To quote Daffy Duck, You’re Despicable

There is a saying in the world of advertising acting: Never be in a commercial with kids or dogs.  You’ll disappear.

For people who love kids and dogs, that sounds rather cynical, but it’s pretty true.  What is cute and appealing sells.  And what is cuter and more appealing than the young of any species?  The harsh truth is that children, puppies, kittens, ducklings, goslings, calves, and the like are made that way by Mother Nature so that the adults will fall in love and not kill them.

Sad, but true.

In the last 200 or so years, western attitudes toward children have evolved around protecting the little darlings.  By law, children are no longer allowed to work in factories or mines.  They must go to school,  They cannot be used as cheap, slave labor.  Or more or less slave labor.  Mining is plain…