Mosher played an important role in exposing the abuses associated with China’s “one-child” policy. In his latest book he tells us that China does not have a monopoly on population control-driven fanaticism and even cruelty …
… What Mosher calls “costs” were not limited to overt human-rights abuses. Around the world, money that should have gone to primary health care was diverted to population-control programs: African doctors report facilities filled with condoms and contraceptives while antibiotics and sterile needles were unavailable.
The abuses and tragedies chronicled by Mosher, which I will discuss over the next couple of days, is an infuriating but strong example of why worldviews matter. What was done to people around the developing world proceeded directly from ideas about the dignity and worth of human life – or, the lack thereof.
Charles Colson, “Population Control and Human Dignity” Catholic Exchange, 3 September 2008, http://catholicexchange.com/2008/09/03/113661/
As Steve Mosher, president of the far-right Population Research institute (an instrumental force in cutting off funding to the United Nations Population Fund for the past7 years), told me, the United States has no business promoting family planning to developing nations women because the government, when involving itself in matters of reproduction, must always “err on the side of caution” when it comes to the beginning of life. Now that this comprehensive anti-choice position has seemingly been embraced by the HHS, medical establishments may be forced to “err” on the side of the religious far right and abandon the long-recognized definitions and standards of their own practice when it comes not just to the beginnings of life, but also to the care of their patients.
Kathryn Joyce, “Contraception Foes With Friends in High Places,” Beacon Broadside, 19 September 2008, http://www.beaconbroadside.com/broadside/2008/09/contraception-f.html
The claim that big families take a roll on resources is a fallacy because if people are educated and have equal access to jobs and business opportunities, they become engines of economic growth. Human resource has made China (population: over 1.3 billion) and India (1.1 billion) major players in the elite nations of the world. On the other hand, Italy (0.2 percent population growth), Spain, Poland, Austria and Ireland (0.3 percent) France (0.7 percent), face staggering problems brought about by a graying population.
“Population growth is a multiplier of wealth; it is a driver of economic growth and creates opportunities for entrepreneurs,” states Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute and long-time critic of United Nations policies that attack population growth in poor countries. Mosher stressed one need only to “cast a glance at dying Europe or moribund Japan, to be proven wrong.”
Malou Guanzon-Apalisok, “why blame family size?” Cebu Daily News, 2 October 2008, http://globalnation.inquirer.net/cebudailynews/opinion/view/20081002-164186/Why-blame-family-size
Steve Mosher, President of the Front Royal, Virginia-based Population Research Institute, spoke with CNA in a Thursday e-mail interview about sex selection in India.
“The laws against sex-selective abortion in India are almost impossible to enforce,” he said. “The preference for sons is extremely strong in India. Many girl children are killed in utero by sex-selective abortion in order that their parents do not have to pay a bride price, as is the Hindu custom.”
Mosher said sex selective abortion is “virtually unknown” in the former Portuguese colony of Goa and in the state of Kerala, areas which Mosher said are “heavily Catholic.” He explained that Kerala is Catholic because of the efforts oil St. Francis Xavier.
“Microsoft and Google pull sex selection product ads after India complaint” Catholic News Agency, 18 September 2008, http://catholic-newsagency.com/new.php?n=13843
In a startling edition of his Break-Point column, Chuck Colson examines the conclusions of Steven Mosher of the Population Research Institute. Mosher contends that the African AIDS epidemic is not the fault of “backward” and “promiscuous” Third World people, but of western activists and researchers pressing particular AIDS agendas.
Lynn Vincent, “African AIDS, American politics” Worldmag.com, 8 September 2008, http://online.worldmag.com/2008/09/08african-aids-american-politics/
