Interesting article on fertility (Henry Mance interview, January 29). As a woman who chose not to have children in the 1980s, I was concerned even then about global population trends and their impact on the environment. My husband wasn’t too worried about having kids and we both wanted a fun career. In other words, I was one of the first generation of women to have a real choice.
Since I was born, the world’s population has nearly tripled. There is still no effective roadmap to address climate change. Emissions are still rising and the climate impact is clear but underestimated by male-dominated business and political structures.
In many cultures, parents’ long-standing desire to have a boy rather than a girl means that an imbalance exists.
The world has become a more aggressively masculine place, and it’s even worse in that regard.
In the United States, male power is conspiring to overturn long-held rights for women, denying women the choice to become pregnant in Texas.
Or when women in India or the UK don’t feel safe walking the streets. When the almost all-male Chinese Communist Party pressures women to have children. And when social media makes young men believe that violence against women is the norm, are we really surprised that women who have tasted a little freedom say, “It’s not for me.”
Or, perhaps unconsciously and collectively, humanity is reacting to the fact that it is now what threatens the future of life on Earth. Therefore, according to Darwin’s theory, we must “evolve our behavior or become extinct.”
leslie ellis
Cool, Aberdeenshire, UK