What is Natalism? What is the Quiverfull Movement?

by phil on Wednesday May 20, 2009 12:09 AM

This is all fascinating to me.

Natalism is a pro-birth belief. Some countries have natalistic policies which lead to interesting phenomena. For example, after Iran's natalistic policies following the Iran-Iraq War, the country experienced a youth bulge wherein approximately 75% of its population was under the age of 30 in 2007.

The Quiverfull movement is a conservative evangelical natalism movement. Quiverfulls believe in receiving children eagerly as blessings of God, eschewing all forms of birth control.

I wonder if this is the future of the pro-life movement. Rather than trying to ban abortion at the federal level, they'll simply channel their energies toward creating a (sub) culture that wants more babies.

It's also interesting to see activism take root among conservatives. I remember on The Daily Show when they were interviewing people at the tea parties recently, and many of these conservatives were on unfamiliar ground. FOX News, during the Bush years, used to make fun of protesters. They also decried "activist" judges, which was always code for "liberal." Why does liberalism have to be wedded to activism? Maybe it's because for the longest time, being a liberal meant you stood for something. While as being conservative meant restraining something that other people stood for. One movement worked "in positivia," the other one worked "in negativia." Maybe that's inherent to conservativism—afterall they're trying to conserve something.

Being against something is not the same as being for its opposite.