A license for parenting
You may have seen a lot of these on the internet lately. The internet is as witty as it always has been. On point memes, sometimes tell a truth way more beautifully than an essay laden with facts. So here is an essay, going easy on the facts yet hard on the truth.
May it be anti-vaxxers, abusing parents, irresponsible guardians or anyone who has authority over the young without the correct knowledge or mindset to do so, are all a stark reality in our world. In a world where the freedom of each human is so highly regarded, a whole subset of our population goes each and every day from their birth onwards through humiliation, boundations, brainwashing and moral policing. In a world where children stories talk about protagonists freeing themselves from evil, children are crushed under the evil disguise of culture and values every single day.
Who gives parents the right to decide the life and future of kids?
Even when the parents are not good human beings themselves?
A young child cannot decide to whom he/she is born. S(he) may land up in the house of criminals or extremists, addicts or fundamentalists, and yet no one in the world gives a damn.
We all think parents always want good for their children. But not every parent is good enough to do that.
We all think parents know the best for their children. But not everything is known by a parent.
We all think that parents care about their children the most. Of course, they do. just until they don’t.
You may not agree with this based on your experience with your parents but for a second, think how can you even know if your parents could not have done better? Maybe they were selfish at certain times, maybe they didn’t know any better, maybe they did the same things their parents did too, maybe they did a ‘good enough’ job. How can you know for sure that they did a great job because you have nothing else to compare it against. How do you know what is ideal parenting?
We cannot just let parents force their religion down the throats of their children, we cannot let parents give bad advice to the younglings, we cannot allow parents to force kids to do eccentric things in the name of culture, society, beliefs and dogmas. We cannot let this happen. Not in this age at least.
In the UDHR, it is time to add a new clause. Right under the freedom of each human being should be written that the child should have a say in their life. At least when things go terribly wrong. It is natural to think that children are not mature enough to know better, but they are conscious enough to know and feel the abuse, or at least will one day understand when they are old enough, why they are scared of human touch, loud noises, crowds, being alone, taking risks, standing up for themselves, realizing their dreams, etc. Maybe one day they may figure out that their religion isn’t as good as their parents taught, their social behaviour is not right, their beliefs not true, their identity a falsehood.
No human is perfect and most of them are outright blunders on a human scale and yet we have openly given the freedom to everyone to ruin a child’s life. Anti-abortionists think we are denying the right to life to a child and yet fail to notice that thousands of such unwanted or even wanted children land up in abusing houses filled with ignorance to the brim. We care so less about children, about ourselves of the past, that RSPCA- the world’s first organisation for animal welfare came almost a century before any proper organisation for child welfare. And yet they were so scattered and unplanned in the 1920s too that the only good reason they could find to care about children was that they were being overused in industries and mining.
Not a twitch on the face of humanity, not even a little worry, to throw every single generation again and again in the same hell hole of bad parenting. You cannot drive an inanimate machine without a license and yet you can easily go on making as many babies as you please, doing whatever with them, teaching them whatever you want, ordering them as it pleases you with no worry at all and little consequences. A license for having kids and parenting may sound absurd but will do so much good to the world that we can’t even imagine. Assuming that all parents care about their children and hence will do a good job at parenting is a fallacy. A guess for which generations are paying the cost.
If not a license, at least we should have a mandatory course for every new parent. Even online would do. Absolutely anything that is better than the current situation would do. Because there might be hundreds of vaccines for diseases, there happens to be none for ignorance.
