"Some people's children!" If only we knew how to distinguish those who will competently raise children for 18 years from those who will not.

We know there are conditions under which children tend to do better, and conditions under which they tend not to do well. The level of the parents' education is a factor. The economic stability of the parents is a factor. The parents' age (not too young, not too old) is a factor. A healthy environment for the family is a factor. Effective schools for the children is a factor. Access to at least basic health care is a factor.

Those are all social factors. Society falling apart? Good luck to any parents who can't insulate themselves and their children from the chaos of things falling apart and the center not holding,

What personal characteristics would you look for in approving or disapproving parenthood?

About what percent of prospective parents do you think are deficient in skills, such that they should not parent children?

Do you think you are a competent prospective (or actual) parent? Why?

Was it Mrs. Trump's fault that her son turned out to be such an exceedingly unpleasant person? Or did he he develop into an asshole all on his own?

It was a very juicy post but now it's gone.

Should there be a licence to have children? Short answer: yes. Will such a legislation ever be established in a nontotalitarian regime? No.

Should there be a licence to have children? Short answer: yes. Will such a legislation ever be established in a nontotalitarian regime? No. — Janus

:up:

What personal characteristics would you look for in approving or disapproving parenthood? — BC

Economic status and possibility of access to employment, not dependent upon drugs or alcohol, the no existence of domestic violence, the eventual parents want to create a family in the future, and they are not just 'crushes', they do not have debts, etc. Well, everything you need to be able to adopt.

Do you think you are a competent prospective (or actual) parent? Why? — BC

No. If I not capable of taking care of myself, I can't parent a kid then. I think this is quite obvious, but for some folks not.

I feel like there might be better ways of achieving the same, or similar, outcome. Using tax incentives for parents who take classes, teaching communication and psychology earlier in school, and improving social supports for families are some alternative ideas. A test has too many potential ways to go awry. Presumably, wealthy people could get tutors while economically disadvantaged parents might find paying for the test burdensome. Administration and bureaucracy around it might become unwieldy.

Also, passing a test doesn't mean you will be good at parenting. There are a lot of bad drivers out there that passed the test, doctors committing malpractice who passed exams, etc. I think the real difficulty would be in where the dividing line gets drawn between what is and isn't considered a good parent or ideal parenting style. The extremes are easy to identify, but the dividing line is not so clear.

In my experience, there are many parents who would like guidance on how to be better, and there are others who are not open to the idea of people suggesting ways for them to improve. To access the first group, just make help available and let them know about it. To impact in the second group would likely require a different intervention than an exam to be most effective. Often, people who are good parents had good parents, have robust social and economical supports, or had bad parents and are highly motivated to not repeat what was done to them. Strategies that factor these considerations might be more effective.

Also, parenting is important, but there have been studies that suggest that genetics and friends actually have more impact on how a person turns out than how their parents raised them. Nurture is very important. I'm not discounting it. I am all for educating parents. It is just one piece of the puzzle, though.

Plus, what would you do in cases where people didn't pass the test? How would you keep them from having kids anyway? That is a road that does not go to good places.

China had a two-child policy for a long while. But then, they're a totalitian regime, you can be put in jail for saying wrong things about The Party.

In any case, the reproductive urge is almost impossible to suppress. The odd thing is when electric power is introduced to a poor country, the birthrate falls. It's odd, because you'd think that improved living standards, which electric power will introduce, might introduce a more relaxed attitude to having children. But no - apparently the underlying psychology is that in a very poor country, the odds are many of your children will die, so the good ol' evolutionary algorithm will kick in to ensure the odds of the success for your particular genotype. So even people whose only occupation is picking over rubbish tips or foraging for edibles in fields will have children, and nothing you can say is going to stop that. There are much deeper forces at work than can be constrained by mere civil laws.

Besides - imagine the bureacracy it would spawn! The Department of Childbirth.

The problem seems too complex for "licensing" criteria which reliably predicts "good or bad" potential parents; compounded by problems of "unlicensed" procreation, etc. Rather, I think biological parents, or any legal caretakers, should be held civilly or criminally liable for their child's 'antisocial violations', along with the child himself, from birth until age twenty-five – statutes of limitation do not apply – and the penalties for which increase accordingly with repeated offenses. Such a 'legal regime' should focus a society's policies-resources on a full-spectrum of public health & welfare, educational & occupational services in order to support familities ... this downstream radical reprioritizing (aka "expense") is largely why such a parental liability law won't be implemented and, if legislated, will be short-lived principally for lack of sufficient public policy follow-up.

Sounds like the first step towards a dystopian society.

I’m imagining the scenario where a passionate couple gets ‘pulled over’ for copulating without a license.
“I told him to slow down officer”, pleads the woman.
“Officer, we promise to only do oral sex from now on! You could watch us to make sure it’s legal”, the man offers. :razz:

One advantage / loophole to the bizarre law is that homosexual couples could screw like rabbits.
(This alone would make any such laws unappetizing to the right wingers).

It takes a village to raise a child. — African proverb

Anyone who thinks they are capable, or any parent or couple can be capable of raising a child without social support, should first demonstrate that they themselves can build a house and produce food to sustain themselves, alone, with only tools they have made themselves. Until then, it is safe to assume that it is society as a whole that is responsible for supporting parents to support children, and that their failure is our collective failure.

I'm just going to throw it out there that the worst parents I've known also tended to not care about things like "needing a license."

Things like: "don't drive with a suspended license," "don't drive around uninsured," "don't drive around drunk with your child in the car," and "don't drive around drunk, high, uninsured, in an unregistered vehicle, with an illegal fire arm and an open container, taking a 'short cut' the wrong way down a one way street directly in front of a cop," etc., that sort of thing.

Adding one more "license" they are supposed to have is going to do exactly nothing, barring some sort of draconian enforcement mechanism.

Anyone who thinks they are capable, or any parent or couple can be capable of raising a child without social support, should first demonstrate that they themselves can build a house and produce food to sustain themselves, alone, with only tools they have made themselves. Until then, it is safe to assume that it is society as a whole that is responsible for supporting parents to support children, and that their failure is our collective failure. — unenlightened

Well said! :up:

It takes a village the Internet with a good Wifi connection to raise a child.
(Streaming Netflix or Disney wouldn’t hurt either.) — African proverb

Hope you don’t mind if I updated that aphorism. :wink:

Why the urge talk about licences? Or the need to approach this question with licenses?

