Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Maybe Large Families Really Are Good for the Earth

I had a good laugh when I saw the headline this week, “Want to Go ‘Green’? Stay Married.” Like just about every other topic under the sun, even divorce is now viewed in terms of its environmental impact. Apparently, it isn’t an eco-friendly picture. Stating the obvious (a specialty of university researchers), a study by Michigan State University reveals that divorced people comprise smaller households than intact families, thereby using energy less efficiently. After all, when a family of four eats dinner together, they are sharing the energy resources of heat and electricity. But if Mom and Dad split, there will be two, smaller households emitting more greenhouse gases. In the United States, for example, researchers found that divorced households spent 46 percent more per capita on electricity and 56 percent more on water than married households.

Yikes! Better think again before calling the divorce lawyer!

Of course, divorce is always sad, and when children are involved, it’s a tragedy. Yet to think that anyone might reconsider a divorce because they are more concerned about the carbon footprints left behind instead of the shattered hearts left behind is ludicrous. On the other hand, I’m glad that this news may help counter the absurd accusation long spouted by some environmentalists that large families (which many people define as having more than three children) somehow hurt the environment, gobbling more than their fair share of the Earth’s resources. The fact is, as this research proves, the more people who can live under one roof are living “geener” than all those one- or two-child families.  In fact, the world population today is in decline overall, yet contains a rising number of individual households. Maybe those who thought of their small families as so environmentally progressive will rethink their positions.