So a European man is accused of slamming African women for birthing too many children, and we have:
1) reverse causality (large families cause underdevelopment not the other way around) implicitly agreed to by many, who agree with him in some way or another
2) white feminists blaming how oppressive, scary, rapey, black men are
3) conservative/capitalists blaming aid, grants etc (despite evidence that women do not, in fact, breed for grants)
4) racists (taking 3 & 4 to new levels) saying things like “the more we feed them the more they breed”
5)…
All of these ignore facts, confuse correlation for causation, reverse the direction of causation, ignore nuance and difference across “Africa”, ignore what #Macron *actually said*, and use the heat of a contentious moment to advance whatever pet prejudice they hold most dearly.
I’ve seen a fair bit debunking these racist and confused claims, but very little on the values of the whole system that even sees number of children some sort of “right” won with wealth. At what GDP/capita or household income does one earn the “right” to have 1, 2, 3, 4, etc children?
Where do the actual living children come into this discussion? The emphasis is all on their parents, and, in some instances, on the “system” that creates these parents…
I think its a values discussion that needs to be turned on its head. I’m for granting rights and agency as a default rather than removing rights as a default in how we approach contentious issues.
In this debate, that changes the narrative from “if you can’t afford to educate/clothe/feed your child, don’t have one (and this is why some still do)” to granting the right to all **children** (note the emphasis on the child, not the parent here) to quality education and nourishment… how would we structure schools, food supply, health care as a society if that was our default setting?
