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Article: Fertility panic and population decline.(Australia's situation)(Editorial)
- Article from:
- Quadrant
- Article date:
- September 1, 2002
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 Quadrant Magazine Company, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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THE PUBLIC DEBATE about the future of the Australian population, and the birthrate, has achieved unusual force in recent months. As is usual with such debates, rational analysis tends to be swamped by emotional urges, irrational fears, the barely disguised claims of privileged professional women to yet more privilege, and deliberate blindness to the future implications of unrestrained population growth. The fertility hounds are at it again, looking for ways to persuade, seduce, bully, bribe, chivvy, shame or force women into having more children, for the sake of the nation or to provide more souls for some God or other. But sooner or later humanity is going to have to face ...