Births Outside Marriage: For Most Women Under 30, That's Where They Happen
"Most" doesn't quite get at the nuances, however. There are strong racial and educational differences.
Jason DeParle and Sabrina Tavernise write for The New York Times that it used to be called illegitimacy but now it's "the new normal" -- that more than half the births to American women under 30 are outside marriage:
LORAIN, Ohio - The fastest growth in the last two decades has occurred among white women in their 20s who have some college education but no four-year degree, according to Child Trends, a Washington research group that analyzed government data.Among mothers of all ages, a majority -- 59 percent in 2009 -- are married when they have children. But the surge of births outside marriage among younger women -- nearly two-thirds of children in the United States are born to mothers under 30 -- is both a symbol of the transforming family and a hint of coming generational change.
One group still largely resists the trend: college graduates, who overwhelmingly marry before having children. That is turning family structure into a new class divide, with the economic and social rewards of marriage increasingly reserved for people with the most education.
...The shift is affecting children's lives. Researchers have consistently found that children born outside marriage face elevated risks of falling into poverty, failing in school or suffering emotional and behavioral problems.
...Large racial differences remain: 73 percent of black children are born outside marriage, compared with 53 percent of Latinos and 29 percent of whites. And educational differences are growing. About 92 percent of college-educated women are married when they give birth, compared with 62 percent of women with some post-secondary schooling and 43 percent of women with a high school diploma or less, according to Child Trends.
Almost all of the rise in nonmarital births has occurred among couples living together. While in some countries such relationships endure at rates that resemble marriages, in the United States they are more than twice as likely to dissolve than marriages. In a summary of research, Pamela Smock and Fiona Rose Greenland, both of the University of Michigan, reported that two-thirds of couples living together split up by the time their child turned 10.
...Reviewing the academic literature, Susan L. Brown of Bowling Green State University recently found that children born to married couples, on average, "experience better education, social, cognitive and behavioral outcomes."
Lisa Mercado, an unmarried mother in Lorain, would not be surprised by that. Between nursing classes and an all-night job at a gas station, she rarely sees her 6-year-old daughter, who is left with a rotating cast of relatives. The girl's father has other children and rarely lends a hand.
"I want to do things with her, but I end up falling asleep," Ms. Mercado said.
You can say what you will of the old patriarchal domination over women, and of the hypocrisy of expected male versus female behavior.
But its hard to ignore that it produced intact families that didn't need to rotate child care amongst relatives.
I suppose everything has its tradeoffs.
Robert at February 19, 2012 5:11 AM
She needs two Mommies!
And one of them needs to be a "thriving" INUIT!
"We" should insist!
Goddamit, the motherfucking American family is going to be whipped into a more compassionate, sustainable configuration, and you had better not get in the way....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 5:26 AM
This is a weird statement: " the economic and social rewards of marriage increasingly reserved for people with the most education"
Seeing as how one can choose whether or when to have children and/or get married, just how is anything "reserved"?
One might better say: Those with half-a-brain choose to wait with kids until they have a stable partnership (normally signified marriage). If there is any failure here, it is the failure to stigmatize illegitimacy. If having a kid outside of marriage might make you a social outcast? For decades that was reasonably effective in discouraging it.
Now, because illegitimacy is no longer socially unacceptable, an entire generation of kids will be paying the price.
a_random_guy at February 19, 2012 5:36 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2987837">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]She needs two Mommies!
She needs an intact family. I knew you'd be here, supported only by your own opinion, which runs entirely contrary to how children in intact families of gay parents do, to come in with low-blows on gay parenting.
The problem is well-illustrated by the mom at the end of the article who can't be home for her kids. Your kids don't care who you have sex with. They'd just not rather know you're having it. What they need is stability and backup and love -- in a stable framework.
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 6:18 AM
> She needs an intact family.
RIIIIGHHHTTTT! Intact!
Your concern is only with adult convenience. You don't think a mother's love OR a father's love is important to child, which makes your concerns about family structure seem somewhat foreshortened (and heartless).
"Reason-based!"
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 7:42 AM
'I'm from the "age of reason", and I'm here to help the family!'
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 7:48 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2987973">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]Crid, the nuclear family is a very recent invention in human history. What mattered and what has mattered throughout human history is that children have a family (and a stable family, I would think, per my discussion with Sarah Hrdy on this subject). I know children of lesbian parents and these parents have seen that children have male role models who are consistent in their lives. Your opinion appears to be based on your emotionally driven beliefs. Not good enough. Not even with the accompaniment of all that snark.
