« September 2006 | Main | November 2006 »
October 30, 2006
What's In Your Wallet???
"Secret History of the Credit Card", must-see video from PBS. If you've got a credit card, you've got to see this. From the website:
In "Secret History of the Credit Card," FRONTLINE® and The New York Times join forces to investigate an industry few Americans fully understand. In this one-hour report, correspondent Lowell Bergman uncovers the techniques used by the industry to earn record profits and get consumers to take on more debt.
Posted by Anna at 1:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 27, 2006
The Girl Who Knew Too Much.....
Last night I had another audit at work, no big deal for me, I've been audited 8 times now. The auditor asked me about a set of charts posted in the break room and which ones I have impact on. I thought I did an ok job of it, until my supervisor came out and yelled at me. Apparently I did too good of a job, and the auditor accused him of bringing in a "ringer". I just can't win.
Posted by Anna at 2:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 26, 2006
Older and Wiser Can Wait.....
Forget "If I knew then what I know now...". I just wanna be four for the rest of my life.
Why four?
Four is the perfect age. You're still cute. All the grownups tell you so. You spend all day playing with no responsibilities whatsoever. You're big enough to do the things you want to, like put on your shoes or carry your plate to the table, but small enough no one expects you to do it. And when you do, the grownups praise you like you'd just developed a cure for cancer.
You can nap, anytime, anywhere, but if you don't want to, you don't have to. You don't have to get up early, in fact, the grownups are relieved when you don't. Food magically appears with no more effort on your part than a loud "I'm HUNGRY".
You're young enough to be totally oblivious to the world around you, in fact, the grownups envy you for that. But you're old enough to drive them nuts with an endless string of "why?" questions.
If there is reincarnation, I want to come back as a four year-old.
Posted by Anna at 1:34 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 21, 2006
What's on Your Reading List?
I was recently engaged in a conversation at work where I was asked "What have you been reading lately?" (I'll admit the questioner was worried because I'd made a comment about having brains sucked out by alien life forms.) That seemingly innocuous question led into the following dialouge:
Q: "What kind of books do you like to read?"
Me: "What kind of books wouldn't I read?"
Q: (shrugging shoulders) "I don't know".
Me: "I don't either".
The truth is my reading list is rather ecclectic, covering every topic from cognitive neuroscience to photovoltaics and I'm always on the lookout for interesting titles. Tonight I discovered via Marginal Revolution a list of "1001 books you must read before you die". The list focuses on novels, which I am not a huge consumer of, but I did better than I'd expected. I can honestly say I've read 11.5 of them and watched movies based on at least 4 of them. I'm not counting ones where I'm fuzzy on whether I actually read the book or am familiar with the story without having read it.
How many books from the list have you read, and if you were writing the list, which books would top it?
Posted by Anna at 8:53 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 20, 2006
Smoking or Non Smoking???
I recently learned of a former co-worker who is battling cancer. My heart goes out to her, I can't imagine anything more scary than being told you have a brain tumor, or going through surgery to have it removed. But I do have a problem with being asked to make a donation to help with medical costs for someone who smoked like a freight train while I worked with her. Obviously the Surgeon General's warnings are not working.
Perhaps instead of using a driver's license or ID card for purchasing tobacco products, consumers should be required to use a special "tobacco product" identification card. Here's how I envision it working:
In order to purchase a tobacco product, a person would have to obtain a card from a health care provider. Nothing complicated, something like the loyalty cards Kroger and other national chains use. No photo, no periodic renewal, just give your name, date of birth, and social security number, it's all embedded in the card so if someone stole it they would not have access to your personal information.
You would present this card any time you wanted to purchase cigarettes, cigars or other forms of tobacco, the retailer would swipe it as proof you are old enough to purchase the product. No sale could be made without the card being swiped. Of course minors could circumvent the system by using someone else's card, but they're already doing that anyway. Each time your card is swiped, a portion of that sale would go into a special fund. Yes, the cost of your cigarettes would go up, but you're addicted, you would willingly pay it. When you are diagnosed with cancer this fund would act as a "cancer rider" and reimburse you for expenses associated with your medical treatment. Think of it as a forced insurance plan.
