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Parenthood Financial Capability Law

A certain degree of basic financial capability is required to become a parent.

The fact is that basic financial capability is a requisite for parenthood so that children can have a secure and fair childhood. But since people do not always take this into consideration before becoming a parent, and since this lack of consideration has ultimately resulted in the unfair and unjust world of today, the law ought to require it.

There's no way to be absolutely sure that no one drives without a license, but that doesn't stop us from enacting laws requiring people to have a license before they drive. There's no way to be absolutely sure that people do not practice medicine without a doctor's degree and there are many quacks who pass off for doctors, but that still does not stop the law from requiring a doctor's degree in order to practice medicine. There is no guarantee that people who do not have basic financial capability will not become parents, once we enact the PFC law, but that should not stop us from enacting the PFC law. We cannot completely ensure that people who cannot support a child practice birth control or contraception, but that is no reason for the law not to require them to do so until they have reached the basic financial capability standard required by the law.

To conceive, deliver and raise a child you need not have any qualification. You do not need the qualification of basic financial capability, which is why poverty exists in the world. You do not need education, which is why ignorance exists in the world. You do not need shelter, which is why the homeless exist. You do not need health, which is why disease exists. You do not need food, which is why hunger exists. You do not need drinking water, which is why unquenched thirst exists.

The logical corollary of the PFC law would be preventing 1 billion poor people who exist today from having children. This may seem unethical at first, but it is not. The poor are also prevented from having nutritious food, clean drinking water, a comfortable shelter and a competent education, which undoubtedly, are more important rights. Isn't allowing that to happen more unethical? When neither they nor we can secure for them their basic rights of food, shelter and education for their survival and personal growth, neither they nor we would be able to provide the same for their child to be born. We are unable to secure their basic rights of survival, of food, shelter and education because of an indiscriminate use of the right to reproduction. Once it is ensured that more important rights like the right to food and shelter will not be affected by the exercise of the right to reproduction, the latter can be exercised freely. Therefore, we ought to withhold the right to reproduction till the more basic rights concerning survival, of food and shelter are secured. The former is not only hindering the latter, but also far less important than the latter and therefore ought to be effectively put on hold till the latter is fulfilled. Indiscriminate use of the right to reproduction has proven to be and is disastrous for oneself and for society. The PFC law does not take away the right to reproduction; it merely postpones the exercise of it to a more favorable time in view of the well-being of oneself, one's child to be born, the sustainability of one's society and the sustainability of the human race, all of which will be threatened otherwise.

The PFC law requires that humans be treated with a minimum degree of respect, beginning from childhood, by ensuring that they are not born into poverty and do not have their basic rights of food, shelter and education violated. The higher the PFC basic financial capability requirement, the more basic rights we can secure for the newborn child and the more effectively the PFC law is enforced, the more of humanity as a whole will have their basic rights fulfilled.

The earlier we accept the PFC law, the fewer sufferings the world will have to undergo. As soon as the PFC law is implemented, a sense that human value has been secured will descend upon people. A sense that no one in his or her country is born into inhuman conditions. Everyone will feel that for the first time in history, the value of the human being has been secured.

Simple. We are human beings. We can't be born in slums. We can't be born in crime-infested, hostile neighborhoods. We can't be born in disease-infected, unsanitary environments. We can and should only be born in financially secure environments, which can take care of our health, food, shelter, education and protect us from both the influence and effects of crime, violence and pollution.

Would it have been fair to you if you were allowed to be born into a slum and hence denied all the comforts of life that we now take for granted and have taken for granted all through life? Would you feel that you have been treated fairly, with respect and dignity deserving of a human being?

If we want to build a perfect world, we must realize that it means that we are not forced to do the things we do not want to do. That is akin to slavery. Most of us work five days a week. For what purpose, to sustain our lives? Doesn't it seem foolish that one has to spend the major part of his short life earning it? We are born and then we have to work to keep living. Better to not have been born at all, in a sense. It's like society asks us: Who asked you to be born? If you want to live, work. Or you will not be allowed to live. Our answer should be: "Why did you make me born if I have to work to live? Was I born to work? Is that the meaning of my life? You will let me die if I don't work. So, my only value to the world is what work I can do for it. Whether I believe in the work or it's consequences or not does not matter to you in the least. I'm just another brick in the wall."

Are we preparing for the coming generation? Now, that is a question we cannot ignore. But we do ignore it. We are aiming for longer lifespan and spending billions of dollars trying to find new ways to avert death, which means that the coming generation will not replace us but will coexist with us. It means that we better die or kill them or find a way to satisfy both of our needs. If we do not prepare for the coming generation, either they or we or both will live in inhuman conditions, because we haven't prepared human living conditions for them. Or they will try to snatch the human living conditions from us, in order to survive.

