Two Plus Two Older Archives - Regulated human reproduction

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I voted "yes"... but only because I like the idea in theory, but I don't like your 2nd condition at all. I think having children naturally should be similar to adopting children. People should have to take a parenting class, and pass some sort of test to make sure they know what they're doing. We make people pass a drivers' test... and driving isn't really all that difficult (although I am amazed at the bad drivers out there). Parenting is not easy... I think it would benefit the parents, the children, and society if parents had to take some sort of class and pass a test before being allowed to have kids.

PS: We should also take away any monetary incentives in having kids (ie: welfare increaseses based on # of kids you have).

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As for the idea of requiring a license to have kids: How exactly do you propose to enforce this? All human beings are equipped to father (males) or bear (females) children (ignoring the small percentage that are sterile due to accident or medical condition). How exactly do you prevent people that the govenment deems unfit from having children? What do you do when they have children without a licence? Put them in prison and put the kids up for adoption, or in an orphanage if there arent enough adoptive parents available (there probably won't be if something like this is implemented.)? Fine them and make them take the parenting classes or whatever? Forcing people to take parenting classes doesn't guarantee that they will learn anything from them or apply what they learn, any more than making people take safe driving classes does. The whole notion of requiring a license to have children is something that looks like a good idea until you think about the practical implications of trying to implement such a policy, at which point it starts to look like a nightmare.