Generation of unrecycled waste by unchecked increase of population

Earth as a Shithole Planet -- from a Universal Perspective? (Part #4)

There is extensive debate about human overpopulation of Planet Earth. This is variously dismissed as a myth, given the purported capacity to distribute food and other resources, as well as envisaged technological adaptation to changing circumstances (Human Overpopulation: Still an Issue of Concern? Scientific American; Is Overpopulation a Myth? Science Alert, 30 December 2016; Overpopulation Is Not the Problem, The New York Times, 13 September 2013; How to debunk the myth of overpopulation in three easy steps, LifeSite News, 1 October 2013; Overpopulation is a Myth).

Considerable skill is exhibited in avoiding reasoned discussion of the overpopulation issue and of the difficulty of debating it effectively, as discussed separately (Institutionalized Shunning of Overpopulation Challenge: incommunicability of fundamentally inconvenient truth, 2008; United Nations Overpopulation Denial Conference: exploring the underside of climate change, 2009). As suggested by the latter there is a strange process of denial in play, reminiscent of that in relation to "shit" and to "shitting" (Laura Carroll, Why We Deny the Realities of Population Growth, The Huffington Post, 5 July 2013; By Rob Mielcarski, Overpopulation Denial, un-Denial, 25 March 2016; Anthony G Gordon, Why is everyone in denial over the problem of overpopulation? ResearchGate, 2014).

Far less is explicitly said about the generation of waste globally, as indicated above, especially including human waste. Succinctly stated, however, this is a case of "more mouths, more shit". This may be particularly problematic in countries lacking adequate sanitation facilities but characterized by unrestrained population growth. Without any racist implication, the countryside there has then to be used as a "shithole" -- literally. This suggests that framing arguments that overpopulation is a myth could themselves be characterized as "full of shit".

Rather than framing the question as to how many people can the Planet Earth hold, it could also be framed as how much waste can the planet hold? This is particularly pertinent given the effects of marine pollution on the fisheries already faced with a challenge of overfishing and fish stock depletion. The same might be said of the impacts on soil, notably as the quantity of agricultural land is diminished or variously rendered unsuitable for cultivation. The argument that civilization has the capacity to process that waste appropriately is proving to be as dubious as the argument that Europe can integrate refugees from countries which may well be qualified as "shitholes".

A more general case can be made in the light of the massive extinction of species on which humanity depends for its survival to an as yet unknown degree.

It can therefore be argued that the increase in the population is intimately related to the increase in the "shittiness" of the planet and its status as a "shithole planet".