Europe’s Childless Leaders Sleepwalking Us to Disaster, by Giulo Meotti.

There have never been so many childless politicians leading Europe as today. They are modern, open minded and multicultural and they know that “everything finishes with them”. …

Europe’s most important leaders are all childless: German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and the French presidential hopeful Emmanuel Macron. The list continues with Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven, Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Xavier Bettel and Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.

As Europe’s leaders have no children, they seem have no reason to worry about the future of their continent. German philosopher Rüdiger Safranski wrote:

“for the childless, thinking in terms of the generations to come loses relevance. Therefore, they behave more and more as if they were the last and see themselves as standing at the end of the chain”. …

Merkel’s childless status mirrors German society: 30% of German women have not had children, according to European Union statistics, with the figure rising among female university graduates to 40%. Germany’s Minister of Defense, Ursula von der Leyen, said that unless the birth rate picked up, the country would have to “turn the lights out”. …

French politician Emmanuel Macron has rejected French President François Hollande’s assertion that, “France has a problem with Islam”. He is against suspending the citizenship of jihadists, and keeps insisting, against all evidence, that Islamic State is not Islamic: “What poses a problem is not Islam, but certain behaviours that are said to be religious and then imposed on persons who practice that religion”.

hat-tip Scott of the Pacific