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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 13, 2023

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An aging species tries to save itself

We begin with Do It For Denmark. The angle in this ad campaign is sex. Don't you want to have sex? No? Well, do it for your country, or at least your mother, who wants grandchildren. We'll also throw in a travel discount for a romantic holiday getaway, where you will hopefully have sex. Of course, the declining appeal of sex is probably not the main cause of declining birth rates.

Like Denmark, Iran also has a fertility rate of around 1.7, but of course we find a more conservative version of the exhortation to build a family in this ad from an Iranian cultural center. The sell now focuses on the benefits of a tradwife: she'll replace your alarm clock, cook you healthy meals, and give you children. I guess they saw no need for an ad on the benefits of a tradhusband.

For the most direct and honest appeal we turn to Taiwan, whose fertility rate of 1.0-1.2 portends a crisis possibly even worse than the much-discussed demographics of its belligerent neighbor. To a soundtrack that tries to be hopeful, this PSA from the Taiwanese ministry of education, which I recommend watching, pleads its case:

Once upon a time, building a family [/ settling down] meant that the man got a second mother [a wife cooks in the kitchen], while the woman had to leave her parents' home [to join the multigenerational household of her husband]. It took many years for her to realize she could search for her own voice ... outside marriage [they return their wedding rings in a bittersweet farewell].

One upon a time, building a family [/ settling down] meant the man's domain was outside the home, and the woman's inside. So they ended up living in separate worlds [split screen: woman waits on the sofa while the man works late]. But sometimes, all it took to break down conventional roles [man pushing a stroller with his son] ... was a chance. [Text: More and more men are taking paternity leave.]

Once upon a time, building a family meant rushing [to have kids], as if to wait was to waste [her] youth / prime years [pregnant woman hands her boss her notice of leave].

[Text advertises increased government assistance for fertility issues.]

When we've learned to better empathize with others, we've become stronger supporters of each other [happy gay couple]. And behind every step of progress we make [happy lesbian couple] ... are countless clashes and acts of persuasion. [Text: paternal benefits are also open to same-sex couples.]

Although things aren't perfect, over the decades we've seen more and more ways to build a family [group of happy young people at a restaurant]. And of course that includes starting a family while single [woman walks alone at night]. Because in a democratic society, everyone has the right to decide how they want to live their life.

[A couple takes care of their baby. The camera lingers on a pamphlet: "From 0 to 6 years old: raising a kid together with your country."]

With gender education [?] and environmental awareness as our starting point, let's work together as a society to do our "homework": raising the next generation. [Montage of different kinds of families.] We promise to work even harder to take care of more families, and make it normal and comfortable for everyone to ...

[final screen with slogan] choose to build a family, together.

I don't know about you, but the earnestness and sheer desperation in this plea really broke me down. And I have no reason to think the whole project isn't exactly that: an act of desperation.

I think this belongs squarely in the 'raising awareness' category of government activity. Governments raise awareness about obesity, mental health, cancer and so on - it does basically nothing.

On the other hand, there are actual kinetic, physical actions.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/41487443

From the abstract of this article, it cost the government about Aus $ 126,000 per new birth in its fertility spending program (giving $3000 to women who have children). Accounting for inflation, that sums to about US $ 118,417.10 2022.

So if Taiwan wants to double its fertility (which I'll take to be that of 2019 pre-COVID, 177,767) births, it would cost somewhere around $21,050,634,839 per annum, or about 2.5% of GDP. That's more than they spend on defense, so they're at least consistent about ignoring all threats to national existence. Anyway this naively assumes the effect scales, which it probably won't seeing as many Taiwanese women are too old to have children or too rich to care about a few thousand here or there. There'd be some dysgenics too.

Only a massive spending program is going to have any significant effect. Alternately, there are more unconventional options like organizing social credit for parents (such that they're priveliged in education and workforce), suppressing contraception, placing caps on women entering higher education and so on. My suspicion is that the ultra-nerdy East Asian youth would instantly start having children if it meant they'd better be able to get into prestigious universities. The amount of effort that goes into education there is ridiculous. But nobody has bothered trying this. Perhaps it's a case of 'you know who else tried raising their country's fertility by encouraging mothers to have children?'

Real desperation is when states start taking serious action.

You might be the first person on the planet to suggest that Asians are too concerned with not copying Hitler.

I was mostly thinking about the West in that bit, that obviously doesn't come through in what I wrote. Anyway, it's striking how important demography and race was to Hitler's thinking. The whole objective of the war was to acquire land to fit more Germans on, ensure that there were as many Germans as possible. Population is power as far as he was concerned. But today, there's this schizophrenic thinking about demography where some countries like Canada and Australia want to massively increase their populations by immigration even as they artificially restrict and complicate housing, as they propagate memes about overpopulation. It's made out to be virtuous not to have children due to climate change. The notion that population is power seems to be very fringe, there's only that 'One Billion Americans' book.

China goes around calling the West racist for police brutality against blacks. They bring in tens of thousands of Africans to Chinese universities. They actually conducted a mass sterilization/infanticide program of their own people in the One Child Policy. Their rhetoric and their official policy are diametrically anti-Hitler. It's funny since China is probably the closest thing ideologically today to fascism but without any of the racial or eugenic angles. They've got the corporatism, the party-state and the national rejuvenation/revanchism elements.

China goes around calling the West racist for police brutality against blacks.

As did the Nazis, with the same motives.

I remember that Spike Lee movie where some waiting Germans tried a "Berlin Betty" kind of thing on an advancing black troop.