Don't Start the Revolution Without Me- A Review of Planet of the Humans

Michael Moore is great at starting revolutions and I have been a fan of each and every one of his films. I remember meeting him and witnessing his passion for doing the right thing at a showing of his film, Bowling for Columbine in St.Paul years ago. Greedy multinational corporations are not put on trial enough for the pain they leave in their wake. The crime of illegal wars, institutional racism and classism and are never deeply examined enough and admirably Moore is consistently up for the task. 

I patiently waited while he ever so skillfully he went after General Motors, the Health Care System, the Gun Lobby and more. Sometimes I wasn’t so patient. While I was completely with him in his attack on everything from the NRA to Wall street greed, I was waiting for a film that deeply questioned why we were still heading for the cliff of collapse even though we had 50 years of Earth days under our belt.

Well here it is, Planet of the Humans, a film detonating business as usual, because to keep on doing the same thing while getting zero results is the definition of insanity. Moore lent his moxie to a film by Jeff Gibbs who dared to question the fundamental ways in which we are dealing with our predicament on the planet. Any objective view of our state of the world would reveal that we are in more trouble than ever. Carbon parts per million is going up, human numbers keep skyrocketing, endangered species keep getting added to the list and in the race to cover the landscape of the planet, forests are losing out to deserts. More than that, monied interests keep controlling the modern human narrative with their advocates deeply in their pockets. The green illusions have to be a part of that story and with Ozzie Zehner’s help we can now see why green has not lived up to its promises.

 Those of us who have been in the trenches fighting for the deep attention the earth really need to be grateful for this revolutionary film. We cannot shoot the messengers even though there is an embarrassing litany of doing so throughout history. Those benefiting from the current way of doing things will always protest, but they cannot get in our way of listening.

 Galileo died under house arrest for suggesting what his telescope revealed. Gibbs has crafted a telescope of sorts to peer into the way energy is delivered to us under false pretenses and some are upset, offended and even call for a violation of his first amendment rights. They refuse to look through his lens, because they are intellectually married to their savior, renewable energy. Ignaz Semmelweis was a doctor who discovered in the 1800’s that if surgeons washed their hands, patients wouldn’t die of infection. He had double blind studies and documentation that he was right. No one believed him at the time and he himself died in his 40’s of an infection himself. The vitriol directed at POTH unfortunately reveals that the tendency to ignore science and evidence is still with us today and hurting us more than ever.

I have long believed that the worst thing we could do is to come up with some magical form of energy to power our destructive ways. If the world of industrial development ever discovers an unlimited and easily harnessed, carbon-free energy source we are all doomed. We do not need a world of bulldozers powered by magical energy, we need less bulldozing. We need less of everything we have been doing.  We are deep into what I like to call the GHG.. the Great Human Gobbling and Gibbs and Zehner have given their life’s blood into waking us up. The fact that POTH uncovers the lies behind our hopes for green energy’s ability to save us from ourselves is just the beginning of the story that needs to be told

 It’s like many people have been riding on a high-speed electric train riding along and enjoying the view, eating their vegetarian organic meals in the dining car when they are told to stop the train. They liked the ride and thought they were on the right train, after all its electric and they are eating the most planet conscious diet.  POTH is the first awakening in a long time to say that the ride may seem to be sustainable but you are still headed for a cliff. We need to be thankful for the warning.

 I have been a lifelong environmentalist and overpopulation activist. For a long time, I knew our house was on fire. I could see the billowing smoke in our numbers alone. But I was told I couldn’t call the fire department, I would be an alarmist even though I knew reckless pro-growth policies would never allow efforts to practice conservation and green up the earth to work.

POTH didn’t just call the fire department, it called a global 911 and I for one am eternally grateful. While some are still wondering why it was necessary and still others have been shocked back into denial, I have other concerns. What concerns me is not that they have revealed that the emperor of green energy has no clothes but how our new and very much needed environmental movement might still miss the mark. If the millions who have seen POTH are shocked and dismayed by the delusions of green energy just wait til they hear how overpopulation and its evil twin overconsumption, have been thrown under the politically correct bus. Even more disturbing will be the revelation that the environmental establishment has been in the driver’s seat not willing to address the implications of the 5.5 billion people we have added to our limited planet in the last century.

