Eugenic Solution?
Offline The Welfare State was a compassionate response to poverty. However, the welfare system allows (some would say encourages) unfit people to breed copiously. Unhealthy, unintelligent, sexually irresponsible people need not suffer the ultimate consequence of their condition and are able to thrive. The financial burden of welfare is taken up by, among others, those capable people who as a result, may well have to limit their own offspring to fewer than they otherwise would. The result of all this is a increase in naturally unfit offspring and a reduction of naturally fit offspring producing a negative affect on the gene-pool as a whole.
Unless we are to return to the days when people were left to suffer if they could not take care of themselves and their children and when children were left to starve, should a Welfare State incorporate a Eugenic solution in order to solve its inherent problems?
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It seems to be the case that humans are the only animals that increase their breeding when they have fewer resources - witness hgih birthrates in very poor countries and among the poor in the US - while succesful people here are more likely to not breed at all or have 1 kid.
Matt Shizzle has been banned from the Rational Response Squad website. This event shall provide an atmosphere more conducive to social growth. - Majority of the mod team
Show me your evidence that poor people are inherently less intelligent or less healthy than anyone else. Or that their offspring would necessarily share those traits. Poor people are less EDUCATED and, as a product of their environment, less healthy, but those factors have obviously nothing to do with genetics.
"The powerful have always created false images of the weak."
That is a very good point. Perhaps many people who are helped by welfare are victims of economic injustice and many who are wealthy are so not because of natural capability but because of the same unjust economic system.
How many brilliant people in the arts, sciences, business world, etc., have you heard of that came from a poverty-level upbringing? Quite a few, over history.
"The powerful have always created false images of the weak."
That's true. Getting out of poverty is almost 100% a matter of luck. If you're born poor you will almost certainly stay that way - same if you are born wealthy.
Matt Shizzle has been banned from the Rational Response Squad website. This event shall provide an atmosphere more conducive to social growth. - Majority of the mod team
The answer is you don't need eugenics to control population. The number one factor in controlling population is the education of the populace. The more educated a country, the lower its birthrate. Look it up. When you educate people, they tend to have fewer kids. Why? Because education is expensive, not just in money, but also in time and effort. Educated parents want to have kids who are also educated, so they tend to have fewer kids because it takes so many resources to educate them.
I know it sounds weird, but the way to control the world's population is to educate the people of the world. It's the most effective solution, it's non-violent, and it produces valuable world-citizens.
Interestingly, the flip side of this is that less-educated people tend to have more children. Maybe that's why religion tries to keep people ignorant, so they'll have more kids to indoctrinate. An interesting hypothesis. (Somebody should check these hypotheses one of these days. I'm sure we can find SOME connection between reading the bible and becoming trailer trash.)
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