Now that is actually a really good, humane, practical idea. I like it.
It’s already kinda been done, though voluntarily for adults - in India. The ‘compensation’ was a transistor radio… Didn’t go down too well. A policy that would not have been out of place during the 30s in Germa… [sub]Oops. Nothing. Doesn’t matter.[/sub]
We could offer mandatory “family life” classes in high school as well - in fact several times from junior high on. Schools have been very busy working these sorts of topic in for years (at least here in the US).
But then if we’ve been doing it for years, and it doesn’t seem to have helped (which I disagree with, I don’t think we’ve proven that things have changed for the worse) then tax breaks for parenting classes wouldn’t do any good either.
(I personally think tax policy is a bad way to regulate behavior anyway. And there is a big difference between showing up for a class and learning anything. And a bigger jump from having heard it to applying it).
Personally, I think this is the “other people’s kids” problem. “My kids of course are darling angels. But those terrors across the street…their parents should have never spanked them because they’ve turned into bullys. Of course, the ones across the alley need a good spanking - spoiled brats.” Every child is different, every parent is different and one size fits all parenting does not work. And, as people have said, you can have bad parents and get good kids. And great parents and get rotten kids.
(Threadkiller, congrats. My oldest was adopted for Korea three years ago. And then there is “Baby Surprise,” who was born seven months later. And I’m female.)
Had Child Bearing Licenses been the law in the past and been enforceable, in Canada:
In 1890, licenses would have been systematically denied to Canadians of Irish, Italian, Jewish, or Black descent, and would have been denied to most Francophones living outside of Quebec, as well as anyone Catholic. Native Canadians (Indians) and Asians would not have been eligible for licenses at all.
In 1914, no licenses would have been available to Canadians of German descent.
By 1920 they might have lifted most restrictions on Catholics and related ethnic groups, and probably Germans, but it would still be tighter than for good Protestant white folk. Jews, Asians, and Natives would still be SOL.
By 1940 Germans and Italians would be SOL again, and Jews would still be fighting to get permits. Asians? Fuhgeddaboutit. Natives are still ineligible, and their numbers are dwindling.
By 1970 most restrictions would have been lifted on ethnic groups - as long as you’re married, of course - but newer ethnic groups, like East Indians, would still be a lot less likely to have their permits approved.
By 2000, most ethnic discrimination is gone. But forget it if you’re gay.
You can apply most of these scenarios to the U.S., adjusting for appropruate ethnic groups. For instance, in the States, the French wouldn’t have had the same problem, but blacks would have been denied permits right up until the 1960s.
Anyone think the government would doa perfect job TODAY? Neither do I.
In my utopia, there would be parenting lisenses. However, there would be no standards: all you would have to do is have both parents sign a form stating that the 1) wish to bring a child into the word 2) understand the legal responsibilities that entails and 3) agree to accept those responsibilities. I think if we were to cut out the accednetal pregnacies, the accedintally-on-purpose pregnancies, and the impulse pregnancies, it would help things a great deal. I tend to feel that just the having to bother to go down to the courthouse and stand in line requirement would go a long way towards weeding out the totally unsuitable.However, I can’t think of any way to enforce this that isn’t totally unacceptable, so it remains a fantasy.
I do hope that they come up with totally reversable vasectomies some day, and it becomes the social norm (not the legal requirement) that all men get them at 13. Having to take the steps to get a vasectomy reversed would serve the exact same point as my idea.
In my utopia, there would be parenting lisenses. However, there would be no standards: all you would have to do is have both parents sign a form stating that the 1) wish to bring a child into the word 2) understand the legal responsibilities that entails and 3) agree to accept those responsibilities. I think if we were to cut out the accednetal pregnacies, the accedintally-on-purpose pregnancies, and the impulse pregnancies, it would help things a great deal. I tend to feel that just the having to bother to go down to the courthouse and stand in line requirement would go a long way towards weeding out the totally unsuitable.However, I can’t think of any way to enforce this that isn’t totally unacceptable, so it remains a fantasy.
I do hope that they come up with totally reversable vasectomies some day, and it becomes the social norm (not the legal requirement) that all men get them at 13. Having to take the steps to get a vasectomy reversed would serve the exact same point as my idea.
I think the best we could do is to foster the creation of a set of ‘social mores’ which frown on irresponsible reproduction. There already are a lot of mores swirling about these issues, but they tend to be emotional, religious, and contradictory.
The culture should reach and then reinforce an consensus that:
People should be married before having children.
Parents should have an ample income to care for all the children they have.
Parents should limit family size to two or three children.