 There have been plenty of us lesser known writers, filmmakers, and activists waiting in the wings for a new batch of environmental recruits. We are willing and able to take on the challenge of steering our train away from the cliff, but will our messages get heard or be drowned out by the next batch of snakeoil salesmen? We are here ready to grab this opportunity with even more truths to reveal.

 Will these newly awakened environmentally concerned get to hear that we have to start de-growing our world one country at a time using the most effective and humane means possible? Will they understand the implications of overshooting our resources locally and globally by both our numbers and habits? Can they embrace the fact that the first method available to us is to redo our immigration, tax and labor laws to stop our trajectory toward our ever-climbing numbers? I hope so. I am concerned that once again our much needed revolution will get off track. So many revolutions start out with great ideas and get derailed by those more interested in profit and power than in truly making a difference.

The full story of the Great Human Gobbling of the only planet in our solar system able to sustain life has begun to be told by POTH. It is just the beginning. Put on your seatbelt -- we are in for a ride and we must we must stay awake. No more falling asleep at the wheel to the soothing voices of those with promises in one pocket and dollars in the other.

Elms R US

Elms R Us by Karen I. Shragg

My city used to be covered with mature elm trees planted closely together. They formed arches over streets in a beautiful configuration that added value to neighborhoods. But then came the bark beetle. Because the trees were planted close together these fungus-carrying beetles had a hay day and soon the trees were dead and had to be removed. The solution was to decrease their density, at least 60 to 70 feet apart, and to plant diverse species with them because usually diseases like this are species specific.

So why are we like Elms? We are being densely planted in cities which welcome growth like it isn’t a recipe for disaster.  We are learning with Covid 19 as our teacher, that our proximity is one risk factor for spreading the disease.  When given the command to keep six feet away from others I wonder how one does that in a world where we have been cramming people into places for decades? Just the word mass transit used to be synonymous with being green, now we think of them as Petri dishes for disease.

Our whole world is turning upside down. We are living in the most ironic times but it is also an opportunity to rethink how we warehouse people believing that density is a problem solver of growth. How strange that spacious offices are sending people home to crowded apartment buildings in order to get away from people.

Experts tell us that pandemics are going to be with us even if we get this one under control. Humans are ripe for them because we have been tempting viruses with our addiction to growth and our total disregard for the way our density disrupts the natural world. We are so afraid of seeing what ultimately threatens our health with our required proximity and it is simply that we live in an overpopulated world.

Yes overpopulation, specifically the 5.5 billion we have added in less than a century and the density it requires, must become the focus of our discussions as a cure for what ails us.  A short perusal of the literature will demonstrate its role in the spread of viruses. Canceling the discussion under some politically correct delusion is just another way to throw a monkey wrench into potential solutions to this economic and public health disaster.  Besides this is global pandemic and pointing fingers between developed and underdeveloped countries is no longer relevant. We all need to reign in our populations by humane means or yes the virus and the ones yet to come will do it for us in ways that are too ugly to mention. 

An ancient remedy for sore throats can be found in slippery elm bark, but perhaps this tree’s greatest contribution to humankind is its lesson on the need to recognize the chaos we create when we disrespect the way nature requires that we be sparsely planted  on our limited planet. 

BYE THE NUMBERS

This February marked what would have been have been my grandfather’s 125th birthday. We called my father’s dad, Zadie. He was born in Russia near Kletsk in 1895. An unwilling Jewish soldier in Tsar Nicolas’s army, he and most of his siblings sought a better life in the US. Not all made it here, which is why to this day I have cousins in Argentina. Yes, I am a proud granddaughter of an immigrant. But he and his relatives came here in the 1920’s, back when the US had a population of around 110,000,000 and the world’s population was just under 2 billion. US immigration was limited in those days for a lot of reasons that most would not be proud of today. Anti-Semitism and a general xenophobia informed much of our policy and kept legal immigration to a more ecologically sane number, approximately 150,000. 

