E-M:/ population/immigration

["Anna Dorothy Graham" <grahama9@msu.edu>]

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Enviro-Mich message from "Anna Dorothy Graham" <grahama9@msu.edu>
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Look, folks --
Overpopulation of the human race is the single greatest threat to the
environment globally that exists.  It contributes to deforestation,
desertification, and the loss of both habitat and arable land.  It creates
the problem of bushmeat in the third world, the depletion of the oceans'
fisheries, and the decline of most species but our own.  Mass consumption of 
fossil fuels by millions of additional consumers, along with deforestation 
and urbanization, causes global warming.  Penetration of the jungles and 
consumption of bush meat caused by overlogging and hungry people whom 
agriculature alone cannot support has introduced diseases like AIDS, SARS, 
and Ebola from jungle animals into the human race.  There are famines yearly 
in many parts of the world, and soon there will be wars over water supplies 
in places like the Middle East and Africa.  The world cannot sustain the 
current growth in human population without the loss of almost everything 
that makes life worthwhile.  This is not alarmism, nor is it fascism or 
racism -- this is what is happening TODAY -- and it is simploy naive and 
anti-environmental to argue otherwise. 

Absorbing the excess population of the developing world through immigration 
does it no long-term favors, and it creates more Americans, the most 
exorbitant consumers in the world.  Assisting the poor of the world with 
family planning, better governance at home, and education about agriculture 
and conservation (or just education, period, particularly the education of 
women) would go much further to save us all. 

Anna Kirkwood Graham, J.D., Ph.D. 




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