Apparently such a person is very dangerous - at least to the child - according to one of my Christian Facebook friends. A few days ago he posted this on Facebook:
Christian Facebook Friend: Dawn Stefanowicz explains her experience being raised by a gay parent http://bit.ly/cQay6a
I posted the following response:
Bud Uzoras: This article really gives Christians a black eye.
Thus this conversation began on his profile:
CFF:
Bud, how so?
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Bud:
It could be that this guy is not the best parent in the world, or is incompetent and doesn't know how to deal with being gay. Such incompetence would have nothing to do with his sexual orientation. And keep in mind this was over 30 years ago. The stigma surrounding homosexuality was, well, a lot worse than it is now. So maybe he wasn't incompetent, just dealing with being gay in a less than amicable context. Dawn wants us to think that her father's being gay is the sole cause of her childhood problems.
It makes more sense to think that Dawn as a little girl would see that "something's wrong" because of the stigma and her father's apparently insufficient way of handling and explaining things rather than (as this article suggests) to think she had some sort of "spider sense" that told her little child brain that homosexuality is wrong.
This exact article could've been written with all the references to "same-sex" (et al.) replaced with the word "interracial." The argument against interracial marriage/parenthood would be equally flawed.
I don't know anything about Dawn Stefanowicz, and I haven't read her book. I'm just talking about this one particular article. Makes me feel bad for all my Christian friends who will be associated with it.
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CFF:
I'll grant that her problems could have been due to her father's poor parentage rather than his sexual orientation.
However I am not sure I understand what you mean by a spidey sense of right and wrong. Wouldn't a child know their father's lifestyle were wrong if he were an alcoholic?
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Bud:
I don't know. I think children notice the effects of actions - or more specifically how actions effect them - rather than any sense that something is intrinsically or ontologically right or wrong. Grasping such concepts requires a level of abstract thinking that children don't develop until later.
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CFF:
"Grasping such concepts requires a level of abstract thinking that children don't develop until later."
A few questions:
-What makes you think this?
-How much later?
-What would be the signs/how would we know?
Additional, if kids merely notice the effects of actions and not "any sense that something is intrinsically or ontologically right or wrong" then wouldn't it follow that no child would think their parents were ever right or wrong in their lifestyle or treatment of them (of which the two are often related)?
I would argue that having a sexually deviant parent (whether that deviancy be homosexuality, prostitution, etc.) has a major impact on their kids.
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Bud:
I'm not a scholar concerning cognitive development in children, but my understanding is that there is a level of abstract thinking that children simply can't do. That's why I wouldn't do something like try to explain even the simplest version of the Ontological Argument to my kids (if there is a simple version).
When I was a child my understanding of "good" and "bad" was rather simplistic, and conditioned by such factors as my parents and, well, Star Wars. Good guys do nice things. Bad guys do naughty things. It was more or less a bad = red lightsaber kind of thinking. I didn't understand that Darth Vader was really a corrupted person who started off okay and still deep down could be redeemed. Hooray for geek analogies.
It's easy for a child to interpret an experience that effects them negatively in the vague term of "bad," but I'm not sure a child can understand a concept like "objective morality" or ponder whether an action, attitude or thought can be intrinsically wrong or not.
When does such abstract reasoning start to happen? I'm not sure. It's probably different for each child. And even when it happens, it takes time to develop. My first real "meta" thought occurred when I became a teenager. But that's just me.
If a child notices the effects of actions, then it follows that they might interpret some actions that affected them negatively (according to their perception) as "bad."
I'm curious about your last sentence. Would you say that about any/all behaviors you find to be a sexual deviancy? Does premarital sex fall into that category? If a widow with three kids starts dating and has sex with her boyfriend, is she no longer fit to be a parent?
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CFF:
"I'm not sure a child can understand a concept like "objective morality""
I'll grant that they might not fully grasp the implications of objective morality at an early age. However I believe they are capable of at least a rudimentary understanding of right and wrong. Even if it is only to the degree that they know stealing and hitting others is wrong.
If we are borne with an innate sense of right and wrong, no matter how rudimentary, wouldn't you think that a child could "sense something were wrong" even without being able to name it?
"Would you say that about any/all behaviors you find to be a sexual deviancy?"
Absolutely! But to clarify, what I am arguing for is not simply what _I_ would consider to be sexually deviant.
"Does premarital sex fall into that category?"
Yes. Anything outside of the marriage context falls into this category.
"If a widow with three kids starts dating and has sex with her boyfriend, is she no longer fit to be a parent?"
I never said that they were unfit to be a parent, just that their kids would know that something were wrong and that such a deviant sexual activity would have negative consequences on the kids down the line.
That's not to say that the widow couldn't correct the relationship with her boyfriend (by making him her husband), just that until she does the children will be exposed to an unhealthy relationship.
I'm still thinking through what he said, and I'll have more to say about it later. What are your thoughts?
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