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From deep inside your audio device of choice.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, there appears to be a rhythm, a cycle to everything, even, or especially, trends in the things that are supposed to scare us.

Good example is the suddenly current trend, at least in news coverage,

about something called natalism, otherwise known as humans have to have more babies fast.

Perhaps the most famous advocate and practitioner of this theory

is a man recently reported to have had at least four wives and at least, well, at last count, at least 14 children.

Yes, Elon Musk, but he's far from the only one. Natalists are popping up on the news like poppies in the California desert.

You know, like they pop. in the California desert.

You know, like they pop.

In the United States, births per woman are running under the replacement rate, we are told,

and our population is getting older.

And it's not just us.

All over the world, the birth rate is going down.

It's like we don't have nearly enough Elon's. Anyone above the age of puberty, though, probably remembers us being told that the population of humans is quickly

outpacing the ability of the planet's resources to support us. After all, never in human history

have there been this many of us,

some eight billion at last count.

Discussions of natalism often bring up the rising cost of having and raising kids,

but that's just the tip of the Berthburg.

In olden times and in poorer countries right now,

kids are an economic benefit.

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