This wouldn't help out non-smokers who are diagnosed with cancer, and it wouldn't help second-hand smokers, unless you could opt to cover them when you registered for a card, but it would be more beneficial for a smoker than a Surgeon General's warning.
Posted by Anna at 6:25 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
OTJ.....
Something hit me in the head tonight at work, I had no idea how bad it was, all I knew was there was blood on my hand. I walked into the supervisor's office, holding my head and announced "I'm bleeding". He just laughed. Laughed. I'm standing there trying to hold my brains in, and he's laughing.
I went up to the first aid room to wash it and see how bad it was, by the time I got up there both my hands had blood on them, so I had to ask someone else working nearby to open the door for me. "What happened?" He asked. "Something hit me in the head". He laughed, but he did open the door for me, and then while I was washing it off he looked into the cupboard. "I don't think we have any head bandages". Then he laughed again.
I left the first aid room after washing it off, holding a dry paper towel to my head and another guy saw me. "What happened?" He looked genuinely concerned, until I told him something hit me in the head. Then he laughed too. I went back to the supervisor's office and he finally looked at it. After laughing. And chatting with someone else for several minutes. Not bad. I was relieved.
I went back to work, but something didn't feel right. The other guy from the supervisor's office told me there were bubbles coming out of the top of my head. He figured I was leaking air. That explained the whistling I'd been hearing ever since getting hit, sort of a tea kettle whistle. Later he told another guy it was a good thing it wasn't cold in the press room tonight, with all the hot air I was leaking, the fog would be thicker than pea soup.
I know they love me.
Posted by Anna at 4:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 15, 2006
Armchair Gardner...
My final getting-ready-for-winter project this weekend was to replace my gerbera daisys with pansies and snapdragons. About half way into my project I realized I had twice as many snapdragon plants and more than twice as many pansies as I could fit into three pots. I spent a couple minutes debating whether I should randomly leave the leftovers on doormats of other apartments or rip out the lifeless holly bush in the window box at the end of my patio. Finally I decided the pink snapdragons and white pansies would nicely complement the georgeous red mums which have managed to survive my care for nearly a year.
With the aid of a spoon from the kitchen I managed to liberate the holly bush whose roots had become intwined with the unsuspecting mums, leaving a crater in the middle of the window box big enough to accomodate 9 snapdragon plants. Any real gardner would be appalled at what I consider technique as I crammed the plants in anyway I could, but the goal here was just to get as much dirt under my fingernails as possible. I finished the job with 20 white pansies nestled around the snapdragons and mums.
I was quite proud of my work until I started cleaning up and read the plant tag. Those things can grow to three feet tall, I could have my own privacy fence by the time they mature. Who puts snapdragons in a window box anyway?
Posted by Anna at 7:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 13, 2006
Do It Myself Guide to Winterization:
So there are a couple drawbacks to single life, not many, but things like when my apartment is trashed there's no one else to blame (and no one else to help clean it). And that "honey do" list... guess what honey! Yeah.
But the frost on my window after work this morning reminds me winter is coming whether I authorize it or not, so this weekend I'm on a mission to get my apartment ready. This means foam insulation for the window my landlord never bothered to finish on the inside, plastic shrink-wrap for all the windows, bubble wrap insulation for the air conditioning unit, switching the ceiling fans to the winter setting and replacing the gerbera daisys on the patio with snapdragons and pansies.
I'm doing well so far, I've got the foam insulation on the unfinished window done, the A/C unit bubble wrapped and the bathroom window shrink-wrapped already.
Posted by Anna at 9:33 PM | Comments (0)
October 6, 2006
Change
While the outside world carefully watches the Amish community which has been thrust into the headlines this week, I marvel at the difference between the Amish reaction to a senseless tragedy and the American reaction to a senseless tragedy. These reserved men and women thought first of forgiveness, and turned to the needs of the other victims, the wife and children of the man who murdered their daughters. As they quietly go about the task of grieving, and healing, you can bet they're not asking what the government is doing to make their children safer.