This century, the persecuted around the globe have increased. Their desperation runs deeper and their numbers climb higher. This is due to many factors, including global overpopulation, climate change pressures, the hangovers of colonialism and the ravages of the US military industrial complex which have kept developing countries in poverty. No one blames refugees for trying to get to a country of apparent riches. I am certainly glad my relatives were able to get in. I have unconditional empathy for those seeking entrance to a country, which promises a better life, even though our racism and xenophobia roots have not disappeared.

The trouble is that due exponential growth, medical advances and a huge increase in legal immigration limits over the years, the US has nearly tripled to an unsustainable 327,000,000.  So has immigration policy stayed low to compensate for the higher population? No it has not.  At about 1.1 million, legal immigration has grown about 6-fold. To be blunt that is half-assed backwards. Our dominant story has followed the poem on the statue of liberty without any regard to the physical, ecological limits that are built into every country’s landscape, including our own. Over a million new drivers, job seekers, and consumers of limited water supplies are now added each year because we feel it is our moral duty to absorb those in need. Our public discourse has shunned all conversation about bringing sanity back into our immigration policies. We need to stress that we also have a moral duty to preserve our fragile ecosystems. Officials in both political parties need to show some courage, integrity and encourage this much needed conversation.

All who care about this country and its environment should join in a chorus of reducing the number of legal immigration back to the days when my grandfather arrived in a ship to Boston harbor. Policies need to reflect the needs for preservation of habitat for wildlife and to protect our local natural resources. We behave as if we expect to avoid congestion, large carbon footprints, water shortages, increases in solid waste and air pollution while adding over 1 million new consumers into our country.  If we continue with current immigration policies we can expect an additional 75 million Americans by 2060.  According to Global Footprint Network, we passed our sustainable number at 150 million. Overshoot is here and eating away at our promises. If clean and available water, open space, less traffic congestion and lower carbon footprints are truly valued, we must look to all sources of population growth and address them. Fertility rates and immigration are both causes of US overpopulation. As such they must both become a part of a civil discussion about how we address our problems at their source.

My Zadie knew how lucky he was to make it to America and worked hard all his life to make better opportunities for his family. He made me respect the challenges all immigrants face and the way they must learn to fit into a prejudiced society. I just wish I had the wherewithal to tell him, years ago, how much I appreciate the sacrifices he made so that my siblings, cousins and I could grow up in the US. I also wish people realized that my Zadie and his peers lived during a time when we had a population we could have sustained. It is in our best interest to convince Americans and our leaders that we have long said goodbye to a number the environment in the US can handle.

Why Environmental Moderates Are More Frustrating than Outright Climate Deniers

If your house was smoldering you could use water from a hose with weak pressure. If your house was just starting to burn you would need to call the fire department. But if your house was being consumed by fire you would need to sound all alarms and call in multiple fire departments. How many Greta’s will it take for the majority of leaders and people to realize our house is burning down? How many moderate responses to an environment catastrophe can we continue to tolerate? I am inspired by the words of Martin Luther King Jr. who was very frustrated with white moderates.

“I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to 'order' than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice [...]

That is exactly how I have felt about environmental moderates. They are our greatest stumbling blocks to doing right by the earth. Those who will not even discuss human numbers and how overpopulation is a driving force behind the flames, frustrate me more than those who deny human caused climate change. They never use their microphone for educating people how people are not going to survive if we don’t stop converting the planet to a place just for us and our billions.

MLK further said “ …a white moderate is someone who constantly says: 'I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action'; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom." Such a person is, according to King, someone "who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a 'more convenient season.'"

As a self proclaimed and proud overpopulation activist, I have personally been told to wait to push this issue because other issues are more pressing. Well waiting gets us an additional 1 million passengers every 4.5 days to find water for, clothe, house, feed and employ. We are already at least 5.5 billion overpopulated compared to our resources and the pollution resulting during their extraction. The environmental moderates also operate by a mythical timetable, one in which renewable energy and cloth bags will save us.

