"Even if you need to so some kinda safety magic on a baby so it doesn't accidentally magic people to death doesn't mean it needs to be a slave."

"Hm?"

"You could just like. Have the baby. And also safety magic, on the baby, who could be a baby who is not a slave. Amentan babies you can like - swaddle them if they're clawing you with their fingernails or something, like, they can't kill people but still - but that doesn't mean you can sell them or hurt them or anything!"

"Who complains to the government if you hurt them?"

"Their other parent or the neighbors or their grandparents or your siblings or their older siblings or their teachers or their doctor or your neighbors!"

"Hmmm. But - so - my parents and neighbors and other people could tell the government if you hurt me. But then the government would find out if I wanted to be hurt, if they could find out. They would try to only do something like convict slave labor if they thought I didn't want it. But we don't want to not change or touch or do magic to babies just because they don't want us to do it to them."

"Yeah, you have to take care of babies even when they're really mad about getting their vaccines or whatever, but you don't... have to solve that with slavery... just with like, custody rights, and an age of majority..."

"Say more?"

"Like at home - uh, if I managed to scrape together credit money, anyway, which is what I first thought you meant when you talked about buying babies - then the baby would be mine, even though I probably wouldn't move out of my parents' house right away, with my sister and brother. They could help me but it'd be my baby to like, bring to the doctor and make sure they were babysat while I was at work or whatever. They could like, try to run away if they got mad that I wouldn't let them... uh, I don't know, watch porn when they're two or something... but whoever they'd run to would like, think literally at all about whether that was a reasonable rule for me to have! They'd be like, sorry, kiddo, your mama is totally right that you are not old enough for a springshow, wait until you're coming up on four and will actually need this information... but if I like, slapped them around, then whoever they talked to would be like, wow, your mama's doing a terrible job, something as precious as a kiddo should not be raised by someone who'd do that, you can stay here with me, or go crash with your friend's family, or move in with great-grandpa, or whatever, and if your mama tries to get you we'll all back you up - this would only be if I was hurting them though, not if I made them eat dinner when they were being a picky eater or whatever."

"Interesting."

"Thanks I guess?? It doesn't seem very interesting to me that we don't treat babies like property or like grownups and instead like a secret third thing which is babies!"

"But it’s so different. Why do you do that?"

"Because owning people is horrible and we don't want anyone being horrible to babies because babies are good and important!"

"Huh. I guess if everyone feels that way."

"Yeah, everyone feels that way - even if, what was it, the snake people, who don't care about their babies, couldn't you just have different snake people baby laws and normal ones for normal people?"

"I don’t understand what problem that would solve."

"The problem where you are enslaving babies that could be just babies instead of slaves."

"Why specifically babies that aren’t snakes?"

"If snakes don't care about baby snakes maybe they need different rules? I don't know, I never met a snake alien."

"But then there would only be rules protecting babies that people probably already want to be nice to."

"You could also make rules about snake babies, I don't know!! How would I know?? I just know slavery is bad."

"It's interesting that you feel this way even though you get to own your baby here and you wouldn't on Amenta."

"I don't want to own my baby, that seems really horrible! And I can't even stop owning them until they're not a baby it sounds like! I want them to like - know I love them and don't want to control them and would never ever hurt them or sell them or - and what happens if I die, at home a relative would get them but they wouldn't own them plus I don't have relatives here -"

"You can tell the government who you want to get your things if you die. I - knew my parents didn't want to hurt me or sell me but maybe I would've known it more if it was against the law. I don't know, I think most kids know that, if it's true."

"I don't want anybody to own my baby."