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Wednesday » November 29 » 2006
Losing the right to a mommy and daddy
Barbara Kay
National Post
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
"Ibelieve children have the right to a mother and a father, and preferably their biological parents." These words -- I agree with them, and so do the UN Conventions of the Child -- were once the equivalent of saying you believed in peace on Earth and goodwill toward men.
But in postmodern societies obsessed with gender equity, as ours has been for the past quarter-century, "mother and father" and "biological parents" have become politically incorrect locutions when joined to "children's rights." Just ask the author of my opening statement, the McGill University bioethicist Margaret Somerville, whose honorary doctorate at Ryerson College last June was jeopardized on its account.
"Words matter," says Elizabeth Marquardt in an interview. Marquardt, the author of Between Two Worlds: The Inner Lives of Children of Divorce, is a Chicago-based affiliate scholar at the Institute for American Values, and director of the Center for Marriage and Families. She is the keynote speaker in Ottawa tomorrow at the Institute of Marriage and Family's first annual family policy conference, a one-day session addressing a 50-strong complement of MPs, senior staff, NGO representatives and other decision-makers around social policy and family issues. Her topic: "The Revolution in Parenthood -- The Emerging Global Clash between Adult Rights and Children's Needs."
By "words matter," Marquardt is referring to Canada's gay marriage law, Bill C-38, which includes a provision to erase the term "natural parent" and replace it across the board with "legal parent" in federal law. At one stroke, she says, the locus of power in identifying a child's parents precipitously shifted to the state, from the civil society that preceded it.
In her report, released Monday across North America and Europe, Marquardt details the ripple effect from emerging reproductive technologies and gender-neutral redefinitions of parenthood. Her research revolved around the question of "Who is parenthood for -- adults or children?" She cites troubling global evidence that adults' rights are privileged over children's. Among many diverse examples: In New Zealand and Australia, influential law commissions propose that children conceived through sperm or egg donation have three legal parents; in Quebec the female partner of a biological mother in a same-sex union is noted as the "father" on the birth certificate; judges in several states in the U.S. have seized on the notion of "psychological" parenthood to award legal parent status to adults (invariably women) not related to the child by blood, adoption or marriage.
When the cultural zeitgeist dictates that children's interests can be fully served in any caring environment, who are the winners and who the losers in the switch from natural to legal parenthood? The winners are homosexual couples, single women seeking social approval for mate-free motherhood, as well as ideologues promoting state control of social norms and the de facto feminization of society. The losers are children -- especially at-risk boys, whose social failures are disproportionately linked to fatherlessness -- and fathers, who through law and cultural attitudes are relegated to virtual dhimmi status in a female-controlled social order.
Marquardt conducted extensive interviews with adult children conceived through sperm donation by strangers, a first in this field of research. Many reveal the negative effects of fatherhood's marginalized role: Some subjects call themselves "lopsided" or "half-adopted" or, in cases of lesbian unions, "queer spawn." One used the term "kinship slaves." Joanna Rose, an Australian interviewee, asks why everyone "flips out" when the wrong baby is taken home from hospital, but assumes donor-conceived children are fine: "I believe that the pain of infertility should not be appeased at the expense of the next generation."
This report -- whose findings range far beyond the parameters of a single column -- is, with a promised second look at gay marriage legislation in prospect, a timely springboard to public discussion and debate. Marquardt concludes, "When society changes marriage, it changes parenthood.... The legalization of same-sex marriage, while sometimes seen as a small change affecting just a few people, raises the startling prospect of fundamentally breaking the legal institution of marriage from any ties to biological parenthood."
Words do indeed matter. Ponder the implications of these: Honour thy Progenitor A and thy Progenitor B (and, where applicable, Progenitor C). Brave new world -- or a postmodern version of child sacrifice on the altar of neo-pagan deities Feminism and Gender Equity?
bkay@videotron.ca
© National Post 2006
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5 comments:
I wasn't conceived via donor sperm, but I grew up without my father due to my parent's divorce. He flat out rejected us and went on to live his own life. I don't see their (donor conceived children) situation as any worse than mine. Unfortunately, I experienced some of the most extreme ramifications of not having the biological father in the home.
This has led me to believe that the ideal environment for a child is a home with their biological parents, i.e. a mother and a father. I also believe strongly that marriage should consist only of a man and a woman. If a woman becomes a single mother, she should STONGLY consider raising her child(ren) alone rather than remarry simply because she believes her children need a father. In those cases, it is better to raise the child without a father figure, IMO.
Still this all leaves me with this: The desire I had for my father is no where near the desire I have for a child. Thus, I have decided to pursue my dream of motherhood via donor insemination. I prefer marriage, but I have to happily go with the hand dealt me in this life. As a product of fatherlessness and as a born-again Christian, this weighed heavily on my mind. In the best interest of my future child, I will only choose open or identity release donors.
Instead of attempting to take away a womans right to have a child, those opposed should fight for the right of offspring to have access to a donor's identity. Also, if heterosexual marriage in our society was strengthened and presented as more desirable, many women would not have to choose this option. There are also medical issues to consider. Some women may have fertility issues where waiting years for Mr. Right may be too late. Adoption is an option, but what't the difference? The child will still grow up fatherless. It is a shame that a woman has a right to end her child's life via abortion, but you have people trying to stop women from becoming mothers by choice. That makes no sense. If this goes any further, I will certainly join the political fight against any opposition to single motherhood by choice.
Back to the effects of fatherlessness on children. Fatherlessness isn't easy but it certainly isn't a dead end. I turned out very well as have millions of others. Those of us who went through fatherlessness successfully should become more vocal since the media tends to be a bit one sided. Life is what we make it.
Knowing what I know now about what is expected of us as believers, exhorted to save people from hell, I wouldn't have had children, I'd be way out there in other lands, preaching the very excellent news about our Saviour Jesus Christ, lormar.
The mission fields are sometimes much closer to home than we think. This is especially true of the country I live in, the US. I am friends with a married mother who is also a missionary (she and her husband).
If words matter, can you explain what a 'right' is? Wikipedia opens with:
"A right is a power or liberty to which one is justly entitled, or a thing to which one has a just claim. Rights serve as rules of interaction between people, and, as such, they place constraints and obligations upon the actions of individuals or groups (for example, if one has a right to life, this means that others do not have the liberty to murder him; if one has a right within a society to a free public education, this means that other members of that society have an obligation to pay taxes in order to pay the costs of that education)."
If a child has a 'legal right' to both a mother and a father, society is obligated to enforce that right leading to situations where a woman could be forced to marry a man who raped her because the rapist is the child's father and the child has a right to the father and "children do best when raised by their biological parents...".
This seems like a ridiculous stretch to find an excuse to oppose same-sex marriage while pretending not to be anti-gay. Wouldn't it be better social policy to insure that legal parents understand their duty or obligation to be responsible parents? Rewarding serious marriage vows "to love and honor until death" will result in a much better (and fairer) policy than oops!. Children will do better by it too.
Two parents marry and choose to have children. They should stay together til death separates them. If they part, better they stay single and live close by to enable shared parenting til the children have left home. After that maybe they might get back together again, without the added stress and without other partners, maybe that would happen more often than not?
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