Family Obligations: Crash Course Philosophy #43
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Date: 2022-04-04
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Comments and reviews: 10
Nico
An interesting question you pose about people having to pass certain scrutinies before they can become parents, even biologically. If we could somehow ensure that such licensing would NEVER be abused in any way, I'd say it would make perfect sense to make people get licensed before they could be trusted with children. That would likely improve our society dramatically.
However, we cannot ensure that a government with that kind of power wouldn't start to abuse it. The government might decide, for example, that people who have political beliefs the government doesn't like aren't allowed to be parents. Or that religious people aren't allowed to be parents. Or that ONLY religious people were allowed to be parents. Or they might decide not to let people of certain races raise children. The government could easily block whomever they wanted from becoming legal parents, and they wouldn't have to give the actual reasons they are turning people away, they could just shape the future however they wanted. You could soon find yourself in a world where every child is indoctrinated to a specific way of thinking that makes them easy for the government to rule. (Yes, I'm aware that public schools and college are already guilty of this)
So, since we cannot be sure that a government with that kind of power wouldn't abuse it, I'd say it's safer to take the stance that it is each individual's right to become a parent, until they abuse that right. I know, it's sad to think that we wait until a child is abused until we do something about it. I don't like that either, but for the time being, it seems like it's the best solution available to us.
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An interesting question you pose about people having to pass certain scrutinies before they can become parents, even biologically. If we could somehow ensure that such licensing would NEVER be abused in any way, I'd say it would make perfect sense to make people get licensed before they could be trusted with children. That would likely improve our society dramatically.
However, we cannot ensure that a government with that kind of power wouldn't start to abuse it. The government might decide, for example, that people who have political beliefs the government doesn't like aren't allowed to be parents. Or that religious people aren't allowed to be parents. Or that ONLY religious people were allowed to be parents. Or they might decide not to let people of certain races raise children. The government could easily block whomever they wanted from becoming legal parents, and they wouldn't have to give the actual reasons they are turning people away, they could just shape the future however they wanted. You could soon find yourself in a world where every child is indoctrinated to a specific way of thinking that makes them easy for the government to rule. (Yes, I'm aware that public schools and college are already guilty of this)
So, since we cannot be sure that a government with that kind of power wouldn't abuse it, I'd say it's safer to take the stance that it is each individual's right to become a parent, until they abuse that right. I know, it's sad to think that we wait until a child is abused until we do something about it. I don't like that either, but for the time being, it seems like it's the best solution available to us.
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Derek
Very interesting topic. I-m gonna leave the parenting licence thing for now. But English runs into a problem when she talks about babies not entering contracts. There-s a long line of philosophical reasoning, especially in Locke, which shows that we ARE born into social contracts we simply cannot abdicate our responsibilities from. The -I didn-t ask to be born- argument won-t work when it comes to paying taxes, or going to school, or other social obligations. CC talks about this in the contractualism video. I-m not taking a hard line position on this. I-m just saying her reasoning is very inconsistent with other socially binding obligations she-d likely be in much agreement about.
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Very interesting topic. I-m gonna leave the parenting licence thing for now. But English runs into a problem when she talks about babies not entering contracts. There-s a long line of philosophical reasoning, especially in Locke, which shows that we ARE born into social contracts we simply cannot abdicate our responsibilities from. The -I didn-t ask to be born- argument won-t work when it comes to paying taxes, or going to school, or other social obligations. CC talks about this in the contractualism video. I-m not taking a hard line position on this. I-m just saying her reasoning is very inconsistent with other socially binding obligations she-d likely be in much agreement about.
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Cairo
Depends if it cuts both ways - if you've grown up, do you treat it that your parents do not owe you anything?
Edit: Also who licences society to licence parenting? I mean use your own logic, we put people through licences when it's something that could do a lot of harm and having parental licenses could indeed to a lot of harm. but okay, who gives licence to society/government to be able to do this? Who is that higher authority? Well I guess you don't get one because it takes parents in order to have any kind of society/government, because otherwise there are no people.
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Depends if it cuts both ways - if you've grown up, do you treat it that your parents do not owe you anything?
Edit: Also who licences society to licence parenting? I mean use your own logic, we put people through licences when it's something that could do a lot of harm and having parental licenses could indeed to a lot of harm. but okay, who gives licence to society/government to be able to do this? Who is that higher authority? Well I guess you don't get one because it takes parents in order to have any kind of society/government, because otherwise there are no people.
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Seeedyyy
English-s argument is a very weak one. Have you ever signed a contract that you wouldn-t murder people in your society? No, it-s a rule that is to be followed in order to improve everyone-s life in the end. Surely the idea that you have certain obligations towards your parents is the same; what you get in return is that your own children have the same obligations towards you. This system gives a certain amount of security to every member of society not to be all alone in this world; I would argue that this is a net benefit.
