The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement

[SilentScope001]

http://www.vhemt.org/

 

This is an political organization dedicated in convincing the human race to stop reproduction (you can still make love, just do it with birth control), thereby ending the human race and saving the Earth from us. Doing so would be the ulitmate showcasing of our superiority, by showing that we are willing to die in order to save something much more important than us. It seems like an interesting movement, but one doomed to utter failure. /shrugs.

 

The human race is growing far too much, and limiting the population may be futile. Evne if you do, they will still consume resources. If you invent technologies, that will consume resources, and you rely on plain luck, hoping that the new technologies will save the human race, when it is likely it won't. And moving to other planets after we trash Earth...well, we're going to likely destroy those other planets as well.

 

Doesn't seem like condoning eco-terrorism, altough I do fear comments by the founder of the movement which suggests he would desire a virus that would render infertile all humans so that they would be forced to choose extiniction. So much for voluntary. But for the most part, that seems an idle comment, and they are mostly going down the political route.

 

Okay, a quick challenge. Go to that site, read it, and then come up with an objection to it. The reason I ask? I read that site, I like it, and I want to find objections to that site so that I remain as netural as possible. I don't want to be biased towards VHEMT at all, so well, I hope we can get some good criticism that can knock this movement flat.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

While there is overpopulation in the world and this should probably be remedied, extinction is going a good deal of steps too far, and the whole site seems pretty poorly thought through.

 

We're not just a bunch of misanthropes and anti-social, Malthusian misfits, taking morbid delight whenever disaster strikes humans. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Voluntary human extinction is the humanitarian alternative to human disasters.

Nope. They're one and the same thing. Human extinction is the outcome of human disasters, if said disasters are severe and numerous enough. They wouldn't be opposites if their metaphorical lives depended on it.

 

Q: What is the official position of VHEMT?

 

Since the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement isn't alive with a brain or a mouth, it can't take positions or have opinions. It can't get into arguments, tell people what to do and think, nor get punched for doing so.

And yet this is what it is doing. Nice contradiction, saying that 'we have no official position, and that official position is that we think it'd be great if humans died out'.

 

When every human chooses to stop breeding, Earth's biosphere will be allowed to return to its former glory, and all remaining creatures will be free to live, die, evolve (if they believe in evolution), and will perhaps pass away, as so many of Nature's "experiments" have done throughout the eons.

If they're just 'experiments of Nature', why's it so bad that we're killing them? To first advocate human extinction to save these species, and for then to downplay their deaths this way, seems very contradictory.

 

The Movement is life-affirming and will benefit all life. We are not advocating suicide, nor an increase in human deaths.

Another contradiction: Does not human life count here? Are we not part of 'all life'? What's in it for us?

 

No reason to worry, though. It's basically just an abstinence movement with a fancy and scary web site, and we all know how successful they tend to be:D. Heck, these people know themselves they won't succeed:

It has been suggested that there are only two chances of everyone volunteering to stop breeding: slim and none.

A voluntary fight against windmills, as it were. I'm more worried by far about people who want to allow euthanasia and stop prevention of suicides.

[Web Rider]

Lets start with their mission statement:

Phasing out the human race by voluntarily ceasing to breed will allow Earth's biosphere to return to good health. Crowded conditions and resource shortages will improve as we become less dense.

 

Statistical truth, the fewer organisms using up resources, the better. However, this is equal reason to advocate the extinction of all non-human species on the planet. Since they wouldn't be using OUR recourses anymore, we'd naturally have more of them, right? but the argument that the earth will improve as there are fewer humans is impossible to prove because the number of humans is only increasing, and the earth's climate is not improving. So the opposite result is only a negative version of a mathematical function. Much like the concept of "white holes" are a direct positive balancing counterpart to black holes. But we haven't found any "white holes" yet, so the idea that less humans=better earth is only hypothetical. not to mention the concept in and of itself allows for the advocation of the destruction of all non-human life.

 

VHEMT (pronounced vehement) is a movement not an organization. It's a movement advanced by people who care about life on planet Earth. We're not just a bunch of misanthropes and anti-social, Malthusian misfits, taking morbid delight whenever disaster strikes humans. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Voluntary human extinction is the humanitarian alternative to human disasters.

 

Isn't there some argumentational fallacy of attacking the people with the opposite position? or, anyone who doesn't take your position? Obviously, people who only care for a particular kind of life on earth, EXACTLY the same as the people who would advocate an Abrahamic view(that the earth is here entirely for us to use and abuse) of human life and animal life.

 

And yes, they are correct that with fewer humans, when natural disasters strike, probability says that there is a smaller chance of something bad happening to them. but again, statistics are entirely what you want them to be.

 

We don't carry on about how the human race has shown itself to be a greedy, amoral parasite on the once-healthy face of this planet. That type of negativity offers no solution to the inexorable horrors which human activity is causing.

