How Overpopulation Causes Social Problems

How Overpopulation Causes Social Problems How Overpopulation Causes Social Problems Introduction The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how overpopulation causes social problems. To do so you must take many things into consideration, such as different views of racial problems and conflicting definitions of a social problem. Social problems can be defined in many different ways. They effect everyone and some of us encounter problems everyday as a result of our race, religion, gender, or low income.

Others experience problems from technological change or declining neighborhoods, others are affected directly by crime and violence in their own neighborhood, and sometimes definitions of social problems are changed by society because of changes around you. Finally in order to achieve the purpose of this which is to examine and discuss different issues and situations that cause social problems such as poverty.Overpopulation and social problems go hand and hand in today's society and there are many reasons and factors as to why these problems exist. Factors that lead to overpopulation that causes social problems are the increase in the number of single mothers in poor neighborhoods opposed to the decline in birth rates in the more efficient parts of the country, how the death rate is at a steady decline because of medical advances in rich and poor countries, the effects immigrants have on an environment and the population growth that occurs, the influence parents leave on children, and what is being done to help prevent the spread of AIDS because this is a deadly disease which is lowering our population but causing many social problems. Elements of a Social Problem There are also elements that make up a social problem. One of these elements is that "they cause physical or mental damage to individuals or society" (Carter p16) which means that sometimes people may permanently suffer before any action is taken to solve the problem because everybody thought it was not that big of a deal until sometimes permanent or short term damage has occurred.

Another element is "they offend the values or standards of some powerful segment of society" (Carter p16) which means no matter what you do someone will always take offense against your actions because everyone has different views and values and what is important to some may not be to others.Another element is that "they persist for an extended period of time"(Carter p16) and everyone can picture that being true because as you solve one problem another always arises. The last element of a social problem is "generating competing proposed solutions because of varying evaluations from groups in different social positions within a society, which delays reaching consensus on how to attack the problem" (Carter P16). This is caused because there are many different social groups that have different ideas and solutions to the problems we may face. Sociological Perspectives on Social Problems There are also different sociological perspectives on social problems such as the functionalist, conflict, interactionist, feminist, and the postmodernist orientations.

The functionalist view on social problems focuses on the social structures that hold a society together over time and they also see sociology as the science of social order.The second conflict orientation sees most social problems as arising from disorganization due to group differences. Another view is the interactionist orientation, which concentrates on how people perceive and define the events that influence their lives. The feminist orientation gives women a voice in a world that has been dominated by male-oriented perspectives in the past. The last and final one is the postmodernist orientation which, is an emerging and still controversial approach to studying society.

Postmodernist insist that the change is so great that a more complex and far less hopeful world has supplanted the modern one we thought we lied in. The Effect of AIDS and Birth Rates are falling but Population is not. Aids is a deadly disease which is hurting a large amount of our population but at the same time it is causing many conflicts and social problems within our society.This disease has made people outcasts in our society because they have this disease that can kill or make someone ill for a long period of time which will adventually lead to death. Widdison and Delaney (1996) write, "It is convenient to characterize a social problem as a conflict of values and duties, a conflict of rights or social condition that leads to or is thought to lead to harmful consequences".

(Page 10) Staying with the topic that over population and poverty combined causes social problems such as scarce jobs and resources for people but only that overpopulation is responsible for the conditions, which contribute to the overall lowering of the quality of life of human beings in society. Another problem is AIDS, which is both a population and social problem. People are sometimes not accepted because they have the AIDS virus.This also affects the poor people more than the wealthy because AIDS is more common among poor neighborhoods because they have less money to buy things such as condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS and other diseases. According to the Global AIDS Policy Commission "about 95 percent were spent in industrialized countries that have less than 25 percent of the world's population", 18 percent of the people with AIDS and 15 percent of HIV infections worldwide." (Tarantola and Mann, 1995 pages 123-124) According these numbers, a very large percent of the money for AIDS prevention and treatment is spent industrialized countries.

This is unfair because the industrialized countries are not the ones that should be receiving the majority of the funds to help prevent the spread of this disease and possibly a cure for this disease in the future. Since the third world countries are not receiving enough funds they are unaware of the importance and are unable to spread the message of ways of preventing oneself from getting this disease. As has already been noted, the United States has tended to follow the recent pattern towards falling birth rates that have become characterized by most of the industrialized democracies of the West. Mattox (1995) notes in regard to the trend in the US: "In 1975 sixty two percent of all women aged 40-44 had given birth to three or more children over the course of their life-times.In 1988 only thirty-eight percent had done so.

The percentage of those giving birth to just one child rose from 9 to 15 percent during the same time period" (p17). There could be several reasons why there is an increase of those giving birth to only one child. In older days it was known that women would stay home and raise the children as the men go out and make the money. Now that times have changed, you see a lot more women in the workplace.

Women sometimes give birth at a later age because they are so busy with their career. In today's society, people get married at a later age because they have to keep working to obtain income that is needed to help pay for their necessities. A reason why the population is still growing and there is a decrease in birth rates could be the fact that there are more cures for diseases that at one point were either not known or deadly. Overpopulation among the poor All this might give one the impression that overpopulation is not a problem affecting the United States. However, "where birth rates have failed to decrease and in some cases have actually increased, has been among the poor, and especially among the inner-city welfare poor" (Widdison p209). Opposite to a widespread misinterpretation, welfare mothers do not tend to have especially large families, most having one or two children with only a small number giving birth to more.

However, the number of instances of single motherhood has been going up even as childbearing has been declining overall in the US.Single mothers represent the bulk of the adult welfare population; such births can be compared to the condition of the poor in Third World countries. Another problem we are facing is a real population explosion among the poor. A reason sometimes the poor have more children than the young adults with money is because of their financial status.

If you have less money you are not going to run out and buy a box of condoms with your last five dollars. You will probably spend it on something that you think is more important, but in reality some people do not realize how big the consequence of having a child is.If you are not able to support a child, not responsible, or mature enough for parenthood it will only hurt the child. The kid will grow up with no guidance and in an environment that is neither healthy nor safe.

Young teenage girls have this feeling that ...