Australian local weather believers are eliminating themselves from the gene pool – are you okay with that?

Essay by Eric Worrall

“…40% of Australian women without children say they are hesitant to have children due to climate change…”

According to a survey, 40 percent of Australian women without children are hesitant to have children because of climate change

More than a third of Coalition voters believe temperatures will not rise at all, a poll shows

Donna Lu
Mon 10 Nov 2025 01:00 AEDT

About 40% of Australian women without children say they are hesitant to have children because of climate change, a new survey shows.

The survey on attitudes to the effects of global warming also found half of Australians were very or extremely concerned about climate change and two in five believed the climate would be “much hotter” in 2050.

…

The poll, which involved a nationally representative sample of 2,000 people, found that Labour, Greens and Independent voters were three times more likely to express strong concern about climate change compared to Conservative voters.

Concern about climate change was also much more strongly correlated with education level than with age.

…

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/nov/10/climate-change-women-hesitant-to-have-children-australia

The climate attitudes survey is available here. The survey was organized by Professor Clive Hamilton from Charles Sturt University.

The survey finds a connection between the level of higher education and concern about climate change.

One possible explanation suggested by Professor Hamilton could be that people with higher education have a better understanding of the dangers we face from climate change.

Or it could be participation or response bias. These days, being outed as a climate skeptic is quite risky for anyone interested in pursuing an academic career in Australia. Look what happened to Professor Peter Ridd.

Seriously, I worry about people who really want to have children but have gotten caught up in climate hysteria. Having a child can be scary, especially your first one. It doesn’t take much additional fear to turn hesitation into delay.

There was a childless couple who lived next door to my grandparents’ house. They were always nice to me when I visited as a small child and always had a plate of cookies ready. But there was dissatisfaction in her eyes, which I noticed even as a child. At Christmas time, my grandparents’ house was full of joy and happiness and full of wrapping paper, but the neighbors didn’t want to see anyone at Christmas. No family ever visited.

One day they just weren’t there anymore. My grandpa never explained what happened, he just said they moved away, but he looked worried when he told me. I was only 9 years old at the time, but I knew better not to ask questions.

My grandfather told me that they never had children because they were afraid of nuclear war.

Many years later, my wife and I felt a touch of this desperation, but we were lucky and everything worked out in the end.

Let’s hope that those who actually want children, those who aren’t using climate hysteria as a convenient cover story for their desire to have children, see through the untruths before it’s too late.

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