Parents should divest themselves of any irresponsible lifestyles such as drug use, late night partying, and criminal activity.
Conservatives tend to support 2-parent families, but turn around and undermine family planning–thus guarenteeing higher rates of single motherhood–while liberals are ‘soft’ on single parenthood from the get-go.
Conservatives tend to become insensed at the suggestion that you can have too many children, whereas liberals tend to be insensed at the suggestion that poor people shouldn’t have children, as if poverty were an ethnic identity rather than a substantive, limitin, predicament.
We need to challenge these attitudes in the course of getting our heads on straight. We don’t need new laws (except perhaps to facilitate family planning programs), but we need to replace superstitious taboos with practical ones.
I say, absolutely. Great idea.
The problem is enforecement. You just can’t.
You can’t force abortion or sterilization or institute euthanisation.
The ONLY thing one can do (from a Government standpoint) is, if an application for a license to have a child is submitted and rejected, and the couple went ahead and had the child, then the Government could possibly withhold any Government funds which might or might not have been privaledge to the child had the application been approved.
Welfare, etc.
No sure if that type of thing is similar in the UK than what we have here in the US.
Could even be used by the Government as a money grab as most license fee are. Could you imagine if you had to pay a $100 license fee for every child born that year in that country? Nice money!!!
It’ll happen. People do things without having the proper license all the time. Why, I can’t even count the number of programs I have on my computer that are unlicensed. 
Curiously, something like this happened to Lady Chance and I…but it wasn’t government inspired.
When we told LC’s insurance company that we had Baby Kate inbound they told us we had to sign up for a parenting class. They also told us that if we attended all 8 classes (Wednesday Night - 3 hours each night) we’d get some extra coverage above and beyond the norm. Not a bad deal.
It wasn’t a ‘how to prevent your kids from growing up and becoming gangsters’ class either. It was worthwhile stuff. How to handle a newborn, bathing, dressing, all that sort of stuff. I got a lot out of it. And they paid for a private room.
Who’s that trip trapping across my bridge.
Can’t provide you with figures on teenage or pre-teenage crime in Northern Ireland or the UK but there has not been a huge jump in the total crime rate.
According to the Northern Ireland Police Service website http://www.psni.police.uk/stats/index.shtml, “The overall level of recorded crime for 2000/01 was similar to that in 1999/00. The total of 119,912 offences recorded compared with the previous year’s figure of 119,111, an increase of 0.7 per cent”.
In the UK “Recorded Crime Statistics for the year to March 2001 have been published by the Home Office. The stats show an overall decrease in crime of 2.5%, with significant falls in the levels of vehicle crime and burglary. Violent crime, however, has shown a continued increase albeit at a reduced rate when compared to the last set of statistics for the year to September 2000.” according to the official govt crime reduction website http://www.crimereduction.gov.uk/statistics15.htm
I think you’ll find the same in most other developed countries. As a general rule never believe anybody (particularly the media) who tells you that crime rates are rising until they provide you with proof.
As to your general question (is this a general question or is this a Great Debate?) you’d have to ask yourself: what right does a Government have to do anything of this nature. A country that tells people whether or not they can have children is one that I would not want to live in.
Can open…worms everywhere!
Motog - I agree the country / government should not have any rights to tell people how many children they can have. I never said I agreed with the premise. But a system of welfare which costs billions of pounds each year is systematically abused by many people to gain advantages.
I know several girls I went to school with who got pregnant only because they wanted a child, & so they do not have to work, are given a council house, weekly money allowance, free child care etc…
Should I have to pay taxes to subsidise their selfishness?
I f the government is spending billions on welfare then it should have a level of control as to who gets the money.
Ironically, all the people ‘best’ suited to being parents (being well educated, financially stable, good backgrounds etc…) are not having kids until later (say 35), and then only one or two.
Whereas the guys who leave school at 16 have 4 kids all on welfare & no job by the age of 25. The first group pays to support the other - is this fair?
Hmm, seems to me that withdrawing benefit (or indeed financially penalising in any way) on the grounds that ‘we didn’t approve of your decision to become a parent’ will make the problem worse (since we seem to be saying that one of the criteria for successful parenthood is financial stability).
I agree, Mangetout. Carrot sans stick. Think of the effect this would have on, say a 15-year-old with an unwanted pregnancy.
One could perhaps extend it further: benefits could be derived from taking the classes up to one year after the child is born. The benefits could include childcare subsidy in the event of the (single) mother securing employment.
The trick would be to make employment more attractive than welfare.
Great idea but then whose going to pay fot it? You? The moralists would be all over it.
