The report on sexual abuse of children by catholic priests at the Archdiocese of Dublin has detailed over 300 cases of abuse between 1975 and 2004. Unfortunately beautiful vulnerable children are being abused in many different ways all over the world very single day. From child soldiers in war zones to children in slave labour to abuse inside the home a child is not safe anywhere. However no abuse is worse than that visited by parents. Poor people everywhere give birth to children without having the wherewithal to feed, clothe and educate them. Whenever you see a news item of famine in a poor country you see families with six to 10 children, all emaciated from lack of food, dressed in rags scrambling in the dirt with nothing to do. Animals also give birth to large litters most of which fail to survive but this they accept as a part of life. Humans, on the other hand, demand that someone else, be it the government or an NGO or a charity should help them feed their children. In India poor people have a large number of children so as to send them out to work. Thus you see little boys swathed in acid fumes recharging lead acid batteries and little girls right inside a municipal rubbish bin trying to find stuff to recycle. Torture of children is an abomination and must be stopped but it will not be unless we accept the fact that a child has the right not to be born.