Thanks for your reply. As they say, if you don't know the facts, you reach the wrong conclusions, and your response is littered with claims that are factually false. There’s a lot in your post, so I broke my reply into two parts. "How many times do you “experts” have to be proven wrong on everything from global cooling (remember the 70s?) to acid rain, to Al Gore’s ridiculous climate predictions to COVID and now overpopulation? There are only models on what may or may not happen with a growing world population. There is no real science behind it, just theories. Just as with climate models. Zero science, just “predictions” that continue being proven wrong." Al Gore is not a scientific expert and DID exaggerate on two issues, so let's set him aside and deal with the actual science. 1) "from global cooling (remember the 70s?)" Uhh, that was mostly a media creation: In the 1960s and 1970s, the vast majority of climate scientists who took a position on the issue in the 1960s and 1970s predicted future global warming due to our emissions, which is exactly what happened. 2) COVID: As the scientists said, the best research and history proves that A) COVID was a deadly pandemic that killed millions of people (which is why Trump, his family, and all sorts of FOX News hosts got the vaccine), B) Vaccines saved millions of lives, C) Good masks worn properly reduced the spread of the disease significantly, D) Social distancing and lockdowns reduced the spread of the disease significantly. Tragically, in my country (America), the GOP and right-wing media frequently turn their back on science and truth, so people in "Trumpier" counties died at measurably higher rates than people in very pro-Biden counties, because so many of the Republicans didn't take the correct precautions. 3) Overpopulation" There is excellent research on humans' individual and collective ecological footprints, and it shows that collectively, humanity's ecological impacts are overshooting Earth's sustainable carrying capacity by about 70% per year. If we don't end that overshoot, worsening ecological and societal breakdown is inevitable, and most of the increase in that overshoot in recent decades has been due to population growth. 4) Climate models. Some of the world's best science stands behind climate models, which is why we have had quite accurate climate models for over 40 years. Even Exxon's own scientists had a model in 1982 that VERY accurately predicted how much warming our future CO2 emissions would cause. Part 2 is coming.

Part 2 5) "Oh, and by the way, curious what is the optimal number of people for our planet? Have you scientists figured that out with your modeling? Haha!" Actually, because our lives and economies are dependent on the “resources” and health of the planet, there is excellent science proving that the optimal number of humans in MUCH lower than 8 billion-getting down to 500 million eventually would be wiser if we don't want to self-destruct. 6) "Same with climate change, what is our optimal climate?" That's easy: You want the climate to stay as stable as possible (or only change very slowly) because that is what all ecosystems on Earth are adapted to, and if you change it very rapidly, the health of ecosystems deteriorate and species die off, and our food supply breaks down. 7) “climate is forever changing” Although that is true of weather, climate is far more stable than that. In fact, average global temps had been very stable for the last 6,000 years and were supposed to be very stable for the next 50,000 years-which would have been great for humans. Unfortunately, we are currently warming the planet ~20 times faster than it usually warms when coming out of a glaciation period, and increasing global CO2 levels 10 times faster than they increased before the worst mass extinction of life on Earth. And yes, thousands of research studies prove that our emissions caused ~98% of all global warming since 1900. 8) "How many times do you “experts” have to be proven wrong?” Actually, global warming, climate disruption, global ice melt, sea level rise, loss of biodiversity, and degradation of the ecosystems that our lives and societies depend on have ALL gotten worse as faster or even a little faster faster than the majority of experts in those fields predicted/warned back in the 1980s and 1990s. Thus, far from being repeatedly wrong, the warnings from the world’s leading scientists have been depressingly accurate. However, you obviously don’t know this, and that’s probably because you get your information from right-wing media or those silly “50 predictions that didn’t come true” websites. If you spend the time to analyze those sites/claims-as I have done as a researcher, you will find that all those “predictions that didn’t come true” were from non-scientists, misquoted scientists, or from rogue scientists whose claims didn’t fit what the majority of experts in the field agreed to be true. In short, those sites are meaningless-but I suppose they are good for making money fooling people. There, I’ve laid out eight areas where you thought the experts were wrong but in fact the best evidence proves they were right (11 areas if you count the separate COVID points separately). I hope this helps clear up some things, but please, find new sources of information that are actually in touch with scientific reality.

