Reaper's Due

 

I often talk about overpopulation problem. 

Despite what some naive and starry eyed 'moral' people want to believe, there is not enough food and other recourses on this planet to feed, clothe and house everyone.

Surely the so called Second Agricultural Revolution Green Revolution - Wikipedia allowed the world to go without major wars since WW II and its population to increase. However now we have reached the ceiling and we now experience the consequences.

High food prices, low rental availability and ever-increasing rental and housing process are all the symptoms of this.

There are too many people on this planet there is not enough stuff for everyone on it.

Therefore, someone has to die and vacate the space and resourses to the rest.

It is does not particularly matter who will die and how. However, they have to die.

In poetic terms Grim Reaper has to be paid his due.

Even one of the American Founding Father and President once said that "Tree of Liberty Must Be Refreshed With the Blood of Patriots and Tyrants"

Did Thomas Jefferson Say the Tree of Liberty Must Be Refreshed 'With the Blood of Patriots and Tyrants'? | Snopes.com 

Aztecs 

Back in the days Aztecs used to have a particular religion. 

According to their myth Nahuatl gods hold humanity in ransom and demand constant human sacrifices in order to avert end of the world.

So, Aztecs went to war to kill their enemies as a sacrifice to their gods and if they could not, they sacrificed some of their own people.

Principle was the certain number of people needed to be offered to the Grim Reaper.

When Spanish conquered Aztecs they converted them Christianity and Aztec religion now often used as an example of how cruel and primitive pagan believes can be.

However, while Aztecs gods themselves are not real. Principle behind them is.

Aztecs could not understand real reasons behind these problems: things such as overpopulation, recourse scarcity and such. However, at least their leaders and priests could understand that excessive population will end up causing problems in the long run.

When there is too many people and not enough food then everyone will starve. Life would be miserable. The longer it will continue, the worse it is going to get. In practice it will be like the End of the World as described in their myth. Life will no longer be liveable or enjoyable.

Most importantly people will die anyway. Just from starvation. The Reaper will get his due, one way or another.

Middle Age

Back in Middle Ages before Americas were discovered by Columbus, Black Death (plague) regularly ravaged the entire continent and regularly fed Grim Reaper, sparing Europeans the necessity of delivering death with their own hands.

Black Death - Wikipedia

Black Death was the phenomenon that kept the population numbers within sustainable numbers on the continent.

In fact, until development of vaccine in the 18th century mortality on the continent was high even after discovery of the Americas.

Vaccine - Wikipedia

Spanish Latin America

Nowadays Latin America is often poor and desperate. Brazilian Favellas and Venezuelan crisis are its modern realities. 

However, it was not always like that.

 

Back when Columbus Discovered Americas, it was a very rich land with untapped by European standards potential. Plenty of gold and silver as well as new unique recourses such as chocolate, cacao, tobacco and cotton.

Spanish were aware of areas of modern US and Canada, but just could not be bothered to settle there. Since up there was plain and boing and it was in the south where all the riches were.

South had gold and silver. Even crops grow better there in warm climate, and you can grow fruits that will not grow up north at all. Why bother with cold north?

And Spanish colonies of Latin America attracted lots of people who came to exploit these riches. Many stayed, their descendants, intermixed with locals and even imported Africans, are modern inhabitants.

It was so rich back them they will even bring in Africans to fully exploit it.

You can still see it in their colonial era architecture. There are not houses built by poor people. They are sophisticatedly decorated and clearly built by people who have plenty of surplus cash to splurge. They had them back in the days.

Then they reached their ceiling. Latin population became too large even for that fertile land to feed.

At first they thought that Spanish Crown takes too much from them. Bolivar led them in War of Independence. They became free and independent republics who all thrive now who are poor and misrable and people from there sometimes emigrate back to Spain.

Now they experiment with socialism and believe US exploits them.

All of that is nonsence. 

Overpopulation it the cause of all these ills.

It is economy, stupid.

The USA and Australia

However Reaper's due could still be delaied. North American and Australian lands were still awailable for settlement. Once they run out of better options they went for what is left.

If you tell a person in 1700 that life in Hudson Bay is better than in Orinoco delta or Lake Maracaibo, he would laugh hard and think you are insane. Yet 300 years later it is out reality.

Back in the days Dutch opted to keep what is now Suriname and hand over what is modern New York to the Brits. Nowadays New York is huge and rich. No one ever heard of Suriname.

So, until they run out of the free land in modern US and Canada by the end of the 19th century, we still could avoid major wars.

During 19th century the US absorbed surplus of continental population. 

At the base of Statue of Libery is it written: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free." 

That is a reference to the role the US used to play in the world. Via New York countless migrants came to the US and travelled further west to settle untapped lands in the west.

Manifest destiny - Wikipedia

As century progressed areas to the west of the original 13 states were settles with migrants. As these areas become populated enough, they stopped being territories and became states, admitted to the union.

However, at the turn of the century they finally reached the ocean on the other end of the US.

Fist California and then Arizona finally became states. There were no more free unsettled land anywhere further west or elsewhere.

Arizona became a last mainland 48th state of the US in 1912. Two years later began WW I.

World Wars

After Arizona became a state further surplus of people had nowhere to go and it had to be exterminated. Thus, WW I have started.

It is called Great War. Lots of people have died then. However, at the end of it all, once Reaper got his due, we got happy and affluent roaring 20s, Gilded Age with jazz, fancy Art Deco Art and other cool stuff.

Population grew again and that in turn culminated with Great Depression of the 30s, poverty, suicides and universal misery.

They wanted to avoid war during the 30s with all their desperate misguided dedication. Just like they desperately try to stop COVID nowadays. That only led to Stalinist Repressions, Holodomor and general raise of authoritarianism. Holodomor - Wikipedia

However, they could not do so.

WW II have happened anyway. 

Because it was delayed it was even Greater than the first one. It lasted longer and killed much more. Some fighting, like against Baltic Forest Brothers and Ukrainian Insurgent Army continued until 1954

The WW II have not started only because Hitler and Nazi are evil. People who think there would be no war if there was no Hitler are naive beyond any reason. There would just be someone else to start a war.

WW II killed enough and that allowed for another peaceful period.

Then Green Revolution kicked in and that allowed easy and happy 60s boomers love so much.

Conclusion

However now we reached another ceiling and Reaper has to be paid to avert pain and misery of austerity that will end up killing people anyway.

And we already have a solution.

COVID.

Instead of supressing it, we should embrace it.

Government special forces can spread the virus discreetly to infect the population, cull the numbers, pay the Reaper his due and finally allow us to stop surviving and start living.

So, embrace Corona-chan and let her pay the Reaper his due and fix the world for us.