Ultimately, King wrote that "shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection."  Thank you MLK, you just described perfectly how it feels to be in a world where most environmental organizations have a moderate approach to saving the world when you know it is like bringing a garden hose to a house fire.

Entrenched in a Sea of Inertia

In our world of declining, non-renewable resources, Inertia seems to be a renewable and infinite resource on any number of issues. Those of us who love reading and learning often think education is the best tool for moving the needle on the inertia scale. Activists on any number of issues,however, would beg to differ. They are frequently disappointed with their results when fact -proliferation is their only tool. Change is hard and complex. Let’s apply this to the gun issue.

The year 2018 ended with a population of 329,093,106 in the US. The US population of guns was estimated to be larger; 393,347,000. The total gun deaths, not counting suicides was 39,773. That is more than how many die in accidents on US roads.

Now to give that context, if you combine the population of Japan, Sweden the UK, Israel and Australia you come up with 246,995,950 people who collectively own 8,804,00 guns. The total gun deaths in those countries combined was less than 1,000, way less it was 460 total deaths. Those facts are enough to make activists squirm and most thinking adults dismayed, but not enough to make the sea change needed.

The ingredients for a seismic shift on entrenched problems, need more than information. I propose a that the recipe for radical social change has to include at least the following: 1) evidence that is provable by many sources 2) a tragic event or incidents that attracts national ( or international) attention AND is intimately and inextricably linked to said evidence, 3) coalitions representing multiple voices from various political groups, gender and racial groups speaking up in a unified voice and messaging with demonstrations, speeches and in writing 4) opposing views are dismissed as being fundamentally unfounded and its ‘leaders’ exposed for being self serving in some way, either for money or power to the detriment of most people and/ or the environment. 5) A way out, direction offered to change behavior that is acceptable to most and doable by enough people to make enough of a difference 6) this all needs to culminate into a tipping point so that society that demands change 7) we then need leaders who know how to make the necessary legislative changes even at possible risk of losing their own political standing. In other words, change is complicated and we need to quit reciting facts as if that is going to work.

We have enough evidence to know that the US has horrific gun problem. We have already had enough tragic events to last us forever. We are starting to build the coalitions to expose how gun lobbyists influence politicians and have also worked hard to crush the world view that gun owners actually stop crime or that gun safety activists are after people’s guns particularly those used in hunting.

What we may need is a way out that offers a new less-threatening approach with the mantra that it will save lives. Do gun owners deserve more freedom than car owners? It’s true, car owners do not have their own amendment to the constitution, but they are free to buy whatever car they can afford as long as they follow the rules. We ask all drivers to pass a test and be insured. We ask that cars get inspected so that they are safer on the roads. We don’t prevent the manufacturing or ownership of cars, we make them safer with rules and regulations. We could even get more creative and use part of the insurance money to pay for the safety training and for follow up gun inspection for those who already own them. Even better let’s push the tipping point of this issue and insist that much of these newly generated insurance dollars go toward fully funding mental health medical coverage.

There are no losers in this scenario. No one has to lose their gun privileges, unless they break the rules. Just like we want drunk drivers off the roads, we want to try to more effectively limit access to weapons to those who are untrained and irresponsible.

welcoming diverse voices to an issue that effects us all

Their names are Jim and Paul, Jeff and Bill and several Daves. They are my colleagues and some my dearest friends. They are my heroes for fighting a fight few wish to discuss, let alone hear about. But for the longest time I have wondered why there were so few women’s voices in the world of educating people about dangers of overpopulation the the over-consumption of resources that follows in its wake.

Much to my delight, I recently have become aware of even more women, mostly in academia, some in media, who are quite vocal on this often-shunned topic. Their fresh voices somehow make me feel less alone. Overpopulation is a matter of understanding how the laws of carrying capacity apply to homo sapiens sapiens too. It shouldn’t matter who is in charge of working on this issue. In a perfect world, the presentation of scientific evidence should demand our attention no matter who is at the podium, yet we all know we live in a world that is divided and subdivided into groups with very unequal power.

