Last updated on 2011.07.20
Don't try to fool Senator Al Franken. Christian theocracy group Focus on the Family tried that, and it didn't work.
Before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday, Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family's political wing tried to persuade senators that repealing the Defense of Marriage Act would put children in danger. Minnery cited a December 2010 study from the federal Department of Health and Human Services and claimed it said children of homosexual couples don't do as well as children of heterosexual married couples.
Senator Franken did what he does best: he read the study and found Minnery read it wrong:
The study referred to better outcomes for children of nuclear families. The study defined nuclear family in such a way as to include married homosexuals with adopted children. The study thus does not justify the continued discrimination Minnery says it justifies. Said the Senator:
The Defense of Marriage Act is an injustice. It is an immoral and discriminatory law. Our nation is founded on the premise that all people are created equal, and that's why I am an original cosponsor of this bill.
...Repealing DOMA will be a great day in this country, akin to the enacting of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution [Senator Al Franken, Senate Judiciary Committee, quoted in Andy Birkey, "Video: Franken Grills Focus on the Family Head During DOMA Repeal Hearing," Minnesota Independent, 2011.07.20].
It's always a pleasure to watch Senator Franken in action, fighting for justice and setting conservative liars straight.
Anyone who defines the family in any other way than the one Minnery stated is the liar.
Check the dictionary. Nuclear family - a family group that consists only of father, mother, and children http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nuclear%20family
Franken is just another perpetrator of the Leftist tactic of attempting to redefine reality. Sorry, normal people don't fall for it. We live in the real world.
Why don't you try standing for what is good, right and healthy for once instead of championing evil? It would be a refreshing change for you, as well as for everyone else.
And here I just thought "nuclear family" was a term used to distinguish one's immediate family from one's extended family.
It is nice to know that people like Franken read the studies that people throw out as proof for their cause.
My main comment is if Franken considers repeal of DOMA equal to the right to vote for women, he is crazy. While I know all the arguments for repeal of DOMA, I've heard none that puts having the legal ability to marry on the same plane.
Bob, in your 'real world' of Rapid City: Would it be healthier for children living in a household where the heterosexual parents are morbidly obese (not atypical for RC) or where the same-sex parents are college-educated professionals who do yoga or ride bikes with their kids every day?
The issue is that DOMA leads to the children of gay people being discriminated against and being less than equal to their peers BY LAW. Structural discrimination. Like apartheid.
Bill, even if one would stipulate DOMA is discrimination, do you really think the discrination of a six year old whose biggest concern is whether he can watch cartoons after school is comparable to adult women can vote is crazy. In all honesty, I know you don't think so and I doubt Franken does either if he thought about what he said.
What bothers me is people on both sides use hyperbole to promote an issue that denigrates the significance of really big issues. Let's just discuss issues on their merits and not try to use analogies that overstate the importance of the issue. Frankly, I have have to believe even a homosexual who wants to marry and raise kids would consider the comparison offensive.
Alas, Troy, I would have to be a woman or a married homosexual (or both) to answer your question completely. And since I am neither, I'll just have to stick with my boring old position that structural discrimination is anathema to our Constitution (as I read it) and leave it at that, my friend.
I can do better than that I think... "my boring, old, straight, white, male, anglo saxon, American, freedom-loving, equality-loving position..."
Yeah. That's better.
Oh and yeah, I guess it would be worse if gay people couldn't vote, Troy.
Point taken.
...or serve in the military.
The rightwingers must live in fear their spouses will be seduced by a gay. As some wag has said, if defense of marriage is needed, make a law against movie stars getting married.
Quibbling about terminology doesn't change the conclusions (or lack thereof) found by this study. If it had used a term other than "nuclear family," it wouldn't magically make it OK to discriminate against homosexual families.
Also, from the Oxford English Dictionary:
nuclear family: the basic family group consisting typically of father, mother, and their dependent children, regarded as a social unit [emphasis mine]
Saw a bumper sticker years ago-- wish I could find one for my car:
Focus on your OWN damned family!
Indeed: the point is not what we each think constitutes a nuclear family. The point is how the study operationalized that variable. The study did not distinguish by sexual orientation. Minnery portrayed the study as doing so. Minnery thus misused the study and deserved the correction Senator Franken delivered.
Tribe approves same-sex marriage: http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2011/08/suquamish-tribe-approves-same-sex-marriages/