Legally, the state owns its citizens and their children. The state merely lends children back to parents to care for and benefit from, as long as certain conventions are maintained. If not, expect a knock on your door.

A birth certificate is a property title. Governments borrow money against the lifetime value of their citizens. The banking dynasties states behind states view us as so many cattle in a ledger.

Which is why we feel like helpless animals when caught in the clutches of the state. Child Procurement agents would never use the word, cattle, but they are brainwashed with other words that lead them to treat us that way. And we are brainwashed to accept it.

It's exactly what Morpheus tells Neo: we are slaves. It's not a metaphor.