I love it when radical environmentalists come right out and say what they’re thinking. Some UK outfit called the “Optimum Population Trust” is urging Britons to stop at two children in order to combat global warming. John Guillebaud is the co-chairman of the organization and also “emeritus professor of family planning at University College London.” He gives Al Gore a run for his money when it comes to overheated rhetoric: “The greatest thing anyone in Britain could do to help the future of the planet would be to have one less child.”

Of course, the conclusion follows logically from a misanthropic but quite popular assumption: human beings are basically consumers and despoilers, not producers and creators. We’re the problem, not the solution. Given this apparently indisputable truth, why encourage even two kids? Why not encourage just one, or none? Perhaps the OPT is being as wise as serpents, and recommending the two child policy as merely a starting point, you know, just to get the conversation going…

What’s troubling is not that some academic in Britain says crazy things. What’s troubling is that, since his logic follows from assumptions widely held on the environmental left, given enough time, the culture–and the state–could easily begin to treat childbearing as a crime. Check out the detailed OPT website for a vision of the future if the extremists prevail.