Morbid Fact!

[Tedob1]

Today's Infanticidal Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

In the 18th century, infanticide was practiced frequently as a way of
the poor ridding themselves of children they could not afford to
support. Most cases of what the law might have considered negligent
or deliberate infanticide were passed off as accidents (such as
druggings or starvation). In the 18th century it was not uncommon to
see the corpses of infants lying in the streets or on the dunghills
of London and other large cities. Eventually Parliament decided to
intervene and set up foundling hospitals with various systems for
collecting unwanted infants without risk to the donor. On the
Continent, infants were passed through revolving boxes set in the
walls of foundling hospitals. However, government was not capable of
sustaining the cost of rearing children to adulthood, and foundling
hospitals became de facto slaughterhouses whose prime function was to
authenticate the state's claim to a monopoly over the right to kill.
Between 1753 and 1760 there were 15,000 admissions to London's first
foundling hospital; of those admitted, only 4,400 survived to
adolescence. Additional thousands of foundlings continued to be
destroyed by wet nurses employed by parish workhouses. In order to
economize, parish officers assigned the infants to women who were
nicknamed "killing nurses" or "she-butchers" because "no child ever
escaped their care alive." Between 80 and 90 percent of the children
in these institutions died during their first year of life.

Culled from: Cannibals And Kings: The Origins Of Cultures by Marvin
Harris

Morbid Fact Du Jour! [despair@shocking.com]

[valhallen]

i think i read some where about italy still having these like infant drop off points - its like a box with a revolving shelf that woman can put unwanted babies on and then turn the shelf round so the baby is inside the box in the warmth...then another person checks the boxes like every hour for drop-offs and these children are taken into care??

v_Ln

[zaggy]

How truly horrific. Apparantly adoption wasn't a big issue back then. What a horrible fate, it is bad enough to know you weren't wanted but to know you would die because of your parent's inability to support you....I just can't stomach that.

i think i read some where about italy still having these like infant drop off points - its like a box with a revolving shelf that woman can put unwanted babies on and then turn the shelf round so the baby is inside the box in the warmth...then another person checks the boxes like every hour for drop-offs and these children are taken into care??

This is unbelievable with all the people searching for children to adopt. There are long lists waiting to adopt. My own sister was adopted from Romania. My father and step-mother chose to do that because there are so many orphaned children in Romaina, and they wanted to be able to make a real difference in a child's life.

[1pizzaluvr4u]

I think that that this is not only incredibly morbid and sadistic, but if abortion is outlawed, some people might end up trying to use this "idea" as an alternative. Not a good thing.

[rosscolor]

what does this have to do with computers

[zaggy]

Originally posted here by rosscolor
what does this have to do with computers

This is general chit chat, if you read the description on the header of the forum, it is for anything that is on your mind.

[gghornet]

Nothing,rosscolor,hence the reason it's in the General Discussion Forum.

How could people do something like that.I once worked for a Humane Society and found euthanasia of dogs and cats so disgusting and cruel I wouldn't take part in it,but killing babies by the thousands is....I don't think they make a word for how nasty that is.Really the worst part about it is between the Catholic church and the government there was enough money to take care of those children,and probably 30,000 more.

[countryphil]

I loved that book. It was old when I read it about 10 years ago.

Many of the issues involved in this type of topic are connected directly to the human condition, we live in a hostile environment. Put whatever faith you may have aside for a moment, if you can, so you can consider this with trying to justify things; Life is hard. We take the things we need for granted, food, shelter, clothing. If we have never been in a position where we face being without these things, we tend to think that it is not possible for us to be in a situation where we have to make horrible, no win choices. Our very defensive nature on this point exemplifies the reality of the situation.