Many people should have licences for nearly everything, starting from how to use alcohol or to have a license to use a computer or a smart phone. Or how about simply the use of kitchen knives? Kitchen knives are terrible, nearly everybody has cut himself or herself with one and you can kill other people with them. How dare they are sold without licenses!!! They belong to the category of cold weapons, hence shouldn't they be registered and regulated like firearms. :smile:

I think talk of "licenses" belongs to the silly totalitarian dreams of control freaks.

The best natural way simply is for the government to provide assistance to couples or mothers that are having children. If the government provides support and assistance without charge, people will use these services. Few will have their babies at home without any official knowing about it. Hence there is already a way for the supervision of childbirth and children in general. If it's obvious that either the mother or the couple is really incapable of raising a child (meaning the child can literally die), then it's up already to the officials to intervene. Children aren't private property.

Hence no need for "licenses". You already have the adequate legal framework in other laws, actually.

Approaching this logically, yet impractically, kitchen knives hurt their owners >90% of the time, yet adults with serious problems due to toxic childhoods generally harm folks other than their parents >90% of the time.

Reminds me of musings we had at 0300 in the morning in residency: "soap should be given away free and Birth Control should be in the water supply and you have to get a prescription for the antidote".

I am wondering if there should be some type of thing you would have to complete to be able to have kids. — Lexa

This is already a thesis by Hugh LaFollette from 1980

Licensing Parents

I support the idea for a license for parents on the simple fact that we have licenses for every other thing in society that has potential to harm someone if not practiced correctly. Like a driver's license. So why should parents be able to take care of a defenseless child with the enormous risk of putting that child in harm due to malpractice, incompetents or downright bad intentions? And the objections that this would produce a totalitarian society is just not valid since we have licenses, certificate and similar for a number of other things that prevents us in society. The criticism based on "totalitarian society" primarily seems more like a slippery slope fallacy than actually engaging with the concept honestly. An inability to see the nuanced process of establishing a functioning practice of it in society, and instead just have an emotional reaction based on the idea that the majority of parents are always good for children. Fact is, the number of childhood traumas and experiences that children go though when growing up are wide spread and the amount of depression, anxiety and other mental health problems that people have as adults correlate to many of these childhood experiences. That we shouldn't have some form of education and licensing in order to make sure children receives the best possible conditions growing up seems like a no brainer really. But people are egotistical and cannot move on from the fact that their role as a parent is not some holy position that is more important than their child.

The children's well being is more important than the parent's ego and identity as a parent. If that cannot be agreed upon, then the fokus is not on the child's well being and instead on fulfilling the "achievement" of becoming a parent. In a time when the ego and individual have been bloated into more importance than the community and others, "achievements" are the norm for identity and there's no wonder that modern parents view their role as a parent more important than the well being and experience of their child, regardless of whether or not they understand this fact.

I'd like to challenge the idea that this strategy for society can only exist in a totalitarian society. That conclusion does not take into account the number of licenses and certificates that we already have and it makes a straw man out of the concept by not even engaging with the process of building a framework around the concept as a practical process in society. We already have something of this process for adoption agencies doing a thorough review of the adoption parents before they are allowed to adopt a child. So why would such parents be treated in that way and not parents getting their own child? What is the difference?

Approaching this logically, yet impractically, kitchen knives hurt their owners >90% of the time, yet adults with serious problems due to toxic childhoods generally harm folks other than their parents >90% of the time. — LuckyR

And how many own kitchen knives and have accidents with them, compared to adults that harm other people?

But the issue is here the licensing, the segregation of people in the form of a license on what they can do. People understand that you need a license for fire arms, explosives with the ability severely maim or kill people. Yes, you should now how to use them. But kitchen knives?

Having a license is quite a totalitarian way to solve the problem and likely opens up other ways that authorities can control lives of citizens.

Just take the case of above Hugh Lafollette. Because the link doesn't work for me, I don't know if this is either @Christoffer writing or then Hugh Lafollette quote. Either if it's Hugh or Christoffer, a comment:

Is a driving license, that you have showed the you know traffic rules and are capable of driving really comparable here? Do we need a license for a bicycle? A toddler can hurt himself or herself with a small tricycle. But the toddler cannot cause huge danger with a tricycle. A person with a big truck can cause a lot of harm. And, even if it might sound strange for Americans, driving isn't a human right.

But, for the totalitarians here wanting licenses for everything, creating a family is a human right.

Let's take into focus from Declaration of Human rights, article 16.

Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.

Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.
The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

So having the right to marry and to found a family is a human right. So basically here people want a license for an issue that is a human right. I think this is totally wrong.

I support the idea for a license for parents on the simple fact that we have licenses for every other thing in society that has potential to harm someone if not practiced correctly. Like a driver's license. So why should parents be able to take care of a defenseless child with the enormous risk of putting that child in harm due to malpractice, incompetents or downright bad intentions? — Christoffer

So there you have it. Parenting, having children is something like driving a car and knowing the traffic signals. What is a family, motherhood (or fatherhood) else than a danger to an infant?

I'd like to challenge the idea that this strategy for society can only exist in a totalitarian society. That conclusion does not take into account the number of licenses and certificates that we already have and it makes a straw man out of the concept by not even engaging with the process of building a framework around the concept as a practical process in society. We already have something of this process for adoption agencies doing a thorough review of the adoption parents before they are allowed to adopt a child. So why would such parents be treated in that way and not parents getting their own child? What is the difference? — Christoffer

The difference is that we do have those processes in society when things don't work. But usually only after they don't work. A license is different. License here is something universal: everybody has to have one. Without one, you are breaking the law. Besides, getting a license you have to prove to an authority, a total stranger, that you do have the qualifications of having children. And the idea is with a certain objective as it's a license: you pose a threat otherwise. Great approach towards your citizenry.

And lastly, assume you would have this extremely stupid arrangement of a license for something that is extremely natural and is considered a human right. Then what you think would be the result when statistics would show that (for example) minorities don't get the license as often as the majority does? Or that (what is actually quite likely) that poor people don't get it as often as the rich?

Great job with your licensing on social cohesion then, because people won't think that the objective is to "protect children", but protect the society from "children of certain people". Yep, it surely is quite totalitarian.

But, for the totalitarians here wanting licenses for everything, creating a family is a human right. — ssu

It's important to not make a poisoning the well or strawman here. By calling others "totalitarian" you are labeling them and isn't engaging in the philosophical argument correctly.

