Responsible Breeding - Socially authorised procreation

[Sweetdeath]

Isn't it the case that educating women reduces the birth rate?

I think education is key, but what worries me are religions that tell women it's evil to use basic birth control...

[Too Few Lions]

If there could be ONE THING that government would pay for, I would choose education.   Think, for example, of the USA. Imagine 300,000,000 people all educated to the limit of their innate potential.  There would be nothing that nation couldn't accomplish.  Education is the most valuable infrastructure investment that a nation can possibly make. 

Among highly educated people, there is relatively little gender, religious, ethnic, racial  or any other type of discrimination.  All boundaries are erased among the very educated (for the most part).  I work in a hospital's legal department.  The attorneys there are Christian, Jewish, Hindu, agnostic, and uncommitted. The physicians in our system are all of the above, plus Buddhist and outright atheist.  At that level, nobody gives a shit.  Everyone is doing OK, so who or what someone worships or doesn't worship, or whether they are male or female, black or white, etc., matters not. High levels of education engender high levels of mutual respect.  So, educate everyone, and all other problems tend to disappear.

I tend to find that's true of intelligent rational people be they highly educated or not. I've got friends who left school at 16, never went to Uni, but are highly intelligent and well balanced people with no antisocial or discriminatory views. I'm not sure education's necessarily all that important in producing well rounded people, those highly educated people you're talking about might naturally be that way with or without their education.

[Too Few Lions]

In a failing, morally and economically bankrupt society the first question is accutely relevant. I am a believer in libertarianism, but I also believe in social responsibility.

Gotta confess I agree with your original post 100% Siz, and I think the key is social responsibility. I don't think people have a god-given right to have as many children as they want if they can't financially support those children. It's socially irresponsible, particularly in western societies that are carrying such vast levels of debt. Everyone should try and live within their means, and I don't personally see why an exception should be made for procreation. Given the wide availability of contraception these days, I think having children is a lifestyle choice, not an automatic result of being sexually active.

[Siz]

In a failing, morally and economically bankrupt society the first question is accutely relevant. I am a believer in libertarianism, but I also believe in social responsibility.

Gotta confess I agree with your original post 100% Siz, and I think the key is social responsibility. I don't think people have a god-given right to have as many children as they want if they can't financially support those children. It's socially irresponsible, particularly in western societies that are carrying such vast levels of debt. Everyone should try and live within their means, and I don't personally see why an exception should be made for procreation. Given the wide availability of contraception these days, I think having children is a lifestyle choice, not an automatic result of being sexually active.

[whispermode]
Shhh TFL, noone agrees with us...
[/Whispermode]

Sadly, according to Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights there IS that right:

(1) 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.

I fear this will prove to be a '2nd Amendment' style cock-up on a global scale.

Although Article 29 does say:

(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject   only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of   securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and   of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general   welfare in a democratic society.

But by the time people wise up to the necessity to invoke Article 29 it'll be waaaay too late.

[Ali]

So practically speaking, how would you prevent people from procreating?

[Siz]

So practically speaking, how would you prevent people from procreating?

Sanctions.

Replace cash welfare payments with food and clothing stamps for those who, while reliant on welfare, payments proceed to have children - accidental or not. There is no excuse. Any rights violated here?

Benefits:
Welfare funded alcoholism will reduce.
Welfare funded smoking will reduce.
Possible improvement in nutrition for the children.
Increased welfare available for the genuine needy and public services.
More of the children's entitlement to aid will get to them in a beneficial form.

Disbenefits:
Enlighten me...

[Ali]

As long as all of the children's basic needs are cared for, I don't have a problem with it. 

[statichaos]

I have no rational argument regarding this, but something about the government having any say whatsoever regarding reproductive freedom just creeps me out.

[Ali]

I have no rational argument regarding this, but something about the government having any say whatsoever regarding reproductive freedom just creeps me out.

I agree.

[Whitney]

So practically speaking, how would you prevent people from procreating?

Sanctions.

Replace cash welfare payments with food and clothing stamps for those who, while reliant on welfare, payments proceed to have children - accidental or not. There is no excuse. Any rights violated here?

Benefits:
Welfare funded alcoholism will reduce.
Welfare funded smoking will reduce.
Possible improvement in nutrition for the children.
Increased welfare available for the genuine needy and public services.
More of the children's entitlement to aid will get to them in a beneficial form.

Disbenefits:
Enlighten me...

What if we just used that system for everyone on welfare?  Just give them some standard basics.  It's possible to play the system even without involving kids....I knew a couple in college who had somehow both gotten themselves onto section 8, welfare and food stamps.  So I remembered that later when I really could have used it and found out that college students don't qualify (but I could have dropped out and qualified which wasn't an option).  I don't know how they managed to play the system but they did.

[Too Few Lions]

Personally I think it's socially irresponsible for people to milk the benefits system whether they have kids or not. For those who are able to work it should be a system that supports them on a basic living until they're able to find work. I've been on the dole myself in the past and scraped by on £50-60 a week. It didn't make for a luxurious lifestyle, but it was nice to have the free time for a while until I found another job.

The trouble is here in the UK it's become a way of life for many people who get more on welfare than the average person earns. I'm not talking about people who work on low wages, I'm talking about people who don't work and have no incentive to work because they'd be worse off financially. Maybe that's not such a big problem in the US, but over here the government now pay out more in benefit / welfare payments than they take in income tax every year, which doesn't seem sustainable to me.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5651825/Benefit-payouts-will-exceed-income-tax-revenue.html

I do hate the Daily Mail (it's a horrible right wing rag) but this article gives some idea of the problem that exists over here, albeit in a rather extreme case

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1303439/Benefits-couple-claiming-30-000-11-children-ANOTHER-way.html

here's a more detailed (and less political) article from the BBC on a couple with five kids who get £600 a week in benefits, out of which they buy 200 cigarettes and 24 cans of beer a week!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16812185

[ThinkAnarchy]

@OP

I notice you mention libertarian philosophy, but you aren't a libertarian if you are even considering the idea the state should control what people do with their own body.

You're problems seem to be with the welfare system, from the few posts I've read, rather than with people having children they can't afford.

[Sweetdeath]

In a failing, morally and economically bankrupt society the first question is accutely relevant. I am a believer in libertarianism, but I also believe in social responsibility.

Gotta confess I agree with your original post 100% Siz, and I think the key is social responsibility. I don't think people have a god-given right to have as many children as they want if they can't financially support those children. It's socially irresponsible, particularly in western societies that are carrying such vast levels of debt. Everyone should try and live within their means, and I don't personally see why an exception should be made for procreation. Given the wide availability of contraception these days, I think having children is a lifestyle choice, not an automatic result of being sexually active.

<3 Great post

[The Magic Pudding]

here's a more detailed (and less political) article from the BBC on a couple with five kids who get £600 a week in benefits, out of which they buy 200 cigarettes and 24 cans of beer a week!

I wonder if the people that are outraged by the cost to society of such wasteful spending factor in that much of that spending is going back to the government.  Beer and smokes would be pretty cheap without taxes.