Save the Whales, Kill the Babies

By Frances Martel

America’s environmental lobby has grown desperate. Throughout the 1990s, when Hillary Clinton was President, foreign policy was the ongoing background joke to the sitcom that was the American federal government (memorable one-liners from that series included Waco, universal health insurance, the Rwandan genocide, and Monica Lewinsky). The Clinton’s interests were difficult to decipher, as their apparent goal became an assault on the wellbeing of every American and, later, the best interests of everyone on the planet. Thus went into the books eight years of history, where the President and his wife (co-President would be a more apt term) frisked about the White House grounds, creating mischief for subordinates and interns like a modern-day Zeus and Hera. With the worst interests of the people in mind, the political environment for the nature crowd was ideal.

Then any environmentalist’s worst nightmare came to life.

In the blink of an eye, they became passé, and the influence that had risen with the fall of the Berlin Wall crumbled at the base of the World Trade Center. They lost sympathy in the White House and became completely irrelevant to American concerns. They were relics America was more than ready to donate to the Clinton Presidential Library’s collection.

So, for a few years, they hired mercenary leftists like Jake Gyllenhaal to star in movies like “The Day After Tomorrow” and played Dr. Frankenstein on the political corpse of Al Gore, giving his eyes a faux twinkle a la Bill Clinton and his hips the salacious curves of Michael Moore. They remain perplexed that, somehow, the invasion of Afghanistan remains more important than the dwindling population of giant armadillos. They are in awe when the death of Saddam Hussein in Iraq attracts more attention than the death of Yan Yan the Panda in the Berlin Zoo.

“Surely this is a farce!” they exclaim to each other in horror, “The vast right-wing conspiracy has brainwashed Americans into caring about issues that affect human beings!”

The typically pacific environmentalists have chosen to go out with a bang, however, and their latest creation, the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, might be the last nail in their coffin. VHEMT (pronounced “vehement”- how clever and revolutionary!) calls for its members to remain childless, arguing that the damage human beings cause to the environment is so great that the world would be a much better place without us. And founder Les U. Knight- again, so clever I don’t know whether to laugh or cry- might be one of the more moderate members of the American extinction crew; he proposes it should be completely voluntary and occur within a time frame that is appropriate, while colleagues like author Alan Weisman propose the Chinese solution: a governmental mandate to prohibit families from having more than one child.

“Let’s unite in peace and love and not make any more kids” sounds like a great idea for Starbucks poets and basket weavers from sea to shining sea (Boston to San Francisco), but it might take the more sensible populace of the United States a little time to warm up to the idea. Not to mention that, upon suggesting this American genocide, they seem to be forgetting a significant chunk of the American population that will be at a complete loss when understanding their argument: the illegal aliens. How exactly, I wonder, will the nature lobby explain to Guadalupe from Mexico, who crossed the Rio Grande with four children in her arms and another in her womb at age 20, that “as long as there’s one breeding pair of homo sapiens, there’s too great a threat to the biosphere,” as Knight has been quoted as saying? How are they going to explain to Guaycoloro from Peru that he needs to sheathe himself with a condom before ravaging his wife after a drunken night on the town with his futból buddies or initiating an extramarital affair with a minor? Something tells me that Native South American culture is not particularly well suited to this idea of family planning in the name of nature, and culture shock is not something that should happen between residents of the same nation. If we really want to integrate these scorned and unwanted fiends- pardon me, completely faultless, angelic, and beloved newcomers, like child molesters Alejandro Bautista and murderer Jose Luis Rubi Nava- into our nation, we can’t be touting all these radical ideas that will only alienate them further from American society.

These undocumented immigrants are concerned about the environment

In fact, we should be adapting to the changing times. Any little alteration in our culture will be a formidable bridge upon which these undocumented immigrants can cross into our society. Despite the minor damage we will cause to nature by having more children, the open-arms approach to immigration that elevating the American population will usher in is sure to make those that disrespect the meaning of citizenship and come into this country to commit felonies feel just like they are back home. And when they acquire the right to vote, maybe they will vote for the reforms VHEMT and Weisman are calling for.

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