What's the Right Thing to Do?

While I'm in Florida I like to read my home newspaper online and often get ideas for blogs from them. Today is a case in point.

A judge has declared that a mentally handicapped 2 year old child should gradually be handed over to her mentally handicapped parents. Right now she is in foster care with limited access by her parents. The parents appear to love her dearly but don't seem to have the mental capacity to provide her with a safe environment.

The mother is in her 20's and pregnant with her second child. The father is much older with quite a few marriages and children behind him. He's an ex drug user and has a minor criminal record in his past. I'm assuming the parents are on welfare because there was no mention of them having jobs.

This family, like it or not, is a drain on society and probably always will be. The last thing we should do as a society is to turn our backs on the weakest of us but is there any logic in allowing people like this to continue to produce offspring they aren't capable of taking care of? Left wingers would hang me from the nearest tree for even putting a thought like that in print.

I think the judge did the right thing by attempting to integrate the child fully with her parents because this is what our society demands...a child belongs with their parents unless there is serious abuse. In this case there is more neglect than abuse and that is due to the parents' mental deficiencies. Social services can help here.

My biggest concern is that the mother is young enough to have many more children all of whom will need public assistance in one form or another. We're not at the stage in our social development where we can demand she be sterilized but circumstances such as these make me wonder why that wouldn't be a good thing.

The truth of the matter is that some people, regardless of intelligence, should never have children. Just ask the police officers who respond to calls at filthy, drug infested homes where the children sleep on the floor because money for beds and food is spent first on drugs. And don't forget the battered children, helpless at the cruel hands of parents who are supposed to love and cherish them. Maybe foster care for these children would be a godsend for them.

Maybe putting this little 2 year old girl back in her parents' home isn't a perfect solution but many children survive under worse conditions. What bothers me most is that there's no way to legally stop this family from growing.