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The Xenophile Historian





THE HOLY BOOK OF UNIVERSAL TRUTHS,
K. U. P.


(Kimball's Unauthorized Perversion)





The Liberal Birth Dearth



Back in the 1980s, conservative columnist Ben Wattenberg wrote a book called The Birth Dearth, in which he pointed out that non-Hispanic whites have a lower birth rate than other ethnic groups, and thus warned that they are not likely to remain the majority group in the United States. Others since then have talked about "the browning of America," and I have heard predictions that before the twenty-first century is over, Asians and Hispanics will become the two largest groups. Perhaps in Manila we can see a sample of what such a society would be like, since the Filipinos are part-Asian, part-Hispanic already. However, I don't think Wattenberg or anybody else should be concerned about the resulting demographic change, so long as the upcoming generations are familiar with the civic values that made this country great. Unfortunately, our schools have done a poor job of teaching civics to today's kids, let alone those not yet born, but that's a subject to be discussed another time.


Breed for Freedom

On the other hand, there is a demographic change that ought to have Americans concerned--at least liberal Americans. According to Arthur Brooks, a professor at Syracuse University, a 2004 survey shows that 100 unrelated adults who call themselves "liberal" will typically have 147 children. That doesn't sound bad, because in the modern world, nearly all children live to grow up, so that's enough to maintain today's population.

But conservative adults are a different matter. The same survey says that 100 unrelated adults who see themselves as conservatives are likely to have 208 children. That's 41% percent more than the 147 kids of liberal parents. If the kids have the same political opinions as their parents (and Brooks says 80% of them do), more conservatives than liberals are born every year, and the trend has been going on at least since the 1970s. In the game of natural selection, whoever leaves the most descendants wins.

Why is that? I suspect several factors are involved. First, because of the date mentioned above, the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s could have something to do with it. Contrary to popular belief, conservatives are having sex--there aren't enough test-tube children around for someone to claim that all conservative kids are the product of in vitro fertilization. Maybe sex is easier for conservatives, because they aren't likely to engage in practices that put them at risk for a sexually transmitted disease. Or it could be the urban lifestyle of many modern liberals, which prefers pets over children. Or it could be that liberals no longer have confidence in their culture or their future; that seems to be a major reason why Europeans don't have as many babies as they did before World War I. Or it could be the reluctance of conservatives to practice birth control or abortion. Finally, conservatives are less concerned about the effect of a large family on the environment; I seriously doubt if any conservatives belong to The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement. In other words, liberals have succeeded in controlling overpopulation--but only for themselves.

A similar trend is affecting whole cities and states, tipping the political balance in favor of conservatives. Most of the so-called "red states" are growing nicely; even places that often get a bad press, like Utah and Mississippi, are doing well. Meanwhile, traditional liberal strongholds like Massachusetts and California are stagnant, and in some cases (e.g., San Francisco) are actually shrinking. Of course much of this is caused by people moving, as well as by natural births, and most people move for reasons besides politics, like jobs (the high-tech bust of 2000 is a major reason why the Pacific coast doesn't look as good as it used to). Still, if they're moving to escape high taxes and real estate prices, which are caused by politicians, the result is the same.

So what are liberals to do? If conservative babies grow up to be liberal adults, the Left is safe. We all know that teenagers and adults in their 20s are likely to have a liberal inclination; college campuses have always been the best place to find liberals. And liberals already enjoy near-total control over our schools and the media, two key institutions for indoctrinating the public. The problem is that while young minds may start out liberal, they don't stay that way. You've probably heard the maxim that a young conservative has no heart, and an old liberal has no head. Therefore, liberals also want immigrants, whether or not they come into the country legally; newly arrived immigrants tend to vote Democratic (at least until they become successful), and they don't have the same family values that threaten the survival of liberal Americans.

If the Left can't make enough converts from right-wing families (and more important, keep them), or import enough to make up the difference, they will realize that they have aborted, sterilized and sodomized themselves to the point that they're not having enough kids. Then they're going to have to promote another baby boom among themselves. Perhaps they will pay or otherwise reward liberals who have large families, the way the Soviet Union did with its "heroic mothers." That would go against several issues that liberals find critical (abortion, gay marriage, environmentalism, etc.). What principles will they give up to survive as liberals? This is going to get very interesting.

Back in high school and college, I had serious trouble getting a girl because I was a nerd, not one of the cool people. And not just any nerd; I was the white Steve Urkel! I also was very far to the left politically. If this "political fertility gap" issue had been around in those days, I might never have become a conservative. All I would have had to do is look for love wherever liberals hang out, and it would have been my lucky day! Unfortunately, even then a liberal woman wasn't expected to be as attractive as a conservative one; I probably would have ended up with a stoned hippie chick or a so-called "liberated woman" (read: fat and hairy-legged). Well, I guess you can't have everything.


Democratic vs. Republican women

"The other day I saw a group of young people with signs that said 'Make Love, not War.' Trouble is -- they looked like they weren't able to do either!"--Ronald Reagan, when he was governor of California.

Sources:

ABC News

Opinion Journal


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