Where are the parents?

The Editor, Sir:

We hear a lot of talk about the responsibility of the Government and places of safety to take care of children and now of unskilled young adults with nowhere to go. My question is: Where are their parents and why isn't the focus on them?

I understand that there are circumstances, i.e. death, abuse, etc. that may require intervention and subsequent care, but certainly this is not the case with the majority and the numbers that we see in the system now. Poverty should not be the factor that determines care, or we would have a nation in 'care'.

Having worked in an institution for many years, I have witnessed first-hand that many persons (and I would say a vast majority) use these facilities as 'boarding school' or simply a convenient way to divest themselves of their responsibilities to the children they bore. With only the obvious tragic exceptions, no one forced these parents to have more children than they could care for, and their lack of discipline and foresight should not become the burden of the rest of the society.

Human-rights groups and appointed officials may debate and decry and weep and wail all they want. Until individuals begin to take responsibility for their actions and the resulting human lives they produce, you are all simply screaming into a vacuum, and nothing will change.

I am, etc.,

M.I. OUTYA

mioutya@yahoo.com