Creating a family is a human right, yes. But you build you argument on the idea that the license has some arbitrary totalitarian principles for deciding who's going to be a parent or not. This is a strawman since the parameters of decision has to do with evaluating the possible damage onto the child by evaluating the competence of the parent. It can also be used to evaluate if special needs are required, and functions in conjunction with more transparency and support into the child's first years in life.

If you are going to bring in human rights, then we can easily apply Right to Health into the mix in the perspective of the child. The evaluation of a parents competence to take care of a child is in direct relation to Right to Health for the child. And since the license is there to evaluate any potential harm and probabilities of harm for a child, it's only there to make sure the child does not end up in harm, either physical or mentally.

So there you have it. Parenting, having children is something like driving a car and knowing the traffic signals. What is a family, motherhood (or fatherhood) else than a danger to an infant? — ssu

This is a dishonest interpretation of the analogy by way of strawman.

The difference is that we do have those processes in society when things don't work. — ssu

This is exactly the issue that this concept tries to remedy or mitigate. When things don't work, past tense.

But usually only after they don't work. A license is different. License here is something universal: everybody has to have one. Without one, you are breaking the law. Besides, getting a license you have to prove to an authority, a total stranger, that you do have the qualifications of having children. And the idea is with a certain objective as it's a license: you pose a threat otherwise. Great approach towards your citizenry. — ssu

Why is this an issue? As a comparison, we do this for adoption parents. They have to prove to social services and go through a psychological evaluation before being approved to adopt a child. Care to explain the difference?

And lastly, assume you would have this extremely stupid arrangement of a license — ssu

"Poisoning the well" fallacy.

for something that is extremely natural and is considered a human right. — ssu

Natural does not equal anything, you are basically making the very definition of a "appeal to nature" fallacy. It is quite natural to kill someone, happens all the time in nature and in our civilisation, especially in our pre-civilized "natural" state.

A human right is, as I mentioned, also Right to Health, which, through the perspective of the child, means they have the right not to be mistreated by their parents or put in harms way by incompetence of their childcare abilities.

We also have other limiting conditions for many of the human rights Freedom of speech is considered a human right, but we still have limitations on it, making it illegal with defamation or libel, or freedom of privacy when people conduct crimes to the level that warrants surveillance in order to catch their criminal activity.

This means that human rights cannot be taken at face value, they're not binary laws, even if they're to be considered a foundation on which we build society. If you apply an absolutist approach to these rights, they (the articles) start to come into conflict with each other rather instantly.

They are principles and we form society so that they respect them but we also apply parameters that sometime limits them in order to protect other rights. Basically, some of the rights are valued higher than others. For instance, the right to health is much more foundational than the right to be a parent. In the very instance that a parent's childcare hurts a child, the right to health trumps the right to be a parent and we remove the child from these parents. It's by this logic that we can apply a license in order to make sure children does not come to harm in the first place.

Instead of doing these slippery slope fallacies you're doing when arguing against this type of parent license, look at what the intent and practice is supposed to be. Taking human rights into account, it guides the praxis of the system.

We are trying to adhere to the human right to health for the child while respecting the human right of becoming a parent. Ok, what does that mean for this type of license? Basically, it's not some totalitarian system with arbitrary rules that some people in power apply to what is needed to become a parent. It is a system of evaluating what level of competence a parent have for taking care of a child in order to defend the right to health for the child.

Will a child be at risk of damage to their physical health, mental health, and quality of life due to potential mishandling of the responsibility of childcare, based on the child's needs rooted in child psychology, their right for freedom and general well being?

These are the parameters for such a license. An evaluation of the quality of childcare that the parents are able to apply.

Basically, it's there to spot the parents who are unfit to apply the correct childcare to uphold the value of right to health for the child. With such a license and with consequent support from social security agencies evaluating the well being of the child during their first years, we can A) Find out who are very unfit for being parents, meaning, at high risk of physical damage, mental damage or both, denying them license, B) Granting a license for parents who score low having a closer support from social securities to be able to spot potential problems much faster and C) Approved and considered fit for parenting with voluntary and more open support if needed (for instance those times the environment becomes a danger without the parents being the cause).

Then what you think would be the result when statistics would show that (for example) minorities don't get the license as often as the majority does? Or that (what is actually quite likely) that poor people don't get it as often as the rich? — ssu

Level of income does not have anything to do with it. Actually, the amount of rich people being unfit as parents can be higher, as they neglect responsibilities in favor of careers and their own ego. I've witnessed families who are considered rich or upper middle class with parents who got children as "tokens", as "props" for their life styles rather than actually caring for the child. Once again you are making a slippery slope instead of engaging with the topic honestly here. You assume that statistics are some lone factor in how we evaluate and approve licenses, without there ever being a stated factor.

The approval is on a case to case basis.

And with the categories, most poor people would probably end up in category B or C, meaning higher support to make sure the child has the necessary well being regardless of environmental factors or income levels.

That there might be a higher case number of category A among poor people can be the result of the higher level of violence within families pressured by socioeconomic issues. But then again, what are you arguing for here? That the right to be a parent trumps the right to health for the child? And we also know that among these cases, the damage in childhood that children goes through, most likely rolls out the carpet for them falling into crime, addiction and other mental health problems in the future, continuing a cycle of violence for these socioeconomic groups. Blocking the downright dangerous or damaging family constellations for children while granting more category B licenses, automatically position support closer to those in need and mitigates the cycle of poverty that easily spirals out of control. Such measures can actually be part in improving the conditions of a socioeconomic group or location, reducing future crimes and building up a foundation of healthy children who grow up in far better conditions and with far better possibilities for the future.

That is a logical outcome of such a system.

Great job with your licensing on social cohesion then, because people won't think that the objective is to "protect children", but protect the society from "children of certain people". Yep, surely is quite totalitarian. — ssu

You ignore the fact that such a license system is applied as a complex system with parameters that avoids a binary and arbitrary foundation. Just like every other system in society, it isn't just "a license", but a webb of practices based around the license.

Your engagement with the concepts quickly hits a wall with the fallacy hasty generalization and fallacy of composition and basically looks like this: "because totalitarian governments have such limitations, therefore any type of limitation is totalitarian".

You are making these fallacies based on your own extreme fantasies about what such a system would imply, without engaging with the concept in a philosophical manner. No it's not automatically totalitarian, that is an emotional reaction to the concept and not an honest overview of its potential when built out as an actual infrastructure.

