Last time I checked, the welfare system is not overwhelmed with single dads on the dole. I’m pretty sure that is why Kevin targeted fathers sticking around and not mothers. As far as Kevin fearing change – let me clarify the “change” these anti-nuclear family people are advocating: casual sex resulting in children that are deprived of a stable home, involved in custody battles, deprived of a mother and father that love each other. Kevin, I’m scared of that, too.

I love imagining a world where people waited until marriage to have sex. It’s not unreasonable – I was a 24 year old virgin the day I got married. In a world where everyone waits, STIs would quit spreading and be gone in a matter of years, there would be no more abortion, and most importantly a huge reduction in child poverty, child abuse and neglect. Also, marriages would be healthier because the mindset of having self control, waiting for your spouse and practicing marital fidelity to your future spouse comes in handy after the wedding day, too! The self control it takes to wait is required to keep you mentally, emotionally, and physically faithful once you are married!

(The ambiguous parent)
Arguing that America would not be better off if parent 1 stayed and took responsibility for their families is silly. When parent 1s defect, they leave parent 1-less families in which parent 2 has to bear alone the responsibility of breadwinner and child rearing. Parent 1-lessness creates poverty to begin with. I am a parent 2 who is very thankful for my parent 1’s selfless love, hard work and responsibility for our family. If more parent 1s were like my parent 1, America would certainly be revolutionized.

I think we can agree that the issue of fatherlessness applies with the issue of motherlessness as well: single dads do about as good as single moms. So, it looks like the issue is not one of “no father,” but of “one parent.” Two parents (whether it be mother-father, mother-mother, or father-father) do better than one parent alone. It’s a numbers game. I have a hard time taking care of pets on my own, I can’t imagine trying it with children.

Let’s skip the part about abortion, since that’s got nothing to do with anything. Onward to: social problems are caused by… social problems?

Jennifer said:
“This is like saying kids only fed McDonalds every day aren’t less healthy than the kids eating healthy meals because of the food itself, its because of socially constructed views about diets!”

What? No it isn’t. Children of same-sex, adopted, and remarried families aren’t at higher risk because of some magic pill being given by their biological parents. Breathing the air exhaled by bio-dad isn’t more beneficial than breathing any other air. There’s no biological reason why the kids do better, there are SOCIAL reasons. So, Stephanie’s proposal that children of married bio-parents are at lower risk because of social attitudes of the “traditional” family (a SOCIAL reason) is perfectly reasonable, while Jennifer’s insinuation of a biological cause is fairly ridiculous without any research to back it up, just more ranting.

Jennifer, you mention “positive reasons” why children of married bio-parents are at lesser risk. Care to share them? ‘Cause all I see is ranting without anything to back it up.

On a related note, now that I’ve gotten past Jennifer’s incoherent ranting, research has shown that step-fathers are 5-times more likely to kill their step-children than fathers are to kill their children. And, when these murders occur, they occur for different reasons. Step-fathers tend to beat their step-children to death during a rage induced by such things as, “He wouldn’t stop crying,” while fathers more often have a “rescue” motivation when they kill their children, often committing suicide shortly afterward. These are not differences that can be accounted for by poverty, general personality of someone who remarries, brood size, maternal youth, or duration of coresidency. The risk factor appears to be solely the fact that the stepfather is not biologically related. Why? Because of the evolutionary need to personally procreate and reproduce our genes. Raising children is costly, in a number of ways. If it’s not REALLY your child, sometimes it’s just not worth it.
http://psych.mcmaster.ca/dalywilson/e&s207.pdf

Now, while it appears that I’ve uncovered a biological cause for children of married bio-parents having lower risk, let’s be clear: the children aren’t inhaling a magic gas from bio-parents as Jennifer seems to suggest. We’re talking about a social result (lower risk) from a social cause (parents caring more for their children) that stems from a biological influence in the parents (evolutionary imperative to pass on one’s genes). And all that’s assuming that there is some homunculus in our brains saying, “Have children!” Is there? Who knows? But additional evidence suggests it might not be all in the biology.

Right now we should all agree that parents of adopted children or parents in a same-sex relationship are in a different situation than a standard step-father.

Your standard step-father marries a woman for the woman, and darn it if those brats come with her. Not my kids, not my responsibility, that’s all on her. Now if they’d just stop making so much noise…

Now, parents of adopted children and parents in a same-sex relationship WANT kids and typically (certainly for adoptions) made the choice to get the children. This has the social result of caring more for these children that rivals the evolutionary imperative to pass on one’s genes, washing away the bio-dad effect when examining the differences between bio-dad and step-dad.