War is imminent if we do not prepare for the next generation.

Chaos is imminent if we do not prepare for the next generation.

Widespread crime is imminent if we do not prepare for the next generation.

Epidemics are imminent if we do not prepare for the next generation.

Unfairness and injustice will be rampant if we do not prepare for the next generation.

It's not that we do not want to prepare for the next generation. It's that we cannot. Our resources are finite. If we do not regulate the numbers of the coming generation, we are going to be stumped with overwhelming need.

The child working in a hotel and the old woman begging on the street - what's common? They are weak. Our societies, built on the principle of the survival of the fittest, do not protect the weak. Instead, it gives preference to the strong. Those who are protected are those who do not need protection at all. If this remains the case with our societies, we will see more child labor in hotels and more old women begging on the street, who are disowned by families that can't support them. It does not end there. The fact that parents are not required by law to have basic financial capability to produce offspring will leave society unbalanced and humanity insecure. You will live in a world where the weak aren't protected. Any moment that you, yourself are weak, you will be met with indifference instead of help by the society, which disowns its weak. The world has use for you only if you are strong and cannot be bothered with you if you are weak. The reason being that, at present the world does not have the resources for all the weak.

The world needs strong people who can give something, not weak people who take something. That is tolerable, but when the world fails to let the weak people take just the bare minimum required to sustain their life and live with basic human dignity, then a standard of human living must be set, below which no human being is allowed to be born. If we ensure that people are not born into environments where their basic needs cannot be met, then no one is born into an environment that cannot support him. And therefore he or she does not have to work when a child or beg when old. The higher the basic financial capability into which a person is born, the lesser laborious or unfair is the work he or she has to do all through life, the lesser are the chances of unfair treatment being meted out to him or her.

We are now faced with a choice: To let the majority of mankind be the instruments of propagation and maintenance of an unfair and unacceptable way of life or to set standards that are human for all humanity and to set them in stone. Only when the bad standards propagate to us do we care. But is that wise? It requires far fewer resources to protect everyone if it was first made sure that there were enough resources to protect them before allowing them to be born. Don't allow anyone to be born unless we have the resources to give him/her a fair life. If not, doom is coming. Overpopulation and consequent horrible living conditions will choke humanity and leave it gasping for breath. Let it not happen. Let us not allow it to happen. All our worries would vanish if we would just put children first. Nobody should have to accept a standard of life lower than a standard that is agreed upon, internationally, as fit for a human being. As much as possible, every human being, until he or she can survive on his or her own should be given the greatest freedom of choice and tightest protection from outside forces and influences that inhibit his or her growth in any manner, whatsoever. It is the weak that we have to protect and not the strong. Parents should not be allowed to mould their children into whatever they have in mind. Rather, if every human being is to be the master of his or her own destiny, children should be allowed to make free choices regarding their future independent of all outside influences, including parental, as much as possible.

A human being can be born anywhere - in slums or in a well-off family. You and I could have been born in the slums instead of in well-off families. Every child born in the slums could have been born into a well-off family. There is no law that ensures that such a thing happens. A law upholding very high standards of living may be impossible now, but one upholding commonly accepted living standards is not. Presently there is no law effectively protecting the human right to live like a human being, with basic decency and self-respect. If we can't give that to every human being, then we shouldn't allow the birth of humans where we can't give them the respect they deserve and the basic amenities they need to survive. If we can't afford to keep five pets at home, then we'll keep just one, rather than let one pet live healthily and comfortably while the others go hungry and diseased, dying slowly. Similarly, let's not have any humans where we cannot provide them with what they need to survive. This is a universal truth: As quantity increases, quality decreases. As the quantity of human beings increases, the quality of their freedom, of their food and shelter, of their education, of their very life, undoubtedly decreases. And the world population is rising steadily.

In today's world, the value of everything is secured; the value of things go up and rarely goes down. But the value of a human being does the opposite. A certain standard must be met to acquire anything but a human being, which is why human beings are not treated with respect and fairness. Appearances can be deceiving. The child, innocent and helpless, though he seems he is, possesses our salvation. To secure him would be to secure the whole of mankind. Safe child, safe world.

We have spent billions of dollars both on space exploration projects, on building military arsenal and on thousands of scattered projects to help the disadvantaged. Spending all that money instead on the PFC law is the need of the hour, because the PFC law holds much more potential for the good of mankind.

If we really want a way out, we must not let the next generation come into existence unless a life of dignity awaits them. We must disallow the possible birth of a child unless its parent has the required money for the child's well-being and welfare. This would secure the child's basic needs and hence his or her well being to quite an extent. The inescapable inequality with which man has lived for all these millennia is all too easily ignored and forgotten. Mankind is different enough among itself without adding any inequality based on economic states.

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