Changing society like proposed isn't a simplified "install license, end problems", it's large infrastructural change for social care and child care systems. It would require that a lot more tax is spent on the well being of children, out of the concept of deterministic strategies to prevent harm towards children, prevent childhood trauma and prevent future crimes that can result in such experiences for children.

Such change in resources throughout society mitigate much the needs for "after the fact" handling of crime and childhood traumas and harm. Some people with childhood trauma and damage have had their whole life being affected by it. Even among considered "balanced and psychologically healthy" adults there are childhood traumas that affect their ability to form relationships or function well in social structures.

To value right to parenting over right to health is rather backwards.

Why is this an issue? As a comparison, we do this for adoption parents. They have to prove to social services and go through a psychological evaluation before being approved to adopt a child. Care to explain the difference? — Christoffer

I'd say the relevant difference is that children up for adoption already exist, and since they cannot defend their interests, their guardian has to do it.

This is in contrast to licensing future parents, because their children do not exist. We thus cannot defend this scheme with reference to the interests of the child.

You are making these fallacies based on your own extreme fantasies about what such a system would imply, without engaging with the concept in a philosophical manner. No it's not automatically totalitarian, that is an emotional reaction to the concept and not an honest overview of its potential when built out as an actual infrastructure.

Changing society like proposed isn't a simplified "install license, end problems", it's large infrastructural change for social care and child care systems. It would require that a lot more tax is spent on the well being of children, out of the concept of deterministic strategies to prevent harm towards children, prevent childhood trauma and prevent future crimes that can result in such experiences for children.

Such change in resources throughout society mitigate much the needs for "after the fact" handling of crime and childhood traumas and harm. Some people with childhood trauma and damage have had their whole life being affected by it. Even among considered "balanced and psychologically healthy" adults there are childhood traumas that affect their ability to form relationships or function well in social structures. — Christoffer

The question then is whether the licensing itself has any relevant effect, or whether the actual effective part of the strategy is simply to provide parents with more support and childcare up to child protection services with more resources.

As has been pointed out by @unenlightened, our basic setup for parenting is kind of bad. And that means a lot of parenting traditions will be adaptations for that situation. That means a lot of bad things might be happening as a matter of course that we don't even recognize as "bad parenting".

As has been pointed out by unenlightened, our basic setup for parenting is kind of bad. And that means a lot of parenting traditions will be adaptations for that situation. That means a lot of bad things might be happening as a matter of course that we don't even recognize as "bad parenting". — Echarmion

One thing we do know is that the state makes a terrible parent. So there is no reason to imagine that the state has any expertise on what even constitutes a good parent or a good upbringing.

I am wondering if there should be some type of thing you would have to complete to be able to have kids. — Lexa

It would improve nothing for most people and add a huge burden - with concomitant increased funding, expansion of powers and invasive practice to law-enforcement - and create a huge new source of discrimination and popular resentment.

A badly organized, badly governed, economically skewed, mutually hostile society will produce too many dysfunctional citizens, no matter how many licenses and punishments it slaps on people. A co-operative, egalitarian, mutually supportive society will produce the right number of healthy, happy, responsible citizens, with very little external control exerted upon them.

. By calling others "totalitarian" you are labeling them and isn't engaging in the philosophical argument correctly. — Christoffer

I do apologize for this, but just to note that it is totalitarian societies that would do this kind of licensing or have licenses for reproduction. And I would emphasize that we are talking about a human right.

Licensing something that is a human right is very questionable in my view. You've already responded to this later, so I'll come back to this. Yet first and foremost, there are naturally many ways that authorities by law intervene in these things. A license-system is one specific way..

But you build you argument on the idea that the license has some arbitrary totalitarian principles for deciding who's going to be a parent or not. — Christoffer

Having not a license when you should have is braking the law. It is as simple as that.

This is a strawman since the parameters of decision has to do with evaluating the possible damage onto the child by evaluating the competence of the parent. — Christoffer

This itself is a strawman argument here. Look at what Merriam-Webster defines a license:

License: a permission granted by competent authority to engage in a business or occupation or in an activity otherwise unlawful.

Hence the activity is unlawful if you don't have the license. Yet for some reason you argue that this has to be dealt with the action of licensing the activity, not by as at the present by authorities intervening if there are problems. Which is my basic point.

If you are going to bring in human rights, then we can easily apply Right to Health into the mix in the perspective of the child. — Christoffer

Great! Lets think about that. Because the human rights start usually with a fetus that is defined to be that human (hence you cannot have an abortion on the last month of the pregnancy). I'm all for the perspective of the child.

But how that license works here?

Well, any activity, occupation etc that we get the permission to do, with the licenses, is gotten before you start the activity. So do the license applicant apply for this reproduction-license when they think they will try to get a child or simply when the mother is pregnant?

Is it then either you get the license or a) the mother does an abortion or b) the newly born child is immediately whisked away when he or she is born?

A human right is, as I mentioned, also Right to Health, which, through the perspective of the child, means they have the right not to be mistreated by their parents or put in harms way by incompetence of their childcare abilities. — Christoffer

And as the vast majority of parents aren't so deadly for their children, the sound and logical system is to intervene in those cases when the child is in danger. Not by have a license system that makes reproduction without the license unlawful.

We do that with a lot of things that otherwise are legal. We can (in many countries) use alcohol. But usually if someone misbehaves under the influence, there are many laws that limit this. But then the issue is misbehaviour, violence or whatever.

Instead of doing these slippery slope fallacies you're doing when arguing against this type of parent license, look at what the intent and practice is supposed to be. — Christoffer

And you should too, actually, because I'm not referring to fallacies here. Having some ownership or activity regulated by a permission from an authority is one form for regulators to act.

And the question which you shouldn't try to evade here is: is for the protection of children the best way to response with authorities implementing a license-system on reproduction?

I simply doubt that is not the most effective way, and it would cause resentment with others than me.

I'd say the relevant difference is that children up for adoption already exist, and since they cannot defend their interests, their guardian has to do it.

This is in contrast to licensing future parents, because their children do not exist. We thus cannot defend this scheme with reference to the interests of the child. — Echarmion

The adopted children that already exists are still evaluated under the idea of probability of harm in the future. It becomes an irrelevant factor if they exist or not because both focus on the probability of future harm. A child that isn't born yet will still be a child and we can still evaluate if a probable child will have probable harm or not. On top of that, such evaluation will dictate if a child that is already conceived and planned to be kept, will be in the hands of harm or well being. (See my answer to SSU with the categories of evaluation).

