They say they want Americans to have more babies. What’s beneath the surface?

^{The Collins Family, by TeggorMindFish, CC 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons}

“Humanity is dying,” billionaire Elon Musk told Fox News anchor Bret Baier recently when asked what keeps him up at night. “The birth rate is very low in almost every country. And so unless that changes, civilization will disappear.” Through interviews, social media posts, funding for population research and his own example as the parent of at least 14 children, Musk has become one of the most visible beacons of anxiety about falling birth rates.

While discussions about the economic challenges of falling birth rates exist across the political spectrum, the right has increasingly taken up the cause under the banner of “pronatalism” to promote higher birth rates. The Trump White House is reportedly soliciting suggestions to boost births from married couples, even as it continues drastic reductions to social services and public health funding.

In recent years, a revitalized pronatalist movement has brought together parts of the religious right, tech types and dedicated "new right" anti-feminists. These camps have some disagreements over government policy, technologies like in vitro...