From Russia With Love

The population of many parts of the world is in precipitous decline, especially among those bad old European white people. If you take out immigration from North Africa and Central Asia, it looks like there won't be too many continental Christians, or even formerly Christian secularists in another twenty or thirty years. The post-colonial self-haters will certainly be delighted.

But not so fast, say the folks in one corner of Russia, who have created something very loosely translated as "Family Contact Day":

The special day for encouraging procreation was dreamt up by the governor of Ulyanovsk province, Sergei Morozov, who this year awarded prizes ranging from a television to a Russian-made all-terrain vehicle for giving birth on Russia's Constitution Day on June 12.

That's right folks, they're getting some Russian kind of freaky, in a city that (according to the article) was named after Valdimir Lenin - who we are told was originally named Ulyanovsk. And on that point - I'm just an ignorant American, but that name sounds dorky to me, and makes wonder whether communism wasn't born out of the resentment fostered by young Uly getting the crap pounded out of him repeatedly on the playground.

So the ironic twist here is that they are giving away obviously Western products like ATVs and televisions if you score one for Mother Russia such that the little comrade pops out one June 12th of next year.

Whatever motivation they use, this is an idea whose time has come. Sarkozy, call your office. Whatever it takes to create a few more Norwegians, non-rioting French, and Italians - all of whom have simply dismal birthrates. Step one is to acknowledge the problem, and see that kids are the only way to a strong society, not to mention an economy that can support their quasi-socialist ideals. But ... to put it in the words of another famous Lennon: Everybody's making love and no one really cares.

Strange days indeed.