In essence, a child's existence or not should not be relevant if the evaluation is done on potential future harm in both situations.

The question then is whether the licensing itself has any relevant effect, or whether the actual effective part of the strategy is simply to provide parents with more support and childcare up to child protection services with more resources. — Echarmion

It is primarily to give more support for the sake of children's well being, but you still need to acquire a license and those who are obviously evaluated as having problems cannot get one. For instance, if the psychological evaluation finds that one of the parents or both have violence tendencies, that can block a license.

We can also propose a license system, either as included in this, or it's own, that's basically the same as a driver's license. Meaning, you need to go through education on child care, take tests and pass it in order to become a parent.

Such a system would never block anyone to become a parent, outside of the most extreme cases, and would just push for becoming more educated in the needs of a child.

At the moment we have education for parents, but it's voluntary... make it mandatory instead. You have to pass tests that makes sure you know what it means to take care of a child and you have everything available to you for educating in the matter.

Think of it as an education degree for parenting. It's not an advanced course, but its enough to ensure that everyone becoming a parent has a knowledge foundation that is necessary to at least mitigate the risk of malpractice. As it is right now, anyone can become a parent, regardless of knowledge of child care. Which means that even among the ones who got good intentions, they can absolutely traumatize a child anyway because of a lack of fundamental knowledge.

This knowledge is also part of the increasing child psychology knowledge base, so with continuing research and science on the subject, we will continue to fine tune the well being for all children, at least mitigate the unnecessary harm that comes out of the naive pretense that all people understand what it means to handle a child over the course of many years.

That means a lot of bad things might be happening as a matter of course that we don't even recognize as "bad parenting". — Echarmion

The number of people who are unknowing and ill-equipped to take care of a child is larger than people realize. Even people who seemingly had a good childhood, might not have had one, as we've seen in statistics from adult psychology addressing childhood traumas affecting adult lives.

A mandatory education for all parents can mitigate some of that and at the same time spot unseen patterns of bad parenting by interacting with parents undergoing this education.

As a comparison with getting an education for a driver's license, we do that in order to mitigate the risk of harm by enforcing knowledge upon the driver, but the driver can still drive like a stupid person, and yet, still never cause any damage. The likelihood that a parent cause harm to child through acting stupid is much higher than that of harm for a stupid driver. Therefor, education for parents is rather more important than education for a driver's license.

Mandatory education may therefor be even more important than introducing an A category of blocking people from becoming parents. I.e everyone can become a parent, but they have to go through mandatory education about child care.

but just to note that it is totalitarian societies that would do this kind of licensing or have licenses for reproduction. And I would emphasize that we are talking about a human right.

Licensing something that is a human right is very questionable in my view. Yet there are naturally many ways that authorities by law intervene in these things. — ssu

And keeping this in mind is an absolute tenet for anyone changing the fundamentals of society. For anything related to changing the very structures of a free society, it has to be functioning within a framework of that free society and its fundamental rights. In that, I agree.

This itself is a strawman argument here. Look at what Merriam-Webster defines a license:

License: a permission granted by competent authority to engage in a business or occupation or in an activity otherwise unlawful.

Hence the activity is unlawful if you don't have the license. Yet for some reason you argue that this has to be dealt with the action of licensing the activity, not by as at the present by authorities intervening if there are problems. — ssu

The strawman is in relation to this:

But you build you argument on the idea that the license has some arbitrary totalitarian principles for deciding who's going to be a parent or not. — Christoffer

Meaning, the difference between a totalitarian system behind the license might be that they create arbitrary rules that has nothing to do with child care. Comparing that to something that evaluate the needs of the child does not have a totalitarian component, since it takes the needs of the child as the source for evaluation, not a group in authority. The ones evaluating aren't deciding arbitrarily, they decide on the grounds of well being for a child. Much like adoption agencies aren't evaluating adoption parents on the grounds of the adoption agencies preferences, but instead through the perspective of the child's well being.

Great! Lets think about that. Because the human rights start usually with a fetus that is defined to be that human (hence you cannot have an abortion on the last month of the pregnancy). I'm all for the perspective of the child.

But how that license works here?

Well, any activity, occupation etc that we get the permission to do, with the licenses, is gotten before you start the activity. So do the license applicant apply for this reproduction-license when they think they will try to get a child or simply when the mother is pregnant?

Is it then either you get the license or a) the mother does an abortion or b) the newly born child is immediately whisked away when he or she is born? — ssu

The decision of going through with the pregnancy or not is based on the choice of the parents and primarily the mother. The choice in this matter should be excluded from the equation and license system. The evaluation has to do with the potential for harm and problems for the child in the specific family constellation that is being evaluated.

So, if two people plan to get a child, they need to first apply for this evaluation (or education as you can see in my answer to Echarmion) and go through with it. If they are evaluated to be in the A category, a potential harm for a child, they cannot go through with it, and if they do, that child will go into adoption. This can be changed by them seeking help to fix their situation until they can pass in to category B, which approves them as parents but with careful overview and support by social security agencies overlooking the care of the child.

If they already expect a child, and plan to keep it, but they fall under category A, then if the situation is proven unable to change into category B, they have to adopt.

Remember, these situations are the worst case situations, when there's a provable risk for harm to a child. Like if the parents have problems with alcoholism, violent tendencies, drug abuse or cannot express even the most basic understanding of a child's needs.

And as the vast majority of parents aren't so deadly for their children, the sound and logical system is to intervene in those cases when the child is in danger. Not by have a license system that makes reproduction without the license unlawful. — ssu

The system basically makes an evaluation of every child's situation rather than as an after thought. The problem is that the cases in which a child is spotted before harm is less than the cases when a child has already been harmed and that is the problem to be adressed.

And you should too, actually, because I'm not referring to fallacies here. — ssu

The fallacies are primarily the focus on placing the system into a totalitarian framework before the details of the system is evaluated. In essence, before it has been expanded into a system functioning within a society that respect human rights. The parameters matter as an authority who decides arbitrarily based on an invented ideological framework is not the same as an authority upholding the rights for someone (in this case the child or future child). The UN is in itself a form of authority, but it upholds the concept of human rights, so authority in itself does not equal something totalitarian, it's the details of their authority and their parameters and framework that matters and define if its totalitarian or not.

