The IVF Clinic Bomber Was Infected by Anti-Humanism

Back in 2010, a mentally disturbed anti-human terrorist was shot to death by snipers after he took hostages at the Discovery Channel, demanding that the television service stop "encouraging the birth of any more parasitic human infants," and instead air "programs encouraging human sterilization and infertility."

Now, a similar disturbing scenario befell Palm Springs, Calif., where a young man named Guy Edward Bartkus killed himself, injured four people, and caused widespread property destruction when he detonated a huge car bomb in front of an in vitro fertilization clinic. The motive? According to Newsweek's reporting, Barkus was a "'pro-mortalist' (believing death is preferable to living) or an 'anti-natalist' (believing no more human beings should be born)."

Anti-natalism is a form of anti-humanism, which isn't just believed by mentally disturbed people capable of violence. Indeed, various forms of anti-humanism have been promoted in professional journals, the media, and popular culture, as a consequence of which, nihilism has been slowly seeping through the culture like a stain.

What are the primary pretexts for such species self-loathing? A neurotic fear of suffering, misguided forms of feminism, and radical environmentalism. Consider the following non-comprehensive examples:

• Last year, the Cambridge Quarterly of HealthCare Ethics published an article by a philosopher urging that people stop having children because "all lives are occasionally miserable, some lives are predominantly miserable, and individuals may think, justifiably, that their lives have no meaning. My reason suggests that it would be unwise and unkind to bring new people into existence and thereby expose them to these risks."