Society is always mindful of degree and titles, to the point that many equate good parenting skills to getting a Doctorate degree from Cambridge or Harvard. While the indicators of excelling in a particular task is normally based on the Intelligent Quotient (IQ) of a person, the question is, can the same standards be used when measuring the ability of a person to become a parent?
In an article published by Yahoo News, the author recounted the "alarming frequency" of the rate by which babies are being taken away from their parents because of the latter's incapacity, handicap, or low IQ. This then leads to the next question, is this enough to take away the parental rights of a parent?
To date, there are 37 states in the U.S. whose laws allow parental rights to be taken away because of a parent's incapacity. One such case is that of Sara Gordon, who was regarded as mentally incapacitated to be a parent because of an IQ of 70.
Sara gave birth at 19, and her baby was taken away from her because she was described as unkempt, imprecise, and missed a feeding at the hospital. These incidents allowed the hospital to report her to the authorities, who eventually took her baby and gave it to a foster home.
This is just one of the instances by which a parent was rendered incapacitated to take care of her baby because of a mental handicap. Based on the publication made by the National Council on Disability, approximately 80 percent of parents who have intellectual disabilities lose their children.
According to The Tech, among the things that are being debated in the world is the definition of intelligence and how it is being measured. If society has adopted a certain set of numbers to measure something so abstract, does it now have the authority to measure the ability of parents to care for their children?
