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I wonder if a license to breed system isn't a little bit too stringent...how about everyone gets a fair chance...but just one. If you screw up, you get fixed. No more bad parents with 8 kids on the welfare program. If you want a big family, you will have to prove yourself as a great parent.

Yes, but how long till we decide that the parents have "screwed up" and need to be sterilized before they do it again? What are the qualifications there? I mean, for every set of parents who screws up, there is at least one child being improperly treated/raised/etc and that's just one more who might carry on the trend when he/she grows up, unless he/she gets past a bad childhood, which also happens.

Just playing devil's advocate here....this is all just wishful thinking anyway, as I'm sure the many breeders out there would never allow a license to breed program to happen.

I know what you mean about "if I can't handle a dog, why should I be allowed to have children?" When we adopted our Golden Retriever a couple of years ago, that told me all I need to know. I'm much more selfish than I ever realized. When I found myself griping that I had to go home and take 30 precious minutes out of my day to change clothes and walk and feed the dog before I could go to happy hour with my co-workers on Friday night, I realized that there's no way I could not resent the hours upon hours that a child would take out of MY day.

Selfish? Yes. Do I care? Not really. I have plenty of friends with kids and nieces and nephews having kids, and I love them all dearly. I can play "Aunt Krista" to all of them whenever I want or choose not to if I'm not in the mood. And here's why I really don't feel all that bad about my outlook on the subject: Hubby & I have had the "if we win the lottery..." conversation many times, and I know at some point we will need to draw up a will, and the same thing comes up every time. Several of our friends/family with kids have limited financial means. If we had a windfall, or when we pass away, a good portion of that will go to make sure these kids are able to go to college or have decent transportation to get them to their first job or college, or whatever they need to help get started on their own in life after they leave home.

All my cuddles and kisses at home get doled out to my hubby & my dog. I LUUUUUVVV my quiet, CF evenings at home with those two boys. But all of my guidance, advice, shoulders to cry on, financial help, hugs, athletics support, tutoring, mentoring, etc., go to my friends' kids and nieces & nephews' kids. Selfish? Maybe not as much as some people would like to think.

Then there's the question of who gets to decide if you're a great parent....

I think China has the right idea limiting how many kids you can have, but it has also created so many problems. Although, I love the idea that you need to be licensed in order to breed, it would never work. Have you ever read Margaret Peterson Haddix's series The Shadow Children? BellaOnline ALERT: Raw URLs are not allowed in these forums for security reasons. Please use UBB code. If you don't know how to do UBB code just post here for help - we will help out!

Ooh, a new series to read. I was even going to the library today! Thanks!

Ingilbert- I've put a lot of thought into that topic. When I talk about tax penalties or reproduction control, a lot of people bring up China. There is one big difference between China and a lot of the rest of the world - China's culture makes having a female baby a REALLY bad thing. That's why people get rid of their little girls. Luckily, we don't have the mysogyny here.

Nonetheless, I agree that we can't really make a law or financial penalty against having more than two children, at least not unless things are a lot worse than they are now. However, I'm hoping that over time it might become socially unacceptible. I'm hoping that CF people like us are a growing movement who will lead to that outcome.

I just fear that the movement will not come soon enough. I think we're running out of resources faster than the mentality is changing.

I agree. I would love to see single- or two-child families become the trend.

I would guess that they're already the trend. For lots of reasons people will only have one or two. People who have more are actually not that common, it's just that we like to glamorise the lunacy by making TV programs about it.

Although having said that, there was a woman in Ikea last night with 4 of them crammed wriggling into a shopping cart, while daddy held the fifth. I don't think she actually got to look at anything though - it kind of reminded me of that "sharks" game at the fairground, where you have to whack the sharks on the head with the rubber hammer when they pop their heads out of the hole. You could hear her yelling right through the store, and every time I saw her she seemed to have about eight arms.

They weren't actually misbehaving, just squealing and jumping as young kids are wont to do - but OMG, I can't imagine how stressful that would be.

Pikasam, you might be right, it's hard for me to tell, living in Texas. EVERYONE here has at least 3 kids. Except me. And freebubbles. And George Strait.