Qualilty of Life: Part 22--Next Added 100 Million Americans

In the context of human societies, overpopulation occurs when the population density is so great as to actually cause an impaired quality of life, serious environmental degradation, and/or long-term shortages of essential goods and services.  This is the definition used by popular dictionaries such Merriam-Webster.  

Overpopulation is not merely an imbalance between the number of individuals compared to the resources needed for survival, or a ratio of population over resources, or a function of the number or density of individuals, compared to the resources (i.e. food production) they need to survive. 

It is rather a situation of shortage of resources and elbow-room that must be caused by population, and not by other factors.   This is because such an imbalance may be caused by any number of other factors such as bad governance, war, corruption or endemic poverty.

Each human-crowding factor is felt  by human beings as an agitation, a gnawing and bothersome affect that is difficult to describe— until you venture to a pristine natural area, and begin to breathe deeply.   Then, you remember what you really want, and don't.

Please ask yourself; why are we choosing to drift aimlessly into this overcrowding?

Are we squeezing together to make room for the unfortunates of the world who have overpopulated themselves into a squeeze-play of their own choosing?

It may startle you to learn a basic truth; those nations already manifest what we move toward.  They planned no strategy for gentle population balancing, and neither do we.

What are we thinking?

In this fragile Republic that we call the United States, we participate in a grand experiment.  Until recently, the ride proved fun.  Of late, the elbow room to play diminishes…along with our creative-competitive energies. 

Our family lives take a severe beating, unnecessarily.

Is it reasonable to ask; when was the last time YOU dropped in to visit the staff in the office of your Member of the U.S. Congress to chat about rampant population explosion, and how that phenomenon harms your quality of life?   Did you plan your visit, and prepare a list of "suggestions" to leave there?

Your senator and House member entertain scores of visitors every month— nice folks who lobby FOR more and more people to join us.   Why do they do that?  Quite simple; because the members of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce employ them to do that lobbying, and pay them well.   

You and your fellow-passengers in the "U.S. Section" aboard Spaceship-Earth have a responsibility to "help" your elected and appointed representatives to maintain an even keel.   Without your active participation, your leaders will sell-out to big business.   You respond, "They won't do anything!"  Okay, then you run for Congress!  You become the change agent. 

How can you turn the horses and reign-in the unchecked population growth?  Is your 'peace-of-mind' and optimized quality-of-life worth the effort?

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