[extropy-chat] Gay marriage in Spain, a world of change

[Mike Lorrey]

--- Brent Neal <brentn at freeshell.org> wrote:

>  (7/23/05 12:23) David Lubkin <extropy at unreasonable.com> wrote:
> 
> >As long as we are mortal, for any society to continue, there must be
> >replacement members. It is reasonable for someone to be concerned
> >that new members are created, and that they are protected until
> > adulthood. It is 
> >reasonable to want a social mechanism that encourages this. It is 
> >reasonable to not want that member production to be dependent on the
> >presence of an enabling technology, so that the society can survive
> >in the face of a profound technological collapse.
> 
> 
> Wow.  So, you're "concerned about gay marriage" because you're afraid
> that without at least a replacement rate of population, we won't be
> able to maintain our society.  This is mind-bogglingly ridiculous. 
> 
> 1) If we maintained our society with 4 billion people 30 years ago,
> why do you think that a population decline back to 4 billion people
> will lead to a collapse? Especially if that means that the per capita
> resources will be higher for each of those people? Quality, not
> quantity....

The baby bust in the western nations by choice, and the legislated one
in China, may cause more than a crisis in social security funding
methods, it may cause just the sort of technological collapse David
worries about, if nations choose to kill off public and private funding
of scientific research in favor of funding retirement systems. Killing
technological advancement through the tax structure WILL cause a
Malthusian crisis.

> 
> 2) I assume, then, that het couples who choose to remain childless
> concern you just as much?

Depends. Are they saving and investing, or spending their income on
consumption and expecting to retire on social security? Is their
activity any better than hets not marrying at all, like myself? There
are enough hets who are IMHO too irresponsible to have kids but do
anyways. 

> 
> 3) Do you really think that not having the government provide
> incentives to get married will keep people from having babies? Heck -
> do you really think that having the government involved is necessary
> for a "social mechanism" to be in place?  (The ruder way to ask this
> is 'Do you wait for W to tell you to go get laid?')

It will for the lower classes who have a definite economic inscentive
from welfare to have babies. It isn't an accident that the cutting of
the welfare rolls by 1/3 in the 1990's resulted in massive reductions
in teenage pregnancy. Clinton adopting that GOP project is one of the
few things I give him credit for being smart enough to see the value of.

Mike Lorrey
Vice-Chair, 2nd District, Libertarian Party of NH
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
                                      -William Pitt (1759-1806) 
Blog: http://intlib.blogspot.com

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