Conservative Soup - food for thought

Ahhhh...nobody said we always have to agree!

While I agree that rearing a child in a homosexual home is not the IDEAL, neither are many behaviors ideal. What a good Good Friday topic!

I believe that Jesus would feel that it would be better to protect children from the spector of institution rearing. By allowing these homeless children to be adopted into loving homes that offer the stability and nurturing atomosphere, they have a better opportunity to grow into happy, well-adjusted people.

I don't agree with their lifestyle mind you...but, there are many lifestyles that I disagree with - and I am not casting the first stone!

All-in-all, I don't think human beings have the intellectual capacity needed to claim that these are unfit parents. And I am on of those mere mortals.

Will
 

Yes, my blogger companion, we have hit an issue where we are standing on opposites sides of the fence.

I've taken some time to digest your thoughts and I will not say you are wrong in the way you are viewing this PROBLEM. Yes, I do think this is a problem, which I think most people would agree. However, I do concede gay people can care and love a child and promote all of the values a real family would provide. Also, I'm not sure how stable this would be for a child.

With this being said, I still cannot support that a gay couple can bring a solid family structure that a child needs for optimal development. I'm breaking this down to the very basic level, that a family needs a mother and a father.
Unfortunately, we do not have this within the family unit on such a large level. With increasing divorce rates and unwed mothers giving birth, there are far too many children that are born with one strike against them.

As for Jesus, I believe that you are right. He would not have allowed the State to raise these children. However, I find it hard to believe he would not rather send them to a mother and father. There are too many good parents wanting to adopt that can provide that ideal family structure we need so much in our Country.

~Milt~
 

Over the years (25 of them) that I've been teaching, I've had three students who I knew for a fact were being raised by gay or lesbian / same-sex parents. There might have been more, but these I knew about for sure.

In all three cases, all the evidence I could see (grades, social skills, etc.) said these kids were doing just fine. They also tended to be more mature and tolerant than their peers. Obviously nothing like a scientific sampling, but this is what I saw. These parents tended to be more involved in their children's educations, and much more supportive of their kids in general, again, from my perspective as the classroom teacher.

On the other hand, kids who suffer through the extremely messy, angry, vitriolic divorces of their STRAIGHT parents have a heck of a time. I have three or four in this situation right now. It stinks, let me tell you.

I also have a significant number of students right now from "intact" straight parent familes whose lives are an absolute disaster because of substance abuse, mental illness, or just plain bad parenting.

And foster care? The system in our state isn't broken: it's a train wreck.

I'll take gay adoption any day of the week. It has to be an option.
 

Of course this is a problem Milt! A single child without a home is a miserable failure of humanity. The fact is that there are MANY children awaiting adoption that do NOT have a line of families waiting in turn.

Fact: the chances of a child being adopted after age 4 falls dramatically. Fact: black children, bi-racial babies, and special needs kids are filling foster homes and juvenile care facilities across the continent (not to mention orphanages abroad).

I equate your stance on this to the overly idealistic peace-movement. Your desire to have all children in a home with a mother and father is great...but, it is a fantasy (peace is great...but, too bad for us there are bad people!).

I'll take my chances by avoiding government-reared children.

Next.

Will
 

Will, you are killing me today. I am a straight, Christian, yet divorced parent of a single loveling child that I have the joy of sharing custody with my ex wife. Optimal parenting? Let's break that down. It's not like us heterosexual folk have a monopoly on virtued relations. There's homosexual behavior in the animal world for pete's sake,... I don't see the the litter of animal kingdom offspring traumatized because "Suzy has two Daddy's" (do you disagree with that behavior as well, Will?). 1 out of 3 straight couples don't make it past their 2nd year of marriage. I live in San Jose, A medium sized City located just south of Gay Central (San Francisco). I have quite a few Gay friends that have adopted kids of their own, and let me tell you, even though I certainly won't extrapolate on the rest of the Gay parenting world, these friends have taught me a thing or two about understanding, patience, resolute spirit and perseverence. After all, there aren't many groups that have had to go through more crap and descrimination than the homosexual community. I think a couple of Dogs can rear a child better than the State can. Name me one, ONE State or Federal run social program that stands like a beacon of exemplery efficiency. The State is about as good in social engineering and custodianship as I we heteros are in saying "... to love and to hold unto death do us part". I respect your logic train on this, but it gives creedence to my knuckehead liberal buddies out here that all you guys in fly-over country are still in the Cro-Magnon stage when it comes to the realization that things change. Cultures have an inertia of their own that does not give a rat's butt about the "good old days". I've seen a few of those orphanages. Talk about spartan soul-less places.
Lastly, you ever seen the movie "Stuart Little"? Tell me George the mouse would have cared if his foster parents would have been Bruno and Sal, rather than Ethel and Mario. I doubt it. But that why this blogging world is so cool. We can all pee against the wind and duck the droplets coming back at us at the same time. The real world is different.
 

Oops! Sorry Will. My blast-o-rama was directed at your co-host, not you. My apologies.
Milt... you get that?
 

Ding, Ding, Ding, Round Three.....

I have obviously kicked the hornets nest on this topic, but that is a good thing. I have been thinking quite a bit about Will and Dardin's opinions on this subject.
I spoke to my wife about this subject expecting to get some support and extra ammo for my blogging buddies, but she gave me a verbal butt kicking instead. After long consideration over Easter weekend I have the following thoughts about why I might be wrong about this:

1) I live in a fairy tale world where all mommies and daddies stay married.

2) I assume that all parents are capable and loving.

3) There are no unwed mothers or pregnant teenagers.

4) Our institutions work well to care for the children that do not have the benefits of 1 and 2 above.

Obviously, a nuclear bomb has exploded on my perfect world here in "fly over country". My wife is a therapist that goes into every situation a child does not want to grow up in. I sometimes fail to recognize that the "other side of the tracks" is still out there, and will continue to be out there.
I WILL AGREE THAT THERE ARE SITUATIONS WHEN A CHILD IS BETTER OFF WITH GAY PARENTS THEN ITS BIOLOGICAL PARENTS THAT MAY BE MARRIED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I still do not accept this as an appropriate situation, even though it may be real.
 

Ha! That was Great Milt. It takes a great man to ponder changing his views, much less admiting it to the minions here in the ether-world. My kudos to you dear sir. As to the butt-kicking from your wife?,.. consider yourself lucky. You live in a wonderful area that happens to dovetail nicely in lifestyle and culure with your beliefs. A little butt-kicking from your wife is nothing. I, on the other hand, am a Neo-Con, Theo-Con (with a Libertarian streak to boot) living in the belly of the liberal beast (Silicon Valley, California). Add to that my lovely a wonderful fiancee who is to the left of Chomsky, Gore and Guevara..., well you get the picture. But the good thing about us is that we wail away at the issues, solve the problems of the world in some dogmatic form, and whatever is left in dis-agreement gets glossed over in the make-up sex that night. Life it good!