Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov has said reviving the nation's birth rate is one of Russia's "top priorities."

Russia has moved to classify key demographic statistics following a dramatic collapse in its birth rate, which has plunged to levels not seen since the late 18th or early 19th century, according to a leading Russian demographer.

For decades, Russia has been experiencing a plunging birth rate and population decline, which appears to have worsened amid its ongoing invasion of Ukraine—with high casualty rates and men fleeing the country to avoid being conscripted to fight.

Projections estimate that Russia’s population will fall to about 132 million in the next two decades. The United Nations has predicted that in a worst-case scenario, by the start of the next century, Russia’s population could almost halve to 83 million.

    • Bravo@eviltoast.orgEnglish
      10·
      2 months ago

      I think the implication is actually that there’s a marked dropoff of eligible young Russian men. To preserve a generation, Russia might soon need to use more North Koreans on the Ukrainian front, but that comes with its own problems and risks.

      It’s weird that Putin’s avoiding peace negotiations, as he more than anyone needs to find a way to scale back the war effort before his hold on power begins to waver. I get that he needs to save face while doing so, but he’s not gonna get conditions more favorable than a Trump administration, so the clock is ticking.

      • ivanafterall ☑️@lemmy.worldEnglish
        7·
        2 months ago

        Consider that he might not want it to end. If it ends, a wartime economy is no longer an excuse/distraction and he’d have to contend more with the disaster he’s created.

      • Ledericas@lemm.eeEnglish
        23·
        2 months ago

        i think kim stopped givign greedy putin more orcs. putin is running out of ethnic russians sooner or later.

    • Ledericas@lemm.eeEnglish
      6·
      2 months ago

      he would probably send 70 more million before he admits defeat, probably not. as long as men keep going to the meat grinder he doesnt care.

        • Bruncvik@lemmy.worldEnglish
          31·
          2 months ago

          I was permabanned from r/worldnews for this, due to racism, so I’m risking the same here. But there is a theory among armchair historians–which I tend to agree with–that Russians had been targets of regressive selective breeding for the past 450 years. Those who display any kind of individualism or independence (mainly educated, intellectuals, etc) have been selectively eliminated from the gene pool: via exile (best case scenario), or through prisons, labour camps or executions. After centuries of this, the share of independently thinking Russians in Russia is far lower than that of native population in Western European countries.

          This is very prominent in science and technology: many of the top inventors weren’t ethnic Russians, but were born or had ancestry in countries that have been under Russian dictate (and regressive evolution) for a much shorter time period. Sergei Korolev, the father of Russian space program was ethnic Hungarian. Russia “boasts” only 15 Nobel laureates in STEM fields since 1917, and only one of them (Nikolay Semyonov) was an ethnic Russian who wasn’t in exile.

          All this helps to explain why Russians are so passive in the face of authority. It also points at the fallacy of thinking that we can push them towards accepting western civilization and democracy in the short term. It will take a very long time and a lot of effort to bring them to the moral ideal of Western Europe.

          • Ledericas@lemm.eeEnglish
            1·
            2 months ago

            they have been through centuries of dictatorships, so they technically dont know any better, and its also indoctrination.

            i avoided that sub, after gaza/israeli conflict begin after catching a temp ban in '23. too much israeli bots were astrouturfing the subs, and banning people, and your comments are easy misconstrued there.

          • Dr. Moose@lemmy.worldEnglish
            51·
            2 months ago

            I agree but not in genetic sense but more of a cultural sense imo.

            I grew up in Eastern Europe and witnesses soviet collapse and culture shift myself. It went from this obedient “no my problem” passive anger and misery to a society that actually cares for each other and is warm and optimistic which only started to regress recently because of fucking ruskies again.

            It’s so frustrating to see this great evil plague the world and pretend that it’s “1 bad putin” when the entire culture has been morphed into facilitating and growing this disgusting evil like rotting bread grows mold.

    • 5gruel@lemmy.worldEnglish
      48·
      2 months ago

      Oh we are now upvoting posts that condemn a whole culture as evil. Very classy Lemmy.

      • TronBronson@lemmy.worldEnglish
        42·
        2 months ago

        Evil like raping your subordinates on the battlefield or evil like kidnapping children and cultural genocide? Or evil like sit on your hands and allow your rulers to destroy you and world security for hundreds of years?

