We need to talk about population overshoot | Letter

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Your article linking the decreasing birthrate with our housing crisis was infuriating to anyone familiar with the escalating global ecosystems collapse (Want to boost the UK’s birthrate? Fix the housing crisis, research suggests, 1 April). Recent research funded by Population Matters confirms that a sustainable global human population would be 2.5 billion. The Earth Overshoot website reveals that Britain is overpopulated by nearly 50 million.

Growth economics, wealth inequality, patriarchy, colonialism, military supremacy, nationalism and pronatalism are all unwise behaviour patterns in global ecosystems collapse. These can all be categorised as a “fluency” response from our limbic system. Our limbic response is the reason that these unwise behaviour patterns persist; they bypass our critical thinking.

There are wiser social paradigms trying to emerge to replace the ecocidal norms of the past. Eco-aware family planning and economic degrowth are two of the emergent paradigms. Until we can talk honestly about population overshoot, the conversation will always degenerate into racist discussions about immigration.
Barbara Williams
Yarnton, Oxfordshire