Many would also argue that the right to rape and murder are biologically driven urges. Does that mean humans should be allowed?

No. But I haven't seen anyone arguing that humans have the right to reproduce if they want to because it's a biologically driven urge. That would be a really weak argument.

Earwicker wrote:I don't think she's being hypocritical at all. She would be if she wanted kids and was getting IVF to enable it but she's clearly stated several times that she doesn't want kids. If she doesn't want her own why would she want someone else's?

Exactly.

Josef K wrote:

Mandroid2.0 wrote:

Josef K wrote:What about the psychological well being of those unable to start a family without medical help.

It's got to be said Mandroid, that your stance is a little hypocritical when you prescribe that everyone else should adopt to help out the orphans but you would not. I mean you don't have to adopt a baby, you could get a teenager and still be helping out.

When did I say that everyone should adopt? I said that I'd prefer that they did. I said that they should if they express religious opinions that restrict abortions and favour adoptions, but that's a different matter that apparently doesn't exist outside the borders of the U.S.

Also, I'm not fit to be a mother. I know that, my friends know that, and even my own mother knows that. I would not be helping out anyone by adopting a child. Seriously. That kid would be better off in an orphanage or in foster care.

I understand that, from what you've written earlier, but the point I'm trying to make is that removing the facility of fertility treatment because there are orphan children is much the same totalitarian concept as making childless couples (or singles - there are plenty of kids well brought up by single parents) adopt.

Even if the suggestion is not for state intervention and what is actually being suggested is that they (the fertility problem people) should consider their moral obligation to mankind above their own desire for a child of their own.
If so, should we not all be asking ourselves if there is a place in our lives to assist solving the problem?

Agreed. Just to try to wrap up this particular issue:

I feel safe in assuming that nobody here is disputing the positions that there are criminally few families available to take in foster children. Some opinions in this thread have been more uninformed than others w/r/t who should and shouldn't be taking these kids in, but we can all agree that there should be more.

With that said, no matter what country or jurisdiction you live in, everybody has a right to their own parenting decisions. Anyone else's opinion and $5 will get you a cup of coffee.

There is nothing inherently egregious about wanting to have your own child, for example. In fact, it's a beautiful thing. Anyone who has been in love with someone enough to have kids by them knows this, and in no way is it mutually exclusive with having the kind of compassion needed to take in foster children and give them a full, happy childhood preparing them for a full, happy life.