        • 5gruel@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          2 months ago

          Great example, I wouldn’t call the whole of german culture evil because of the third Reich.

        • wpb@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          2 months ago

          I think the mods are doing an okay job here, but I also think it’s fair to judge the community by what they upvote. And before it was deleted, there were definitely more upvotes than downvotes on something very blatantly genocidal. And there’s still a comment up in this thread on some bizarre hick race science shit, again with a bunch of upvotes. Cartoonishly racist, still up, and with a bunch of upvotes. I think this does say sth about the community.

    • wpb@lemmy.worldEnglish
      116·
      2 months ago

      You’re literally rooting for the extinction of an ethnicity. Don’t conflate a people with their government. The folks in the Twin Towers did not deserve to die, regardless of all the horrible things their goverment has done. The folks at the October 7th festival did not deserve to die, regardless of the horrible things their government has done. Russians do not deserve to go extinct, regardless of the horrible things their government has done. Please try to keep your genocidal tendencies in check.

  • iAvicenna@lemmy.worldEnglish
    11·
    2 months ago

    yea putin, fuck the world up and then complain that people are not making kids. we will all die in our own filth when the infrastructure collapses and you can wipe your ass with all that money and power

  • TrackinDaKraken@lemmy.worldEnglish
    181·
    2 months ago

    If AI and robots will take over so many jobs, why is a declining birthrate a bad thing, in the long term?

    • Dr. Moose@lemmy.worldEnglish
      31·
      2 months ago

      I don’t think ruzies are worried about technologies they can’t even afford.

    • GreenKnight23@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      2 months ago

      because all wars are a war of attrition. the country with the largest military or the deepest pockets always wins.

    • Ledericas@lemm.eeEnglish
      3·
      2 months ago

      depends on where its decling, if its only like elderly left and the young not reproducing thats would be a problem.

  • Randomgal@lemmy.caEnglish
    75·
    2 months ago

    Kinda rough to have babies if most of your men are being turned into fertilizer.

    • TheFonz@lemmy.worldEnglish
      12·
      2 months ago

      I promise you, the last thing on the minds of Russian women in this moment is climate change

    • Zenith@lemm.eeEnglish
      152·
      2 months ago

      I’m a woman, with two kids, they’re not my biological children. I never wanted to have kids but other people are having kids and I figure why not love the kids already here? There’s plenty of kids to go around there’s no need for me to personally make a kid. If the kids are already here we should do as much as we can to make their lives good but if they’re not already here it should stay that way.

      • debil@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        2 months ago

        100% agreed. If possible, get a rescue kid. (In general, without getting into the nitty gritty details about the adoption processes around the world.)

        • daq@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
          9·
          2 months ago

          I hate to shit on your general point, but they absolutely do ask in this case.

        • Hanrahan@slrpnk.netEnglish
          15·
          2 months ago

          Im 57, i tried to have a vasectomy at 18 and was refused here in Australia mutiple times over 2 years because “I would change mind” and I was told I would meet somone who would want to have kid with me and they’d be upset if i was unable to."

          I flew to Thailand in my late 20s and had it done at the end of a holiday there in a hospital in Bangkok, no pun intended.

        • Saik0@lemmy.saik0.comEnglish
          111·
          2 months ago

          I’m a snipped man… there were a lot of questions.

          I don’t know who told you “no questions asked”, but that definitely doesn’t match my lived experience.

            • Saik0@lemmy.saik0.comEnglish
              10·
              2 months ago

              So I refute one specific point of your argument. Another commenter even says they were outright denied. And your sane and rational response is “well that doesn’t matter” and you downvote me even though I was adding to the topic/discussion that you brought up?

              Grow up dude.

              Unfortunately for your case, you’re still wrong. But that won’t change your mind regardless and I’m not interested in talking to someone who acts the way you are.

          • Hanrahan@slrpnk.netEnglish
            6·
            2 months ago

            I was refused (tried a few tines from 18-20) and had it done overseas im my late 20s. Thay was decades ago though so it might have changed.

            Am Australian.

        • Alaik@lemmy.zipEnglish
          31·
          2 months ago

          It’s the false liability excuse. They think women will sue since it’s not as reversible. Really it’s management just justifying their jobs with bullshit policies.

