Bioethicist Wants to Tax Parenthood

Saving the planet is all the rage these days. Now, an Australian bioethicist wants to charge people a carbon tax for having children. The money would be used to plant trees as an offset to the global warming that the new children would allegedly cause. From the story:

Professor Walters, clinical associate professor of obstetric medicine at the University of Western Australia and the King Edward Memorial Hospital in Perth, called for condoms and “greenhouse-friendly” services such as sterilisation procedures to earn carbon credits.

And he implied the Federal Government should ditch the $4133 baby bonus and consider population controls like those in China and India.

Let’s see: China and India have terrible problem with sex selection abortions and China also has an infanticide problem. Moreover, in other contexts we are told by many bioethicists that reproducing is a fundamental right by whatever means desired by whomever might wish to become parents.

Global warming has become a catchall for policies people would be pursuing anyway based on ideology. Or to put it another way: What a crock.