When their school reopens, whether in a new location or in the same building, they may hug their children more tightly at the beginning of the day, but I doubt they will be holding "lock-down" drills, installing metal detectors, or eyeing strangers more cautiously. And I wonder, will this tragedy change them? Or will they change us?
Posted by Anna at 7:58 PM | Comments (0)
October 3, 2006
If I had school-age kids....
I would have kept them home today. Not out of fear that harm may come to them, but just to have them close. My heart is broken for all the parents who have lost their children in the last few days.
Posted by Anna at 2:11 PM | Comments (0)
October 2, 2006
Does Dr. Dobson Think You're Stupid?
No matter which side of the gay marriage issue you stand on (or if you're still standing in the middle) you're better off not watching Focus on the Family's movie "Why Not Gay Marriage" in hopes of gaining perspective. I became curious in seeing what they had to say after reading a news story about the danger the Republican party faces this election year, due to the errosion of their conservative Christian base. In response to this threat, Dr. Dobson and the Southern Baptist Convention are promoting this video in order to mobilize voters.
I am not a huge player in the same-sex marriage issue, I just don't have a dog in that fight, and honestly, a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage now does not insure homosexual couples will never be allowed to legally marry. If you don't agree with me, perhaps you should read the Eighteenth Amendment. I am a huge proponent of common sense and accurate data however, and what I read about their movie flew in the face of common sense.
I hunted the movie down on this website. What strikes me immediately is their introduction to the film:
A video presentation of the most effective arguments in the marriage debate. Focus on the Family defends natural marriage and opposes same-sex marriage whenever and wherever we're invited. Over time, we've learned which arguments have been most persuasive. In this concise and convincing presention, Senior Analyst Glenn Stanton shares what he's learned through many college-campus debates. Master these responses, and you'll be equipped to defend the family with love and compassion.
Notice the presentation is not billed as "factual", "accurate", or "informative", you can be persuasive, effective, convincing and still be completely wrong. Viewers are not invited to evaluate the issue or judge for themselves, only to learn to repeat the responses like mindless robots. Come right in, invites Focus on the Family, but check your brains at the door.
As he introduces his topic, Mr. Stanton continually encourages his audience to "Master these lines", promising them if they do, they will be as well prepared as he is when he goes out to debate. They will be able to "defend the family with compassion, love and intelligence". But as we will see in his presentation, some of his information is inaccurate, incomplete, and an insult to the intelligence of his audience.
The Presentation is broken down into 12 segments, mostly centering around ten questions. I have broken it down into 9 seperate posts, for easier reading. Comments are open throughout, and I welcome your feedback.
How will my same sex marriage hurt your marriage?
Is same sex marriage like interracial marriage?
Where does it stop?
Can't we all just get along by having religious marriage and civil marriage?
What public good does marriage provide?
Is it healthy to subject children to experimental families?
But haven't medical and psychological groups said same sex marriage is fine?
How do we know what kinds of families children need?
Is the same sex family about the needs of children or the wants of adults?
Does gender really matter?
Conclusion
Posted by Anna at 12:45 AM | Comments (0)
Part 2
Q. "How will my same-sex marriage hurt your marriage?"
This segment makes a key point and sets the tone for the rest of the presentation. Mr. Stanton makes this statement:
"You saying that your same-sex marriage is just as valuable, just as important, just as neccessary as my family absolutely sends that message to my little boys and my little girls. It says that they as gendered beings, as males and females are not essential for the family."
In those two sentences, we learn that some people are less valuable than others, that some parents, some families are not as important or as necessary as his family. If I were sitting in a public viewing, I hope I'd have the balls to leave, because I am not ok with any organization promoting value judgements of an entire class of people.
It is not your same-sex marriage hurting Mr. Stanton's family, it is what he tells himself about the value of you and your family that causes harm.
