So back to the three sweet girls I mentioned in my last post. They asked me to state in two minutes my case for traditional marriage. Here it is:
Millennials, if any generation understands the pain of fragmented family, it is you. Never before has our nation witnessed more children who are growing up outside of a married-mother-father home. There is a good chance that you and/or many of your close friends don’t get to live full-time with, be loved by, or be raised by one or both of your parents. You get that there is serious pain
and loss in that arrangement. Maybe grandparents, aunts and uncles, or neighbors have stepped in. Hopefully the church is there by your side. I bet that the parent you are living with is doing the best s/he can under difficult circumstances. But something that belongs to you, by right of your birth, has been lost. I don’t take that lightly. And I bet you don’t either.
Divorce, negligent/absent parents, single parenting, adults choosing to have children via sperm donors, gay couples, cohabitating couples- all of those arrangements are a reality of this world. And our country rightly permits people to make decisions about how they want to live. But as a nation, if we are going to *promote* a family structure by enshrining it into law, shouldn’t it be one where kids have the hope of being raised by their mother and their father? Friends, gay marriage (or the other alternative family arrangements above) can never accomplish that. For a child, there is no such thing as an “in-tact” gay household. If the parents want a family, the child has to lose his biological mom or dad.
Standing for traditional marriage is not popular, as you well know. And it’s ok to disagree with others about this. But, mis chicas bonitas, don’t let anyone convince you that by saying “kids need, long-for, and deserve a mother and father” you are bigoted or ignorant. You are just stating what ever child, within or without a nuclear family, knows innately.
For more on why kids need a mother and a father, see the five-part post “You’re only against gay marriage because of your religion”
askthe"Bigot" 
“adults choosing to have children via sperm donors, gay couples, cohabitating couples”
The problem with your argument is that these three don’t necessarily match up with your first three.
There is nothing about sperm donors, gay or cohabitating couples that makes those parents lesser than straight married couples. And there is nothing that says they can’t be loving and nurturing as well.
Hi NotAScientist. It’s been a while. I hope you are well.
I completely agree with you here. I am not saying that any of the adults in the alternative family arrangements do not have the ability to be loving and nurturing. You are right, they all have the same aptitude toward parenting skills- as well as heterosexual married couples.
There are selfish, negligent parents who are heterosexual, homosexual, and single parents. There are also loving, involved, selfless, responsible heterosexual, homosexual, and single parents. So let’s work from a level playing field. What I am saying is, all things being equal (let’s assume that everyone involved is parenting well), gender adds a significant and valuable aspect of child development. Both in how the child understands her world:
https://askthebigot.com/2012/08/20/parentgender-is-relevant/
and in how she sees herself:
https://askthebigot.com/2012/08/20/gender-identity/
Statistically, biology also plays a role in the life of the child:
https://askthebigot.com/2012/08/20/biology-matters/
I have the best example of a woman in a same-sex relationship who was a great parent! As a matter of fact, many of the things that I do well as a parent are because I am reproducing what my mother did for me. My father was a good dad too. The point is that losing a relationship with one of your parents is a big deal, no matter how that happens.
“gender adds a significant and valuable aspect of child development”
Significant. Certainly. Valuable? That depends entirely on what you value.
Great to read this comment, many Christians forget in all the debating that straight couples are not necessarily better parents, as you know, some straight couples are horribly abusive.
My question is, what do you think a child misses in not having a mother/ father? Is it certain skills? A mother can teach a child to cook, or teach them to play football. A dad can teach sewing and carpentry. Likewise, our role models don’t need to be the same gender as us. Female Christians should still follow Christ as their ultimate role model, even though we find human figures to inspire us along the way. So if both parents are equally loving and as good as parenting as a straight couple, what does a child miss in being raised by a gay couple?
Hi Jacob & NotAScientist. You are both asking similar questions so I’m going to go the lazy-blogger route and answer them together.
