Not sure if it's the one you had in mind, but Suzette Elgin had a series of short pieces on her Livejournal about cyberdragons - cute robot dragons who triggered all the same nesting instincts as real children, and who adults loved more than their children. Several of the pieces deal with the interaction of a horrified society with a terrorist group called Humanity First or somesuch, who basically go around kidnapping and publically destroying cyberdragons