This News Should Scare You

By James Donahue

A recently published report confirms the logical concern many of us have been sharing . . . that the six billion plus people now packing this earth are more than the planet can support. The human race is literally breeding itself into extinction.

The World Wide Fund for Nature in Brussels calculated that humans are now pushing the planet about 30 percent beyond its capacity to provide from its natural resources "without suffering serious damage."

The report noted that "if people in the developing world consumed as much as those living in the richest countries, the human race would need another two planet Earths to cope."

The WWF report measured the amount of natural resources needed to provide basic things like food, energy and manufactured goods to carry the burden, or "ecological footprint" each person is leaving on the environment.

The results of the study, published in Living Planet Report 2012, were frightening. If the study is correct, there are no longer enough natural resources to feed, clothe and shelter everyone without killing the planet.

It should be no surprise, then, that people are already starving and living in extreme poverty in many of the world's underdeveloped countries. Wars are breaking out over territory. On the other hand, people in the so-called "developed" nations, who enjoy a higher than average standard of living, are consuming more than their fair share of the world's resources.

That we have large and powerful corporations bent on gaining rich profits though continued exploitation and pillaging of the planet intensifies our dilemma. That people in developed nations are constantly being programmed by slick advertising campaigns to buy more clothes, shoes, cars, and pleasure toys than they need, is an example of the extreme insanity occurring in our society. Some outspoken scientists, including the renowned physicist Stephen Hawking, are warning that the human race is speeding toward total extinction.

The effects of overpopulation are having dramatic results. Because we have cut down the trees and filled the ground and atmosphere with toxic elements, we no longer live on a life-friendly planet. The dynamic storms, droughts, general changes and unpredictability of weather patterns, global warming, melting ice caps, mass extinction of various plants and animals, mutated frogs, appearance of deadly new strains of disease are affecting everyone. If we don't get our appetite for materialism under control and stop having babies, the disaster going on around us will intensify expeditiously.

Even if we could do these two things (which we won't), the human race would still find itself in a serious quandary. We still have too many people attempting to live on a planet that lacks the resources to support all of us. The WWF report suggests that we need to also take immediate steps to reduce this population because we face the possibility of not having a living planet under our feet. When a planet dies, the living creatures that depend on its life force perish with it.

Some believe Mars may once have supported life. We have scientific equipment crawling over the surface of Mars even today searching for clues concerning its ancient past. That planet, like Earth, may have once teemed with water and living things. Today it appears to be just another spinning rock in the night sky. If the Earth, our last lifeboat in this solar system, dies, we have no place left to run.

Efforts to control the world's population growth have been tried without much success. China,　where the people live under the rule of communism, is the only nation that successfully moved to control the number of children allowed in each family. And it was done by force.

Largely thanks to the Roman Catholic Church and other religious influences, peaceful efforts at world-wide birth and population control failed. Now we have reached a point where the only solution seems to be the unthinkable.

Statistics seem to indicate that billions must be gone within the next decade if the human race stands any chance at survival. We seem to find ourselves in a space ship that is running out of enough food, supplies and oxygen for everybody aboard. The physicists aboard calculate that half the passengers must be thrown overboard so the rest might live.

Rather than listen to the warnings and face this ugly dilemma, however, it seems that most of the passengers would rather shut their ears to such warnings. They prefer to continue along as if everything is just fine. They rationalize about the growing number of respiratory ailments caused by our polluted air and the rising number of cancers and other strange illnesses caused by contaminated foods and a destroyed ozone layer. They believe the television news reporters who promise that the violent weather patterns are a natural phenomenon. But they cannot remain complacent much longer. Extreme heat waves and world drought patterns, and killer hurricanes like Katrina and Sandy should be received as a serious warning of what is yet to come.

Because of the extensive damage already done to the world eco-system, some argue it is too late even for a mass reduction in our population to save us. We are already living on a dying planet.

Nature has a way of solving problems of overpopulation of a species. When the fox population gets too thick in a specific area, for example, there is a die-off caused by a food shortage, disease, or predators. These things do not seem to work with humans, however. Because we are an intelligent and communicable species, we see the event coming and take steps to avoid it. Like all animals on this planet, we share a natural instinct for survival. And like all animals on this planet, we share a compulsion to breed to regenerate the species. Why can we not use our intellect to alter our behavior enough to plan ahead for our survival?

Of all the animals on this planet, man is among the few that has no natural predator. We seem to be an unnatural predator against all other life on this planet. Because our presence upsets the natural balance of nature, some might question if humans even belong here. If allowed to continue unchecked, we not only threaten our own extinction, but the extinction of every living thing around us.

The warnings are all around us. Even our religious belief systems teach that we may be living at the "end of times." I don't think a week passes that I haven't noticed a television documentary about past extinctions of plants and animals that occurred on this planet. Some say it happened as many as four different times.

Theories claim the disasters were caused either by sun flares, collisions with meteorites, pole shifts, or possibly powerful volcanic explosions that blocked out the sun and created an ice age. Nobody knows exactly how it happened in the past. All of the reports suggest that whatever occurred could happen again.

War is a man-made disaster that seems to be especially designed to keep our numbers in check. It is a lop-sided solution, however, since it usually involves sending our strongest and finest males off to die on a battlefield. This practice must be taking its toll on the quality of the human gene pool. The contemporary weapons of war are so toxic and so destructive that every time they are used, the chemical pollution of the planet's air, land and water intensifies.

If you think you are not going to be affected by the radical changes occurring on our planet consider this:

Everything on this planet is now so toxic, the soil and plants are not only killing us, they are killing the plants and animals we depend on for life support. A team of British scientists, in a report published in the latest issue of Nature, warned that even the extensive planting of trees may not be enough to stop the heating of the planet and climate change now that it has gone this far. Hawking warns that the Earth could reach temperatures of 400 degrees or higher, making the planet barren.

Perhaps the Mother Earth is already starting to take care of this serious problem. The flooding, killer storms, drought and plagues are increasing with each passing year. People are going crazy and shooting up public buildings filled with people. A mass kill-off appears to be occurring before our eyes.