Q. "Is same-sex marriage like interracial marriage?"
He states emphatically the two are not the same, but this segment is not free of flaws. Even the graphic of what I assume is supposed to be a nuclear interracial family is problematic, if a white mommy and a black daddy have babies, wouldn't both of the children be approximately the same color? Mr. Stanton claims there is no data showing interracial marriage to be harmful to children, but that there is considerable data showing serious developmental harm to children in intentionally fatherless or motherless homes.
What he does not say is that this research is on children in same-sex homes, in fact, this data could represent a number of children as products of heterosexual marriages which ended in separation or divorce, or who were conceived by heterosexual parents who chose not to continue the relationship, or by single women and men who chose to conceive or adopt a child on their own. He dumps a whole big batch of data in one bucket and tries to pass it off as proof of it's applicability to a demographic which may not even be represented in it.
The reality, as we'll find out later is there isn't a "large body" of research on children in same-sex homes. But the research that is available shows little difference between children raised in heterosexual families and children raised in homosexual families.
Posted by Anna at 12:42 AM | Comments (0)
Part 3
Q. "Where does it stop?"
How many times through history was the question "Where does it stop?" asked. When slavery was abolished? When women were given the right to vote? When blacks and other racial minorities were given civil rights? Contempt of Court details the lynching of Ed Johnson, a black man who was framed with the rape of a white woman, denied due process during his trial, and lynched by a white mob even after the Supreme Court intervened on his behalf. The authors describe the racist environment of Chattanooga, Tennessee in 1906.
"Chattanooga's attitude toward race was best expressed just weeks before Noah Parden's trip to Washington D.C. As various civic and community groups struggled with how to deal with the race problem, a prominent Baptist church voted seventy-four to seventy-one that black people do have souls and can go to heaven. "Thank God for the Soddy Baptist Church," Parden responded sarcastically, "I just hope they notified God about their decision."Can you picture a church full of God-fearing, white Americans debating such a tense issue? "Where does it stop, if we give blacks souls and let them into heaven, our farm animals will want souls too."
So if we give Homosexuals the same rights and protections of marriage, where does it stop? Mr. Stanton fears allowing same-sex marriage could lead to polygamy. Has he not noticed society has been moving away from polygamy? Polygamy was common in Biblical times, and there are many cultures today which allow multiple spouses. Martin Luther, one of the founding fathers of Christianity was not opposed to polygamy. In a letter to the Saxon Chancellor Gregor Brück, Luther stated that he could not "forbid a person to marry several wives, for it does not contradict Scripture". According to Mr. Stanton, full acceptance will be mandatory, in other words, a family can be as open as the members would like it to be.
If same-sex marriage is allowed, we will also be throwing away freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and even the freedom to think our own thoughts. Again Mr. Stanton raises the question of value.
"You will fully value the same-sex family as the heterosexual family."The ACLU may be preparing their briefs already.
Education control is another concern he raises, our children will be bringing home school books depicting little Sally with her two dads, going to feed the ducks. Lucky for him Sally's dads decided to take her to feed the ducks which fit nicely into his "one male and one female" thesis, because "nature is something we just can't get away from". Imagine if they'd taken her to a dairy farm, where all the cows are impregnated by one bull, or a chicken farm where only one rooster takes care of all the hens, but no one can really explain how he does it. Even worse, what if the trio went to pick out a new puppy where one puppy doesn't look the same as the others. Perhaps Sally's dads should just read to her from this book instead.
Posted by Anna at 12:39 AM | Comments (0)
Part 4
Q. "Why can't we all just get along by having religious marriage and civil marriage?"
Marriage is an institution which superceeds both religion and the law, according to Mr. Stanton, we don't draw a distinction between a couple who is legally married and a couple who married in a religious ceremony. I agree with Mr. Stanton, a good example is the refusal of the Catholic Church to acknowledge remarriage after divorce. Their refusal, does not in any way diminish the existence of the marriage.
