Posted on 07/14/2018 1:16:41 PM PDT by Mrs. Don-o
Family planning advocates are working hard to position contraceptives as the key to achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As an event on Tuesday demonstrated, however, their arguments collapse under closer scrutiny.
The Wilson Center event was the third in a series focusing on the benefits of family planning for peace and security, societal resilience, and global development. Similar to previous events, the panelists stressed the importance of access to family planning and estimated the cost savings of reductions in fertility, but glossed over how to push more contraceptives in a world approaching market saturation.
In a departure from the event’s theme, keynote speaker Peter McPherson, former head of USAID, provided a brief history of the agency’s family planning work, focusing on his tenure during the Reagan administration. He recounted a telephone call with Mother Teresa, in which she urged him to “protect the unborn.” In contrast, he recalled how then-Planned Parenthood president Faye Wattleton, upset by the exclusion of abortion from family planning programs, paid for large advertisements on D.C. buses saying, “Administrator McPherson Kills Women.” He said Wattleton’s campaign, “absolutely cemented” his position in the White House because “Reagan thought [the signs] were great.”
Jay Gribble, deputy director of the Health Policy Plus Project, argued that investment in family planning would help to meet several of the SDGs, and discussed a USAID-sponsored tool to help advocates make the case for family planning based on multiple goals. He estimated that Malawi, for instance, could achieve between 60% and 68% contraceptive prevalence by 2020. Yet he did not explain how this increase in use can be achieved, especially given that only 2% of Malawian women with “unmet need” claim a lack of access to family planning,
Cornell professor Parfait Eloundou-Enyegue, noted that some have questioned whether there is a demand for family planning. He asserted that there is a demand, particularly among youth, if you broaden the definition to encompass “life planning” apart from just planning births. However, when a young man in the audience later asked what specific programming exists for young people to plan their lives apart from not getting pregnant Eloundou-Enyegue admitted, “precious little.”
Eloundou-Enyegue noted the broad agreement of the audience in favor of family planning, referring to his presentation as “preaching to the choir.” Even so, several attendees commented on what they perceived as a pervasive “dump on Africa” tone to the event.
Marlene Lee of the Population Reference Bureau spoke about the “demographic dividend” and stressed the fact that it is not automatic and depends on a variety of factors, including corruption, good governance, and the education of the emerging workforce.
Later in the discussion, Gribble pointed out that “the demographic dividend got picked up by family planning advocates because it was a way to get people outside of the health sector to say, ‘Oh, this stuff isn’t so bad after all, its going to help us get wealthier.’” He noted, however, that the concept has been greatly oversimplified at the expense of its economic and governance aspects.
Gribble quipped, “when it’s a group of family planning people, it doesn’t matter what the question is, family planning is always part of the answer.”
Really puts the AIDS in International Aid.
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At this pint in my life I believe most problems are created by humans - so yes less humans equals less problems.
Contraception and sterilization more humane and a softer solution to the problem of White pre-eminence in the world than violent extermination.
No matter the question?
Will Hillary run in 2020?
Who was McCain’s ‘girlfriend’ in the Hanoi Hilton?
Give every house electricity and the birth rate falls immediately. Capitalism is the solution. The higher a countries KW per capita. The lower the birth rate.
Oh, Gates and his liberal white globalist elites aren’t racist, even though they want all darker hued folks to stop reproducing...no, couldn’t be, he and Melinda just care deeply about the planet...
Sarcasm off
Ah, the humanitarian possibilities in the neutron bomb! The Final Solution!
But God has put precious possibilities in every human person.
They haven’t halved the population of Earth yet, but it’s not for lack of trying.
Those are good questions!
“Family planning advocates are working hard to position contraceptives as the key to achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).”
SDG aka Agenda 21 aka Agenda 2030. Don’t worry. You will love living in high density apartment and housing next to rail tracks. No you won’t need a car either. We gotta save to yellow belly snot sucking snails and that is why it is necessary to vacate rural housing and villages. If you think this is BS go to any fair size city and see if there is not a ton of construction of high density housing going on next to rail tracks.
Remove electric lights, then, and Europoid civilization will survive.
The problem of White pre-eminence?
What?
But don't worry, all of Europe is closing in on self-extermination.
Less humans also means less solutions.
The world of the future will be ran by a small population of skilled technicians who put in 10-hour work weeks only to ensure the machines stay running and spend the remainder of their time in scholarly pursuit and leisure.
There will be no need for billions of unskilled, illiterate masses, dependent entirely on the generosity of the skilled and educated, who know only how to procreate, eat food that was given to them, murder, and steal.
Getting from here to there is going to be interesting.
Exactly!
When God indicated in Scripture that children are a “blessing from the Lord”, He did so with full awareness that a lot of them would grow up to be jerks and it didn’t change His mind.
Wait. Who chose this? Anybody?
You mean I don't get a choice?
No matter the question (to the left), the answer is always abortion, amnesty and open boarders.
Oh, you'll get a choice. We all will.
Neuter all immigrants to Europe and the problem will be solved in several ways.
“Sustainable” is the new Fascism from the radical left.
It’s everywhere on College campi, failing churches, and leftist governments.
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