth. A notable example is Russia's infamous tax on childless persons enacted during the reign of Joseph Stalin - yes, you read that right, that Stalin - to financially strong arm people to procreate to boost its low birthrate. The policy, despite its unpopularity by an already miserable populace, was a resounding success. It was so successful in fact that it caused Russia's birthrate to exceed the government's expectations. Satisfied the population was stable once more, the tax was phased out.[10]

Given the currently deteriorating conditions after the fall of the Soviet Union, birthrates have begun to plunge again. The idea of bringing back the tax was again put on the table in 2006 with Vladimir Putin adding that women should be paid more money to have a second child.[11] To the relief of the childless people in the country, these plans have not been put into effect. They are however in a holding pattern given the still decreasing birthrate.

That isn't the kind of behavior, especially considering Russia's questionable track record, that a supposedly genocidal government that desires depopulation would show. The fact they've been open about their intentions to regulate the population back to a stable level further proves its unlikely they're involved in a grand plot to depopulate the planet.

In Closing

Given previous facts it is extremely doubtful that there's any depopulation conspiracy. If there is the governments involved are suicidal as people are their greatest resource. Too many or too little human beings are devastating to them and is why they must maintain a stable, healthy population count. The less people there are, the more extreme the methods will become. The same goes if they feel if the population is getting too big as too many people can be just a bad as too little people.

Also, considering the lower population, it would be highly unlikely that any huge government could remain big without repercussions. Governments have grown in size in reflection of growing populations. Naturally the inverse would have to be true as well as a lack of people would mean less people to run the government too. If there is plans to enact a one-world government in the wake of a depopulation, it'll sure as hell be a damn small one meaning it won't have as much power or clout as theorists claim it will have.

Considering all that, the only real agenda going on is not a depopulation agenda but a stable population agenda. That is, unlike the former, entirely provable. So that means anyone who has children and within reason is part of an obviously devious plot to help the government maintain a healthy population count. Worse still, it assures that they'll be future socialist guberment employees to keep it going.

Possible origins

Fears of this sort may have been stoked by science fiction such as the 1973 film Soylent Green, the 1976 film Logan's Run, by Garrett Hardin proposing rich Western nations practice "lifeboat ethics" in refusing immigration (not a very liberal view, eh?) and by real examples of governments which put radical depopulation into practice, such as Pol Pot's Cambodia between 1975-1979. However, as a conspiracy theory, the scope of the depopulation plan is global, with various conspirators (the Rockefellers, the Club of Rome, Henry Kissinger, British royalty) claimed to be secretly working to reduce the world population by as much as 80 percent.

See also

  • Genocide conspiracy
  • HIV denial: There is some overlap between depopulation conspiracy believers and people who believe AIDS is a government-created mechanism for depopulation.
  • Pacte de famine: The idea's French predecessor.

External links

Footnotes

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