What is it the institution of marriage creates that superceeds law and religion? Marriage forms a bond between two individuals which cannot be established by any other contractual arragement (except perhaps, adoption). Austin Cline refers to this bond as "kinship" in his article on about.com
"Kinship is an important thread in the social fabric. It isn’t an “institution” like marriage because there are generally no specific legal, religious, or social rules regulating it. Kinship is, instead, an amorphous creation of many other institutions which help people structure their relationships with one another."If you know that someone is your kin, you know that you have different legal, social, and moral obligations to them than you do to total strangers. If you know that two people are kin, you know that they not only have different obligations to each other than they do to you, but also that you have different obligations to them as a group then you would to them as individuals if they weren’t kin.
"Marriage establishes a relationship which does not and cannot exist for people who are simply living together. However much a cohabiting couple may love each other and however long they may have been together, their relationship is not such that it can be described as “kin” and, as a consequence, they cannot make any legal, social, or moral claims on others to treat them individually and jointly as if they were kin."
Along with this bond, married couples enjoy far more advantages than unmarried couples. From hospital visitation, to immigration rights to pensions, married couples benefit where same-sex couples are not allowed to. A better discussion on these topics is available here
Posted by Anna at 12:32 AM | Comments (0)
Part 5
Q. "What public good does marriage provide?"
He begins with pointing out no society NEEDS same-sex marriage. I would like to point out no society NEEDS neckties either, but the presenter and most of the men in his all-white audience are wearing them. Not that I'm against neckties, I can think of several uses for them, some of which I'm sure would not be endorsed by Focus on the Family, just that they are not a necessity for survival of our species.
Mr. Stanton makes the assumption here that all marriages in all cultures at all times were always heterosexual. The problem with making that blanket statement, is that we weren't there. We interpret history through the lens of our own experiences and with our own biases. Where did marriage originate? We can safely assume that Eve did not have the traditional white wedding as we know it today. No, she and Adam just started doing "it", they probably didn't even call it marriage.
It may have been several centuries before marriage as a cultural phenomenon even existed. The caveman just found a girl he wanted, dragged her home and had sex with her and nobody had a problem with it. We don't know that some of those couplings weren't same-sex. Then, sometime in later history, we began regulating those couplings, until we have the institution we know today as marriage.
Basically, according to Mr. Stanton, there are four purposes for marriage, first is to socialize men. The role of women in a society is to get men to behave. I've provided a poll at the bottom of this section, I'd like to hear what women think of this idea. I am currently not married, dating or otherwise attached to a man, but should I be in the future I would prefer one who already knows how to behave himself.
The second purpose of marriage is to regulate sexuality. Apparenly Mr. Stanton was too busy preparing his presentation to notice that infidelity is at an all time high. 50-60% of married men and 40-50% of married women engaging in extramarital sex at sometime or another during their relationship does not sound like monogamy is being effectively enforced (Atwood & Shwartz, 2002 - Journal of Couple & Relationship Therapy). In the words of a married, male, former co-worker of mine "You can have you one at work, and another 'un at home".
The third purpose of marriage is to protect women. "A society's most serious problem is the unattached male". (Wasn't the BTK serial killer married, as well as president of his church council?) Mr. Stanton seems so concerned about protecting us poor women from these "aggressive, selfish males" (another value judgement) he forgot to check his domestic violence statistics. Who was protecting Laci Peterson and Lori Hacking? A quick visit to www.endabuse.org provides these interesting statistics:
Nearly one-third of American women (31 percent) report being physically or sexually abused by a husband or boyfriend at some point in their lives, according to a 1998 Commonwealth Fund surveyThirty percent of Americans say they know a woman who has been physically abused by her husband or boyfriend in the past year
On average, more than three women are murdered by their husbands or boyfriends in this country every day. In 2000, 1,247 women were killed by an intimate partner.
As many as 324,000 women each year experience intimate partner violence during their pregnancy
Annually in the United States, 503,485 women are stalked by an intimate partner
Domestic Violence against women is not just an American problem, again from www.endabuse.org (this page loads as a .pdf)
In 48 population-based surveys from around the world, 10-69 percent of women reported being physically assaulted by an intimate male partner at some point in their livesA large study of India found that 43.5 percent of women reported that they were psychologically abused by their partners, and 40.3 percent reported that they were physically abused. Fifty percent of women who were physically abused reported violence during pregnancy
Intimate partners commit 40-70 percent of homicides of women worldwide.