Ok, I understand you lean hard left and want to pretend you hold the moral high ground as you try and hide behind “the science”. So, first of all, science isn’t about consensus and it’s certainly never settled. I’ve read both sides of the argument for climate change which is how I came to this sight. It was only after I came to this sight that I realized how corrupted the climate and population narrative had been corrupted by the left. As with the left, the thing is never the thing. You guys don’t want to save the planet. You are certainly not wanting to save humanity. You are simply wanting to bring about another attempt at a creating a “communal” society. But of course, this time you’ll make it true communism-the good communism. Which is scary to think any human being can advocate for such a system knowing the tragic and dismal history of such social and economic experiments. Ha! Didn’t Marx think he was using science to come up with his theory materialism? On Al Gore, the reason I brought him up was because he won a Nobel Prize for his ridiculous movie that has since been proven a complete and utter hoax on every one of his climate predictions. A Nobel Prize for making false predictions? Hahaha! Of course throughout the entire movie, like you, Gore kept referring to the science and experts to give his words more credence and authority. There are no real academic studies or scholarship on climate or population. Climate wasn’t really a study until the last decade when colleges and professors saw all the money behind the narrative. So now, we have all kinds of experts in the field of climatology. Ha! So here we are now with studies on retarding population growth and de-industrialization? Huh? Hahahaha! I watched the video and couldn’t help but laugh at the three idiots on the stage pretending to be serious about the idea of eliminating humans from our planet. How do we rid our planet of the billions needed to have a sustainable population that equals our resources? Huh? Murder? Starvation? Abortions? Huh? Good Lord! Do you think people are just going to happily go along with forced/coerced prohibitions on reproducing…a la China? Madness! And what’s with all this de-colonization? Post-Capitalism? I know those are great buzzwords for the left born from the far side of our college campuses where “critical studies” (hyphenated studies) can be found. As for Covid, wow! I know you guys hate Trump, but good grief. The “experts” have already said that they made up the whole story on masks and social distancing. We certainly found out who our wannabe dictators were during Covid, that’s for sure. Wow! I hope we learned our lesson that centralizing decision making never ends well. What we did to ourselves of COVID, we should be ashamed. The damage we did to our young people especially!!! Very sad! And yes, the vaccine did help those who were typically old, unhealthy and obese. The virus was relatively harmless to everyone else. And we knew this early in the pandemic that younger and healthier people were NOT going to die from the virus. We knew this. We also knew social distancing was a joke. But yet, we continued with lockdowns. Lockdowns of healthy people-even our children. We suffered needlessly, in other words! Hopefully, in our next pandemic we won’t look so much like China! Ha!

Perhaps you should have read some science on the issue before weighing in so critically and confidently. Speaking as a senior university professor and researcher, there is a TON of scientific evidence proving that humans are currently overshooting Earth's sustainable carrying capacity by ~70% and are thus depleting the resources humans will need in the future while also destabilizing the climate and destroying the ecosystems and biodiversity that our future depend on. The bottom line is that large industrialized economies are inherently unsustainable and self-terminating systems, and burning fossil fuels, capitalism, competitive nation states, man-made chemicals, and AI all just accelerate the rate at which the web of life breaks down. Shrinking the global economy by 55+% and largely de-industrializing it is the ONLY scientifically-viable option for preventing the premature deaths of billions of people and the extinction of millions of species. Sorry for the bad news, but this is just the science, and you need to know the scientific facts first, then work out later what political arrangements are needed to save as many people and species as possible. Be well.

