Friday, September 15, 2006
ZaNuLabour - The caring state is watching you
The local "news"paper reports here on rising teenage pregnancy. The article tells us: "The figures from the Department for Education and Skills (DFES) have earned City of York Council a red light on a traffic light system with a rise in the number of teenage pregnancies, from 100 in 1998 to 113 in 2004."
Rather interestingly for the purposes of the state, teenage means under 18s. I would have thought that the figure of interest would be under 16s, as this would indicate a criminal offence. Alternatively if one was using a pure interpretation of the word teenage then under 20 should be the criteria. Once a person reaches 16 and can consent to sexual relations, if they do then consent to the same, then those same relations are no concern of the state.
Of course we get the usual platitudes as "justification" from Beverley Hughes, the Children, Young People and Families Minister (I ask you dear reader, for millennia we've had children, young people and families without the need for a minister, why oh why do we need one now?) she is reported as saying: "It's shocking that the infant mortality rate for babies of teenage mothers is 60 per cent higher than for older mothers." So shocking that the preferred method is to kill the babies before they're born by abortion especially the "morning after pill".
She can't leave out the sacred cow of the NHS: "The impact on those individuals is justification for action in itself," yes we must take you into care and look after you, it's for your own good you know "but there are also wider impacts on the whole of society. Teenage pregnancy costs the NHS an estimated £63,000,000 a year." So what! Who cares? What's the NHS there for? I'd rather my money (yes that's right love MY MONEY) was spent giving healthcare to mothers regardless of age, I thought that was one of the reasons it was extorted from me in the first place. What I don't like seeing my money wasted on is artwork within the NHS (see The Times today), sex change operations, unnecessary government ministers, the list just goes on and on ...
Anyway to return to my original point, which is the insidious way ZaNuLabour can and does track any aspect of our lives that it wants to. If someone aged 16 or over decides to get pregnant and have a child that's their decision and nothing at all to do with the state (I know the state encourages them, by priority provision of council houses and other goodies, but that's for another time). I find it worrying and distasteful that the state is so interested in peoples lives that they're tracking every single under 18 pregnancy. Just how much money is that wasting? The state needs kicking out of peoples lives and should be confined to two roles (off the top of my head) of defence and maintaining law and order. Anything else is none of its business.
Rather interestingly for the purposes of the state, teenage means under 18s. I would have thought that the figure of interest would be under 16s, as this would indicate a criminal offence. Alternatively if one was using a pure interpretation of the word teenage then under 20 should be the criteria. Once a person reaches 16 and can consent to sexual relations, if they do then consent to the same, then those same relations are no concern of the state.
Of course we get the usual platitudes as "justification" from Beverley Hughes, the Children, Young People and Families Minister (I ask you dear reader, for millennia we've had children, young people and families without the need for a minister, why oh why do we need one now?) she is reported as saying: "It's shocking that the infant mortality rate for babies of teenage mothers is 60 per cent higher than for older mothers." So shocking that the preferred method is to kill the babies before they're born by abortion especially the "morning after pill".
She can't leave out the sacred cow of the NHS: "The impact on those individuals is justification for action in itself," yes we must take you into care and look after you, it's for your own good you know "but there are also wider impacts on the whole of society. Teenage pregnancy costs the NHS an estimated £63,000,000 a year." So what! Who cares? What's the NHS there for? I'd rather my money (yes that's right love MY MONEY) was spent giving healthcare to mothers regardless of age, I thought that was one of the reasons it was extorted from me in the first place. What I don't like seeing my money wasted on is artwork within the NHS (see The Times today), sex change operations, unnecessary government ministers, the list just goes on and on ...
Anyway to return to my original point, which is the insidious way ZaNuLabour can and does track any aspect of our lives that it wants to. If someone aged 16 or over decides to get pregnant and have a child that's their decision and nothing at all to do with the state (I know the state encourages them, by priority provision of council houses and other goodies, but that's for another time). I find it worrying and distasteful that the state is so interested in peoples lives that they're tracking every single under 18 pregnancy. Just how much money is that wasting? The state needs kicking out of peoples lives and should be confined to two roles (off the top of my head) of defence and maintaining law and order. Anything else is none of its business.
