Children: a Privilege not a Right

I'm hoping to elicit some comments with this entry. Basically, this last week there has been a lot of news in the UK regarding child abuse:

a 17 month old foster child was brutally beaten for months before being killed and left in his blood-spattered bed.
a mother stabbed her two young children to death (Manchester)
a mother was involved with the kidnapping of her own daughter in order to get a share of the reward money when she was found (Leeds).
a father was discovered to have repeatedly mentally and physically abused his two daughters over a period of 25 years! leading to 19 pregnancies, 9 births and 7 living children (many of which have severe disabilities). (Sheffield) [this comes on the heals of a similar case in Austria recently]

This brings me to the very obvious point that there are some people who simply should not be allowed to raise children. Actually, they should not be allowed to conceive, raise or even be around children. In this day and age, with almost 7 billion humans on the planet, there is no justification for allowing such people to breed. Countries like China already have limited procreation, perhaps the west should follow.

Incidentally, many people will argue: well China does it because of their limited space and resources. China is the fourth largest country in the world, and has a population of 1.3 billion. The United Kingdom is one of the smaller countries in the world (about the size of Oregon), and has a population of about 60 million. In terms of population density, the UK, with 298/sq km has over twice the density of China (138/sq km)! [you can work it out for yourself using the numbers on the CIA world fact book web site] There is no way that humans evolved, are wired if you will, to live in an area with an average density of almost 300 people per square kilometre (incidentally, that's about the same as India).

I propose that a license be brought in. You have to take a test and qualify for the right to have a child. And then, your license will state how many children you are allowed. The government should love this as it could be another source of revenue--you have to renew your license after the first year, and then every x years (5, 10).

[as an aside, I'm still adjusting to all the people in other countries. I grew up in Canada, where the average population density is 3.3/sq km (and 0.3/sq km where I grew up). You get a very different perspective on life in such places).

[aside #2: it's interesting to me that most countries really start to worry when their population growth is negative. This is a sign of the times: growth is better, more is better, quality doesn't matter. In today's world, in a country like the UK, with 60 million people, the government should be happy with a falling population. The country would probably be comfortable with about 20 million people. Incidentally, a license could help regulate the rate of population growth also.]