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 8:02 AM
"Fifty years ago, researchers have found, as many as a third of American marriages were precipitated by a pregnancy, with couples marrying to provide respectability"
That's a lot of shotgun weddings. And a bride visibly pregnant on her wedding day was not an uncommon sight even in medieval times, never mind 50 years ago. Expectations of men were also different in olden days - if you knocked her up, you married her, and you went to work in the fields or the factory to provide for your family. Compare that to this:
"Ms. Strader said her boyfriend was so dependent that she had to buy his cigarettes. Marrying him never entered her mind. "It was like living with another kid", she said"
So WHY did she have sex with this loser? Beats me, but it's hard to imagine this guy as ever being a provider.
Martin at February 19, 2012 9:15 AM
"73 percent of black children are born outside marriage"
So, when are we going to have an honest discussion about race in this country? Take almost every dire statistic, break it up by race and result is so obvious that nobody can actually talk about. (Want to honestly talk about obesity? You can't. Welfare dependency? You can't.)
Another point is that marriage is now so twisted in favor of mothers, why the hell should a guy get married? Forget alimony, child support laws not only make little sense, they consciously and officially reduce parenting to writing checks.
joe at February 19, 2012 9:24 AM
> the nuclear family is a very recent invention
Science! Science! Thank GOD you have the omniscience, the compassion and the courage to see beyond the example of everyone you ever met.
> Your opinion appears to be based on your
> emotionally driven beliefs.
And yours appears to be driven by the need to look cool in front of the white wine crowd:
Golly, everyone could live happily ever after and there'd be no bad news if we could just put me in charge of policy! Because human nature is not a factor! Policy is the problem! Meanies are the problem! If you're cuddly and compassionate, there are no constraints on what's best for children! Inuits! Inuits! Reason!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 9:34 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2988079">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]> the nuclear family is a very recent invention Science! Science!
That's your lame-ass disputing of the fact that we evolved to live in tribal, not nuclear, families? This IS human nature. In fact, you could argue that parents rob their children of something they need by not raising them in a house with grandma and other relatives. Where's Crid in arguing for the importance of same house-dwelling grandmas?
Oh, and most of my friends drink liquor. And if you're buying, bone-dry white wine for me, thanks.
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 9:47 AM
Science! Science!
This decry from a guy typeing on a coumputer built by science, connect to other computers based on science, conversating with people ten to millions of miles away thru the miricle of science.
Funny how when someone stumbles upon a truth before you do crid how what science sayds no longer matters as much as it did when you were the one who found it first and used that very same science SCIENCE!! to bolster your claims
Also, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 19, 2012 10:05 AM
No... You are not a scientist, you're a fangirl. Your preening adoration of (a tiny, silly selection of) those who actually practice it is a pretense to authority which you have not earned.
A brilliant, brilliant tweet for "we."
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 10:08 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2988109">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]I use scientific methodology and am extremely rigorous when I read science. To demean me as a fangirl is just childish -- especially when you do it entirely sans evidence. It's just a playground taunt of a guy who should be old enough to be better. I hear rather frequently that scientists say positive things about me behind my back -- about my rigor in putting out good science. A friend who is a scientist recently told me that I'm more rigorous in my assessments of what is and isn't good science than many with Ph.D.s. And he's right. Helen Fisher, for example, thinks the Dutton and Aron shaky bridge/sturdy bridge is fine to reference in one of her books. I read it. The methodology behind it is shit -- tiny sample size and they weren't exactly doing fMRIs. I wrote to Arthur Aron, saying, help me out her -- your hypothesis is not adequately supported; please direct me to any studies that replicate it. He sent me two or three -- can't remember exactly. Each study had major problems -- yet all are referenced as if the findings mean something by people with big shiny science Ph.D.s.
Albert Ellis himself taught me not to worry about my lack of credentials. It's just dismaying when people use nonthink and playground-level bullytalk to demean me when I work so hard to differentiate what is adequate and telling science.
