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I would rather spend 500$ per day for someone who cant take care of themselves like a disabled child versus someone who chooses not to.
How much do we spend on someone in prison?
That's $180k a year, or $1.8 million over 10 years. Even if you personally have millions of dollars to spend on someone else's handicapped child, I doubt anyone would actually do this when there are so many other charitable activities they could contribute the money to.
The question is: who is going to pay $500 a day? What if nobody can afford that? Does it lessen the pain to say that the parents cannot afford to raise the child?
Soldiers contributed their health and life to society. They are beyond the scope of this discussion.
Ahh you have decided worth.
Imagine a terrible accident and your youngest has survived with severe trauma. Your young one, has recovered physically. You are being told, there are memory issusand does not remember more than a few sentences at a time. The team tells you, they will know more over time,but they will have to wait until the inflamation of his brain heals, and that might take months even years. But the good part is your beloved young person will continue to grow.
Your beloved family member, can be aggressive and violent. The child does not remember and sometime the people attending look unfamiliar and the child is afraid. Your youngest does not like to be bathed or showered, because water hitting the head is a terrible experience, one that cannot be to communicated. You need three people to bathe your child.
That's $180k a year, or $1.8 million over 10 years. Even if you personally have millions of dollars to spend on someone else's handicapped child, I doubt anyone would actually do this when there are so many other charitable activities they could contribute the money to.
So if we are reduced to quantifying someone's worth to a dollar value... How much is a disabled child worth? A prisoner? A welfare recipient? A person who becomes severely disabled?
At what point do we value human life above a dollar amount?
The government wastes billions of dollars on idiotic programs, studies, and bailing out companies and individuals. I have no problem taking care of disabled people.
They even pay farmers NOT to plant crops. seriously.
While following another thread in this section, I had a question come to mind: if a baby is born with defects from the malnutrition or other health issues of the mother or father, he will probably be very costly to sustain and raise. The particular examples from the other thread are with parents that are drug addicts. I'm trying not to offend anyone and I hope nobody takes this personally, but with the extra cost associated with this baby, we could save other people's lives or provide better living conditions for other, normal babies. So do you think that the babies should be kept and raised despite the higher cost and the very high risk of them being disabled physically or mentally for the rest of their lives?
Wow tough but interesting debate. I think maybe let the parents decide ,if they want the baby OK, if not , put it down, sounds cold but its actually better for society
How sad for the parents and children. I am sure every one of those babies were loved
You could not be more wrong and you are missing the point.
Of course YOU are welcome to birth any baby you'd like, love them, and raise them in your home. No one is stopping you or instructing you otherwise.
But the sad reality is that many of these kids are abandoned. The group home worker working with an abandoned kid with an IQ of 20 making minimum wage and having feces thrown at him certainly does not "love" that child. And neither does anyone else. Sorry to be so blunt, but this is the cold harsh reality for most of those in state care.
In all of my time working in such places, I never ONCE saw a volunteer come in "just to spend time with" these severely special needs children or adults. It's a sad reality. People volunteer their free time with children, elderly, animals, etc. But severely limited and special needs children? It's just not happening.
It's very easy for everyone to sit back and care *in theory,* but in reality, society at large does not care. Yet society is not willing to reassess spending for fear of the term "eugenics" and due to the ignorant saccharine and romanticized notion of the most severely handicapped "having something to teach us" and "will melt your heart with a smile."
Even if that were true, is that ONE smile worth millions and billions of dollars so ONE person can "have their heart melted" ONE time by ONE child so s/he can then write a sanctimonious blog post about it?
That's just more propaganda eschewing the real issue of the monetary and behavioral economics of reality. The reality being that some babies are born severely limited, unable to love, be loved (besides "in theory"), are in constant pain, and would rather not be here anyways. Yet, for "the sanctity of all human life", we keep spending billions of dollars per year for all of their care.
You could not be more wrong and you are missing the point.
Of course YOU are welcome to birth any baby you'd like, love them, and raise them in your home. No one is stopping you or instructing you otherwise.
But the sad reality is that many of these kids are abandoned. The group home worker working with an abandoned kid with an IQ of 20 making minimum wage and having feces thrown at him certainly does not "love" that child. And neither does anyone else. Sorry to be so blunt, but this is the cold harsh reality for most of those in state care.
In all of my time working in such places, I never ONCE saw a volunteer come in "just to spend time with" these severely special needs children or adults. It's a sad reality. People volunteer their free time with children, elderly, animals, etc. But severely limited and special needs children? It's just not happening.
It's very easy for everyone to sit back and care *in theory,* but in reality, society at large does not care. Yet society is not willing to reassess spending for fear of the term "eugenics" and due to the ignorant saccharine and romanticized notion of the most severely handicapped "having something to teach us" and "will melt your heart with a smile."
Even if that were true, is that ONE smile worth millions and billions of dollars so ONE person can "have their heart melted" ONE time by ONE child so s/he can then write a sanctimonious blog post about it?
That's just more propaganda eschewing the real issue of the monetary and behavioral economics of reality. The reality being that some babies are born severely limited, unable to love, be loved (besides "in theory"), are in constant pain, and would rather not be here anyways. Yet, for "the sanctity of all human life", we keep spending billions of dollars per year for all of their care.
I understand the workings of caring for the severely disabled. I also knew people who viewed them as less than human.
Our realities are certainly very different. No volunteers? So what? Do children need volunteers to give them worth and value?
When there is no appreciation for other types of lives but our own, we become small, mean and selfish.
What happens when it is your child needing that kind of care?
I must say that IMHO, many people are hypocrites on this issue. I think that this thread has less posts because people don't know how to deal with their own inner cognitive dissonance. (e.g., some don't want to admit how they really feel, some don't know how they really feel, etc.)
There is (of course) another thread on "Great Debates" about basically sterilizing welfare recipients. It's twice as long as this thread and was started after it. Most are PRO FORCED STERILIZATION or forced birth control.
The reason most often given, summed up in one succinct sentence by an anonymous poster:
"I'm tired of my tax dollars supporting people without the wherewithal to care for themselves."
I understand the workings of caring for the severely disabled. I also knew people who viewed them as less than human.
Our realities are certainly very different. No volunteers? So what? Do children need volunteers to give them worth and value?
When there is no appreciation for other types of lives but our own, we become small, mean and selfish.
What happens when it is your child needing that kind of care?
No volunteers. Why? Because people care less for these beings than they do for other special needs populations and animals. Yes, i do think that contribution to society is important, even if that contribution is making just one other person happy.
I chose not to have children. One of the reasons is because I knew that I could never care for a child who was self abusive, had no motor control, "deaf and dumb," etc. I knew that if this happened, I would end up being that parent who drops their kid off to a residential school because they can't cope.
I think if you are not ready to deal with the real possibility of such a situation (and most parents are not given the statistics of special needs residential schools population vs those who attend in day - time only) then you should not birth a child.
Moderator - Diabetes and Kentucky (including Lexington & Louisville)
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