by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Writer
(Feb. 13, 2008) One of the most under-reported news stories in the secular media today is the effect of the decline of the human family on global population rates. But a new documentary by experts from around the world is about to make headlines.
Demographic Winter: The Decline of the Human Family, which is being released on DVD today, seeks to reawaken society to the importance of the stable, intact family by calling attention to the grim results of its global decline.
• At present, no European nation has replacement-level birthrates. If this trend continues, these countries will lose half of their people in every generation.
• In Europe, the number of children under five has declined by 36 percent since 1960. Worldwide, there are six million fewer children age six and under than there were in 1990. If the current trend continues, the world will have 248 million fewer children by 2050.
• By the mid-point of this century, 16 percent of the world’s population will be over 65. China will have 400 million elderly citizens by 2040.
• Russia’s birthrate fell from 2.4 in 1990 to 1.7 today, a decline of more than 50 percent in less than 20 years. Each year, there are more abortions than live births in the Russian Federation.
• Even though the U.S. fertility rate is at replacement level, this is only due to higher immigrant birthrates. All of the trends that have led to the demographic decline of Europe are present in the U.S. today: high divorce rates, the rise of cohabitation, families putting off procreation to pursue careers, an anti-family culture and voluntary childlessness.
Backed by prominent pro-life organizations such as the Heritage Foundation, Family Research Council, World Congress of Families and the Latin American Alliance for the Family, the film was produced by award winning director Rick Stout who began filming at the World Congress of Families IV in Warsaw, Poland in May, 2007.
Stout was given access to expert sociologists, demographers, economists, psychologists, as well as government and religious representatives. Hundreds of interviews resulted in a film packed with information about where the world is headed if it doesn’t take another look at the importance of the family.
“When the great social experiment of the 1960’s were launched, and when concern over a ‘population bomb’ loomed large, we did not have the social science and economic studies we have available to us today,” say the experts. “So the world embarked unknowingly on a selfdestructive course.”
This film aims to educate as many people as possible and is being made available to educational television networks, selected theaters, on-campus screenings, and through traditional video and book stores.
For more information, visit the website at www.demographicwinter.com
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