Now women did have a chance to work on this existential threat to humanity and all life forms and they collectively blew it. In 1994, at the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, the most vocal women there hi-jacked the purpose of this important meeting. This was a gathering of leaders from around the globe that was supposed to be focused on slowing population growth through population policies. Instead feminist activists moved it downstream to be about improving the lives of individual women. Their consensus was that enhancing individual rights and health of women would eventually lower fertility and slow population growth. ( I don’t like saying population growth because the numbers already here are alarmingly unsustainable, but that was the language of the time.) The deliberate diversion from what should have been important conversations and proposals for a truly sustainable earth were lost in this earlier version of the me-too movement. So how did their narrative play out? Well women around the world continue to suffer and Egypt’s population is now over 100 million. It was just over 63 million back in 1994. A total failure by any calculation.

Having said that, I still think women who truly understand this issue need to have more leadership roles. If they were more visible, I believe they could bring deeper and different conversations to an issue that obviously needs a new approach.

I recently took a quick survey of ten + US based population NGO’s including: World Population Balance, Negative Population Growth, Californians for Population Stabilization, Population Connection, Population Media Center, Global Footprint Network, I found that 100% are led by men. Only Canada and Australia have population NGO’s led by women. Our movement as it were, has always been plagued with a lack of diversity of both gender and race. To outsiders looking in, instead of seeing people sincerely alarmed at the crisis we are in, they see another group of (white) men telling them what to do with the very personal decisions of their lives.

Perhaps over the years, instead of mostly reaching out to the public to educate them about an issue that seems so obvious to those of us in the know, we should have been reaching out to women leaders and leaders in communities of color. We should have led the conversation with the fact that those who are disenfranchised are the first to feel the adverse effects of overpopulation. They must understand that they have skin in this game.

I really do understand that to many on the outside of this issue, it just keeps looking like a white man’s narrative, and its time for that to change. I am betting that deliberately and compassionately trying to change the complexion and gender of the leaders in this field would create many more overpopulation activists who deeply understand that this is an issue that must concern us all especially those who continue to struggle in this very unequal world.

The North Shore Beckons

The North Shore Beckons by Karen I. Shragg

I can hear her conifers beckoning

From my perch

Behind the keys of my computer

Where I dwell surrounded by the din of a city

Who lost her soul to growth long ago

I wonder

In what mood will I find Superior

When I finally arrive at her doorstep?

I recall the wildness of her sweet shores

So iconic, dappled with mergansers, towering waterfalls

People-free horizons and sunrises that humble

But that was long before her popularity

Crippled her

The rocks that have long taken her beating

Are likely the only things which remain unchanged

Still, I will try to ignore the wider roads and billboards

The traffic and the felled trees

And enjoy her majesty once more.

Only Photosynthesizers Get a Pass

http://nuarchive.wbai.org/mp3/wbai_181120_220005etff.mp3

Here is the archived interview done by Jessica Schab that I did on November 20th 2018. I also wrote a check to the Equal Time for Freethought program on WBAI-radio 99.5 FM New York because they truly are public radio and do not get money from corporate donors. Congrats to them for being bold enough to approach and embrace the topic of overpopulation.

What I wish to blog about is the dance we must do in all of these types of interviews between pessimism and hope. If any of us were at all optimistic, we wouldn’t be working on this issue. Forgive my choice of words, but we are mostly scared shitless about the future of planet earth because of human numbers and modern day ability to use up resources to try to meet our every need and desire. So to those people who are unaware of this issue, how do we wake them up without depressing them so much that they go back under the covers of denial?? How do we tell them the unvarnished truth about being already 5.5 billion people over our carrying capacity without painting a picture so dark and impossible that it sends them to the liquor cabinet or in my case, the bakery? How to we say that on top of that we add over 81 million to the earth every year net gain without sending them over the edge?

I struggle with this every day and with every message I write about this super challenging issue. My premise for what I do and say comes from my training and experience as a naturalist. Only plants can take energy from the sun, make their own sugars and release a product that is beneficial to the world. All animals are takers, especially homo sapiens sapien and that is exacerbated in our overpopulated world. With nearly 8 billion of us on earth, even flushing a toilet with potable water is a ridiculous waste of precious resources and most of us do that if we are lucky enough to have indoor plumbing.

