​Congrats, humans. We did it. We won the game. If the goal was to pack this planet like a can of sardines, we get the gold medal. While other animals are just trying not to go extinct, we are smashing population records every single day.

​Who cares about traffic that moves slower than a snail on a coffee break? Who cares if water is running out? More people means more party, right?

​Wrong.

​A long time ago, people had twelve kids because, honestly, life was hard. You needed a whole soccer team just to run a farm. But modern medicine fixed everything. We survive. We grow old. We take up space. But we never stopped cranking out babies.

​It’s like we are playing musical chairs, but nobody ever takes away a chair. We just keep adding more people to the game until we are all sitting on each other’s laps.

​We tell ourselves funny stories to justify it. We ask, “Who will take care of me when I’m old?” But let’s be real—your kids will be too busy paying off their student loans to change your diapers. Or we say, “I need a boy to carry the family name!” Trust me, the family name will be fine. Nobody is checking.

​Some people think more kids equal more love. It also equals more noise, more mess, and a grocery bill that looks like a phone number. If babies came with a warning label, it would be terrifying. You are basically signing up for a lifetime subscription to anxiety. Sleep becomes a distant memory, like a dream you once had in the 90s. And eventually, they grow up and blame you for everything anyway.

​The governments love it, though. They treat having kids like a rewards program. “Have another one! We will give you a tax break!” They don’t tell you that the tax break buys about three days’ worth of diapers. They promise free parks (which are crowded), free schools (which are packed), and a bright future (which is currently melting).

​We are heading toward a world where “personal space” is a myth. Future apartments will be the size of a closet. You will have to book an appointment just to look at a tree. But don’t worry—the billionaires say they will save us. They want to fly us to Mars. Because that’s the solution, right? Ruin one planet, then hop in a rocket and go ruin the red one.

​We don’t need more humans. We need better humans. We need to stop treating overpopulation like a high score in a video game. We need to teach the next generation that it’s okay to stop. It’s okay to have just one. It’s okay to have none.

​Because right now, Mother Earth is looking at us like a tired landlord. She is thinking, “I love you, but the house is full. You are eating all the food and trashing the living room. If you don’t calm down, I’m going to have to evict some of you.”

​And her eviction notices look a lot like floods, fires, and viruses.

​So, maybe take a breath. Look around. We have enough people. What we need is a little more space, a little more water, and a lot more sanity.