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There are a lot of flavors of "pro-natalist". For example Elon Musk is a "pro-natalist" but he seems to clear favor white Christian people and himself especial
by bhouston 7mo ago
There are a lot of flavors of "pro-natalist". For example Elon Musk is a "pro-natalist" but he seems to clear favor white Christian people and himself especially. Others are pro-natalist but have a general eugenics bent, rather than just white/Christian supremacy. And then others are pro-natalist in a more general sense, in that our culture in general should encourage at least rough replacement levels of fertility so that that we should avoid a population collapse.
- wahnfrieden 7mo agoSome seem to use it as cover for being predators. Musk exposed his genitals to an employee without their consent, in a confined space without ability to escape, for instance.
- graemep 7mo agoChristian? Musk says he is not religious. He has said he is a "cultural christian" - a description also used of themselves by a lot of people ranging from Richard Dawkins to Anders Breivik. https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2024/1218/elon-musk-cultural-christian-richard-dawkins https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2024/1218/elon-musk-cu...
- ben_w 7mo agoThat would still match "[favouring] white Christian people". Or at least that part matches the "Christian" part, the other stuff Musk associates with seems to suggest at least some racial (and not simply cultural) biases in his thinking, e.g. how he regards DEI as being a promotion of undeserving people rather than a way to give equal opportunities to deserving people who are demonstrably under-represented given their qualifications.
- graemep 7mo agoOn that basis Richard Dawkins matches the Christian part.
- ben_w 7mo agoIt is entirely unimportant how Richard Dawkins is categorised, isn't it? Last I checked, the "pro-natalist" part isn't there for Dawkins, so how other things modify a pro-natalist stance don't connect to anything.
- graemep 7mo agoI am suggesting that a definition of "Christian" that includes Richard Dawkins is flawed.
- ben_w 7mo agoYou're the one who chose to combine Musk and Dawkins in the same group here with "cultural christian", that's absolutely a straw man if this is what you're doing. I mean, your own link up there has a sub-heading of "Everyone has their own definition". Especially when you're replying to "he seems to clear favor white Christian people and himself especially" rather than "is a Christian". Queen Victoria wasn't a feminist, neither.
- graemep 7mo agoYou are saying they are Christian in the same sense of being "cultural Christians" rather than actual Christians. if you say one is a Christian it follows that the other is a Christian. The point is that given Musk is clearly not an actual Christian he cannot favour Christians "himself included".
- delecti 7mo agoI don't think those groups are as distinct as you're implying, certainly not in the US. I think there is considerable overlap, in the form of people who believe in the "Great Replacement" conspiracy theory. Essentially "we need to make sure there are enough white babies so that white people can outbreed <insert preferred minority scapegoat>." That thought is inherently eugenicist because it implicitly holds that white people are "better" in some way. "Christian" is also often implicit in "white babies," especially in contrast to Muslim or Jewish people being a common choices of scapegoat.
- ryandrake 7mo agoThe Christian "Quiverfull"[1] movement embodies that "Out-Breeding The Others" idea. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiverfull https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiverfull
- bhouston 7mo agoI guess I would like a distinction because I personally would like to avoid population collapse, thus I am pro-natalist in wanting a replacement level fertility, and I would prefer if that fertility was well distributed rather than highly concentrated in the most conservative religious folk. I do fear what will happen if we continue to shrink, it has to stop somewhere.
- delecti 7mo agoThat's why I specified the US, where the population is still growing, and the remnants/echoes of the baby boom aren't as stark. I don't think it looks like we're headed for population collapse, and if we are, it's far enough in the future to course correct pretty gently. I have less insight into the culture of natalists in countries like Japan or South Korea where their population pyramids are heavily inverted. I don't know what they're doing to address their age demographic issues, nor do I have any ideas for what they should do.