Judge orders couple not to have children

I have a good friend who works as a casemanger over a set of caseworkers at child protective serices. His job gets to him alot. Everyday he goes into work and reads casefiles of parents who beat their children, torture their children, drug their children abandon their children ect ect. Every week he goes to court in another court battle of the state versus some parents in an effort to take the children legally away from the parents. Every week. The state already does intervine, all over the country and everyday in the affairs of famllies taking them away from torture and sometimes from future death. That is reality. How far of a stretch is it to intervention from early childhood to conception? We have age restrictions on drinking, on driving on voting....we have constraints..and wise ones for the most part, on all of them on those things and many others...but for some reason, conception, which is at least as important, and maybe more so than the others listed it completly unregulated and no morality assessed at all.....It is almost like it is a taboo to suggest, much less than impose santcions and regulations on conception. Why is that? Society exists because of rules (laws) that encourage a long lasting soical coehision as a whole. But not so much in this area. What if there were laws at least ideas, on how to regulate conception....just on paper..to test the idea of its feasablity......what would they be....what is amicable to the majority of society? What would be the youngest age that a couple could have children? What would be off-limits in terms or conception? It is really amoral or apprehensible to say that a woman drowing in cocaine not be allowed to concieve knowing that the woman is feeding cocaine to any children she becomes pregnant with by ingesting it during her pregnancy? All laws came from ideas at one point....right?
 
I concede that the state might have the right to regulate this case. A judge should not there needs to be some very clear restrictions and limitations on the reasons that can be used. To remove a persons right ton procreate is one of the harshest punishments that can be inflicted. If you do you are also violating the individual’s privacy. There is also the question of enforcement. How far and irreversible are you willing to go. I admit that my knee jerk reaction to this is that if someone is deliberately harming a child they should be punished extremely harshly but how do you go about it while not harming my civil liberties.
 
laughing weasel said:
I admit that my knee jerk reaction to this is that if someone is deliberately harming a child they should be punished extremely harshly but how do you go about it while not harming my civil liberties.
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I am not proposing punishment I am proposing absense before the crime is committed. There is no way to infringe on pro-creation without harming your or anyones civil liberties. That would be part of the package if there were laws and something to consider if there were laws in this area. Weasel, accepting the reality that this would infringe on your (and more so womans) civil liberites, do you have a loose paradign or idea on how the idea of banning child birth in some instances could be feasible?
 
The government should have to prove that these individuals were unfit parents using pretty much the same guidelines that we have for taking children away from their parents. Then the government would have to show a pattern of irresponsible behavior. The court would then allow the individuals to select a form of birth control that is approved by the court and should discuss the least intrusive way to verify continued use of the approved control. It probably should be blood test or some such test. The court should also set the conditions for a reversal hearing.
 
Denying someone the most basic function of life without their breaking a specific law is unusual punishment. It also sets the precedent that the court should be allowed to decide who is an acceptable parent and which lives have a value. These are two powers that I do not think that the government has or should have.
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I can agree with the first sentence. I DO think that the court should be allowed to decide who are acceptable parents and who aren't. Since the government is already trying to take parenting out of the hands of the parents (that is enacting laws to make parents less responsible for their children --> alcohol, smoking, video game ratings, you name it, these laws are designed to take the burden off of parents, to make their job easier.), I think they should go the whole way and take care of the children entirely, removing the parents from the issue entirely.

On the other hand, if the government removed these age restrictions on smoking, alcohol, video games, etc then parents would be more forced to protect their children and take care of them to further their gene lines.

The fact of the matter is that society these days is too protected. Protected people become complacent and lazy. "Oh, the government will pass laws to protect my children, I don't need to protect them myself." People of that type should not be allowed to have children. People who don't take an INTEREST in raising their child, an INTEREST in protecting their child from what they deem as harmful, should not be allowed to have children. And since the government has already stepped in and PROVIDED the means to create children who will survive with minimal parental supervision, the government should a) step in and take complete control over child production or b) roll back the laws which make parents complacent and lazy. The middle ground is obviously not working.

So the bottom line is that society needs to be mortally dangerous to children so parents will take a more active role in protecting their children from "unwholesome" (whatever those may be) influences.
 
I agree the first thing that we need to do is to outlaw women in the workplace because that will encourage them to stay home and supervise their children. We can get the money for this by savings that we will get from not having to educate them either. Let’s be rational children need to be cherished and cared for like the important resources that they are.
 
Wow, this debate has brought out a number of personal ideas and perceptions of what our justice system is and is not designated to do, better yet, and more appropriately, how it protects civil liberties.

I've posted, several times throughout this thread, that each and every right, or liberty, we have comes with an obligation to not infringe on the rights and/or liberties of others. These two fuq-ups are infringing upon all our rights, as tax payers, by burdening us with the financial, not to mention the moral, responsibility of ensuring their little bastards get a good up-bringing. It is not, nor will it ever be, my 'social responsibility' for their children - considering they are 'fuq-ups'.