And here is the question, you shouldn't try to evade here: is for the protection of children the best way to response with authorities implementing a license-system?

I simply doubt that is not the most effective way, and it would cause resentment with others than me. — ssu

A fair question and I think the previous answer to Echarmion helps to give an alternative in the concept of a mandatory education. It's actually more close to that of a driver's license in that no one is blocking you from getting a driver's license, there's no authority that stops you getting the license. But you have to go through the mandatory education on child care in order to be allowed to parent a child. Through that, the most unfit parents will of course be spotted, those who absolutely cannot function as a parent and would either require constant support in the process, or be so unfit they would not be allowed to (those extreme cases)

A mandatory education also helps mitigate problems that arise out of parents with good intentions still doing it the wrong way and harming the child unintentionally.

Just education alone could mitigate a large chunk of the problems in society. Right now we have voluntary education available, but I think at least mandatory education would save a lot of children from harm. Especially together with much better support from social security authorities, with a case handler that's constantly there for support during the first years of the child's life.

Such a mandatory education still means that those who ignore it will face consequences, but it's more of a focus on verifying that parents have been exposed to relevant knowledge than anything else.

The adopted children that already exists are still evaluated under the idea of probability of harm in the future. It becomes an irrelevant factor if they exist or not because both focus on the probability of future harm. A child that isn't born yet will still be a child and we can still evaluate if a probable child will have probable harm or not. — Christoffer

Well, no, it will not be a child because your proposed solution is to not have the child born. So you'll have to explain who is supposed to be the subject whose rights you are protecting in this scenario.

It is primarily to give more support for the sake of children's well being, but you still need to acquire a license and those who are obviously evaluated as having problems cannot get one. For instance, if the psychological evaluation finds that one of the parents or both have violence tendencies, that can block a license.

We can also propose a license system, either as included in this, or it's own, that's basically the same as a driver's license. Meaning, you need to go through education on child care, take tests and pass it in order to become a parent.

Such a system would never block anyone to become a parent, outside of the most extreme cases, and would just push for becoming more educated in the needs of a child. — Christoffer

Some kind of education of monitoring program is a good idea, I'd agree. Schemes like that already exist, like regular checkups for children, where failure to attend leads to an appointment with child protection services. Of course such a scheme must be set up with special care so that it does not further aggravate the situation of families under financial pressure.

At the moment we have education for parents, but it's voluntary... make it mandatory instead. You have to pass tests that makes sure you know what it means to take care of a child and you have everything available to you for educating in the matter.

Think of it as an education degree for parenting. It's not an advanced course, but its enough to ensure that everyone becoming a parent has a knowledge foundation that is necessary to at least mitigate the risk of malpractice. As it is right now, anyone can become a parent, regardless of knowledge of child care. Which means that even among the ones who got good intentions, they can absolutely traumatize a child anyway because of a lack of fundamental knowledge. — Christoffer

Well, sure everyone should have basic knowledge. But at the same time the amount of problems caused by simply lack of basic knowledge seems small. The physical care of children is ultimately not that difficult. It's the emotional/ psychological side that's difficult, and that cannot easily be taught. Parenting is simply such a huge change to your life that you cannot really prepare for it.

This knowledge is also part of the increasing child psychology knowledge base, so with continuing research and science on the subject, we will continue to fine tune the well being for all children, at least mitigate the unnecessary harm that comes out of the naive pretense that all people understand what it means to handle a child over the course of many years. — Christoffer

Well, that's a good plan, but one does need to consider that the knowledge here is still very much in flux. While there may be broad agreement on what the psychological needs of children are, it's much harder to tell what this means in practice.

Even if it wasn't, knowing and doing is very different. It's one thing knowing in the abstract how you want to raise your child. It's quite another to actually deal with children. Parents are exposed to very strong emotions and I'm not sure how preparation for that would even look.

The number of people who are unknowing and ill-equipped to take care of a child is larger than people realize. Even people who seemingly had a good childhood, might not have had one, as we've seen in statistics from adult psychology addressing childhood traumas affecting adult lives.

A mandatory education for all parents can mitigate some of that and at the same time spot unseen patterns of bad parenting by interacting with parents undergoing this education. — Christoffer

Plausibly, education might improve things but I think a lot of bad parenting practices are a result of desperation. So I'd prefer first to improve the resources parents have available. This reduces the focus on the parents as the single point of failure and might be necessary to even provide the kind of time parents need for their education.

It's actually more close to that of a driver's license in that no one is blocking you from getting a driver's license, there's no authority that stops you getting the license. — Christoffer

At least here there is a test drive, which you have to pass. So yes, the authority can stop you from getting the license of you don't pass it.

If you are talking just about "mandatory education". Then the question is what is the punishment if you don't do your "mandatory education"? Is it a fine, or then an social-worker comes to check up how you are doing. Or then you aren't allowed to have children? It seems so based on what you state here:

So, if two people plan to get a child, they need to first apply for this evaluation (or education as you can see in my answer to Echarmion) and go through with it. If they are evaluated to be in the A category, a potential harm for a child, they cannot go through with it, and if they do, that child will go into adoption.

This is more Orwellian I thought. Before planning to have children, I guess a couple needs to show to the authorities that they are to be eligible to have children. So this evaluation happens when there even isn't a child! Perhaps it should be done immediately if people get married. Or just move together and are deemed to be in sexual relationship? Just in case...

Sucks to be planning for your first baby. Especially in the West that some countries try to get people to have more babies...

Just education alone could mitigate a large chunk of the problems in society. — Christoffer

Yet just education isn't same as a license for "being fit to have children". Besides, flunking that exam and wow, I guess looking for job places will be tough after you cannot to have this license.

Again I have to make ask again: why the obsession with a license? A reproduction permit?

Why not a softer approach?

Already authorities intervening in cases where parents simply cannot (or will not) parent their children are dramatic and some controversial. It's a delicate matter, not some regulation of handling hazardous stuff.

Right now we have voluntary education available, but I think at least mandatory education would save a lot of children from harm. Especially together with much better support from social security authorities, with a case handler that's constantly there for support during the first years of the child's life. — Christoffer

I would, and from my own personal experiences, support the Finnish method of the government giving free maternity package to pregnant mothers and couples and free counseling for future parents. It works, it has all the correct things and is very useful. That usefulness makes it so that people really use it. Rules and the threat of punishment isn't the only way you can inform people. And a very lousy way to try to "educate" them.