If gender is a real phenomenon, then it will impact all social situations. (Wouldn’t you say that an all-male supreme court would be at a disadvantage compared to one composed of both genders?) It is the same with parenting. Study after study show that kids don’t just need parents, they need mothers AND fathers, because the gender of the parent brings innumerable valuable and complimentary benefits. Here are just a few:
When my friend who was raised by a gay dad saw this study she remarked “That explains a lot”:
“Women with gay or bisexual fathers were significantly less comfortable with closeness and intimacy, less able to trust and depend on others, and experienced more anxiety in relationships than women with heterosexual fathers.” http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19631107
This article primarily discusses the rights of children that are currently being ignored in the face of the desires of adults, but near the bottom discusses the unique role that fathers play in childrearing as per recent research. . http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/diane-bederman/donor-rights-parents_b_3141019.html
Here are two testimonies from men who were raised by lesbians. The women involved were loving and stable but both men felt that they were left with gaping wounds because they didn’t have a father:
“It is not therefore the taboo against homosexuality that made me suffer, but rather, gay parenting. Homosexuals should naturally be embraced with brotherhood. They enrich humanity and if it is necessary, of course, one ought to show them the same rights as heteros, as much as possible, but this equality cannot be applied rashly to the ‘right to a child’ which exists nowhere and can be drawn from no text at all. I suffered from the indifference of adults to the intimate sufferings of children, starting with mine. In a world where their rights are each day rolled back, in truth, it is always the rights of adults that hold sway. I also suffered from the lack of a father, a daily presence, a character and a properly masculine example, some counterweight to the relationship of my mother to her lover. I was aware of it at a very early age. I lived that absence of a father, experienced it, as an amputation.”http://englishmanif.blogspot.com/2013/01/le-figaro-runs-confessional-of-man.html
“I had no male figure at all to follow, and my mother and her partner were both unlike traditional fathers or traditional mothers. As a result, I had very few recognizable social cues to offer potential male or female friends, since I was neither confident nor sensitive to others. Thus I befriended people rarely and alienated others easily. Gay people who grew up in straight parents’ households may have struggled with their sexual orientation; but when it came to the vast social universe of adaptations not dealing with sexuality—how to act, how to speak, how to behave—they had the advantage of learning at home. Many gays don’t realize what a blessing it was to be reared in a traditional home. My home life was not traditional nor conventional. I suffered because of it, in ways that are difficult for sociologists to index. Both nervous and yet blunt, I would later seem strange even in the eyes of gay and bisexual adults who had little patience for someone like me. I was just as odd to them as I was to straight people.”http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2012/08/6065/
Also, I cite several studies in the five-part post mentioned above “You’re only against gay marriage because of your religion” that have to do with the impact of the parent’s gender on child development.
Think like a naturalist- the conditions under which a child is conceived is likely the ideal conditions under which to raise that child.
Clearly you’ve thought a lot about these issues. Thank you, I appreciate the insight.
Thanks for your thoughtful questions. I often see both sides of this debate using superficial slogans or over-reaching statements to support their view. I wish all of us would look more deeply into this issue.
Stop by anytime, Jacob.
“Study after study show that kids don’t just need parents, they need mothers AND fathers, because the gender of the parent brings innumerable valuable and complimentary benefits”
But to say this, you are implying that when I have kids and become the stay-at-home-dad, my children will suffer because it isn’t my wife who is the stay at home parent.
“The women involved were loving and stable but both men felt that they were left with gaping wounds because they didn’t have a father:”
But WHY did they feel that? Because there is something biological missing? Or because society and our current culture says there should be something missing?
“Think like a naturalist- the conditions under which a child is conceived is likely the ideal conditions under which to raise that child.”
Sorry, but no, I don’t see how that follows at all.
Due to the fact that they can’t have a child without considering it, a gay couple seems more likely to be prepared and good parents than a straight couple.
