Special Note: Please note that this scenario is meant to be read as entertainment, not as an accurate prediction of the future. Also note that the viewpoints and opinions that may come across in this scenario are not necessarily the viewpoints and opinions of the author.
The Great Temptation is the cause for low birth rates, greed, immorality, selfishness, impatience, and material excess that is common in the late 20th and 21st century. This vice can be excised well before the 22nd century, but people need to go deep down within their hearts, re-assess their priorites, and agree to live a life without the decadence, luxuries, and excess that started in the 1980s and forces us to choose between parenthood and structured vacations with family members.
We have a duty to our government and ourselves to marry and reproduce. If we don't do that, our civilization will never last long enough for an United States of Earth to form along with colonizing into other planets and celestial bodies. Mindlessly following religious dogma can also complicate the road to parenthood; as do alcohol, frequent traveling and unstructured video game playing.
Inabilities to balance a family budget can also be used as an excuse to postpone or cancel childbirth.
The 10 Roots of The Great Temptation[]
- 1. Video games turn teenagers and young adults into introverted lazy people who do not desire to have a social life or a life that revolves around dating the opposite sex. However, there is a minority of people who desire to play video games and have a normal social life, but these people are uncommon. The rise of obesity is also linked to video game addiction, making gamers more unattractive to the opposite sex to reproduce.
- 2. Frequent structured family trips drain the budget; which leads to lack of money and/or time to reproduce. Winning the lottery can leave a family of "leisure tourists" (no breadwinner or provider; must find a job when lottery winnings run out).
- 3. Online games and "social networking" timewasters like Facebook and Twitter give a "pretend" or "simulated" feeling of talking to other people. the person often ignores people who live near him and prefers to focus on like-minded people who live in another part of the world.
- 4. People focus on career too much; don't give themselves time to have a social or romantic relationship. These people must learn to balance career with family and leisure.
- 5. Books with fantasy stories or revolutionary messages keep people from talking to each other; preventing them from having a relationship that leads to reproduction.
Watching a movie about someone being a successful family man DOESN'T make YOU a family man.
- 6. Movies give an illusion of "doing something" when a person is actually doing nothing at all. If any advanced species was looking for us, it would have to put up with prejudices against extraterrestrials picked up from the movies, films, and television shows of Earth (unless they wait until at least the year 2040 when a worldwide television ban is in place).
- 7. Some teenagers form semi-professional music bands; while this gives them more more than a minimum wage job, the practice sessions involved give them no time for a steady romantic relationship with a member of the opposite gender.
- 8. Religious people believe that only God can grant them a boyfriend or girlfriend; this is hogwash. All you need to do is to walk up to someone about your own age, introduce yourself, have a pleasant conversation, exchange phone numbers, and you're in "the Club." The world is becoming less Christian and by the year 2105, only very small pockets of the world population will believe in God or Jesus Christ. The largest percentage of Christians will reside in Africa and other developing third world countries. Even the "Bible Belt" in the United States will eventually become more secular.
- 9. Fanaticism to certain things exclude the opposite gender; people need to broaden their interest(s) in order to have a meaningful relationship with a member of the opposite gender that leads to reproduction and parenthood. The rise and acceptance of "Geek culture" such as video games, anime, superheroes, fantasy novels, etc. is contributing to the fanaticism.
- 10. For an ideal relationship, date someone that is less than 100 miles away from you; anything more can lead to heartbreak and possible turmoil. Also, you and your partner might not cheer for the same sports team when sitting in a stadium together watching the ball game (if you live far enough away from each other). Only desperate people, wealthy people, and Internet stalkers date people from far away places like Russia, Japan, China, Hong Kong.
Other Contributing Factors[]
Other factors are contributing to the Great Temptation as well. The easy access to pornography as one of them. The internet makes it easy for adults to have instant, almost unlimited access to porn that was, about 30 years ago, only accessible in magazines and late night adult movies. Instead of having actual physical sexual relationship, adults will rather masturbate or have "cybersex" in front of their computer screen to satisfy their desire, which will decrease reproduction. Like the video games, this will encourage introverted lazy young adults that rather stay in their homes and masturbate instead of actually going out and finding people to date.
Birth control is another factor. With better birth control strategies and the legalization of abortion, that will make it more likely to have a shrink in the population growth as well.
The LGBT community is contributing as well. Non heterosexual couples are more difficult to reproduce because you need a male and a female (sperm and egg) to create a new person.