I think the idea is ludicrous in the extreme for reasons that have all ready been brought up in this thread.
I also don’t like the idea of “blame the parents”. Granted there are a huge amount of bad parents out there who couldn’t give a shit if there kid is playing games robbing a car and endangering people lives in it. Alternatively there are a lot of very good parents who raise kids to know right from wrong but who still have children who end up in trouble with the law.
I don’t know anyone who never broke some form of law as a kid/teenager. I caused criminal damage(very minor but still), tried drugs and a few other things that I’m not that proud off and had parents that tried their best to raise a functional adult who could fit into society. I was loved and thought right from wrong. my mother was always questioning me as to who I was with and what I was doing. I lied and went about my teenage life which by no means was a crime spree but did have it’s moments.
Who sets the yard sticks if these laws where brought in? Dangerous and risky stuff indeed. Why it’s almost like … what was the name of that Law again? Goodvin or something like that 
Doesn’t denying welfare to “noncompliant” families unfairly punish children whose only fault it was to be born to parents who would not (or could not) comply with some government edict? The children are there and they need to be cared for. Isn’t the government being hypocritical when it denies benefits to children in the name of improving the (collective) lot of children?
In my personal utopia:
At birth children are fitted with a devise that prevents them from having babies. It can’t be prematurly removed, but when properly removed hs no negative effect on fertility.
The potential parents must show that they are:
in a long term monogamous relationship
are financially stable
don’t have a criminal history
have a rational, consistant child rearing philosophy
autz: what are the safeguards that prevent this “device” from being used for eugenics?
autz: Also, why is monogamy required? Why can’t the parents be in a long term stable polygamous relationship?
If it was utopia, why would you need licences?
Sorry, just gotta say that this statement is -not- true. There is a fine to pay if you have more children than you’re supposed to, but there are no forced abortions.
I’m intrigued by Mangetout’s suggestion actually. Tell me Mangetout, did you envisage a hospital decapitation department or would there be a separate government building. And what kind of soup? I think that onion may have a more soothing effect than tomato, but maybe that’s just me. Or perhaps mushroom. Oh gosh, too many problems to resolve. It may not be so workable as it first looks.
…
But on a more serious note, I’m concerned about this idea that one must be financially secure to have kids. One person’s definition of “financially secure” is almost certainly different to the next. lee once started an ironic thread in which she asked how much one should have to earn before one can have kids - this question seems aposite now.
Some people want to have their children young - my parents certainly did. They felt that they would have more to offer and that they wanted their children to grow up with young and active parents. Were they “financially secure” when they made that decision? Highly subjective, but by many people’s standards probably not. For example, they lived next to a train station but just after I was born my dad couldn’t afford the rail fare for the 30 minute train journey to work so had to take a series of buses giving a 2 hour trip instead.
But both my parents have an incredibly strong work ethic and they are both very smart. They were also living in a time with a “job for life” culture, where firms invested in their employees (something which more than paid them back, incidentally - my father is now a senior manager at BT, the same firm he stated out with as a 16 year old apprentice 30 years ago; but that’s another debate). Their financial insecurity did not last long. By the time I was five they had bought a house in a desirable area and were well on the way to being affluent. By the time I was 10 my mother had completed her second degree, whilst working full time.
So what I want to know is: who the hell are you to tell my teenage parents that they shouldn’t have children? I think they did about as good a job with my sister and me as it is possible to do. To be denied a child license because of “financial insecurity” would simply have been wrong in their case. They could amply handle it.
As it happens, the fact that they were so young means that:
a) I had lots of parental attention during my first few years - my mother had me reading fluently by the age of eighteen months, which she puts down to simply having little to do other than play with me during this time.
b) My mother was doing her degrees during my formative years, so I grew up in an atmostphere of learning, viewing it as inherent to life rather than something separate.
c) I saw my dad work hard and be rewarded for doing so. I saw him study and improve, being promoted all the way. I grew up viewing this as the way things worked, which has served me well ever since.
d) Now I’m all growed up and with a career of my own and my parents are still in their mid forties, younger than most of my work colleagues. They are two of my best friends.
Hell, being a teenage parent is very tough. I’m still not ready emotionally to have them myself and I’m almost 50% older than my mum was when she fell pregnant. But it is most definitely a decision that belongs to the individuals involved and no third party should be making it for them.
If people really want children then I’m afraid that you have to let them make their own mistakes. And triumphs. Offer support - make the classes available, ensure that there is advice and a support network - but the one thing you absolutely cannot do is take away the right to do the one thing humanity has been doing since before it was humanity.
Geez, have you never read 1984?
pan