Quote:
Originally Posted by mental_complex
I decided to make this thread because one of my other thread kind of got off topic and made me think a little. Do you thing gays should be allowed to adopt? How about Single People? After all children need a mother and a father to have a normal productive life. What say you?
|
I posted this in the other thread you mentioned, since it's primarily about the topic being addressed in this thread I am also posting it here. I apologize if this bothers anyone; I also apologize for its length which I believe is necessary to adequately flesh out the argument as to why gay couples and single individuals should be allowed to adopt.
Tradition is a set of practices, customs and beliefs tied to a particular culture that are handed down from one generation to another generation. As an abstraction, tradition is normatively neutral; it is neither good nor bad. Tradition is a means of keeping a particular culture alive through changing times.
Now, a lot can be said for the need to preserve culture; it's nice to have a link to your people's/ancestor's past. Tradition can help bind a group of people together and ensure that one's cultural practices aren't forgotten. However, tradition isn't an ultimate value; there is no reason why every custom, belief and practice of a particular culture should remain eternally unchanged. Some cultural practices are better than others; some become outdated and some (such as certain traditional roles proscribed to women) could easily be construed as immoral and in need of change.
As time goes on, traditions evolve; some practices, beliefs and customs are dropped because they no longer make sense, others are altered to better fit into changing times and circumstances.
Regardless, and this is important, traditions are not inherently good or bad. They are simply a means of maintaining a particular group identity over a period of several generations. Tradition should not be seen as an ultimate value that should be accorded special treatment; they should not trump all other concerns. If it becomes apparent that the continuation of a particular tradition will, in some way, impinge upon the rights or others or do harm then there is good cause to do away with that tradition.
Now, lets move this line of thought from the abstract to the particular. The topic we are concerned with here is whether children should be permitted to be adopted and/or live with either single parent families or homosexual families. The assertion by EDDIE and a few other posters here is that the two parent nuclear family is a tradition worthy of being maintained.
Now, there are a number of flaws with this line of argument.
Firstly, it's not at all clear that the nuclear family is as solid a tradition as these posters maintain. While it may have been the primary organizational method for family life in recent times, many families have been larger or smaller as well. Single parent families are certainly not a new phenomenon, though they may be increasingly common. Children throughout the ages have, at times, been removed from their families for political reasons. Many children have been forced into servitude. Many have been raised by single or multiple relatives. Children born to aristocratic families were often raised primarily by servants. Even where the nuclear family has been a mainstay in the past several centuries, the relationship between members has changed significantly.
The roles commonly proscribed to mothers and fathers are vastly different today than they were a hundred years ago, as are the roles of children.
Secondly, in our modern society there are many children who have, for a variety of reasons, been taken from (or have lost) their families and placed in the care of the state. These children are funneled into the foster care system (or orphanages in some countries). The lives they lead are particularly bad; they are unstable and characterized very little, if at all, by love. Children who grow up living in multiple homes as a result of this system are likely to be developmentally challenged as a result and are far more likely to face regular abuse.
Now, it seems to me that it should be very clear that the state has a vested policy interest in taking these children out of the foster care (or orphanage) system and placing them into homes where they are loved, fed, clothed, treated well and where they have stability. Unfortunately, there are far more children in the system than there are people looking to adopt,
even when single individuals and homosexual couples are included. If we are to prohibit single people and homosexual couples from adopting these children then we are forcing MORE of these children to stay in foster care, which is worse by any account, than would have to otherwise. If we want to be utilitarians about this then it is very obvious that we should let homosexual couples and single individuals adopt; they are far more likely to provide these children with a loving and nurturing environment as well as stability than the foster care system.
It seems to me that in this situation blindly clinging to the supposed tradition of the nuclear family, which is arguably a dubious tradition to begin with, is doing real and fundamental harm to these children who are in need of families. It seems clear that this is a case in which a particular tradition, which is really normatively neutral, should be trumped by the needs of the children in question.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
