Declining population. (Letters).

SIR: These are strange times for population debate. Nowhere is self-hatred for Australia's inherited European culture more evident. The Greens want much less than zero population growth, yet also oppose effective border protection policies.

Even Liberal appointee Sex Discrimination Commissioner Pru Goward lamely follows the feminist mantra that the continuing decline in fertility is a "paradigm shift" that cannot be reversed. She fails to ponder what that means for the distant future. Without a national plebiscite it would be impossible to unravel really "what Australian women think" as the debate swings over what statistics tell us about their choices. Angela Shanahan in the Australian is one of very few voices in dissent.

I am puzzled over the supine acceptance of below-replacement levels in affluent societies, including monocultural Japan, which is the most myopic of all, repelling boarders, including nearly all refugees.

In the West, even countries like France and Holland are starting to question the make-up of their society looking ahead. The European immigration debate will soon be tied to this issue if long-term demographics are belatedly considered. The spectre of racism simply masks the real issues, stifling media thought. But if Goward's Law is meekly accepted, no internal reform in fertility will be possible.

Never before, without war or pestilence, has the West been faced with the prospect of its long tradition of continuous native family lines coming to an end. This is the deepest form of change. It is cultural suicide by numbers. It will eventually produce profound effects on the transmission of cultural and religious identity, especially when "non-congruent" (for instance Indian, Asian) immigration is seen as the only ...