I’m going to speak this, keeping in mind that I am a single parent.

The first and best situation for any child, generally speaking, in the very very vast and very very overwhelming majority of cases, is a home where both of their natural parents are in a low-conflict relationship.

Yes. Under my definition, I gave my own children less than first best.  A lot of that was beyond my control, but those are the facts.

Worst situation?  Out on the streets.  In government custody.

So, get your ass off your shoulders.  I wasn’t a “bad parent.”  I made the best of a bad situation.  The fact remains I went into it with at least a strike against me.  Single parents, step-parents, adoptive parents - and children thereof - what we have are (presumably) decent people similarly making the best of their situation - but still having an extra hurdle or hurdles to overcome.

Yeah.  Natural parents fuck things up at times.  Given the advantages they have in thier situation, it’s arguably more egregious.  And when you have genuine abuse, drug use, criminal behavior, etc. that “first best” situation, due to the ACTIONS of those parents, becomes less than first best.

I know a lot of adopted children.  Every single one of them has wondered, at one time, who their natural parents were, and fantasized about what their life would have been if they had been raised by them.  Most time, like most fantasies, these are idealized and unrealistic.  It remains - I never fantasized about that.  I never fantasized about my home being unbroken, I never fantasized about “What if my other parent had lived?”  My parents never had to deal with that, either.  None of that fallout.

So despite the fact that some natural parents fuck things up, and that other parents often make the best of bad situations, you don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.  To equivocate a natural family with another arrangement is patently absurd.  Yes, I have bought name brand items that were junk - and bought off-brand things at discount that are still going strong.  Push comes to shove, though, I want a watch, I’m going to buy a Timex and not some knockoff that says “Timmex.”

So what we do is give a preference and a nod and a presumption to such arrangements, and arrangements which more closely resemble them.  It’s a good bet.  We promote Marriage between a man and a woman over an unmarried relationship.  That unmarried relationship is preferable to a single parent household.  A married heterosexual adoptive couple over others  Etc. Etc. Etc.

“Presumption,” also, is just that.  A tally in the “Pro” box for a traditional relationship, versus a tally in the “Con” box for any other.  Out of the gate.  Social revisionists and eningeers may howl and hold their breath and stomp their widdle feet, but it is the non-traditional relationship that has the burden of proof against this presumption.

Burden of proof.  Yes, this means this presumption is rebuttable.  God knows there are some toxic relationships out there.

This is why, even though I am a critic of what society has made of marriage what with no-fault divorce and the Family CourtsStar Chambers, it is important to preserve that definition.  It is important.  And we should encourage it, by rewarding it.  Not by making demonstrably lesser arrangements the moral equivalent, which they manifestly are not.

One of the reasons leftists - socialists, let’s not mince words - have been doing their damndest for years to dumb down, undermine, and redefine traditional marriage.

One more rason I got out of business.  I’ll be damned if I will let the government force me to recognize anything like gay “marriage.”

If you’re in California, vote “Yes” on Proposition 8.