 

but you just did.

 

As VHEMT Volunteers know, the hopeful alternative to the extinction of millions of species of plants and animals is the voluntary extinction of one species: Homo sapiens... us.

 

why do they deserve to live and not us?

 

Each time another one of us decides to not add another one of us to the burgeoning billions already squatting on this ravaged planet, another ray of hope shines through the gloom.

 

read: everyone who doesn't do it our way is a bad person!

 

When every human chooses to stop breeding, Earth's biosphere will be allowed to return to its former glory, and all remaining creatures will be free to live, die, evolve (if they believe in evolution), and will perhaps pass away, as so many of Nature's "experiments" have done throughout the eons.

 

but humans of course, do not fall under this category because we're bad critters.

 

True, wildlife rapidly going extinct and 40,000 children dying each day are not laughing matters, but neither laughing nor bemoaning will change what's happening. We may as well have some fun as we work and play toward a better world.

 

again, numbers are exactly what you want them to be. Does not much of animal life not make it beyond the first few years? Or even the first few weeks? Many animals are known to smother the runts of the litter.

 

Besides, returning Earth to its natural splendor and ending needless suffering of humanity are happy thoughts -- no sense moping around in gloom and doom.

 

We have little to no idea what earth was like before humans, assuming it was better than it is now, the idea is sound, but that's only an assumption, not fact.

 

It has been suggested that there are only two chances of everyone volunteering to stop breeding: slim and none. The odds may be against preserving life on Earth, but the decision to stop reproducing is still the morally correct one. Indeed, the likelihood of our failure to avoid the massive die off which humanity is engineering is a very good reason to not sentence another of us to life. The future isn't what it used to be.

 

so much for not giving into the doom and gloom, read: life sucks, nobody wants to live in the horrible future, so lets all die now.

 

Even if our chances of succeeding were only one in a hundred, we would have to try. Giving up and allowing humanity to take its course is unconscionable. There is far too much at stake.

 

Assuming humanity's course is a bad one, I suppose that's true. However, neither they, nor I can see the future, we can imply what the future may be like from studying the past, but thats not a guarantee that we'll be right. Of the myriad of possible futures, they see only the worst ones. And their reaction is, like Hillary's to video games, a knee-jerk reaction.

 

After we've seen a few hundred TV dramas where the good guy kicks the bad guy's butt, it's tempting to look at the real world with this same knee jerk, zero-sum mentality. We might look for an enemy to attack when championing our righteous cause, but in reality our enemy doesn't have a butt to kick.

 

after you've already attacked those horrible doom and gloomers who are sentancing their children to a horrible fate of the future. Can I ride my white horse now? Or at least kick their soapbox out from under them?

 

In the end, the real "enemies" are human greed, ignorance, and oppression. We can achieve more by promoting generosity, awareness, and freedom than we can by vainly kicking at a buttless foe.

 

Great progress will be made toward improving the quality of life on Earth by countering greed with responsibility, ignorance with education, and oppression with freedom.

 

so human extinction isn't necessary, just societal change. I'm down with that. both rank up there in the '"slim to none" in their chances.

 

that's about 1/5th to 1/4th of their "about", I think that's enough holes for this post.

[MdKnightR]

See my posts about "The Planet Is Fine" by George Carlin in the thread about the global warming threat meter. This is pure BS.

[SilentScope001]

Thanks all for responding! Glad to always manitan an NPOV viewpoint!

[mimartin]

Glad to always manitan an NPOV viewpoint!

 

 

The extinction of the human species is not something a lot of humans will remain neutral about. Our entire existence since we set foot on this planet has been one of survival. Survival and procreation is the essences of whom and what we are. It actually seems to be two things that we are actually good at.

 

 

I’m all for protecting the environment, but for our future generation not because I want the cockroach to have a better way of way of life. I’m for voluntary population control, but not to the point of extinction.

[SilentScope001]

The extinction of the human species is not something a lot of humans will remain neutral about.

 

Well, true. I just desire to just hear both sides of an issue, rather than remain biased towards VHEMT or against it. I don't like taking sides for anything for that matter.

[Jae Onasi]

From a theistic point of view--we're all put here for a reason, so voluntary extinction is not an appropriate choice.

 

From an evolutionary point of view--we've evolved just like any other creature, and have just as much right to be here as any other creature. This is an extreme response to the problems that humanity creates. I'm sure there are other far better solutions than this. Besides, there may be things that the world needs from us as humans that no other creature or thing can provide. Assuming that we're bad for the world when we haven't even fully explored our risks and benefits to earth is rather presumptuous.

[Darth InSidious]

You remember that kid on the playground that no-one, but no-one liked? The one that pretended to have major problems but didn't?

 

It seems they've formed a club.

[John Galt]

those guys are schmucks. If they want to remove THEMSELVES from the gene pool, more power to 'em. However, the moment they try to do the same to anyone else against their will, they need to be shut down. immediately.

