Radical idea: child abuse and neutering/spaying

As I go to and from the Mother's hospital to visit my wife and the two boys, I occasionally see recently-birthed moms loitering outside the hospital, puffing away.

And my wife also overheard one of the staff contacting Child Protective Services (it's still confidential, as she didn't catch the name) of the birth of a child to a mom whose other kids are already on ''the list'' of CPS as having been abused.

So, here's my (tentative) but radical ideas:

1) If you're convicted of child abuse, you're spayed/neutered (depending on whether you're male or female). It's conceptually equivalent to having your license taken away after too many DUIs/DWIs, or being de-barred for misconduct, etc. Clearly, you've shown that you can't be entrusted with children.

2) Smoking around little kids -- and especially when you're carrying -- shows you're a carp parent. (And I'll stand by that statement.) Either it's because you have no sense; no willpower; or you just dare care about the kid. But whichever reason, you're screwing up the kid's heath -- and in this day and age, who **doesn't** know that, hey, secondhand smoke is bad for kids? And regardless of the reason (stupid, weak, or uncaring), those are signs of a carp parent.

2a) Is smoking around little kids tantamount to child abuse? Arguably -- although I'm not completely sure. And no, it's **not** comparable to feeding the kid too much sugar or saturated fats...

2b) Should parents who smoke around their little kids be spayed/neutered? Should they have their kids takes away from them? Or just get a big spanking, or "I BE STUPID BAD PARENT" tattooed on their forheads? I'm undecided, as of yet.


Makes me want to adopt them all (the kids, not the adults): go up to the parents and say, "Look -- clearly you care more about your nicotine fix than about your child's health. You just go away and spend thirty bucks a day on smokes, and **I'll** raise your little one -- o.k.?"


--GG


Afterthought : OK, I guess people have the capacity to change. Sometimes. Maybe for their first kid, they get a warning; and on their "second strike", they're out?