Overpopulation is such a huge topic. It is taboo for so many people, and yet it is the number one problem on our planet. It seems like some people realize this, but they want to dance around the topic, or they feel like they are losing their rights as a human being if the population was controlled in any way, shape, or form.A big problem with this topic is the lack of education, which is essential to fixing this problem.
One approach to educate people on this topic is to be open about the reality, however, only in very small doses. One example of this could be that the traffic going into work was really backed-up one day, and you know good well that many of your coworkers were also stuck in the same traffic. After greeting them, you know this topic about the traffic is inevitably going to come up in conversation. Give them a small nudge, such as:
“the traffic was really bad this morning, too many people are moving here with their babies”
Or if you have a certain industry you work in, like for example the water supply, and you are working with coworkers on new water infrastructure for the city, because new neighborhoods are being built all around the city, and the city is struggling with budget to fund this new water infrastructure, give them another nudge, and say something like:
“All those people having babies are using up more water in the city”, or “everyone and their momma are moving to this city”, etc.
With more people more funding is required, the cities get so big and complex that they can’t deal with the growing population. These things require electricity, space, equipment; the funding can create debt, and for the most does; if debt already exists then more debt has to be created thus more loans and lack of funding due to paying off old debts.
The next thing that you could tell your barber about why the city is in debt, if the conversation came up for example, then you could say something like:
“Too many people are having kids that grow up and can’t find good jobs, and if they can’t contribute high taxes with high income, they are just making the problem worse.”
This approach is like an indirect way of mentioning the overpopulation problem, educating people in small doses, thus thinking about the problem more, or perhaps gradually as they hear more and more indirect comments that relate to this problem.
Over time, you will see fruit bear from this. Many may perhaps not comment, or just brush it off, but others will start to connect the dots, and will start up conversations, to which you can explain the gravity and reality of the problems of overpopulation.
One should not go too overboard with this small approach however, because you may drop a brick. One such example, one of my coworkers announced that he was having another baby while standing around a bunch of my other coworkers in the breakroom at work. I blurted out:
“Can you afford another baby?”
And he said:
“Uhhh… uhh…”
His face turned red, and one of my female coworkers shouted out
“I would have never said that!”
Then I felt bad for even bringing it up in such a way. It definitely was a rash expression, but it makes me chuckle just thinking about it, and I am still able to work with this coworker without any hard feelings.