Around the world, 1 in 3 women have been beaten, coerced into sex, other otherwise abused in their lifetime. Most often, the abuser is a member of her own family.
Sounds like there are a whole bunch of women not doing their job of making men behave. These statistics do not break down what percentage of the abuse is perpetrated inside of marriage, but it is obvious unattached males are not the greatest threat facing women these days.
The fourth purpose for marriage is to insure children have a mother and a father to take care of them. I'm willing to give this point to Mr. Stanton, however, I would caution against assuming the quality of parenting in a typical male/female marriage is automatically superior to the quality of parenting in a same-sex marriage.
I would like to point out Mr. Stanton missed one very obvious purpose of marriage, to keep us from eating carmel dip straight out of the container, with our fingers in the middle of the night.
Posted by Anna at 12:18 AM | Comments (0)
Part 6
Q. Is it healthy to subject children to experimental families?
The main premise of this segment is "it's never been done before". I find this argument tiresome, what visionary hasn't encountered this brick wall when trying to inspire change? We never did it that way before. Can you imagine our founding fathers sitting around smoking pipes and saying "I just don't know, we'd be exposing our children to experimental government. No one's ever tried government of the people, by the people and for the people. We'd better just stick with the status quo." Or how about those early Americans who loaded up their wagons and headed out beyond the horizon to make a new home in a new land. We don't refer to them as experimenters do we, we call them "Pioneers". How many of the children in those families came to tragic ends during the long journey, yet we hold them in our memory as heroes.
Mr. Stanton presents this quote from the "Lesbian Parenting Book":
"It can be exhilarating - and sometimes scary - to be painting a new and different lesbian family tree"
Keying on the words "exhilarating" and "scary" he likens same-sex parenting to strapping a child to a bungie cord or roller coaster against their will. Every family is an experiment. No one knows when a couple takes their marriage vows what the end result will be. What new parent, biological or adoptive doesn't look at their new child and feel exhilarated, and a little scared?
Mr. Stanton insults the intelligence of his audience by stating, "We don't experiment on animals", refering to the statement on your bottle of shampoo that no animals were harmed in the manufacture of that product. Does the term "Pavlov's dogs" ring a bell? We sent monkeys into space before we sent humans. We do experiment on animals, every day in reputable research labs all across the country, around the world and sometimes in space. Where did the medicines you take come from anyway, and how do you know they're safe? It starts with testing in animals, then moves into testing in humans (sometimes even in children) long before they are ever brought to market. We do this because in our minds, if the potential life-saving medication turns out to cause internal organs to self destruct it is better to turn the internal organs of lab rats to mush.
Posted by Anna at 12:15 AM | Comments (0)
Part 7
Q. But haven't medical and psychological groups said same-sex parenting is fine?
Mr. Stanton begins by asking about various medical and psycological organizations who support same-sex parenting, then clearly states "Those organizations are wrong". In order to support his claim, he turns to the statement issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics:
"Is it the case that children born to lesbian couples 'can have the same advantages and the same expectations for health, adjustment, and development as can parents who are heterosexual,"
Mr. Stanton informs us that this statement was not the opinion of a majority of AAP members, but a committee of just 8 members. (The Supreme Court has 9.) Apparently their statement sparked a considerable controversy among the Academy membership. (Articles in support of and opposing the decision) Mr. Stanton would rather focus our attention on what he perceives as "activism" than on the research behind the statement. (The difference between activism and advocacy is in whether you agree.)
Mr. Stanton finally begins to discuss the research on same-sex parenting, but begins by setting two requirements for "good" research. The first requirement is a large population to study and the second requirement is a long time to study the impact. He then talks about the conclusion reached by the American Academy of Pediatrics that children in same-sex homes do just as well as children in heterosexual families. Quoting from the AAP study:
"Research exploring the diversity of parental relationships among gay and lesbian parents is just beginning.""The small and nonrepresentative samples studied and the relatively young age of most of the children suggest some reserve."