[Jae Onasi]

However, the moment they try to do the same to anyone else against their will, they need to be shut down. immediately.

Not to mention put in jail for murder/attempted murder.

[John Galt]

Not to mention put in jail for murder/attempted murder.

 

I was specifically referring to the "sterility virus" thing, but you do have a good point.

 

Besides, if they value nature so much, why can't they accept that (as per George Carlin) EVERYTHING people make is natural, because humanity is part of nature?

[Nancy Allen``]

I've been to that site before and in my mind, for them to want some type of virus that would effectively wipe out the human race, I'll put it this way: if they want to harmonise with nature they can go harmonise. Be dumped in the middle of nature with nothing at all and see how much they like it, how dangerous and indiscriminate nature is.

[PoiuyWired]

Well, I don't see anything voluntary about their ideas. At best, they should be considered bio-terrorists.

 

I mean, this is quite a bit different from the "get yourself neutered(by neutered I don't mean rip your balls off obviously, guys would reather die than be ballless) and you get a radio and 50 bucks" movement.

 

Granted, I dso think that the world is fare too over populated, and it would indeed be nice if people are to produce less spawnlings. If anything, there are more resources to go around for us to play with. Unfortunately it seems that only the more civilized parts of the world have caught on the the idea of breeding(for offsprings) less.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

From a theistic point of view--we're all put here for a reason, so voluntary extinction is not an appropriate choice.

Excluding the end-of-the-world cults:p.

[GarfieldJL]

You remember that kid on the playground that no-one, but no-one liked? The one that pretended to have major problems but didn't?

 

It seems they've formed a club.

 

 

Hey don't lump unpopular kids into this, seriously I wasn't exactly popular and I'm still not popular, but I think the idea of voluntary extinction to be stupid.

[LesUKnight]

You're right SilentScope 001, I don't advocate a virus that renders all male Homo sapiens sterile. That wouldn't be voluntary. We're not in favor of increasing human deaths and diseases. We're saying that the intentional creation of one more of us by anyone anywhere can't be justified -- at least not at this time. We're not advocating restrictions on breeding. Everyone who doesn't want to breed should have the freedom to not do so.

[John Galt]

You're right SilentScope 001, I don't advocate a virus that renders all male Homo sapiens sterile. That wouldn't be voluntary. We're not in favor of increasing human deaths and diseases. We're saying that the intentional creation of one more of us by anyone anywhere can't be justified -- at least not at this time. We're not advocating restrictions on breeding. Everyone who doesn't want to breed should have the freedom to not do so.

 

Last time I checked, we do have that freedom, at least in the US and presumably most (if not all) of the civilized world. The fact is that the desire to procreate is hard-wired into the human psyche, at least for most of us. If you don't want kids, that's fine, but attempting to take away others' freedom to procreate is, in my opinion, a despicable violation of individual rights.

 

Just my two cents.

[Web Rider]

You're right SilentScope 001, I don't advocate a virus that renders all male Homo sapiens sterile. That wouldn't be voluntary. We're not in favor of increasing human deaths and diseases. We're saying that the intentional creation of one more of us by anyone anywhere can't be justified -- at least not at this time. We're not advocating restrictions on breeding. Everyone who doesn't want to breed should have the freedom to not do so.

 

that's a short sighted policy. We can't justify reproducing now. But maybe later?

 

well, there won't be a later if there isn't a now. Not to mention, that all the people who would voluntarily participate, would be the people you WOULDNT want to not reproduce. Not to mention that the human body is only designed to be able to reproduce for a select number of years, so it's literally, do or die.

 

And: everyone who doesn't want to breed HAS the freedom, save freedom from natural urges, to not breed.

[SilentScope001]

You're right SilentScope 001, I don't advocate a virus that renders all male Homo sapiens sterile. That wouldn't be voluntary. We're not in favor of increasing human deaths and diseases. We're saying that the intentional creation of one more of us by anyone anywhere can't be justified -- at least not at this time. We're not advocating restrictions on breeding. Everyone who doesn't want to breed should have the freedom to not do so.

 

Good to know.

[Nancy Allen``]

I'm going to use as much of the planet's resources as I possibly can just to p--- these people off.

[John Galt]

I'm going to use as much of the planet's resources as I possibly can just to p--- these people off.

 

I think I will too.

 

So, wanna clear-cut a forest so we can barbecue a herd of buffalo? j/k.

[Web Rider]

I think I will too.

 

So, wanna clear-cut a forest so we can barbecue a herd of buffalo? j/k.

 

can we butcher some baby seals first?

[Darth InSidious]

Whaling trip, anyone?

 

[Jae Onasi]

Yeah, after we kill off a bunch of endangered birds, frogs, and other species, re-release CFCs into the atmosphere, and burn every drop of oil possible in the next 2 years, I think it'll be time to get back on topic....