Originally Posted by waitingtables

Well, they would have a much more acceptable excuse for doing it, then the wealthy would. And no, not only wealthy people are good parents, some of the wealthy are probably worse parents then their poorer counterparts. But, it is much more likely that those living in the economically depressed areas would have problems with drugs, or are going to do other things to get by, like prostitution, robberies, etc. And it is less likely for those poorer people to have abortions as well. My point is that you cannot make laws based on the premise that the majority of parents are good parents, when the fact is that there are many, many, bad parents out there, in all economic strata. And that at 16, I was a better judge of my life than my parents were. And I am not the exception, there are plenty of others who shouldn't have to rely on their parents judgement about their lives when faced with certain circumstances. I do think that the majority of kids will speak to their parents about this kind of thing, but there are still many who wouldn't, and shouldn't have to.