@@HealingLifeKwikly So, according to you lefties who claim you only want to help save the human species and our ecosystems, the answer to our problems is to do away with fossil fuels and capitalism. Ok, below is a list of all the products made from fossil fuels. Products mind you that come from the factors of production known as land, labor and capital. It is capitalism (private ownership of those factors) that brings about such products to satisfy our individual needs and wants (life). If you do away with capitalism, who then will be creating the products necessary for life? Yep, exactly, the state (politicians/bureaucrats). And what a disaster all state (planned) directed economies have been throughout history. But yet, you guys think you can somehow ameliorate for all the bad mistakes from the past and make a new and improved communal society…aka socialist society (communism)? Huh? Hahaha! What you guys will do is simply bring about a catastrophic man made disaster as you try to “plan” a world with fewer people and fewer products. First of all you’ll create one heckuva of a tyrannical state in the magnitude of Stalin and Mao-yes, it’ll take a whole lot of coercion/force by the state to get the masses in line with state interests vs private interests. Hyperinflation will be lasting as there will obviously be a shortage of everything-adding to inflation will be the high cost of energy due to the shortage of reliable energy sources (fossil fuels). Adding to the inflation will be the cost of agricultural goods since they’ll be in short supply due to the fact of a shortage of fertilizer and diesel. Adding to inflation will be the high cost of transporting goods due to the high costs of fuels. Which is all to say, you guys won’t ring in the utopia of democratic economy, you’ll simply wreck civilization as we know it. You can’t expect to tear down what took thousands of years to create and think you can come out on the other side unscathed. There are serious consequences to what you guys propose. This isn’t some academic thought experiment, there is such a thing as reality. All this sounds great in a “nice air conditioned” college classroom or lecture hall-with your so-called research you then get to call science. As with all leftist movements, getting people to go along with their grand schemes for a better society always creates chaos and violence. Always. Why? Simple, we humans don’t necessarily enjoy being slaves to the state. If one is not allowed to pursue one’s own self-interest (liberty), then one is simply a slave. A slave to his master’s interest (the state). One can only imagine how many people would love to be a master of such a society. Yeah, we’ve seen such masters in the last century. Do I need to name them all for you? You need to come into the light. Advocating for a world of fewer people and fewer output of goods (life) is a very, very dark place. Evil in fact. “Here are some of the ways petroleum is used in our every day lives. All plastic is made from petroleum and plastic is used almost everywhere: in cars, houses, toys, computers and clothing. Asphalt used in road construction is a petroleum product as is the synthetic rubber in the tires. Paraffin wax comes from petroleum, as do fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides, detergents, phonograph records, photographic film, furniture, packaging materials, surfboards, paints, and artificial fibers used in clothing, upholstery, and carpet backing. Solvents Diesel Motor Oil Bearing Grease Ink Floor Wax Ballpoint Pens Football Cleats Upholstery Sweaters Boats Insecticides Bicycle Tires Sports Car Bodies Nail Polish Fishing lures Dresses Tires Golf Bags Perfumes Cassettes Dishwasher Tool Boxes Shoe Polish Motorcycle Helmet Caulking Petroleum Jelly Transparent Tape CD Player Faucet Washers Antiseptics Clothesline Curtains Food Preservatives Basketballs Soap Vitamin Capsules Antihistamines Purses Shoes Dashboards Cortisone Deodorant Footballs Putty Dyes Panty Hose Refrigerant Percolators Life Jackets Rubbing Alcohol Linings Skis TV Cabinets Shag Rugs Electrician's Tape Tool Racks Car Battery Cases Epoxy Paint Mops Slacks Insect Repellent Oil Filters Umbrellas Yarn Fertilizers Hair Coloring Roofing Toilet Seats Fishing Rods Lipstick Denture Adhesive Linoleum Ice Cube Trays Synthetic Rubber Speakers Plastic Wood Electric Blankets Glycerin Tennis Rackets Rubber Cement Fishing Boots Dice Nylon Rope Candles Trash Bags House Paint Water Pipes Hand Lotion Roller Skates Surf Boards Shampoo Wheels Paint Rollers Shower Curtains Guitar Strings Luggage Aspirin Safety Glasses Antifreeze Football Helmets Awnings Eyeglasses Clothes Toothbrushes Ice Chests Footballs Combs CD's Paint Brushes Detergents Vaporizers Balloons Sun Glasses Tents Heart Valves Crayons Parachutes Telephones Enamel Pillows Dishes Cameras Anesthetics Artificial Turf Artificial limbs Bandages Dentures Model Cars Folding Doors Hair Curlers Cold cream Movie film Soft Contact lenses Drinking Cups Fan Belts Car Enamel Shaving Cream Ammonia Refrigerators Golf Balls Toothpaste Gasoline Ink Dishwashing liquids Paint brushes Telephones Toys Unbreakable dishes Insecticides Antiseptics Dolls Car sound insulation Fishing lures Deodorant Tires Motorcycle helmets Linoleum Sweaters Tents Refrigerator linings Paint rollers Floor wax Shoes Electrician's tape Plastic wood Model cars Glue Roller-skate wheels Trash bags Soap dishes Skis Permanent press clothes Hand lotion Clothesline Dyes Soft contact lenses Shampoo Panty hose Cameras Food preservatives Fishing rods Oil filters Combs Transparent tape Anesthetics Upholstery Dice Disposable diapers TV cabinets Cassettes Mops Sports car bodies Salad bowls House paint Purses Electric blankets Awnings Ammonia Dresses Car battery cases Safety glass Hair curlers Pajamas Synthetic rubber VCR tapes Eyeglasses Pillows Vitamin capsules Movie film Ice chests Candles Rubbing alcohol Loudspeakers Ice buckets Boats Ice cube trays Credit cards Fertilizers Crayons Insect repellent Water pipes Toilet seats Caulking Roofing shingles Fishing boots Life jackets Balloons Shower curtains Garden hose Golf balls Curtains Plywood adhesive Umbrellas Detergents Milk jugs Beach umbrellas Rubber cement Sun glasses Putty Faucet washers Cold cream Bandages Tool racks Antihistamines Hair coloring Nail polish Slacks Drinking cups Guitar strings False teeth Yarn Petroleum jelly Toothpaste Golf bags Roofing Tennis rackets Toothbrushes Perfume Luggage Wire insulation Folding doors Shoe polish Fan belts Ballpoint pens Shower doors Cortisone Carpeting Artificial turf Heart valves LP records Lipstick Artificial limbs Hearing aids Vaporizers Aspirin Shaving cream Wading pools Parachutes Americans consume petroleum products at a rate of three-and-a-half gallons of oil and more than 250 cubic feet of natural gas per day each!”