You know what, I now wish the judge had sterilized them both.
 
I agree the first thing that we need to do is to outlaw women in the workplace because that will encourage them to stay home and supervise their children. We can get the money for this by savings that we will get from not having to educate them either. Let’s be rational children need to be cherished and cared for like the important resources that they are.
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Oh, ouch, the sarcasm stings like salt-water on my sandals, and the assumptions cut right to the bone of the boneless chicken I'm eating.

Seriously, parents taking an interest in the raising of their children doesn't mean "women no work, Bubba Ugh man work", it means that parents don't depend on the government to take care of their children for them, instead if they can't be home to supervise, they hire someone trusted to do so. It means parents know what their children watch on TV, it means parents discipline their children so that later in life they can trust their children to not do anything overly stupid, and if the child IS going to break the rules, they're damn well going to go about it in an intelligent manner because otherwise they WILL get caught and appropriately punished. Children who grow up in households with rules, where their parents KNOW what those children watch on tv, what video games they play, what books they read, what they do on the internet, etc turn out to be much more well adjusted than children who don't. Laws which "protect" children from {BAD} take more of the burden of childrearing from the parents, which is what we DON'T need. People tend to value things by how much they invest in them. If a parent invests more time and effort into raising a child, they will value the child more and they will be more careful and thoughtful about decisions they make that effect the future of that child.
 
Nasor said:
It’s pretty clear that these people are terrible, unfit parents who shouldn’t have any more children. Never the less, a judge can’t simply decree orders like this, regardless of whether or not the orders are a good idea. Our entire justice system is based around the premise that judges shouldn’t be able to just arbitrarily order people around.
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huh? it's hardly arbitray. They've already had 4 children taken away, no one argued that, even the mother agreed that her last child should be put in foster care. I hope this ruling sets a precident but I have a feeling it will be struck down eventually.

Once you prove that you're a terrible parent I'd say it's pretty reasonable to lose your right to procreate until you get your shit together. The judge didn't say they can never have children again, they just have to show they can/will support them.
 
Once you prove that you're a terrible parent I'd say it's pretty reasonable to lose your right to procreate until you get your shit together. The judge didn't say they can never have children again, they just have to show they can support them.
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I concur.............................. [damn character restriction]
 
It's obvious that some people should NOT be allowed to have children. Why
do you so passionately defend dysgenics ? Excellent decision by the judge.
 
I believe that the state only has power to punish people who break laws. If you give it the power to punish people who have broken no laws you end up with a system that allows people to be arrested and taken to jail with no trial. It is already happening in America. You have to oppose the government’s constant desire to gain the power to make everything better because it can also use that power to make everything so much worse.
 
If you get caught driving drunk, you lose your privilege to drive for a time. If you use a gun in a crime you lose your right to bear arms for a time.

It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that if you show (by way of losing your child/children to the state) that you cannot function adequately as a parent you lose your right to have more children until you can display the ability to bear the responsibility in this case as well.
 
I believe that the state only has power to punish people who break laws.
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True, these two haven't broken any laws but is it that much of a stretch to see that these two may be infringing on others rights and liberties; those of the children, those of the taxpayer, those of the state(keep in mind the state has rights as well, the right to govern)? And, if so, how do you propose the court deal with that possibility, considering no 'specific' law has been broken here?
 
Isn't not supporting your children (to the point that the state can take them away) against the law? A father that doesn't pay support is breaking the law, I'd assume it's also the case if the parent with custody doesn't adequately support them. Otherwise how could the state justifiably take them to begin with?
 
Cazov said:
So if someone commits habitua infanticide, they should continue to be allowed to produce more children?
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This may come as news to you, but here in the United States, we have a legal system. And, last time I checked, infanticide was illegal.

The way I see it...the more defective people like this who are prevented from having more children the better....
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The notion that you are important enough to ascribe your personal preferences to the lives of others is arrogant and idiotic. What makes your invective so important that society as a whole should embrace it?
 
That is why we have state and federal legislators to make laws and set reasonable punishments. The judicial systems job is to interpret laws not to make new ones. That is why we have separation of powers in America.
 
That is why we have state and federal legislators to make laws and set reasonable punishments. The judicial systems job is to interpret laws not to make new ones.
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Point well taken, although it still does not address the issue, the issue some here claim, of rights and liberties... Question is, who provides and restricts rights and liberties?

EDIT: So much for the 'big picture', this debate is lost in the weeds.....
 
I believe the following: the judge should not be able to take away a person’s right to procreate; the legislator does have the right to set laws into place which would prevent these people from having children. This means that the judge was wrong to remove their reproductive rights. All rights that are not surrendered to the federal government are reserved for the states in the United States that is part of our constitution.
 
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