I am a polluter. I am an apex predator. I take from the earth and return only pollution. I make an effort to compost and recycle, but it pales in comparison from the water I consume and the plant based food I buy which comes wrapped in plastic or mesh and comes from far away places. I never want to position myself as a model of low consumption. In an overpopulated world I don’t believe that model exists. So how to we promote hope when each of us is a part of the problem?

We sell the very real notion that this IS solvable. We demand a seat at the table. We make it very clear that IF one cares about wildlife, the future of humanity, poverty, pollution and all other progressive issues, one HAS to care and work on this issue. We can and must reduce the over-demand for nonrenewable and diminishing resources. I believe hope lives in working on the right ballfield. We cannot hit one out of the park if we are in the wrong ball park. The problem is us and the solution is less of us and our demanding ways. Working on that is hopeful because it gets us somewhere. What problem can you think of that wouldn’t be improved with less humans?

Shirley Chisholm once said, “If they don’t let you have a seat at the table, bring a folding chair.” I am on my way to the thrift store right now.

From Venom to Compassion

From Venom to Compassion: Telling the Positive Side of the Overpopulation Issue.

We must take the venom out of the overpopulation issue and inject it with the compassion that truly is at the heart of its story. When some people hear the word OVERPOPULATION, they cringe. The images that are conjured up in their minds are negative. They hear the word “population control” even if you don’t say it. They remember stories of draconian measures in China, when the success of their population policies are ignored.  Did trying to enforce a one child policy create some disturbing problems? Of course it did, but why do we neglect discussing the millions who were saved from the horrors of starvation? We need to tell the side of the story that is positive.  Policies that prevent misery, suffering and early death are worthy of a more positive place in our collective memory of history. They could always be implemented with more compassion and understanding. But it is up to us to understand the time bomb of exponential growth and its darkest ramifications.

The overpopulation isn’t that complicated. When humans numbers rise exponentially resources cannot keep up. In fact our limited resources decrease and result in pollution.  But few want to hear it or allow it to be a part of our public discourse. This is the real doomsday scenario, increasing demand on a limited planet with decreasing resources. Two grandparents having three children and those children having three children for three generations will result in 81 progeny. That kind of success is just not sustainable. Most species are limited by disease, lack of food and habitat.  Humans are great at eliminating those natural controls, so our numbers go out of control. That sets up for long term problems of suffering, misery and early death when we start to demand the very basic resources we need from an earth that cannot keep up.  We started on that downward slide a mere 90 years ago. In that blink of an earth eye we added an unsustainable 5.5 billion to our limited earth . That is like adding over 3 China’s in one person’s lifetime.

All of this reality is so hard for most to swallow because it means changing their story of a limitless earth where everyone has a right to reproduce especially if they are financially well situated. The activists who focus on specific issues rarely even mention overpopulation because they know the risks of associating clean water, saving tigers and whales  etc. with this quicksand-laden issue.

To recalibrate this scenario without a happy ending, we have only one humane choice. Have less children, a lot less. The results from this difficult choice are the possibilities of the continuation of our species and many others who are so innocent in their own demise. We owe our fellow citizens of this planet to tell the positive side of the overpopulation story.

Instead of focusing on the reality of what will happen if we don’t have less children, lets focus on what will happen WHEN we do. We will have more water to go around, less pollution, more minerals, more open space, less traffic, and my personal favorite, more wild spaces for wildlife. Those goals are ONLY possible if we tame and reduce our exponential success. We can reduce our consumption most successfully if we reduce the number of consumers. It is that simple and that complex. I wish celebrities would get it and demonstrate with their own actions how moral it is to stop after one child. Instead they keep having children with each new spouse, clueless as to the very unfortunate example they are setting.