​@@sowellbeliever6109 Thanks for your reply. "So, according to you lefties who claim you only want to help save the human species and our ecosystems, the answer to our problems is to do away with fossil fuels and capitalism. Ok, below is a list of all the products made from fossil fuels." 1) Adult conversations work better if you don't slap supposedly-derogatory labels on people. I'm just a researcher trying to understand how to save as many people and species as possible, so let's just discuss issues like adults. 2) "who claim you only want to help save the human species and our ecosystems" It is absolutely bizarre to me and to billions of people like me that so many people in the world are so cynical they think everyone is just out for themselves when in fact a large portion of the population cares mostly about helping people and the planet. That's what my whole career has focused on, ditto for my wife and almost all family members. 3) "One can only imagine how many people would love to be a master of such a society." Good Lord man, please stop the endless cynicism (and changing of the topic): I'm just a researcher trying to describe the features of the ONLY kind of society that can be healthy, fair, and sustainable, and you are jumping ahead to possible abuses. Given that we are dealing with humans, of course there will always be some people who try to take advantage, and our job is to rein them in. But let's keep our eye on the main topic: The only type of civilization that can meet the needs of 8 billion people on a small finite planet. You need to first face the well-established scientific facts that… A) we are dependent on the climate, ecosystems, and millions of other species that make life on Earth possible, B) there are limits to the population size of any species that any ecosystem (including Earth) can support: too many deer, too much algae, or too many humans hurts the health of the ecosystems those species depend on (and then causes a collapse of that species unless the imbalance is fixed [e.g. mass starvation of deer]), C) humans are currently overshooting Earth’s sustainable carrying capacity by ~70% per year, and that overshoot is rapidly depleting the resources, destabilizing the climate, killing off the biodiversity, and degrading the ecosystems our futures depend on. More bluntly, we are destroying our only home. D) because the size of the ecological destruction is directly proportional to the size of global GDP, energy use, and material throughput, we have to shrink the global economy and largely de-industrialize it. 4) “OK, below is a list of all the products made from fossil fuels.” Thanks for the fun list, but I don’t need it: I’m well aware that over 6,000 types of products are made from plastics. But you can’t understand the world or make good decisions if you only do benefit analysis, you must examine the COSTS too. And sadly, our emissions of CO2 are hurting people and the planet in hundreds of well-documented ways and unless we stop raising global CO2 levels, we will wipe out most life on Earth, including most humans. The bottom line is that large changes in CO2 levels were THE main “kill mechanism” for most major and minor extinction events in Earth’s history. It’s strange that a conservative wouldn’t know by heart that many of the most pleasurable things in life destroy them in the end, which is why traditional conservatives preached self-control and limiting consumption and pleasure-seeking. If you’re preaching “If it feels good, do it,” which you seem to be doing, you’re not a real conservative. 5) “You need to come into the light. Advocating for a world of fewer people and fewer output of goods (life) is a very, very dark place. Evil in fact.” No, my friend. I’m a long-time Sunday School teacher in addition to being a long-time university researcher, and the truth is that shrinking and de-industrializing the global economy while weaning ourselves off of fossil fuels is the ONLY scientifically-plausible way to save billions of people and millions of species from a terrible and premature death/extinction. Please, catch up on the science of humanity’s predicament before weighing in again on the morality of the situation. Be well.

