Why Human Population is an Animal Rights Concern
Each new human added is invariably a harm to other animals
The issue of human population is notoriously taboo and on the rare occasion it is discussed it’s often downplayed and assessed from an anthropocentric (human-focused) perspective. This taboo exists in both the environmental and animal rights movements. Even the film Cowspiracy has a segment that plays down population concerns when compared to the harms of animal agriculture. Consumption and the number of consumers are of course two sides to the same coin. We calculate human impact by multiplying the two.
This anthropocentric focus is a necessity because if we are to factor in our impacts on the millions of other species and the requirements of each new human it quickly becomes clear we are the cause of a disproportionate amount of harm. Human population affects all earthlings, this includes human animals, other animals and not least the new human who comes into existence.
The current human population as of writing this article is in excess of 7.9 billion. The total number added to this finite planet rises by 230,000 new humans every single day (after deaths) and is predicted by a conservative UN estimate to reach 11.2 billion and rising in 2100. That’s if we can be sustained for so long.
We go into ecological overshoot (the point at which the earth can no longer replenish what we have taken) at an earlier point every year and we are causing the collapse of the oceans and fueling climate change through our activities. Should we want to add extra numbers to what many scientists have now designated The Anthropocene Epoch?
The Anthropocene, a geological age in which humans have significantly influenced the Earth’s atmosphere, has seen wild animals half in total number since 1970 according to the WWF. In the same period human animals doubled in number. We intensify the basic rate of extinction by 1000–10,000 times, 200 species a day. We have the dubious honour of being the first species to drive an extinction event. We are the asteroid. We are the volcano.
“But vegans don’t contribute to extinctions! We photosynthesise then emit oxygen and fairy dust!” Sadly not. While vegans generally require less land and water and produce less pollution than those who demand the direct exploitation of farmed animals, they still have highly harmful impacts on other animals. Reproduction is by far the most significant personal factor in our greenhouse gas legacy.
All of us will require land for agriculture, housing, fuel/energy, remaining clean water, finite mined resources etc. If we’re in the high consuming western world then multiply these demands further and factor in cars, transport for our food, roads and other infrastructure. These basic requirements will all push wild animals out and require that our activities take place in what was once their habitat.
So, procreation is a huge gamble at the best of times but comes with fixed certainties for those who are concerned with other animals living freely of human encroachment. The idea of purposefully creating conscientious children is sadly an act in self-deception. Environmentalism or veganism are ethics that babies and children are unable to subscribe to. The many possible descendants that the biological parent is responsible for will all behave however they choose. These choices will be made in a speciesist, consumerist society, surrounded by speciesist, consumerist peers. Remember that many of us rebelled against our parental and cultural upbringing.
We live in a pronatalist (pro-birth) culture where reproduction is celebrated and rewarded but everyone has the ability to change their mind. Biological parents are still able to change their message regarding population and the adding of new humans in the future.
Some will point to destructive financial systems as responsible for the greater blame. Every new human will be born into that same globalised capitalist system and supply/provide demands as the worker/consumer cogs that the machine needs to continue. Let us also note that all other industrial economies and ideologies have been just as destructive environmentally and have also been speciesist. They all harm other animals.
Very few people or nations on Earth are asking to consume less. On the contrary most wish to consume more and see greater opportunities still for their descendants. We can’t replace ourselves with a new fantasy animal nor is the hope of reducing our consumption (or everyone magically becoming environmentalist and/or vegan) an argument that humans are not overpopulated. It is conceivable that the majority of the 400,000 daily births will never encounter these select ethics, let alone convert and adhere to them.
What then if we just replaced ourselves? Unlike some animals we don’t reproduce and then die. Instead we multiply exponentially. Children, parents, grandparents and even great-grandparents often all live at the same time and make impacts simultaneously. Remember that other people will continue to have as many as they want, ours would be additional, on top of the existing growth.
Vegans and environmentalists are conscientious people who often wish to opt out of causing unnecessary harm. Not contributing further to what naturalist and Population Matters charity patron David Attenborough has described as “the human plague” could therefore be said to be the very least we can do. Just as breeding new cats or dogs when so many are already in need of homes could be called unethical, if we are to be consistent then adoption is imperative for those who possess a strong parental urge.
Let’s certainly not forget humans are animals too and in addition to the suffering we cause others we should also factor in the suffering the future descendants will experience. Suffering is implicit to life and as such I believe it wrong to needlessly throw another being into existence. This could be especially prudent given the dire warnings coming from scientific papers regarding life in an ecologically ravaged era of climate change, pandemics, wars, food shortages, water scarcity and ultimately civilisational collapse.
The value of each individual drops and becomes cheaper with more and more of us. All social justice issues rely on a habitable planet in order to stage them. With 230,000 new humans being added to the planet daily, all causes are lost causes and all problems are made worse. We need to move upstream instead of focusing solely on the downstream symptoms.
It is not compassionate to be laissez-faire regarding the adding of new humans into such a chaotic future and as I have shown, our concerns should be wider still.
Marcus Dredge is host of The Species Barrier. You can access the Podcast on Itunes, Podbean, Archive etc and follow on Twitter, Facebook etc