NotAScientist, did you read what those two men said? They are both thoughtful, educated men who have had time to reflect on their childhood and do so in a way that does not degrade their mothers. They both speak explicitly of WHY they have suffered loss. Read it. Read all of it. And don’t dismiss it because it doesn’t fit your formula.
I’m not implying anything about who should be the bread winner and who should stay at home. What I am saying is that it clearly matters that kids long to be known by, and benefit from, a parents of each gender in their life.
“And don’t dismiss it because it doesn’t fit your formula.”
I don’t. I dismiss it because it’s the anecdotes of two men. I know more than two men who were raised by gay parents that disagree. Who should I believe?
“What I am saying is that it clearly matters that kids long to be known by, and benefit from, a parents of each gender in their life.”
And I’m saying that not every child longs for that, and it would make sense to discover where that longing comes from. I don’t believe it’s biological.
@NotAScientist – Gender, physically, is a biological reality. Both genders are required in order to make new human life. Why then would the need for both genders as that life grows not be a biologically based need? I would think that any other explanation would require some burden of proof to back it up.
If you propose that it is sociological instead, how would you go about testing that? We cannot completely isolate children from any form of society while they grow and then ask them.
“Why then would the need for both genders as that life grows not be a biologically based need”
Because gender doesn’t necessarily imply personality, or values, or way of life.
Again, this implies that any child I have will suffer because I, the father, would be the stay at home parent. Are you saying that?
I don’t think I quite follow your thought process, NotAScientist
People are physically different in gender – at the superficial level of our external appearance, as well as internal organs, brain composition, all the way down to DNA. Why would we assume that these differences wouldn’t give rise to differences in personality, approaches to relationships, problem solving, etc?
As for your final question, I suspect that having a stay at home dad instead of mom (as is more traditional in our society – though no stay at home parents is becoming more normal) would have some impact on your child – but not necessarily negative. However, if your child had no influence from a mother figure at all (as in the case of a homosexual male couple raising a child) then I would *absolutely* say that would have a negative effect on the child! The same is true of a child being raised by a single parent, or a female lesbian couple.
If you want evidence to that effect, look at the numerous links the Bigot posted in previous comments on this thread.
“then I would *absolutely* say that would have a negative effect on the child! ”
What would that negative effect be?
What can my wife give a child that I cannot?
Great blog! I agree 100%.
To the above question , what can my wife give a child that I cannot?
Sir no matter how effeminate a man is, he doesn’t make a good mommy, and no matter how macho a woman may seem, she’ll never be a dad, or man.
Some things are by design. From a perfect Designer. Once we no longer choose to recognize that it seems as if nothing matters, and any argument works.
My son is eleven months old and he’s already learning to be e little man from his daddy. It’s cute and it’s all over him, and his behavior. He copies him in so many things. On the other hand I as his mother nurture and love in an entirely different manner. There is a difference that is simply woven in the fiber of our beings as male and female that will never be erased.
“Sir no matter how effeminate a man is, he doesn’t make a good mommy, ”
I do not accept your vaguely sexist opinion that a ‘mommy’ or a ‘daddy’ are only one thing.
Women identify with children on a more emotional level than men do, and establish relationships in different ways. Having *both* a mother and father figure is critical for full, proper development of children – and while I think the lack of a father can be a bigger impact on adulthood (increased risk of involvement in crime, for example) there are definitely things my wife provides for my children that I couldn’t.
Here is an article that discusses some of these things:
http://www.the-spearhead.com/2011/09/14/a-father-cannot-be-a-mother-and-he-should-not-try/
NotAScientist,
It is not sexist for me to admit that I’m a woman who has never been, therefore cannot fully be, a man.
Neither can my, all man husband, be a woman. There for we relate to life differently.
You might as a male , give the facts of life to a child, but you simply cannot and will not experience everything physically or emotionally as a woman.
Maybe you should be thankful for that. 🙂 Life is full of realities that cannot be denied.