The Economist | November 6th, 2025
By Barclay Bram
Posted by MinorityRepublican
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Ordinarily, Tim Adkinson, a trucker, sleeps in the back of his vehicle. But on a warm night at the end of March, he checked into a hotel in Austin, Texas. He had dressed up smartly: a white linen shirt and chinos, with his hair brushed forward in an attempt to mask his receding hairline. On his wrist, he wore a yellow paper wristband.
This accessory was meant to signal to the people he’d meet that evening that he was single, open to dating, and, most importantly, looking to procreate—a lot.
“I’m 32 years old and I haven’t had any kids,” Adkinson told me. We were sitting next to each other eating a dinner of roast chicken and broccoli in the auditorium of the Bullock Texas State History Museum. It was the opening ceremony of NatalCon, a two-day conference that tasked itself with “gathering the brightest minds in the world in search of new solutions” to the global fall in birth rates.
The 200-strong crowd was full of self-proclaimed pro-natalists: those who believe that people (at least people like them) should be having more children, and that, if they don’t, society (at least as they know it) will collapse.
Adkinson, whose solitary life on the open road gives him a lot of time to think, was concerned that he was contributing to the problem.
“You know, the alarm bells were going off. Like why hasn’t this happened for me?” There was a flash of vulnerability in his face. “It’s not just trucking,” he said. “It’s not me specifically. It’s everywhere.”
He had seen influencers speaking online about NatalCon and decided to pay the $1,000 fee to attend.
*Excerpt*
Read more at economist.com.
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**Topics:** Health/Medicine | Politics | Science | Society
**Keywords:** MinorityRepublican, NatalCon, pro-natalism, birth rates
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### Comments
**MinorityRepublican:**
Conservatives recognize and appreciate the cultural value of the family unit, and we endeavor to preserve it. The Left abhors the family unit and believes the affairs of the family should be the province of The State. It is as simple as that.
**rlmorel (Factio Communistica Sinensis Delenda Est.):**
Oh, got it. “Fertility fanatics.” The British misanthropes want to point and titter at the crazy Americans who want to have children. Gosh, it’s the ’70s all over again: when do they start labeling mothers as “breeders” and babble about “overpopulation” — things they only talk about when it comes to White people.
**Regulator (It’s fraud, Jim):**
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