It is so difficult for many to wrap their heads around the concept that less people is a recipe for success, but indeed it is. If you want a more just and peaceful world, we must improve the ratio between our numbers and our resources. Fossil fuels are just that, resources that aren’t coming back once they are gone. We can’t be continuing to contribute to setting up a world where we will be fighting over diminishing resources. Of course there are many other challenging issues but I can tie them all to this one.  Everything gets better with less of us. Everything gets worse as we grow.

Holding hands and wishing for peace is an important gesture but must be coupled with ecological reality, a reality which must include the humane goal of closing the gap between relentless growth on a limited and degraded planet.

The Flaw in the Statue of Liberty

The talented and hard working men who replaced our patio door had heavy Russian accents. I soon discovered that they were from the same part of Russia, Belarus actually, where my grandparents were born. One worker had been here for 13 years the other for three. My paternal grandfather got on a ship that sailed for our borders in 1922. I am a second generation American who has always appreciated the sacrifices made by those who immigrated here so that subsequent generations could have a better life in America.

I have intentionally traveled to countries populated with people with different languages because I enjoy learning and absorbing different cultures. I have devoted my professional life as a naturalist to make our nature center accessible to everyone. The doctor title before my name was earned in a degree that was steeped in social justice. I have not wavered from my steadfast belief in the justice for all concept in our constitution, but I am continually stunned by how so many of our policies completely ignore ecological reality.

It is time to have a more nuanced discussion about immigration that includes the environment. In this time, on this planet, in our country we have a reality shaped by how many people are already here. “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!” Is a heartfelt sentiment put on the Statue of Liberty on its 100th anniversary. Though the statue was intended to be about liberty, the addition of the Emma Lazurus poem gave it a new twist. It started to be symbolic of our attitude toward immigrants. It was an amazing gift given by France to the United States in 1886, back when our population was just over 50 million people. By the time this poem was added to this beautiful statue our population had soared to over 240 million. Now that we are over 324 million the message and the meme of being the repository for all who need to escape their lives or join their relatives needs to be revisited. 

The flaw in the sentiment on this iconic statue that stands in the harbor of New York is that it assumes that our country will always be better off with more and more people. It assumes we will have enough resources for them. It assumes we will have enough fresh water, open space, wildlife, wild lands and everything that makes for a quality of life. It assumes we have enough now. When the hushed voice of environmental measurement is allowed a seat at the table, it speaks a shocking story. It turns out that if we are to look at immigration and the US population through the eyes of sustainability then we passed up our sustainable numbers at least 150 million people ago.150 million just might be sustainable but it depends at what level of consumption and how many resources are left at the time this goal is achieved. 

I am in my sixties now.  Our population in the US has doubled in my lifetime. Those additional 163 million consumers have transformed this country. They are responsible for our crowded cities and traffic problems, more pollution and less open land. More people make a wide variety of negative impacts on the environment and it doesn’t matter from this perspective the nationality of those additional people. We are all consumers. We can and should try to consume less but we all need water, energy, food, jobs, open land and none are in a limitless supply. The consumption in the US is so high that those who keep the statistics on this like Global Footprint Network, tell us that it would take five planets to supply the globe with enough resources if everyone were to consume like us. Adding more high level fossil fuel consumers is horrendous for our climate too. I acknowledge that this is a very difficult discussion to have. I don’t pretend to have all of the answers. But I know for sure it is a part of the equation that needs to be on the table.

Overpopulation has been ignored, dismissed and trampled upon for far too long. We absolutely cannot allow our overpopulated country to be an excuse for treating immigrants inhumanely. The atrocities happening at our border are indefensible. But it is equally hard to imagine that we can make good decisions about our country’s future regarding immigration policies while ignoring the tragic state of our country’s limited life-giving resources. Is it really fair to welcome people into a place that is already over-pumping its aquifers? We must acknowledge that we all suffer when we exceed our country’s environmentally determined limits, and we have already exceeded them. We must try our best to walk that fine line between loving our fellow human and conserving the resources that support life itself. 

How ironic that even if Emma Lazurus had been a more futuristic poet, and wanted to add the words,  “until it is no longer sustainable to do so, ” to her poem it was too late.  The US was already overpopulated by at least 90 million people in 1986 when her poem was added.