So, this seems to indicate that having kids, getting divorced, and then getting remarried to someone else is bad for the kids (worse than single-mom? Who knows?), while planned configurations with two parents (including same-sex couples) should work out just fine without the step-father effect. I’ll also point out at this point that unwanted children, even with married bio-parents, do absolutely terribly, which overrides the evolutionary imperative for one’s children to succeed. As with most things in life, planning is key.

Yes, I did just ramble on for six paragraphs to go nowhere, but at least I have research to back it up.

You said “I hope you realize that you are arguing that family values and dads staying would not decrease poverty and be good for children because you have digressed into the liberal obsession with the world being fair and everyone being on “equal footing”.”

And I would respond that no, that’s not what I’m saying, nor is it why I’m saying it. What I’m trying to get at is that the mom-dad-two-kids nuclear family evolved out of economic efficiency. Economically, there’s no difference between any two-wage-earner family with kids, and another two-wage-earner family with kids (controlling for income). So the difference in the statistics must come from social causes. And yes, how a child and their family is treated by the outside world is a social issue.

I do not come from the “everything should be fair” school of thought, and I especially do not believe “the world should be made fair by unnecessary laws.” That’s tyranny at its worst. But a return to “family values” (which I have yet to see defined by the author or any commenters – what family values are we to return to, exactly?) simply because of a statistical correlation is foolhardy. There are more factors feeding into this issue than can be solved with a pithy saying like “Let’s return to good old-fashioned family values.”

Also, I would appreciate it if you used facts and statistics to back up your views, and also if you would not make assumptions about my views and character based on limited information. We could all come at this using personal experience only, but that would lead to an extremely limited discussion.

I think you have some excellent ideas, and many of them I completely agree with. But there is one nagging issue that I think deserves some consideration. I took paragraph nine and reworded it. The structure and basic meaning are still the same, but I’ve changed a few words that will hopefully illustrate my later argument.

“We need to focus more on slavery and what black people used to be. Years ago in America and currently in other countries, white families looked out for their black slaves. Today in America, instead of slaves providing for their master’s family, we have way too many people looking to the government for support. What if we got back to this idea?

Furthermore, white men embracing the responsibility of being a slave master would change this country over night. Negros not having a white master to look after them is one of the biggest statistical disadvantages that exist. Black children of single moms are almost guaranteed to be poor. Instead of worrying about offending every single black person, why don’t we focus more on what is best for the black race? The statistics are undeniable. Negros always do better with a white slave master. Crime would go down, welfare would go down, and our economy would grow, our government could shrink.”

It sounds horrible and racist, but it proves my point entirely. You are suggesting that we embrace traditional, nuclear families because they are… well… traditional. But supporting a belief because “it’s the way we’ve always done it” demonstrates that you fear change. Now there are only two reasons to fear change: you either don’t understand the new idea, or it clashes with your existing concept of the universe.

There may be many good reasons to embrace traditional family values. And maybe that’s exactly what America needs. But you’re not analyzing the problems of high crime, welfare abuse, an economic recession, or a bloated government and suggesting a corrective action. What you’re doing is saying “we need to go back to the 1950’s family model” and “oh take my word for it that crime would go down, etc”. That tells me that you’re not pushing family values because you think it would benefit America; you’re comfortable with the nuclear family and you don’t know what kind of impact these new values will have on the society you live in. That is the very definition of fear.

And you might try and claim that we have a higher crime rate, a higher welfare burden, our economy is proportionally worse, and our government is excessively larger than the 1950’s. And you’re right. Guess what else has gone up significantly? POPULATION. That’s right, a higher population often translates to higher crime. Look at the first few results in http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=population+growth+increase+crime&btnG=Search for examples. I’m not suggesting that population growth is to blame for all of the issues you brought up, but you can’t reasonably point at 50 years ago and say “well America was better when we had traditional family values” because there are other variables (time, population, culture, the rest of the world, etc.) that you’re not taking into account.

We previously established that you’re afraid of contemporary culture. The only question left to answer is: do you not understand it, or are you afraid simply because it conflicts with your existing beliefs?

I hope you realize that you are arguing that family values and dads staying would not decrease poverty and be good for children because you have digressed into the liberal obsession with the world being fair and everyone being on “equal footing”.

Like most moral relativists who demand that abortion be available on every street corner until the second before the head pops out, you have created an argument —against family values! How shocking. Let’s get this straight, kids of same sex partners do not do as well because of “social attitudes” towards them? How about a kid raised by both biological parents has the most advantage because of the benefits that this situation provides – not because they’ve never in their life been looked at quizzically because after all they don’t have two moms.