I know exactly what both mean. Who today is defending colonialism? Nobody practices this anymore. Capitalism is defended because it is proven to be the most efficient and effective economic system ever created.

@@anthonymorris5084 What an innocent person you are. Proven? Proven by whom? By the atrocious figures of inequality and environmental damage? You make me laugh. Capitalism is atrocious, it hasn’t solved the problems of human well-being because that’s not the interest of a model that grows destructively. Have you seen the alarming figures on ecosystem and environmental indicators? If capitalism did better accounting, it wouldn’t claim to have produced anything other than an unheard-of wealth for the few and extreme poverty for many, alongside massive environmental devastation.

@@anthonymorris5084 Now, are you telling me no one practices colonialism anymore? Are you that naive? Do you think colonialism is just guys with spears chasing naked natives? Come on, Europeans often believe their worldview is universal and not full of ideological biases that their condition as historical plunderers afforded them.

@@Harlinson-ib1xk The entire Western world embraces capitalism. The West represents the most successful societies this planet has ever seen, by any measurement you care to examine. Please find me a time when any society enjoyed economic equality. The history of humanity is a story of suffering and impoverishment. Wealth was owned by the dictator or the King. Everybody else worked from sun up until sundown in abject poverty. The Middle class is a capitalist creation. Life for humanity has never been better and data proves this. There is no moral imperative to make everybody economically equal. Nor is this even a possible endeavor. Socialism is the ideology of envy. The only goal should be to lift people out of poverty and capitalism has proven to succeed at this. "Environmental damage" is caused by consumption not capitalism. Every economic system is designed to facilitate the transaction of goods and services. If you want to live in depravation be my guest. Environmentalists all foolishly believe that the Earth is some kind of pristine place of harmony and purity that humans, like a parasite are wrecking. In fact the Earth is a hostile place that will kill you at any given opportunity. Humans have made it safer and more livable with each passing decade. Impact on nature is not some kind of evil, it's how humans flourish. Please enlighten me, where is colonialism being practiced today? Try to explain this without embracing socialist tropes.

Cognitive dissonance ....

The point is that people have ALREADY realized this. We just don't have the political power to change course. Yet.

@@acobster I debate people all the time who insist increasing our numbers will never be a problem. So many still are full of cognitive dissonance.

The US throws away 40% of all food produced. And corporations make literal tons of products that don't sell and end up in landfills every day. Until we have a democratic economy this will continue to be the case, because overproduction and waste is still profitable to capital.

@@acobster Nobody takes a product that doesn't sell and puts it in a landfill. Are you for real? That's why "market pricing" is such a successful practice. Everything sells, it just depends on the price. If it's a bad seller the price goes down and they don't make any more. Over production and waste is never profitable. How on Earth did you arrive at that assumption? Please explain how a "democratic economy" (meaning socialism) solves this problem? It can't. There is no mechanism to tell producers what or how much to produce. This is why in Soviet Russia they had shelves full of products that nobody wants and empty shelves of what people do want.

@@anthonymorris5084 "Nobody takes a product that doesn't sell and puts it in a landfill. Are you for real?" In fact, lots of never-sold items simply get destroyed, including clothing (even high-end clothing) and Amazon destroying millions of items of unsold stock--including laptops and flatscreen TVs. Overproduction is rife within capitalism.

@@HealingLifeKwikly You should start all of your fairy tales with "Once upon a time."

@@anthonymorris5084 Sorry Anthony, but I've got all the science and history on my side, as a 10-second search would reveal. However, you are committed the the fairy tale this hopelessly unsustainable economic system that destroys our morality can somehow work out in the long run just because it provided some fun goodies in the long run. Sorry, but that's not how the laws of nature work. Many physicists bang their heads on the table in frustration at the fact that many people are so lacking in scientific and mathematical reasoning that they believe perpetual growth is possible on a finite planet.

Like he said, where will 'we' create the electricity necessary to make this hydrogen economy possible?