A Finnish maternity pack:

Well, no, it will not be a child because your proposed solution is to not have the child born. So you'll have to explain who is supposed to be the subject whose rights you are protecting in this scenario. — Echarmion

This is getting down into the gritty trenches of philosophy. We already have diseases that can be tested for at the very early stage of pregnancy and inform if the right course of action is to terminate the pregnancy because the child will suffer if born. So if that is already in practice, an idea of a child that is likely to end up in harm is even less problematic to avoid. Remember, these are the few cases in which parents are utterly unfit to be parents, where there's a high likelihood of harm.

Let's say there's an 80% chance that an unborn unconceived child is likely to be harmed or live in harm during their childhood. Would you say "go ahead" or argue for that child not being conceived? Let's say that a couple who are regularly taking drugs and who zone out due to it that they can't have the focus to care for a child. There's no sign that they are willing to go to rehab and change their ways anytime soon and they don't show any knowledge of even the most basic daily care for children.

Would you argue that they should not conceive a child, or allow them to do so, knowing the likelihood of harm to the child?

Schemes like that already exist, like regular checkups for children, where failure to attend leads to an appointment with child protection services. Of course such a scheme must be set up with special care so that it does not further aggravate the situation of families under financial pressure. — Echarmion

The big problem is often that such checkups only starts after the fact. A child can be traumatized for life because of one single event and even if child protection services start to involve themselves, it's often too late because the child already has trauma.

Better then to have a system with checkups for all children born, as a common practice in order to spot dangers before anything evolve into an event that could traumatize the child. Of course, some falls through the cracks, as with all systems in society, but the aim is to mitigate and lower the probability as much as possible.

Well, sure everyone should have basic knowledge. But at the same time the amount of problems caused by simply lack of basic knowledge seems small. — Echarmion

Not really. I've heard many stories from adults who have minor traumas from their childhood, things that seem basic, but that affect their entire life after. Many patients going to therapy have traumas they didn't even realize they had but realize when getting their childhood into context through the process.

A common thing that parents on a large scale are bad at is handling the first five years of a child's life. This period is part of solidifying a lot of basic psychological traits and can also catalyze underlying mental disorders. A common mishandling is the basis for "attachment issues", in which the adult exhibit problems handling social interactions due to the parents not able to carefully handle these first years of the child's life. For instance, many parents scream at their children when they're loud, but they do not understand when they can set boundaries and when they shouldn't. So they might either never set boundaries or they set too many of them. Either way can produce a minor trauma on the child's psychology. Understanding when and where to set boundaries and when not to is one concept that is important and that many fail at on a broad scale.

In the research I've done, there's a disturbing amount of adult issues that can be traced back to these early years of life, seemingly due to very common behaviors that slip through the awareness of educated child care personell.

It's the emotional/ psychological side that's difficult, and that cannot easily be taught. Parenting is simply such a huge change to your life that you cannot really prepare for it. — Echarmion

The psychological side is greater than the physical in my opinion. And it can be taught how to mitigate such problems, it's just not mainstream enough and there's a stigma of "telling parents how to raise their children" that I personally think is pure bullshit. The arrogance of parents believing they know everything that's best for their child might be a hormonally biological drive, but it's also a cultural narcissism of parents believing themselves to be the "gods" of their children.

Rather we should accept the fact that most people are unprepared and that maybe we should losen the fanaticism on such ideals and collaborate more in society for the sake of children's physical and mental health. Both for the common good and for the sake of the individual children.

And you also touch upon the huge change in that, because of it, why not focus more on mitigating that unpreparedness? With education and support and making sure unfit parents don't harm the children that comes into this world. It is for this very reason, that we are unprepared, that I'm arguing for these concepts.

Well, that's a good plan, but one does need to consider that the knowledge here is still very much in flux. While there may be broad agreement on what the psychological needs of children are, it's much harder to tell what this means in practice. — Echarmion

Of course, but no knowledge as opposed to knowledge that exists is still relevant, and knowledge that exists still has more positive outcomes. It's basically the same with all types of knowledge. I learned things in school that would never be taught today. We can only move society based on the best knowledge we have and using the best knowledge we have is still better than no knowledge at all.

Even if it wasn't, knowing and doing is very different. It's one thing knowing in the abstract how you want to raise your child. It's quite another to actually deal with children. Parents are exposed to very strong emotions and I'm not sure how preparation for that would even look. — Echarmion

Child care personell and child psychologists usually have very simple guidelines that are still both being ignored and aren't known in the mainstream. In good fact-respecting newspapers you can sometimes see article series with child psychologists answering questions from parents that seem obvious but aren't to many people.

The problem is that we have created a culture around those strong emotions, instead of creating a better collaborative atmosphere around child care.

It may look like I'm advocating for some cold authoritarian system, but in truth, the full concept has a much stronger focus on collaborating for the sake of the child, that we structure society more away from the hard borders that families create around themselves and be more open with caring for our children as a collective.

There are plenty of examples of this around the world in which tribes and collectives raise children more as a group, more collaborative.

But the problem is that in the west especially, we've created this mythological aura around the concept of being a family as parents and children. It's part of our individualistic culture to form a family, a constitution in which we build borders against the world and we know best. This I want to blow up, because we're obviously damaging our children in ways we don't even realize. The arrogance of the individual is a problem.

Plausibly, education might improve things but I think a lot of bad parenting practices are a result of desperation. So I'd prefer first to improve the resources parents have available. This reduces the focus on the parents as the single point of failure and might be necessary to even provide the kind of time parents need for their education. — Echarmion

I agree with the resources part. I'm not opposing support for parents, but the psychology is being ignored or downplayed when, in fact, our first years in life mostly defines the well being of our entire lives. So if we can maximize the ability for parents to give the best possible life to a child during their first years, that would not only help them as individuals, it would make them as adults much better capable to handle the complexity of life.

All in all, the ones not getting approved for parenting should not be a large sum of people and they will still have the chance to change their ways and be reevaluated. While those who get approved but with caution would receive a lot of support, far greater than we have today, even in nations like Scandinavia where the support for families are much greater.

