Unusual Organizations Pt 3

The Church of Euthanasia, hailing from Boston, MA, is by far the most unusual – and disconcerting – organization I’ve found so far. (Do not visit their site if you take umbrage to the juxtaposition of porn, 9/11 footage, and explicit lyrics.)

Dedicated to stemming what it perceives as an overpopulation of Earth, this group’s single commandment is “Thou shalt not procreate”, its slogan is “Save the Planet, Kill Yourself”, and its four pillars are “suicide, abortion, cannibalism, and sodomy” (the latter broadly defined as any non-procreative sex act).

The Church has been kind enough to provide a ticker, counting the new mouths emerging into our world demanding to be fed. Also, they provide an emergency contraception phone number.

Should the Church of Euthanasia be taken seriously? My feeling is that the problem they address should be taken seriously, but their proposed solutions? Perhaps not so much. Abortion and “sodomy” (non-procreative sex) are, I believe, morally valid behavior and pragmatically valid techniques of preventing overpopulation. After all, the only methods are to increase the resource base or to decrease the stress on those resources, and I think a two-pronged approach is best.

Cannibalism and suicide are far more ethically and philosophically convoluted. On the one hand, it could be argued that anyone who warns against overpopulation contradicts him- or herself by NOT committing suicide. After all, “if you want to change the world, start with yourself”. (Of course, this goes for the entire Church of Euthanasia, as well.) This would be sort of like an advocate of honesty telling lies all the time. On the other hand, suicide is probably morally inadvisable and practically not very feasible (since not everyone can commit suicide and most people would rather not, who should and who shouldn’t?), particularly because effective contraception and abortion would render it wholly unnecessary.

Cannibalism is perhaps the most interesting of the Church of Euthanasia’s “pillars”. For staving off overpopulation, it would be marvelously efficient: we could rid the world of mouths to feed AND feed the remaining mouths at the same time. Talk about net gain! (Note: I’m thinking like an economist here, not an ethicist. Yes, I believe it’s necessary to be both as often as possible, but these things must be considered thoroughly.)

More interesting still is the fact that, as far as I can tell, cannibalism already takes place, even if it doesn’t take the obvious form of people literally eating human flesh. Cannibalism can be broadly defined as the consumption by one person of another person’s energy. Isn’t this exactly what happens when babies suck at nipples, when slaves are driven under the whip, etc.? In other words, whenever one person benefits from the labor of another, isn’t that cannibalism, albeit at a slightly higher, less visible level? (I suppose the exchange would have to be “zero-sum” to count as cannibalistic; this isn’t a very refined discussion. Just food for thought. Er…)

Ultimately, I think the strongest reason not to take the Church of Euthanasia seriously is their conspicuous failure to even mention one of the most effective – and certainly the most morally and practically beneficial – option in regard to preventing overpopulation, i.e., to downsize and restructure production-consumption patterns, particularly in MDCs and between MDCs and LDCs. This, it seems to me, is the keystone of any welfare-conservation policy.