Am I gay? Not particularly. I like to define myself as heterosexual with an open mind. I am straight, more or less, but I'm not gonna let something as silly as sexual orientation stand in the way of a good time.
I assume it means you are generally inclined toward the opp gender, but open to the possibility- not averse to it at all.
One could call it "slight bicuriosity", if that. It simply means that I suspect there may be a man, or a certain limited number of men, out there that I could potentially find attractive, and if I find myself with the opportunity and desire to get with one of these theoretical dudes, I wouldn't slam on the emergency breaks just because I suddenly remember I'm supposed to be hetero and heteros don't do that. Or to put it in other words, "straight until proven otherwise". And I do on rare occasion wonder what it might be like, but I don't go so far as to fantasize. That may be an expression of some sexual flexibility on my part, or it may simply be a function of my natural curiosity (I think about what lots of things might be like) or it could be the writery bits of my brain doing that thing where it tries to take on a new perspective. It could be all three. Just because I wear this more-or-less accurate label, that's not to say it couldn't be misplaced in a moment of passion. Okay, I've probably belaboured the point enough now
Am I gay? Well, no. However, I would say I am fairly asexual as a whole. Relationships hold no particular value or interest to me and one-night stands to me is effectively a wasted night. I mean, I could be alone and rather would like to be alone if I had my way - but some people find it offensive (who knows why? ) when I tell them I'd rather have the company of a book and sitting at home on my couch watching a movie, reading a book or stuffing my face with some beautifully good food. However, if it happens then so be it. Great for me I suppose?
Well, the results of the poll are in. This board is about twice as gay as the national average. I should have ask are you exclusively heterosexual? I really didn't expect any comments. If you're wondering about my opinion of gayness I think there are 7 billion people on the Earth. It can support about 1 billion. Anyone who would forgo reproduction should be applauded.
Actually, at peak efficiency converting arable land to plant production and converting land that can't be commercially sowed to pasture, then the Earth can support about 10 billion.
If you want to live stacked like a ball bearing. Maximum efficiency≠maximum happiness, in fact, it's pretty close to the inverse.
But again, according to the University of Texas, "The total land surface area of Earth is about 57,308,738 square miles, of which about 33% is desert and about 24% is mountainous. Subtracting this uninhabitable 57% (32,665,981 mi2) from the total land area leaves 24,642,757 square miles or 15.77 billion acres of habitable land." So even at 10 billion people, if we distributed it equally, then everyone could get an acre and a half each. Which sounds a lot less congested than downtown Tokyo... or Toronto even. This, too, is assuming that people can't live in deserts or mountains, which hopefully most people realize isn't exactly true, and you could probably even get some communities on offshore oil rigs which would free up some land, and people could start reclaiming land from the oceans like they did in The Netherlands, which may even happen naturally given the desalination plants needed to feed fresh water to the population will likely lower ocean levels some anyway.
I've lived in Japan for almost twenty years though, and I've seen the results of "maximum efficiency." Not that they've hit max, but Japan has a population density of 336\sq km. However, the real density is much higher, as only 27% (yes, I'm googling, not even going to pretend to know these numbers off the top of my head) of the land is occupied, the rest is too mountainous and prone to landslides. The Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto corridor has a density of 5200/square kilometer, and the average size of owned property (most of which is much larger than rental units) is ~122 sq meters. My apartment is a 3dk, which means it has three "bedrooms" and a dining kitchen. The total livable area (not counting bathroom, toilet, and a short hallway) is 18 tatami mats, which comes out to a little under 30 sq meters. It's okay for my wife and I, but not unusual for a Japanese family of four to live in the same space, with one bedroom used as a living room, one for the parents, and the kids (even mixed-gender teens) sharing the third. Plus, Japanese work ridiculous hours. If you ask them, they have a forty-hour workweek. "What time do you start?" "About eight thirty." "What time do you go home?" "About eight pm." "How long is your lunch?" "Thirty minutes." "How long do you spend on the train?" "An hour each way." "What about weekends?" "Oh, Saturdays are half days, we go home at three in the afternoon. And we don't have to work on Sundays." "How many national holidays are there?" "Fifteen, but our company doesn't take all of those." "How many vacation days do you get a year?" "Ten, but we aren't allowed to take them all at once. I usually don't take all of mine." Save for the commute, that's your "maximum efficiency" worker lifestyle right there, just enough time off to keep them from going uselessly crazy. We could do better if we substituted euthanasia for retirement and culled those unfit to work, but that's not on the table. Yet.