If you are talking just about "mandatory education". Then the question is what is the punishment if you don't do your "mandatory education"? Is it a fine, or then an social-worker comes to check up how you are doing. Or then you aren't allowed to have children? It seems so based on what you state here:
— ssu

So, if two people plan to get a child, they need to first apply for this evaluation (or education as you can see in my answer to Echarmion) and go through with it. If they are evaluated to be in the A category, a potential harm for a child, they cannot go through with it, and if they do, that child will go into adoption. — Christoffer

This is more Orwellian I thought. Before planning to have children, I guess a couple needs to show to the authorities that they are to be eligible to have children. So this evaluation happens when there even isn't a child! Perhaps it should be done immediately if people get married. Or just move together and are deemed to be in sexual relationship? Just in case... — ssu

You have two scenarios, one in which you plan to get a child, in that scenario you simply apply to the education, go through it and gets an ok to move on with that plan. The second is that you accidentally conceived a child, then you need to go through the education.

I see no difference in the demands on people getting pregnant today? More than the need to go through an education. Couples who get pregnant need to do checkups, need to maintain close communication with the health care to make sure the pregnancy goes well.

A mandatory education isn't an academic education that only a few people are able to achieve. It's important to understand the level this is at. The mandatory aspect is that parents are forced to be exposed to the knowledge, forced to show engagement in the topics of child care. Because if they don't care, then that is and should absolutely be a red flag for the ability to take care of children.

Why should we birth children and be naive about the necessary knowledge of taking care of them?

In tribes there's long been practices of the community being part in caring for the children being born into the community. Just as I said to Echarmion, we have built a very strange bubble around the concept of "family" in which we believe that we, as parents, know what's best when in reality there's little to support the fact that every person understands what it takes to raise a child without producing traumas and issues in their psychology. Why then not support even further and by having such education we can evaluate the capabilities of the parents, while building a ground for supporting them if they're not scoring well. As I said to him, this is more about the community, as in society, being part of making sure children does not come to harm and the ones who gets a no because they fail the education or evaluation aren't your common families, but those who are clearly not good for children, through things like addiction, active crime, alcoholism, violent tendencies or clearly bad practices.

I see no problems with this education being part of the normal preparations that parents go through today. The only difference is that instead of volontary education, it's mandatory. You have to go through it when you're becoming a parent.

Sucks to be planning for your first baby. Especially in the West that some countries try to get people to have more babies... — ssu

Yes, this is actually an apt counter point you're making. After a time in which we've been taught that the world is going to shit because we will be overpopulated, it seems that it's the opposite, that we're dropping in numbers all over the world and that this can have dire consequences as well.

The argument I'm making isn't very good in that perspective, however, I do think that we can't look at numbers alone and that the well being of individuals is too important for society as a whole and therefore we have to make sure people get the best childhood that we can achieve as a collective.

Yet just education isn't same as a license for "being fit to have children". Besides, flunking that exam and wow, I guess looking for job places will be tough after you cannot to have this license. — ssu

You still need to go through the education to "have the license". It's mandatory and if failing you can get more support to finish it through. But as I said, this isn't some high education, most of it is basic stuff, some is concepts that are easy to follow but things that I've seen people don't understand today. You'd be surprised as how many basic things that parents today don't actually know. In order to flunk the exam you need to be really unfit, but it would catch those who actually are unfit and who produce a strong risk for children's well being, regardless of their intentions.

The focus is rather to force people to expose themselves to the knowledge. So that people don't ignore it which happens when it's voluntary.

Again I have to make ask again: why the obsession with a license? A reproduction permit?

Why not a softer approach? — ssu

I already think it is soft, I think that you apply your ideas about authoritarianism onto it and imagine a far more dark scenario than I'm actually presenting. It's easy to see it as the opposite of soft with that lens, but if you look at the cogs and bolts of it it's not really that wild as a concept. Especially since there's no authority that impose ideologies onto parents, but a process that enforces the knowledge from science of child well being onto parents so that they are more aware, as well as better support to catch problems before they escalate and the ability to prevent the most extreme cases of child abuse and malpractice that gets missed because of how lose the system is today.

Already authorities intervening in cases where parents simply cannot (or will not) parent their children are dramatic and some controversial. It's a delicate matter, not some regulation of handling hazardous stuff. — ssu

Because of our culture around the concept of "family". It's controversial because we've put the value of family and the individualistic ideals before the actual care for children's well being. I see, daily, the arrogance of parents and the controversy often just stems out of that arrogance. The care and well being for children takes second place over the identity as family.

So it's a delicate matter, yes, but I couldn't care much when the foundational structure of it all is based on almost spiritual values of "family" rather than the necessity to make sure all children are well.

And the problem today is that authorities just intervene when that trauma has already been set in motion. I'm interested in preventing things, to make sure something doesn't break, I have no interest in trying to fix something that's already broken.

I would, and from my own personal experiences, support the Finnish method of the government giving free maternity package to pregnant mothers and couples and free counseling for future parents. It works, it has all the correct things and is very useful. That usefulness makes it so that people really use it. Rules and the threat of punishment isn't the only way you can inform people. And a very lousy way to try to "educate" them.

A Finnish maternity pack: — ssu

This I'm all in support of. But the problem I see is that there's a large portion in society that just don't give a fuck. It's easy for us to discuss the ins and outs of 90% of people's situation as parents, but the 10% has a major impact on society and for the individuals. 10% of children who're affected by malpractice is too much.

The unfortunate thing is that this number is probably higher, if we add in minor traumas that makes a large chunk of adults seeking therapy because of something dark from their childhood, it's not 10%, it's far more.

My point is that if we have such mandatory education we can mitigate a lot of problems that we might even miss in statistics due to only the most extreme cases being visible. But there are so many adults who I've witnessed have childhood traumas without there ever being extreme situations considered part of their childhood.

I've read about the finish maternity pack and as a Swede I'm jealous of how well Finland handles these things. Even if we're so similar up here in the north around this subject. But I still think we can add more and improve more. And I think you form somewhat of an extreme totalitarian scenario in your head around the concept I present, while it's more or less a larger extension of the support system you have in Finland.

Who is the proposed standard-setter and arbiter of all these qualifying criteria, child welfare, potential harm, etc? In what sort of environment could such educating, evaluation and licensing take place?

Given the present situation in the US, where only 8 states provide free school lunches, 3,000,000 children have no health insurance, 2,500,000 are homeless, 3,700,000 are home schooled with minimal or no supervision and every state has different laws regarding child care and custody, how could any of these proposals be implemented or funded?