Homosexuality is helping to curb overpopulation.

I negate. My opponent's argument rests on two faulty assumptions: (1) homosexuals cannot and do not have children, and (2) there is an overpopulation problem. I will refute both assumptions. 1) Homosexuals cannot have children (a) In the not-so-distant past, in countries like the United States, there was a significant stigma to being homosexual. Most homosexuals entered normal relationships with opposite sex partners and procreated with them, as was expected of them at the time [think Don Draper's 1950's or the gay husband from the show Masters of Sex]. It is estimated that *even today,* as many as 3.4 million women are married to gay men. [1] Conclusion #1: in the past, when social stigma was much higher for gay people, most gay people procreated because they did what was expected of them by society in order to stay closeted. (b) In modern times, now that social stigma is lower and homosexual relationships are more acceptable, reproductive technology has caught up so that gay couples can have biological children. In a lesbian relationship, either woman (or both!) can have biological children through in vitro fertilization. In fact, many lesbian couples are using one woman's eggs and implanting them in the other women so both can share in the pregnancy process. [2] Gay men are using surrogacy in order to have biological children. [3] Conclusion: the assumption that gay people do not have biological children was faulty both in past times and in modern times. In past times, gay people entered straight relationships and had children (because many were closeted). In modern times, gay couples are having biological children through the use of reproductive technologies, which are becoming cheaper every day as more people use them. 2) There is no overpopulation in countries most likely to house openly gay couples There has been a recognized demographic trend that poor countries tend to have really high birth rates (in part because children are a form of valuable labor and in part due to the need to compensate for high infant mortality rates), whereas wealthy countries tend to have really low birth rates (in part because women face a higher opportunity cost for having children since they have more options outside the home and in part because the cost of raising a child in a developed country is really high, for example due to the cost of education). The result is that developed countries, like the United States, Japan, and the UK need *more* children, not fewer. A country needs to maintain a birth rate of 2.1 children per family in order to be at the replacement level, meaning that enough children are born to make up for the number of people who are dying. Nearly every developed country in the world is *below* that threshold. The U.S. has a birth rate below 2.1 and is only able to maintain its population size through large amounts of Hispanic immigration. [4] "Western European countries have low fertility rates, below the replacement rate of 2.1. Germany: 1.4 . . . Holland: 1.8 . . . Belgium: 1.8 . . . Spain: 1.4 . . . Italy: 1.4." [4] France is so desperate for people to have more children that it will literally pay you to have kids. [5] The moment you give birth the government will write you a check. Why do countries need to be above replacement level? A shrinking population is bad because the health of a country's pension system depends on having a large enough population of young people to support the population of old people. The health of a country's retirement system is measured by the ratio of young to old people. However, in Europe, the number of retired people is set to *triple* by 2060, while its population of young people is set to *decline* by 6 million. [6] Commentators have called this depopulation trend in Europe and Asia a "demographic time bomb." [6] The fact is, developed countries *need* more births in order to bring their population growth rate above replacement levels and ensure that they have a healthy retirement system. In the U.S., Social Security and Medicare would collapse if the birth rate significantly fell. So what does this have to do with homosexuality? Homosexual relationships are generally only considered acceptable to the most developed countries, which tend to have the most liberal systems of government (because development is a necessary precursor to a legitimate liberal democracy). For example, Russia - a rather poor country - is very anti-homosexual, as anyone can see from the Sochi Olympics coverage. Most African countries are very homophobic. For example, Uganda recently made it a crime - punishable by life in prison - to engage in homosexual acts. [7] Conclusion: in countries where birth rates are above replacement, homosexuality is so stigmatized that homosexuals are likely to stay closeted and continue to have children in straight relationships (to avoid persecution, prison, or even death). So in countries where the population is *growing,* homosexuality is so stigmatized that there is no way that it is helping to curb population growth. In countries where homosexuality is acceptable enough that it may curb population growth, there is no overpopulation problem. In fact, there is the reverse problem - those countries need *more* children. Thus, I urge a negation of today's relation because (1) gay couples do reproduce - either in a closeted relationship (to avoid persecution) or through the use of reproductive technologies (in countries where homosexuality is seen as acceptable). Countries that accept homosexuality have no overpopulation problem and in fact need *more* kids. Countries that are so anti-gay that it would be extremely risky not to stay closeted are the only ones with a potential overpopulation problem. But even in those countries, high infant mortality rates are doing more to curb overpopulation than infant mortality. tldr; Homosexuals can have kids (surrogacy, in vitro). And in developed countries where homosexuals can be openly gay, those countries actually *need* gay couples to have kids to avoid "depopulation." Also, my opponent can't refute anything I say (since it's a one round debate :P). So just for funsies: I assert that every time a gay couple has sex, a child is spontaneously generated in India. My opponent drops (concedes) this argument by his failure to respond, so by the rules of debate, you as a judge must accept this as true. So homosexual sex actually leads to reproduction (at least in the confines of this debate). Hope you had fun reading. <3 Bluesteel [1] http://www.nytimes.com... [2] http://www.nbcnews.com... [3] https://www.ihr.com... [4] http://www.forbes.com... [5] http://www.learnvest.com... [6] http://www.economist.com... [7] http://www.brookings.edu...