But I want some of that land to be wilderness. I want a LOT of that land to be wilderness. As much as possible, really. I live in a municipality with a population density of about 5 people per square kilometre, and that feels just about right, to me. Could we cut down some trees and increase the arable land, or at least use it for pasture? Yeah. But... why? (Not to say that I think homosexuality is a great solution to overpopulation. There's no reason straight people need to have babies just because they have sex, and there are a lot more straight people in the world, so I think our strategies should be aimed at them... increasing financial security and women's freedom does a hell of a lot to control the birth rate, and has other benefits as well!) ETA: 5 people per square km is about 1 person per 50 acres, if my math is correct. That's... still not quite enough land!
I read an interesting article once which studied homosexuality in nature among animals, mostly primates, and the conclusion was interesting and kinda cool: basically, not only is homosexuality natural, but it's vital. Essentially the findings were that the incidences of homosexuality increase disproportionate to the population, not exponentially, but far more than the law of averages would dictate, and what this seems to suggest is that homosexuality is a sort of natural defence mechanism against the dangers caused by a population explosion. Basically, it removes healthy adults from the breeding population, although they still assist with child rearing among their relatives. This helps prevent a situation where a population boom causes the species to destroy its own environment and then die off. And guess which species is the most population explosiony? Yup, good ole homo sapiens. Long story short: In the gays, we will find our salvation. Or at least that seems to be what mother nature intended. So anyone who says homosexuality is wrong ... might well just be wrong. Not just morally, but scientifically too, which is awesome!
Yeah, me too, but given the choice between that and death, I have a feeling I know what most people would choose.
MY death, or someone else's death? (But really, how about just non-birth? Is THAT too much to ask?!?)
We don't need to enforce it and we don't need to decide. If we promote income equality and gender equality, the birth rate drops like magic. Most western countries aren't producing enough babies to maintain their current populations without immigration. That's GOOD!
I agree, but globally, we're still above a replacement rate, and the lower replacement rate in Western countries has a lot to do with our culture. But when we bring people into a country, it can be assumed that they come from a nation that has a higher fertility rate, and it can also be assumed that they have their own culture that allows for that higher fertility rate, and, again, we can assume that they will bring some vestiges of that culture across the border with them. So, allowing for cultural changes in western society due to an influx of immigrants, our fertility rate may go up again in the near future. Who knows, either way, even if the Earth can support 10 billion, at our current rate we've only got like 30 years before we outstrip that, and barring some other agricultural revolution, we're in for one heck of a Malthusian check.
It's not just a question of people moving to the west and adopting our culture. Even within their "home" countries, the more education women have, the fewer children they have. "In Mali, women with secondary education or higher have an average of three children; those who don’t go to school have an average of seven." https://slate.com/technology/2014/04/educate-women-and-save-babies-how-to-control-population-and-end-hunger.html" ",,,in 1991, 57% of girls completed primary school in Ghana and the fertility rate was 5.5. Twenty years later, in 2011, 91% of girls completed primary school and the fertility rate was 4.1." "In India, improved education of women in the early 1970s resulted in voluntary fertility declines in the Indian state of Kerala. Kerala had a population density three times the average Indian state, but the state government invested in universal education and provided greater access to family planning and, by 1989, the fertility rates there had fallen to the second lowest in the country." https://newint.org/blog/2014/07/08/education-women-fertility "...the one proven way to reduce fertility rates is to empower young women by educating them." https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-women-can-save-the-planet/ And in terms of poverty... "Over the last two decades, reduced levels of extreme poverty in numerous countries, including Guatemala, Cambodia, and Namibia, has coincided with a decrease in average family size to about half." https://borgenproject.org/birth-rates-decrease-as-people-rise-out-of-poverty/ "Poverty does cause population growth and population growth does cause poverty. " (case study at link) http://donellameadows.org/archives/poverty-causes-population-growth-causes-poverty/ etc. It's not about bringing people to the west and expecting them to adapt; it's making some basic changes to their lives, wherever they live, and watching the birth rate fall as a consequence.
I think you inadvertently started a permanent thread. I hope it sticks around with the likes of "The Happiness Thread", "What are you reading" and "Share your first three sentences." See if you can get a mod to change it to "The Are You Gay? Thread". There are enough answers to that question to sustain it for years. Also, 13.3% isn't that high. Accepted numbers are in the 9-11% range, and that only includes people who are mid to high range on the Kinsey Scale. I also imagine more straight folks were indifferent to the question than those in the sexual minority, so the real numbers on WF are probably lower in reality due to non-participation of disinterested heteros. That's just a guess.
So you're saying the biggest problem with overpopulation isn't that the Earth can't handle large volumes of us, it's that humanity in general is too screwed up to effectively handle the problem? Because I agree with that entirely.
