USFG should adopt a Childbirth Limitation policy

Now, I will first clarify why having a larger population is not necessarily beneficial or necessary, as my opponent used this argument several times against many arguments. I stated we wont need a large population to take care of people more because with a smaller population there wont be as many people we need to take care of. He says under this logic we should have 0 kids so we wont have to take care of anybody. But he misinterprets this completely. The point was made to show that there isn't a down side to a lower population. It was not advocating that we should cause a drastic drop in people like he's maKing it out to be, only that a gradual decline is acceptable. So its established that having a lower population is not detrimental or necessary in any way. This takes out the vast majority of his arguments defending his C1, as he uses that same point several times. Also in C1, 1. He claims bigger population = strong economy. It is actually the other way around. Strong economies come first because of technological improvements, then the population increases as people flock to the wealthy nation. 2. He claims young people make most major discoveries. I agree. But this argument is entirely non-offensive. There are still millions of young people in places such as China, which have limited childbirth. This policy does not eliminate the young population in any way. 3. He says death rates in the US aren't decreasing now. That was not my point. I was saying that when countries become wealthy their death rates decrease because of that. The US is already wealthy. Our death rates have already become low. Onto his C2 defense. 1. The consensus of his first 2 points is tat we can modify crops for faster food production. However this did not address my point at all. I said increasing population will cause a need for crop growth to become faster and faster as more and more people begin consuming food. Eventually technology will not be able to keep up, unless my opponent can prove that we can modify crops to regrow in 5 minutes. 2. His biological explanation claims women wont have kids if the environment cant support them, because they will be suffering from starvation and thus will not have the nutritional capacity to produce kids. That sounds like a great way to limit population growth, wait until everyone starves! I'm pretty sure it would be more effective to prevent us from getting to that point in the first place (by voting pro). ALSO. He seems to have a contradiction here. He says food deprivation will prevent population growth, but he claims earlier that technology prevents us from running out of food in the first place. Go ahead and discount both of these points then since they are incompatible. 3. His social explanation says people voluntarily wont have children in a crowded environment. But again, thats because the environment has become crowded and the earth cannot support any more people. It would be preferable to *prevent* us from getting overcowded, rather than letting it happen and letting it "work itself out". 4. The Reason Magazine evidence is also flawed because it says population will eventually decrease, but as previously stated, that is only because people will be starving and struggling to find necessary resources because of overpopulation. Now C3 I understand Utilitarianism recognizes rights. However it also does what is best for the greater good. If limiting certain rights will help the greater good (by preventing resource scarcity and excessive population density), then my opponent's own theory supports limiting childbirth. He makes a big deal about Griswold vs Conneticut, however this was in 1965. Far before overpopulation had become the issue that it is now. Thus, overturning the law is acceptable because we recognize it will create a greater good. Then on the enforcement policies: I addressed in round 1 that it would be best to not be too specific on the enforcements because then the debate could be about "this policy is good/bad" rather than "childbirth limiting is good/bad". However it seems my opponent wants an enforcement mechanism, so here it is: The third child will be euthanized. Lol, just kidding. The enforcement is a progressive fine based on income. He claims fines are more like a tax; this is not true for large fines in the tens of thousands of dollars. Also, it does not violate the EP Clause because parents can control whether or not they have three children. Onto my points. He says my source says population is not increasing. Again he misinterprets. The source was not about population increase whatsoever, it detailed how several families have three or more kids. And population IS growing in the US, contrary to what he seems to believe. Growth is in the hundreds of thousands every single year. Then on Ghana. GDP has no relevance in comparisons, as the US has a larger landmass/resource base to export goods with, thus accounting for the disparity. Average income is alo a biased statistic because Ghana's prices on services are also much lower than the US's, again accounting for the disparity (1) So again we see that nations do not have to have a large population to have a strong economy. To close, I will elaborate one more time about the major argument in this debate: whether or not a larger population is good. Increasing our current population causes, 1. Resource strain (2) 2. Weakened economy (2) 3. Increased unemployment (2) 4. Increased pressure on environment (2) 5. Decreased watter supply (3) 6. Faster disease spread due to population density (3) And many more. Yet my opponents message has been that higher population is somehow good. My opponent never denies that adopting a childbirth limitation policy will solve for overpopulation, so we accept that it will. Since overpopulation causes all those negative impacts, population control will solve for them. Increasing population, which is what my opponent wants, create them. I urge a pro vote. 1. . http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu... 2. . http://www.overpopulation.org... 3. . http://www.budgettravel.com...