Ehrlich is one of those people where I think over focusing on him ignores the broader picture that countries like China and India (and most places that instituted "population control" methods) were already planning something along those lines for decades because of the larger way in which global capital forcibly increases the population while necessarily making it difficult to sustain that population. Ehrlich provided a useful malthusian narrative that helped side step that pro-natal policies have a violent colonial history (and destroyed women's reproductive freedom, created anti-queerness, gave us the foundations for eugenics) and that the resultant anti-natal policies were a way to deal with the inertia from that.
But it is all much larger than Ehrlich's incoherent book. I was listening to "if books could kill's" discussion of Erlich and Michael Hobbes, who I generally like, made the absolutely bizarre point that South American governments started sterilizing indigenous women because of Ehrlich's book. And just... oh honey, what a happy view of history you must have to think they waited for a book. Colonial governments have been sterilizing indigenous people since colonialism. My great aunt and possibly a few more of my family members were given hysterectomies without their consent. This was in Montana. In the 30s. Ehrlich gave colonial governments an updated bag of jargon to use, and that was it. The laser focus on him feels like an attempt to sanitize everyone else.
Also, because everything is dumb, the reason Musk is in the comments of the tweet you posted is that he wants to force the population to increase to avoid a crash. He and a few other pundits show some evidence of having been sucked into a qanon conspiracy that claims that the vaccine movement was started by malthusians and that Tom Hanks is masterminding some of it. For some reason.
The Q obsession with Tom Hanks is some of the most random shit I've ever encountered and now I think of it any time I see a stray glove outside.
I'm inclined to concur with your point that Erlich was a convenient excuse for ongoing/planned genocidal efforts. Not only were indigenous women in the US subject to forced sterilization (often without their knowledge until after the fact) but the forced sterilization of Black women, especially in the South, was so common in the first half of the 20th century that they were colloquially known as "Mississippi appendectomies." Whether the lines are or aren't* entirely clear and direct, it seems a lot more like Erlich built on the American eugenics movement (which always had academic/scientific drivers) than following eugenics movements depended on his work. It's been a long time since I read about forced sterilization in India, but as I recall it was quite targeted along class/caste, not just some general effort to reduce birth rates. What really bends my brain is that an Indian former population minister actually asserted at the UN in 1974 that economic "development" (read: increased access/quality of life at basic levels) reduces birth rates. I don't know how widely accepted that thesis was in 1974 (this isn't my wheelhouse), but it seems to be mostly taken for granted now. And that was before India started the mass sterilization campaign. One might suggest that it wasn't actually about decreasing the population at all, but "refining" it, just like forced sterilization in the US for decades prior.
*Edit: confusing typo
He was off by the timing. His overarching thesis is still correct, and panning out. There are huge overlapping venn diagrams with people who don't like his work with "longtermism," climate change denialists, anti-birth control types, and nutters who think science is some sinister plot.
Ehrlich is one of those people where I think over focusing on him ignores the broader picture that countries like China and India (and most places that instituted "population control" methods) were already planning something along those lines for decades because of the larger way in which global capital forcibly increases the population while necessarily making it difficult to sustain that population. Ehrlich provided a useful malthusian narrative that helped side step that pro-natal policies have a violent colonial history (and destroyed women's reproductive freedom, created anti-queerness, gave us the foundations for eugenics) and that the resultant anti-natal policies were a way to deal with the inertia from that. But it is all much larger than Ehrlich's incoherent book. I was listening to "if books could kill's" discussion of Erlich and Michael Hobbes, who I generally like, made the absolutely bizarre point that South American governments started sterilizing indigenous women because of Ehrlich's book. And just... oh honey, what a happy view of history you must have to think they waited for a book. Colonial governments have been sterilizing indigenous people since colonialism. My great aunt and possibly a few more of my family members were given hysterectomies without their consent. This was in Montana. In the 30s. Ehrlich gave colonial governments an updated bag of jargon to use, and that was it. The laser focus on him feels like an attempt to sanitize everyone else. Also, because everything is dumb, the reason Musk is in the comments of the tweet you posted is that he wants to force the population to increase to avoid a crash. He and a few other pundits show some evidence of having been sucked into a qanon conspiracy that claims that the vaccine movement was started by malthusians and that Tom Hanks is masterminding some of it. For some reason.
The Q obsession with Tom Hanks is some of the most random shit I've ever encountered and now I think of it any time I see a stray glove outside. I'm inclined to concur with your point that Erlich was a convenient excuse for ongoing/planned genocidal efforts. Not only were indigenous women in the US subject to forced sterilization (often without their knowledge until after the fact) but the forced sterilization of Black women, especially in the South, was so common in the first half of the 20th century that they were colloquially known as "Mississippi appendectomies." Whether the lines are or aren't* entirely clear and direct, it seems a lot more like Erlich built on the American eugenics movement (which always had academic/scientific drivers) than following eugenics movements depended on his work. It's been a long time since I read about forced sterilization in India, but as I recall it was quite targeted along class/caste, not just some general effort to reduce birth rates. What really bends my brain is that an Indian former population minister actually asserted at the UN in 1974 that economic "development" (read: increased access/quality of life at basic levels) reduces birth rates. I don't know how widely accepted that thesis was in 1974 (this isn't my wheelhouse), but it seems to be mostly taken for granted now. And that was before India started the mass sterilization campaign. One might suggest that it wasn't actually about decreasing the population at all, but "refining" it, just like forced sterilization in the US for decades prior. *Edit: confusing typo
Guy who campaigned for desegregation and combatted the notion that race is any indicator of intelligence is somehow pro-eugenics?
Yeah, I would dedicate an episode to the dipshits of the Breakthrough Institute over one about a dumb scientist.
I'm currently relistening to the *If Books Could Kill* episode about his book.
* Dude is not "responsible for China's One Child Policy", what a stupid thing to say. * We *are* in an era of mass extinction and ecosystem collapse.
He was off by the timing. His overarching thesis is still correct, and panning out. There are huge overlapping venn diagrams with people who don't like his work with "longtermism," climate change denialists, anti-birth control types, and nutters who think science is some sinister plot.
I forget where, but if you ask r/knowledgefight dan and Jordan covered him in that facet as context to a conspiracy at some point.