The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (VHEMT) believes that overpopulation is devastating the planet (Picture: Kristine Kibbee/Les Knight)
Les Knight, 77, didn’t realise overnight that he wanted humanity to go extinct.
Before becoming a high school substitute teacher, Knight was a college student in 1970s Portland, Oregon, who did what he could to protect the environment.
It was the ’70s after all. To him, signing up for his local chapter of Zero Population Growth was a no-brainer.
This all but cemented something he’d been thinking for years. ‘As many others have done, I followed a train of logic, guided by love,’ Knight, who has since retired, tells Metro.co.uk.
‘I saw what humans were doing to the planet and realized the best thing for Earth’s biosphere would be for our species to go extinct.
‘The most humane method is for us to voluntarily stop procreating and phase ourselves out.’
Les Knight says his beliefs stem from a deep admiration for nature (Picture: Les Knight)
Large swathes of forests in Oregon were chopped down in the 1900s by logging companies (Picture: Getty Images)
Knight named this belief the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (VHEMT), a loose network that believes overpopulation is the main factor in climate change.
‘I called it the Human Extinction Movement in the early 1970s and added the “Voluntary” in the late 1980s,’ Knight adds, partly to clarify that the movement does not condone mass murder or forced birth control.
‘The idea was the cause. I didn’t know anyone else who thought this at the time but I knew there had to be others, so I called it a movement.’
Growing up, Knight had watched forests in his state be chopped down and resources – and people – dragged into a war he disagreed with; Knight was doing what he could to avoid being sent out to Vietnam.
‘By luck, I was sent to Germany instead of Vietnam and escaped after two years,’ Knight says.
‘That was 1970 and at the time human overpopulation and the environmental movement were inseparable.
While the human population has soared in recent decades, wildlife numbers have sunk (Picture: Brian Matthews/Solent News/REX/Shutterstock)
‘There were 3.7billion of us, and it was obvious that wildlife habitat was being converted to human habitat, which is to say, relatively dead.’
Now Earth is home to a record 8,200,000,000 human beings, many buying groceries, paying taxes and boarding trains. Wildlife populations, meanwhile, have plummeted by 70%. Emissions of planet-warming greenhouse gases have soared – and how much we pump out hasn’t even peaked yet.
‘As one species causes the sixth mass extinction, it’s time to take a hard look at that one species,’ explains Knight. ‘The humane path is voluntary extinction. A shrinking population would benefit all life.’
Our 10-digit population may swell to 10,300,000,000 by the 2080s before petering out, according to UN estimates.
UN demographers did think before, however, that the world’s population would peak far sooner and higher (Picture: Metro.co.uk)
‘I feel sad for the suffering these additional billions will endure, as huge regions become unlivable,’ Knight says. ‘I feel sad for the suffering these additional billions will endure, as huge regions become unlivable.’
Knight, who once edited the movement’s newsletter These EXIT Times, knows that his way of thinking might not catch on anytime soon.
He’s trying, though. His website, blocky and crammed with text, is available in more than 30 languages, including Latin, obviously. It hasn’t changed that much since it was made in 1996.
‘May we live long and die out,’ is the movement’s motto. ‘Thank you for not breeding,’ says one of the group’s bumper stickers.
The movement’s motto (Picture: VHEMT Graphics)
VHEMT’s Facebook group has more than 11,400 members, where users share memes about not having children (‘100% of all criminals were once children,’ jokes one) and stress that, no, they don’t ‘endorse homicide’.
‘Like a Democrat in a Republican neighbourhood afraid to display a Kamala Harris yard sign, I am reluctant to use my, “Thank you for not breeding,” bumper sticker,’ says Hillary Mead, 49, an accountant in Portland and one member of the group.
‘I love it but wish to avoid offending parents, especially my friends with kids.’
A married, childless dog owner, Mead has held beliefs similar to the movement’s for about a decade – that ‘humans are the causing the collapse of Earth’s ecosystem’ – though only discovered VHEMT five years back.
‘No matter what we try, our sheer numbers make it impossible to stop this destruction which has already progressed past the tipping point,’ she explains.
As is Kristine Kibbee, 47. The writer and author living in Castle Rock, Washington, said ‘Jiminy Cricket, how long you got?’ when asked why she supports VHEMT.
Kirstine Kibbee, an author, says she joined VHEMT as she has a ‘general lack of faith in humanity’ (Picture: Kristine Kibbee)
‘To give the Cliff Notes version: societal collapse, global warming, inhumanity, species extinction, war, politics and a general lack of faith in humanity,’ says Kibbee. ‘And for how long? Jeepers, maybe 12-15 years?’
Some member’s beliefs are stronger than others – even when compared with Knight. Take Nicolaj Ortmeyer, a 36-year-old man living in Denmark who cannot work due to his mental health.
‘Most VHEMT people are probably only concerned about human life here, but personally I wish for all life to go extinct,’ he says. ‘Voluntarily, that is, though of course in the case of animals, it can’t really be voluntary.
‘I haven’t made my mind up about how to go about it regarding animals, but in the case of humans I am personally an advocate of a gradual extinction.’
Overpopulation is the idea that there are too many people and not enough resources,
‘All problems on Earth may be traced back to humans, and the more of us we are, the worse the problems,’ Knight says.
Experts say that while overpopulation isn’t necessarily a good thing, it’s more about how we live than how many people are alive (Picture: Getty Images)
The idea of having fewer children for the sake of the environment often goes hand in hand with this. A third of young people don’t want children – or become ‘breeders’, to use VHEMT’s terminology – over concerns about climate change.
UN officials worry about overpopulation, too. More people means more poverty, they say, and more people ‘exposed to climatic hazards’.
Crucially, empowering women and increasing access to contraceptive methods and sexual health is one of the biggest ways to reduce fertility rates, the UN says. Nearly half of all pregnancies worldwide – about 121,000,000 – are unintended.
‘I say, “Feed ‘em, don’t breed ‘em,”‘ adds Knight, who has no children and got a vasectomy in 1973.
Experts don’t always agree on how much overpopulation is environmentally a problem. Population growth is the least influential part of climate change, according to one expert who wrote for Vox in 2018. Lower fertility rates often lead to higher consumption too, researchers have found.
The world population has shot up in the shape of a hockey stick for centuries (Picture: Rex)
Ditching planet-warming fossil fuels and better resource management are far more effective ways of curbing climate catastrophe than having fewer, or no, children, Dr Edward Gryspeerdt, a Royal Society University Research Fellow at the Grantham Institute, says.
‘It is important not to despair about climate change – it is a massive problem that requires action at an unprecedented scale,’ he explains.
‘However, we know the cause of the problem and we know how to stop it from getting worse – replace fossil fuels with renewable energy and reduce emissions to net zero. Net zero is not just a buzzword, it describes the solution. When we achieve net zero, the world will stop warming.
‘Tackling climate change and achieving will make the world a better place to live, with additional benefits, such as better air quality, cheaper energy bills and healthier ecosystems.
‘Human activities have drastically impacted the earth but there are good reasons for optimism. From small community groups to global collaborations, so much work is already happening to make Earth a safer place to live for future generations.’
Still, Knight would never force anyone to believe what he does. He knows he’ll die one day – ‘I’m too old to die young,’ he jokes – so all he can do is hope that the current generation, Alpha, won’t have kids anytime soon.
‘An abundant life is possible if we just stop creating more of ourselves and each other,’ Knight says.
‘Extinction,’ he adds, ‘is forever.’
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