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English-s argument is a very weak one. Have you ever signed a contract that you wouldn-t murder people in your society? No, it-s a rule that is to be followed in order to improve everyone-s life in the end. Surely the idea that you have certain obligations towards your parents is the same; what you get in return is that your own children have the same obligations towards you. This system gives a certain amount of security to every member of society not to be all alone in this world; I would argue that this is a net benefit.
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Koarta
The test to see if you would be a good parent exists, it's a huge load of papers and it's kind of like an exam.
My mom had to take it when I was young for legal reasons I'm not gonna specify.
So what I'm saying is, the test is there, it's been created and everything. Why not make it mandatory? There are many people out there that you can just look at and see they wouldn't make a good parent, and many others who totally would but can't for one reason or another.
Just make the testing, it's not that hard.
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The test to see if you would be a good parent exists, it's a huge load of papers and it's kind of like an exam.
My mom had to take it when I was young for legal reasons I'm not gonna specify.
So what I'm saying is, the test is there, it's been created and everything. Why not make it mandatory? There are many people out there that you can just look at and see they wouldn't make a good parent, and many others who totally would but can't for one reason or another.
Just make the testing, it's not that hard.
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Mark
Francis Galton would be shocked by professor Lafayette's proposal.
The MMPI before you can have a child?
How would you prevent people from conceiving?
Since it is all based upon the feeling and connections that people have for eachother, ethics are involved, but people work them out for themselves.
What about the BTK serial killer Dennis Rader?
What do his children own him?
It will be interesting to see, over time, how they treat him - what kind of affection did he show them as they grew up?
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Francis Galton would be shocked by professor Lafayette's proposal.
The MMPI before you can have a child?
How would you prevent people from conceiving?
Since it is all based upon the feeling and connections that people have for eachother, ethics are involved, but people work them out for themselves.
What about the BTK serial killer Dennis Rader?
What do his children own him?
It will be interesting to see, over time, how they treat him - what kind of affection did he show them as they grew up?
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Shubham
Asian cultures are not being talked about. The majority of people here are poor. They spend their every single penny to educate their childrens in a hope that one day they will lead a better life and in the process parents too live a better life as their child grow.
So they do think their children owe them money, time, affection.
There is simly nothing wrong in it.
Asians, stop proudly declaring that because of owing mindset of parents you left them. It's nothing to be proud of
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Asian cultures are not being talked about. The majority of people here are poor. They spend their every single penny to educate their childrens in a hope that one day they will lead a better life and in the process parents too live a better life as their child grow.
So they do think their children owe them money, time, affection.
There is simly nothing wrong in it.
Asians, stop proudly declaring that because of owing mindset of parents you left them. It's nothing to be proud of
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education
No one will listen, then what? Kill the babies? Sell them to Families? Perhaps selling them to other countries? Perhaps we start removing parts of peoples bodies for punishment? Maybe jail them for life or make life harder with fines? Sounds really ridiculous. Or even better! If you have a child with no license you get killed, and the child takes your place. I dont like where any of this is heading. No one complains until the spotlight is on you! sad.
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No one will listen, then what? Kill the babies? Sell them to Families? Perhaps selling them to other countries? Perhaps we start removing parts of peoples bodies for punishment? Maybe jail them for life or make life harder with fines? Sounds really ridiculous. Or even better! If you have a child with no license you get killed, and the child takes your place. I dont like where any of this is heading. No one complains until the spotlight is on you! sad.
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tergre54
I don't think that contract is a helpful concept here. I did not exist before I existed so there was noone with whom my parents could enter into a contract related to my subsequent coming into existence.
Also, my parents did not choose to bring me into existence. They chose to bring someone into existence, and I turned up. How can I be held to a contract that doesn't specify me, specifically, as a party? A weak contract at best.
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I don't think that contract is a helpful concept here. I did not exist before I existed so there was noone with whom my parents could enter into a contract related to my subsequent coming into existence.
Also, my parents did not choose to bring me into existence. They chose to bring someone into existence, and I turned up. How can I be held to a contract that doesn't specify me, specifically, as a party? A weak contract at best.
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Juliet
Does this -parenting licence- sounds like The Handmaid's Tale to anyone else? I've heard people saying: -Poor people shouldn't be allowed to reproduce-. I know is not quite the same but it sounds very problematic already. I agree that parenting should be chosen very wisely but people, parents learn on the way, and it takes a lot of factors to determine good parents, even more difficult to predict it.
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Does this -parenting licence- sounds like The Handmaid's Tale to anyone else? I've heard people saying: -Poor people shouldn't be allowed to reproduce-. I know is not quite the same but it sounds very problematic already. I agree that parenting should be chosen very wisely but people, parents learn on the way, and it takes a lot of factors to determine good parents, even more difficult to predict it.
reply
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