@@RubenKemp The US grid loses so much energy (24 quadrillion BTU), that it could easily power another US economy. Use the regenerative grid theory, namely create battery fill and hydrogen from nightly and seasonal losses, to meet energy needs. Easy money.

There is no better way. Do you seriously think that after 200 years this guy suddenly figured it all out while nobody else has? First of all he's being totally dishonest, he's just using new terminology. Degrowth, and "democratic economy" are blatantly new age words for socialism. There is nothing new here, only language manipulation.

@@anthonymorris5084 " Degrowth, and "democratic economy" are blatantly new age words for socialism." With all due respect, you didn't listen very carefully to the video. De-growth is totally different from the socialism you speak of because old-school socialists weren't trying to shrink the size of the economy, but that is a core feature that he is advocating for. Also, he is advocating for making the economy eco-friendly, which was also not on the radar of old-school socialists. Not everything is old wine in new bottles, some things are actually new wine.

@@HealingLifeKwikly My friend these people don't even understand what growth is, or what growth does. Degrowth is synonymous with depravation. It translates into a shrinking quality of life and standard of living. Rising standards of living aren't created by a magic genie. Life for humanity gets better and better because of economic growth. Imagine if the people of the 1930's demanded a no growth policy. Do you understand what that would have meant for you, your health, your longevity, quality of life, leisure time, your knowledge, experiences, opportunities, etc? They would be dramatically compromised. There is no such thing as an "eco friendly economy". All human activity impacts nature, even if you're just building mud huts. So please tell me where you draw the line. A hospital is incredibly environmentally destructive. Does a hospital qualify under "eco friendly economy?" This is all language manipulation to attract gullible idealists and anti capitalists. Most don't even care about it's life crushing detriments as long as it ends capitalism.

@@anthonymorris5084 Thanks for your reply. "This is all language manipulation to attract gullible idealists and anti capitalists. Most don't even care about it's life crushing detriments as long as it ends capitalism." Look, I understand that you are cynical, but that's simply not reality Anthony. Everyone I have every met who is a critic of capitalism and wants to replace it feels that way because they want things to be better for more people. There are billions of people with unmet needs and billions of people who have been exploited by rich countries ancd industrialized capitalism. "Life for humanity gets better and better because of economic growth." Yes, and no. In the short run, economic growth boosts material living standards--although the well-being for many people is already trending downward. But meanwhile, the growth of industrialized capitalism is steadily destroying the Earth's ability to support life, including human life. If you claim to understand economics, then you should understand cost benefit analysis. It's not that capitalism or burning fossil fuels hasn't had short-term benefits: Of course it has just as burning fossil fuels has, but those benefits have overwhelmingly gone to the richest 20% of people. Meanwhile, what scientists have been telling us to 50 years--and the science proves to be true--is that this form of civilization is totally unsustainable. We are getting more golden eggs today by killing the geese that lay the golden eggs of humanity's future. Be well.

kzbin.info/www/bejne/p6PGqJmvq7Slgrc

@@criskalogiros8181 thank you, much appreciated :)

Ah, so you're one of those people that assess content based on "vibes". Your entire post is you doing precisely the thing you're accusing Hickel of doing.

@@CelticKnight missing the “accusation” part of my little comment, I would honestly be interested to know why you think so: I didn’t quite get what do you mean with “vibes”, can you elaborate that?

Allow myself to say I got a non dissimilar feeling.

I guess that would be determined by direct democracy or representative democracy in parliaments the same way we decide what laws we should have.

The people doing the labor. That's what a democratic economy means.

Funny thing is that he’s selling fried air: there is nothing solid tangible at the end of one hour - almost non stop - of him talking. He would make an excellent politician

He talked about the cooperatives, democratization of the economy and forming aliances between labour unions and ecological movements for example.

He literally has a PhD in economics.

I like how he addressed that by directly answering her question about what those people were wrong about and why he disagrees

What does an economic anthropologist say about mandatory accounting in the schools?

That produiction that is necessary for the population ( that cannot be exported)_

Pardon me to say bravo to be one of the few noticing something like that, even if I say so myself

You missed the point. Degrowth just means that the economy doesn't need to constantly grow. It does _not_ mean "no more growth in any sector," and it doesn't rely on Malthusian "world overpopulation" ideology (which _is_ eugenicist, as you point out). Hickel named the current mode of production as the core problem, just as you did.