I have read that study, these are two sentences out of a huge study. Why does he stop there? Why doesn't he quote this sentence as well?
"However, the weight of evidence gathered during several decades using diverse samples and methodologies is persuasive in demonstrating that there is no systematic difference between gay and nongay parents in emotional health, parenting skills, and attitudes toward parenting."
Mr. Stanton does not continue to discuss the findings of the study, because he has told you everything he wants you to know. He does not want you to know this:
"A growing body of scientific literature demonstrates that children who grow up with 1 or 2 gay and/or lesbian parents fare as well in emotional, cognitive, social, and sexual functioning as do children whose parents are heterosexual. Children’s optimal development seems to be influenced more by the nature of the relationships and interactions within the family unit than by the particular structural form it takes.""The gender identity of preadolescent children raised by lesbian mothers has been found consistently to be in line with their biologic sex. None of the more than 300 children studied to date have shown evidence of gender identity confusion, wished to be the other sex, or consistently engaged in cross-gender behavior. No differences have been found in the toy, game, activity, dress, or friendship preferences of boys or girls who had lesbian mothers, compared with those who had heterosexual mothers."
Why wouldn't he want you to know? Because it would end his presentation, and there are three questions left to go.
Posted by Anna at 12:10 AM | Comments (0)
Part 8
Q. How do we know what kinds of families children need?
Mr. Stanton's position here, supported by Child Trends and the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), is that children do best when raised by both of their married, biological parents. I highly doubt any reasonable person would argue with him on this, and I certainly won't, but I hope he's banned "The Ugly Duckling" from being read to his five children. However, it begs several more questions which he does not take the time to address; Are we going to begin enforcing the marriage of young, pregnant girls to the child's biological father? Should we deny couples who are physically incapable of producing their own biological offspring the honor of being parents? What do we do with all the kids in foster care currently available for adoption?
What if tomorrow morning we woke up in a parallel universe. One in which Mr. Stanton and his wife, ready to begin their own family discover Mr. Stanton is physically unable to reproduce? Would the Stantons simply shrug their shoulders and walk away from their dream of a big, happy family? No, of course they wouldn't, they would grieve the loss of their dream, but then they would get a new dream. And they would go out and fulfill that dream, maybe they would use modern science to produce a child that was 50% biologically theirs, or maybe they would adopt. They would buy bikes, attend school programs, hold backyard barbeques, and wait up late at night for their children to return home safely. They would cry at graduations, weddings and the addition of each new grandchild. All their friends, neighbors and co-workers would stand by, shaking their heads and comment "This was not best for those children."
Absurd? Of course it is, we would applaude the Stantons, perhaps more so because of their struggles in reaching their dream.
Here is an interesting quote taken from Focus on the Family's website. The question is posed "Are adoptive children more likely to be rebellious than children raised by biological parents." In answering Dr. Dobson states
"As with so many other behavioral issues the critical factors are the particular temperment of the child and how he or she is handled by the parents."
Focus on the Family has a strong position on adoption, from this webpage "Every child is precious in the eyes of God and deserves the chance to be loved". "God is preparing the hearts and homes of families all across this nation to receive these children." Perhaps Dr. Dobson is unaware of the Child Trends and CLASP conclusions about biological families.
Posted by Anna at 12:05 AM | Comments (0)
Part 9
Q. Is the same sex family about the needs of children or the wants of adults?
Mr. Stanton talks about an interview between Dianne Sawyer and Rosie O'Donnell in which Rosie is asked about her son Parker, then six years old. Rosie said she gives this answer when her son Parker says he wants a daddy.
"If you were to have a daddy, you couldn't have me as a mommy, because I'm the kind of mommy who wants another mommy."
This is an incredibly moving appeal for the case of heterosexual families. Mr. Stanton asks "How different is Rosie than the 1970's and 80's pariah man who goes out and gets a trophy wife?"
