The key, then, is to somehow get the kids to care. One caring teacher really can make a big difference...what a child needs is at least one caring adult, even if it isn't a "parent" (I put that in quotes, because IMO, just contributing to the dropping a wriggler into a doctor's hands is in no way equivalent to actually being a Parent...). I sure as heck didn't learn about what motehrs are from my female chromosome donor; my frined's parents were more involved with my activities than my own (and they bever had to beat me black and blue to get me to follow their suggestions).
Parents are important, but it is erroneous to think that bad parents are the end all and be all, and that nobody else can step in and be a great influence in a child's life - and education.
More to the point, they don't care - their protstations of "caring" are self-delusion, and illusion, created so that they "look good" and "keep face". Actions speak ouder, however, than words - if you care about a child, you learn what to do to try to keep teh child healthy, which includes nutrition. If one does not, it's nothing more than self- centeredness and laziness. Well, sometimes sheer stupidity...
Part of the problem is precisely the ntion that kids are basically [porpoerty, and what "parents" do to them is "nobody else's business". If people treated a dog or cat teh way many people treat their kids, there would be hell to pay.
Yes, people are nosey - but that is far different from being *concerned*. Merely gossiping about someone's neglect or abuse is low and stupid and destructive.
OK, so really, we know all of that. Most people suck. But does that make it ethical to merely ignore what happens to children? In a way, part of the problem is that people are so obsessed over what they think tobe their own individual rights, that they refuse to learn from, or take advice from, ANYONE. ANd they also refuse to answer to anyone. They have, they beleive, the "right" to "raise" their kids however they damn well please, regardless of whetehr it is harmful to the child.
No. Poeple have the right tio harm themselves if they wish, but a child is a human being, and taking into account different styles of child rearing, there are things which harm children, period. Malnutrition is one such thing, and ther eis no excuse for it to exist in a houshold that is materially decently well-off - it's nothing more than parental laziness (and yes, many kids *are* malnourished, precisely because of not being provided adequate nutrition because it's "too hard" or "takes too much time" to provide erasonably-helathy food). WHy is this permitted? Why is it OK to allow poeple to harm other poeple, just becaus ethose other people are not adults? What kind of mindset is it to accept that someone has a *right* do harm their child, simplybecause the figure that the child is their "property"?
SO what is the solution? Or not even "the" solution, but at least some possible solution?