You seem baffled as to why kids with both bio parents fare better and end up blaming the very values that mom and dads that stay live by which gave the advantage in the first place-its their fault, because those that don’t have a bio mom and dad feel left out! This is like saying kids only fed McDonalds every day aren’t less healthy than the kids eating healthy meals because of the food itself, its because of socially constructed views about diets! If only “traditional families” would quit being elitist, the kids of single moms (and double moms) would feel better and not be at a disadvantage. Or maybe Obama can through a mandate in one of his spending bills (no one would even catch it!) that ONLY same-sex families be allowed. That way we’ll all feel better about our non- traditional families and we’d never again have to hear about “equal footing”!

The problem is that you assume everything should be fair in the world and that there are no consequences of bad decisions. Then again, you probably don’t believe in bad decisions if you are a liberal. The fact is that kids with a bio mom and dad are at a greater advantage for many positive reasons. No, its not fair to the same sex and adopted kids who were given up by there selfish/young/fornicating unwed biological parents who were just nurturing enough not to dismember their tiny bodies in utero. Yes, it may hurt the feelings of same loving sex parents to know that they do not provide the optimal situation for a child to grow up in. But we are not talking about feelings, we are talking about facts. Delving into “maybe its the way they are judged by society that gives the disadvantage” is comical. The perpetual liberal battle cry – “Damn family values because they make other people feel bad.” Maddening.

Also, the research I’ve cited (in the comment and the previous) indicates nothing of “not having a dad” being the important factor, or the need for a “mom and dad.” All that has been shown is that children fare better in households with two caretakers, rather than one. As I said, the statistics put children of remarried households, adopted households, and same-sex households on equal footing.

There’s also the question of why – which isn’t easily answered by statistic data. Why is it that children are at a lower risk if they are raised by biological parents who are married to one another? There shouldn’t be any significant difference between that child and an adopted child, but there is. Perhaps the problem is a social one – social attitudes toward non-traditional families (with two parents) could be what causes there to be a risk. In that case, how will a so-called “return to family values” help these children?

“Canadian Press recently published the results of a massive Statistics Canada study of 23,000 children across the country during an eight month period in 1994 and 1995. The central conclusion of the study is that children raised by single mothers face increased risks of emotional, behavioural, academic and social problems. (Statistics Canada)

One in six children in Canada live in single-parent families, 93% of these headed by single mothers. (Statistics Canada)

Social researchers have long known that growing up in poverty puts children at higher risk for problems such as hyperactivity, emotional distress or failing a grade at school. But, the agency found the incidence of such problems among children of well-off single mothers was generally higher than for children from poor two-parent familes. (Portia Priegert, Canadian Press)

Such statistics do not mean single mothers are worse parents, rather they suggest that single mothers have a tough job juggling their responsibilities at work and home and have fewer resources than traditional families. (Carolyne Gorlick, social policy professor at the University of Western Ontario)

And children may be more prone to problems because their parents have gone through painful divorces. (Robert Glossop, Vanier Institute of the Family, Ottawa)

The fact that children raised by single mothers are at increased risk is found over and over again. Acknowledging that fact is the first step to changing our legal framework and cultural attitudes toward parenting and raising children.”

continue reading at http://www.fathermag.com/701/Trev2/

—————-

I think people tend to push back on the idea that kids raised by single moms are at a huge disadvantage because they think we are attacking women and their capabilities. As this article mentions, it doesn’t mean the moms are bad parents but that it is extremely tough for them to juggle work, household, parenting by themselves.

Also, yes your comment on being poor influences the kids to also be poor is correct. However, I’ve seen plenty of data to support the idea that this article also mentions which is that poor kids with single moms are much more likely to be poor vs a poor kid with two parents. Again, I’m still working on stats for all of this.

Lastly, we haven’t even mentioned the increase in crime, academic achievement, etc. although it is all intertwined w/ poverty levels.

Being against growth in children being raised by single moms does not mean I’m anti-women. It means that I strongly believe that kids are way better off with a mom and a dad. More stats to prove this are on the way…

“What’s important is not whether they are raised by one or two parents. It’s how good is the relationship with the parent, how much support they’re getting from that parent and how harmonious is the environment.”

What a load of crap.

I love how this article claims “sons from single moms CAN succeed” because of the example of Barack Obama. Thats like saying new research shows that nerdy kids can make billions and referencing the life of Bill Gates.

I’ll have stats regarding children raised by single moms soon, I’m still compiling them.

Sources worth pondering:
http://www.clasp.org/publications/marriage_brief3_annotated.pdf
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-08-27-single-moms-succeed_N.htm

You make a great argument. And, banning political parties would be a great step in the right direction.

Thank you for your comments!