Conversely, if you know you'd suck at parenting your own and/or foster children, and make your parenting/non-parenting decisions accordingly, you're also doing everyone a favor. Point being: any informed parenthood decision is valid on some level, from tubal ligations to fertility treatment. And yes, that includes abortion, which isn't always "murder" but in many cases is euthanasia and sometimes the most humane decision one can make. Only the mother knows all the facts when making such a decision, and sad to say, but to those of you with strong opinions or religious beliefs about it, they don't mean shit to her and her situation which you know nothing about. So stay the fuck out of it.

~~~

The solution?

Advocacy. More funding for better staffing of the foster care system and better subsidies for foster families, implementing awareness and outreach programs to attract potential foster families, coupled with a better screening process to weed out families fraudulently taking in kids to get the money, but also with assistance programs with counselors for both parents and kids. The program should be strictly audited, but also taken seriously with funding. This should be coupled with comprehensive sex ed programs in school. The goal here should be to empower people to make-- and follow through with-- informed parenting decisions.

Removed to allow Fuzzbob's post a little room.

simmo wrote:

Rick Reuben wrote: Answer the question, Honey: how much should a socialized health care system spend on fertility problems? Unlimited? I thought that health care was for people who are already living. Now taxpayers are supposed to foot the bill for expensive fertility treatments ( that may still fail in the end )? Why not spend the NHS budget on adopted kids? A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

In 2000, the British government pledged an additional £66.5million annually to adoption services, and a further £41 million annually to social services geared towards parentless children. The total annual spend on social services for parentless children is now at around £375 million.

In comparision, the NHS offers one free fertility cycle treatment to couples seeking IVF. The costs of one cycle rarely reach £3,000, and about 46,000 couples seek IVF treatment each year. That means total costs spent on patients amount to around £140,000 annually. Of course, money has to be spent to establish and maintain facilities for IVF treatment, but this is thought to peak at about £500,000 a year per local authority (and usually falls well short of this target).

In short, the amount of money being poured by the British government in to just adoption services alone, let alone wider social services for parentless children, is well in excess of that spent on infertility treatments.

Is this division of spending really unjust?

I was going to suggest that more might be spent on adoption services than IVF treatments, so I'm glad somebody actually came up with some figures. This also doesn't take in to account the cost to the NHS of pre & post natal care for children who are then given up for adoption. Also you don't get unlimited IVF treatment cycles from the NHS & you only get them if you meet certain criteria

If my wife & I weren't able to conceive naturally I'd be glad the NHS was able provide IVF if that's what we decided to do. Fortunately we haven't needed it - our first, a boy, is due in about 3 weeks. Was it planned? Yeah, kind of.

simmo wrote:Many would argue that the right to bear children is a human right, and one that the state can and should have no right to interfere with.

I’m sure many would argue that. I might too.
However in certain circumstances rights are removed for the benefit of society at large. People have a right to roam about freely until they fuck someone over - then they (hopefully) go to prison. Their rights are taken away as a punishment and for the sake of the rest of us.

simmo wrote:And the relationship of "bearing" is very different to the relationship of "owning".

I (perhaps poorly) tried to touch on that distinction. The fact is, generally, that when someone has a child they are responsible for its upbringing (they ‘own’ that child in one sense). In certain circumstances this is not the case and the child is removed from the parent/s but there has been much talk in this thread of there being too many children waiting for adoption. This removed child is likely to become another one of them with his or her life chances diminished and their survival dependant entirely on the rest of society.
Why not raise the matter of whether they should have had the child in the first place?

simmo wrote:Consequently, the ethical considerations to be taken in to account when looking at these relationships are different.

I’m aware of that – that was part of my point to begin with – but I think we might have it the wrong way round.

simmo wrote:On the contrary, I think people have plenty to say about bad parents having kids.

Of course but I am not talking about someone who shouts at their kid in a supermarket here I’m talking about people who have been viciously cruel to their own offspring.

simmo wrote:But when people say that bad parents shouldn't have kids, this concept of "should" is a moral one. Again, is it the government's place to turn this subjective moral idea in to objective legislation?

Governments do do this. Much (if not all) legislation is based on moral considerations. The idea that revenge is bad is a moral conclusion. Some would consider it their right to take violent revenge on someone who had done them wrong. Society disagrees, legislates and punishes accordingly.

simmo wrote:Moreover, even if such a policy were to be pursued, how would it be tested and enforced?

Don't know

simmo wrote:Who would assess potential parents for their worth, and what criteria would they use?

Well, take a look at some news website and type in the search engine ‘social services criticised’ you will get a list of violent and abusive parents who have done astonishingly horrific things to their own children. Stabbed them with screwdrivers, crushed their babies skulls, used them as ashtrays and if you can imagine it much much worse. For me those things might receive the punishment –
‘you no longer have the right to bring more children onto the earth’ and I’d add ‘you cunt’ onto the end of it.

simmo wrote:How would the policy be enforced? Through medical intervention? Not the first time, the discussion seems to be veering dangerously towards eugenics....

Fine, I'm not worried about where the conversation might veer.
So can you - or anyone else for that matter - put forward a case to me why such a cunt as would rape or torture or murder (or all three) their own child should have the right to have another?

Medical intervention in such cases sounds fine to me.

Why should it be up to anyone, the state/physicians/etc, to forcibly sterilize someone? If they abuse their children, social services can take them away. That's still a far cry from having to sterilize someone once it's arbitrarily decided you're "unfit" to conceive.

A forced sterilization, at first, would be considered "for the good of society", then, it might extend to any person, criminal or not, that is deemed "unfit". It's a slippery slope.

Skronk wrote:Why should it be up to anyone, the state/physicians/etc, to forcibly sterilize someone? If they abuse their children, social services can take them away. That's still a far cry from having to sterilize someone once it's arbitrarily decided you're "unfit" to conceive.

Given the examples I've given I'm not sure you can call the decision arbitrary. It would be based upon the cruelty they have imposed on their offspring.
Why let them have another for social services to take away?
Why does that make sense?
I've not seen a convincing argument yet.

If the answer is 'it's just not right' then that is arbitrary.

My point is once you lend credence to the idea that someone should be sterilized, where will it end?

I'd rather have social services do it's job if necessary, instead of diminishing or halting a person's natural ability (right) to procreate. Why does sterilization make sense to you, Earwicker?

It's too drastic, and downright tyrannical when a sterilization program can forcibly take away one's choice.

In a system like this, there is no oversight, or transparency to make sure one day we won't face this sort of tyranny on the average person.