          Start locking up management who try to dictate patient care for practicing medicine without a license, see how fast most things level out.

          That includes insurance groups, hospitals, and any other group who doesnt have an MD at the top level.

    • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      91·
      2 months ago

      yeah! that’s what I am thinking too, have been for years now. but at the same time babies are booming in the area (not russia, but east eu) so obviously a lot of people think differently.

      • Hanrahan@slrpnk.netEnglish
        1·
        2 months ago

        You say booming ? But every woman needs to have 2.1.on average to have a stable population, so “booming” would be 4-8 at least, per woman. Is it that high ? Hungary ?

        Australia’s first female member of it’s federal parliment had 13 kids for example, my mother was one of 8, I was one of three, my brother has 2, my sister and I none.

  • magnetosphere@fedia.io
    1674·
    2 months ago

    It amuses me that world leaders pretend to be surprised by declining birth rates. They know perfectly well that it’s because of their and/or their neighbors policies. The environment is being poisoned, and possibly destroyed. People are reluctant to bring a child into this world, and I think they’re right to be.

    • Ledericas@lemm.eeEnglish
      6·
      2 months ago

      almost all of them avoiding the discussion why its happening instead of trying to enact anti-abortion laws, or punishing peopel for not having children.

    • samus12345@lemm.eeEnglish
      141·
      2 months ago

      “Nooooo! Keep pumping out babies to feed to the capitalism meat grinder!!”

    • joostjakob@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      2 months ago

      I haven’t read recent research on this, but at least until a decade or so ago, consciously not having children is a very small part of this. It’s more about economic outlooks and the immense pressure of expecting both parents of working full time and raising kids at the same time. Or wanting to have two kids, but putting off the decision so long that the chance of not having successful pregnancies rises a lot.

    • WanderingThoughts@europe.pubEnglish
      15·
      2 months ago

      But it’s unthinkable for these leaders to change the policies that gave them the power and wealth they desire, so they’re gonna run with it until it falls apart, no matter the cost for everyone else.

    • Wanderer@lemm.eeEnglish
      2·
      2 months ago

      Think its more high house prices and low wages. But the wealthy are more concerned with making money so immigration is at an all time high meaning house prices keep going up even when wages are kept below market value and training is non existent.

    • JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      59·
      2 months ago

      And even ones that want kids take one look at the economy and their bank accounts, and decide to wait until both look better, because they want to be able to afford the kids a happy childhood. The worst thing for population growth is giving people the ability to choose when, if ever, to get kids, and an environment they don’t want to have them in.

      Two ways to fix that issue. Which one is used tells a lot.

  • andybytes@programming.devEnglish
    47·
    2 months ago

    It used to be if a nuclear bomb went off, all planes would be grounded. Now, they’re going to use small yield nuclear weapons, but we know about the escalation ladder, so regardless if it’s a tiny nuke, it’s a nuke. Things just start or continue to escalate while plane companies are now getting nuke insurance because they’re still going to fly planes as the nukes are shooting. I don’t know if you got a… Entopic… pregnancy… like the pregnancy that gets stuck in your… phleopian tube… or something… if you could actually just go to a doctor and have that dealt with… you know, because… the pregnancy is not viable… and it’s most likely gonna kill you. I mean if I was a gal I’d say hell no. And honestly if I was educated and I had money I’d be out of here. If you Google mass shootings the violence project, you’ll see that a lot of the mass shooters, their motivations were economic issues. And that kind of explains a lot of this right wing violence being done by 20-something-year-olds. Young, dumb and full of cum, and also barefoot and pregnant. There’s also, I guess, studies that say that younger women are dating older men because they’re more mature, but I really think it’s just because their wallets are more mature and who could really blame the women? These kids live in these horrible situations with nothing to live for working at Mickey D’s as ungrateful boomers come in and scream at them because their fries are cold. We’re just going back in time as the boomers just fucking gaslight us, as they lived in the most economically prosperous time, you know? Hedonistic, arrogant, middle manager, PhD, magical thinking ladder pulling pigglet whatever the fuck’s. Always telling you’re overreacting. But just wait, once we get there, we’ll get to that point. Were it eventually will click, and you’ll see a fear in their eye, and possibly a tear. Zippty doo dah zippy ehh my oh my what a wonderful day.