could spread out across the land, but I can't The notion of "control" can be a beautiful notion: control of one's temper, the self-control of the seated Buddha, the control of the labor of a community for its own benefit, control of resources for growing food. Of course control can be abused. " Reproductive freedom," given the responsibility to understand and act on the consequences of the understanding, is the tool by which a society can take control over the stress their own demands make on the land. France and Spain have characterIStically been small-family societies for many generations- French intensive gardening, Spanish aquaculture- social adaptation to limited land and human fertility. An Indian farmer who had many children 50 years ago saw only a couple make it to inheri ting his accumulated goods; today, a half-dozen oungsters may share the inheritance, each with a meager share. The social pattern is non-adaptive, and with interests in the individual welfare and the land itself a benefit could be assured by lowering the family size. To return to the single valuable contribution of the article, I want to know how the land can be redistributed to the population 10 the Third World. As consumers, should we stop drinking coffee and tea, eating bananas and pineapple, sugar and tapioca, using mahogany and teak and rubber' I wish RAIN could investigate this end of the population problem, the problem of the distribution of land and population. One small last comment: the authors share a misconception that wilderness IS created as a playground of Wide open spaces for greedy Westerners. The single most compelling reason for wilderness IS to preserve viable natural systems that are being systematically destroyed by human exploitation and interference. In the Northwest, as elsewhere, our long-term regional selfsufficiency may hinge in some part on our wild fisheries and natural gene pools of timber, food, fiber and medicinal plants, and food- and fur-producing animals that may only remain as relics in wilderness aftE.'r corporate and individual exploitation remove the standing wealth we now enjoy. Sincerely, Taffy Stewart Springfield, OR Dear Tom and Lane , Your population article seemed romantic to me. Are you contemplating having a baby? I couldn't help wondering. 1think if you lived in my neighborhood, you'd feel diHerE.'n tl y. 1li ve in the J2th densest city in America, Cambridge, Massachusetts. 1live in the densest neighborhood of Cambridge, 32,000 per square mile. There are 300 dwelling units on my street alone (one block long). Sometimes 1think you lost' sight of the nasty problems of living in the East Coast Urban Corridor because you live in a very What is there in our values, our institutions and our economic system that makes us destroyers rather than enhancer~ oflife? sparsely populated part of the country. Jagree with you that people arc our most important resource and 1also agree that we should take care of our own business in the U.S. before we start messing around with the Third World's problems. But shouldn't we also improve education and advertising (yes ! advertising) of birth control info in this country 7Maybe when 1see condom ads on TV and in mass market magazines, I'll be less worried. Don't you feel that freedom of information on birth control (I can't think of another word except control-but I mean personally controlled, not government controlled) is censored and forbidden 7 I do I Overcrowding rUins good farm land with suburban housing, ruins good living with rime, noise, ugliness, air, water and earth pollution. Americans, as you point out, waste toO many of the earth's resources and the way to stop thiS 15 not by censoring birth control info or by disallowing funds for Medicaid-funded abortions. One could argue that large numbers of people increases large technology and large government (i.e. centralization). Do you really want Oregon packed to the gills like Massachusetts? (You should know that Massachusetts is as dense as West Germany, Belgium, Lebanon, or Japan-that is approx. 750 people per square mile.) I suppose we believe you'd like that. You didn't build your house in the city, did you ? I hate overcrowding. It is inhuman and hurts human dignity. I want to move but cannot afford to. But I'd be glad to trade with you all the benefits of living in close quarters with my fellow earthlings if you'll let me live in the Oregon woods. Charles Spencer Bedard Cambridge, MA Howdy ! I enjoy occasionally reading your provocative discussions in RAIN . I'd like to make a comment pertinent to the issues raised in " /s Population a Problem 7" 1think you may be overestimating the amount of control people have over population growth. Let me give an example. A couple of years ago 1was studying Brazilian culture. The population of the country then was something like 110 million. Now Braz.il's growth rate was one of the world's highest, and had been for some time. Demographically, what this means is that the population is relatively young, i.e., a relatively high percentage of women are of childbearing age, Because of this, even if the birth rate were to have been suddenly rE.'duced to the same as the death rate in 1977, the population would have stabilized at over 300 milliorJ many years hence IThis phenomenon is sometimes called " demographic momentum." It may be likened to traveling 70 mph in a car: it takes a while to The Boston-Washington slurbanoid exists because more of us have chosen to migrate there. stop, even once you decide you want to. Brazil is probably an extreme case. But it raises the issue of whether we aren't going too fast already, even given the epidemics you mention (my friend just mentioned to me Paul Ehrlich's assertion that one couldn't dream of a better breeding ground for an epidemic of Bubonic Plague than many of today's Third World urban slums). The real population crisis may not be so much one of numbers , but rather of control . . . David Stein cont. Oakland, FL
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