Imagine for a minute you are a ten year-old boy who has been in foster care for the last four years. You have no idea who your "real dad" is, and your memories of your mother cause you to wake with cold sweats in the middle of the night. You've had many foster siblings, and a few foster parents, but you have no family you can call "yours".
One day, when you're visiting your social worker, the one permanent person in your life, she tells you this: "Johnny, I know of someone who wants you in their family. They picked you, out of all the other kids waiting for forever families, they picked you. They have good jobs, live in a nice house where you would have your own bedroom, they're even talking about buying you a bike already. But, there is no mom in this house, it's just two dads, what do you think? The decision is up to you." Would you walk out of the social workers office kicking your feet in the dirt because you don't want two dads, or would you float out of there with the information that somebody wants you? Would you fall asleep that night still wondering if you would ever have a mom and a dad or would you lay awake all night thinking "I have TWO dads, and they want me!"
What happens to the 20,000 to 30,000 children who "age out" of foster care each year? The future for these young adults is bleak, a study by Mark Courtney at the University of Chicago found that 25% become homeless, 56% are unemployed and 27% of males wind up in jail. Even those who manage to make it on their own lack family connections. "The day I graduated, I was there alone," says Jelani Freeman, who aged out of the foster care system after ten years. "My Christmases and Thanksgivings are spent, to this day, at home alone or at co-workers' houses, which doesn't feel right. It always feels like something's missing."
There may be same-sex parents who treat their children as the 70's pariah man who takes a trophy wife, I don't know if Rosie O'Donnell is one or not. There surely are heterosexual families who do the same. But there are a great number of gay men who have the heart of a father, and lesbian women who have the heart of a mother. Why would we deny children a loving, forever family because they do not fit our mental image of what a family is?
Posted by Anna at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
October 1, 2006
Part 10
Q. Does gender really matter?
Same-sex families, according to Mr. Stanton, promote a "Mr. Potato Head" view of the world, that we are all the same except for our external body parts. He claims that same-sex families send the message that "all women are not needed for the family", and that "all men are not needed for the family". Same-sex marriage is anti-human. He closes by telling us heterosexual families celebrate diversity and same-sex families celebrate sameness.
Absolutely gender matters, if it weren't for gender, how would we know which restroom to use at the mall? What is gender, how do we define it, and are we really talking about gender, or gender stereo-types?
Gender is a fairly simple concept, right? Most of us understand it by the time we figure out how to use the toilet, boys are outties and become daddys, girls are innies and become mommies. In High-school Biology class we get a little more in depth and learn that gender really is determined by our chromosomes, girls are XX and boys are XY. Who remembers hearing about XO, or XXX, or XXY or XYY, XO/XY, XX male or XY female combinations, or about individuals with four or even more sex chromosomes? It would be much easier if we were all either square pegs or round pegs, then we could find the appropriately shaped recepticle and get on with our lives.
The biological basis for homosexuality has become clearer in recent years, and maybe some day we will completely understand it. But how do those who believe homosexuality is a choice and is completely condemned by religious beliefs adapt to this new information? It wouldn't be the first time. We no longer consider the cause of mold or leprosy to be sin, we know they are caused by micro-organisms, and have adapted to this information. Carlos and Fernando are a pair of gay flamingos who have been together for five years, they have sucessfully raised three foster chicks by stealing eggs from their heterosexual neighbors, maybe they can help us.
Conclusion:
I began this journey as a neutral voice in the gay marriage debate, but my position now is much more in favor of gay marriage than neutral. How did hearing Focus on the Family's presentation and researching the facts for myself change me? It was after hearing Mr. Stanton's impassioned plea for gender. With his words still ringing in my ears a number of questions began to form in my head. Am I a person who tells young girls "You can be anything you want to be -- except a mommy"? Am I a person who tells young boys "You can be anything you want to be -- except a daddy"? Am I a person who looks out at society and says "You can't be who you are, because I'm not ok with it, I want you to be somebody else."
Posted by Anna at 11:53 PM | Comments (5)