From: Wayne Hayes (wayne@cs.toronto.edu)
Date: Sat Mar 14 1998 - 08:05:32 MST
"Mark D. Fulwiler" <mfulwiler@earthlink.net> writes:
>I do not think that any minister can require a teen mother to give up
>her child. A judge could order it, if it was determined she was "unfit"
>or unable to care for it.
That would be almost irrelevant. The kind of people who follow Falwell
don't think for themselves. A teen mother who is told that her child
will be taken away (for the good of both of them, of course) probably
won't argue. She's already way too stressed, young, impressionable,
and willing to bow to authority.
>Of course, most kids from single parent
>homes turn out fine, but that doesn't mean it's the optimal situation.
>Didn't you ever wish you had a father? I'm sorry you didn't have the
>experience. Provided he's a decent fellow, it is good for kids to have
>one around.
In my particular case, he was out of the scene before I was born, so I've
never met him, never will, and never missed him. I've never wished I'd
had a father, although intellectually I wonder what it would have been
like, or how things may have been different. For example, I may have
developed self-confidence sooner than I did, but now I'm none the worse
for wear.
"Geoff Smith" <geoffs@unixg.ubc.ca> writes:
> I think this is a correlation/causation question.
Indeed. I would not be surprised if prisons had *slightly* more single-
parent kids than not, but the original message made it sound like it was
a vast majority. I won't believe that without proof. And as you
point out, it probably depends precisely on the circumstances. A messy
divorce may screw up a child alot more than a child (like me) who's never
had any experience with a second parent.
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