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 10:22 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2988110">comment from Amy AlkonAnother example is here. Note the reservations I attach to my reference to oxytocin -- which is widely attributed in mainstream media (and in some pedigreed scientists' work) to have all sorts of powers that are not supported if one reads the research:
http://www.advicegoddess.com/ag-column-archives/2012/02/code-goo.html
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 10:24 AM
> I use scientific methodology and am
> extremely rigorous
Rigor! You're so rigorous you don't think children need mothers or fathers.
There's this great book about the "scientific" underpinnings of social policy....
> Albert Ellis himself taught me
..And name-dropping is not a degree.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 11:28 AM
You know, I keep hearing about the nuclear family being a recent invention, yet whenever I read books from another era, the parents always live together, married, unless one is dead. And if they are in a western book, they are monogamous. Yes, sometimes grandparents or aunts live there, too, but all in all...
NicoleK at February 19, 2012 11:30 AM
"You know, I keep hearing about the nuclear family being a recent invention, yet whenever I read books from another era, the parents always live together, married, unless one is dead. "
Nicole beat me to it... The statement "The nuclear family is a recent development" is true as far as it goes, but it's also a red herring. I think that if you look back that far, you might find all kinds of extended-family arrangements, but in most of them, both parents were present unless one had died. And in cases of widowhood, some other relative often stepped in to take the role of the missing parent.
Cousin Dave at February 19, 2012 11:51 AM
> Nicole beat me to it...
Me as well. Y'know, nutritious food is a "recent development". Rejection of abject slavery is a recent development, and one with a long way to go. (I trust you wouldn't reject that effort as well.)
Y'know, no family is as "intact" as that of an addled, egomaniacal, socially incompetent, sexually obtuse, state-dependent, underemployed single mother. Hers is one tight-assed household, always.
She'll certainly "be there for her kids", won't she?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 2:01 PM
And furthermore—
> lame-ass disputing of the fact that we evolved
> to live in tribal, not nuclear, families?
Nowhere earlier on this page does discussion of "tribalism" appear. And even if it did, people don't, don't want to, and probably can't live in "tribes" anymore.
And furthermore, I think I know more about evolution than you do.
And furthermore, evolution isn't to teach us how to live. We "evolved" to live to 30 and die of gum infections and broken limbs and birth and starvation... So the fuck what?
And furthermore,
> Also, go fuck yourself
Share feelings, always.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 2:22 PM
Name dropping is not a degree
Well crid, given you dont even accept the findings of people who have degrees; what, exactly, is a form of criteria or credential you would accept as valid in some one who dares disagreee with you?
Also, please not that you too dont believe the love of a mother or father is important. Otherwise you'd advocate the forcible removment of the children of widows, widowers, and divorcees, the termination of their parental rights, and adopting the children into homes where a man and a woman are married.
Common crid, put your money where your mouth is and take your half asses train of thought to its inevitable conclusion
Also, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 19, 2012 2:29 PM
Did you go to college?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 3:32 PM
What a bunch of.morons. two Homo parents does.not a family make.
ronc at February 19, 2012 3:38 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2988509">comment from roncReally, ronc? Why not? Ever been to Christmas dinner at the home of "two Homo parents"? I have. How do you think it's different from any other family's Christmas dinner and how do you think the day to day life is different? Do "Homo parents" have some inability to get their kids to preschool? Do they not love their children and discipline them?
Are heterosexual parents who are abusive to their children family? And then two loving lesbians with children? They're not family?
What about parents with adopted children? Are they family?
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 3:44 PM
> how do you think the day to day life
> is different?
No experience of intimate love (or even merely comfortable adult presence) from a parent of the other sex; no years-long demonstration of patience, exchange and bargaining between the most profoundly distinguishing factors in human character. Etc...
Ronc is kinda wackazoid, though.
You know what's best for kids? What's best for kids is a loving mother with a loving father.
Do you want what's best for kids? Or do you want something else?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 4:04 PM
Did you go to college?
Yes, but given your distain for science and people with degrees I cant help but wonder if you didnt make the cut yourself.
I wonder is your question based on my spelling? Cause we've been over this a number of times. Either you are far too stupid to understand the concepts involved or, well I guess there isnt another choice is there?
You know what's best for kids? What's best for kids is a loving mother with a loving father.
So then you do advocate confiscating children from widows and widowers and adopting them out to 'intact' families? Cause anything less just aint good enough, right?
Also, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 19, 2012 6:42 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2988758">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]What's best for kids is a loving mother with a loving father.
What's best for kids is loving parents.
Amy Alkon at February 19, 2012 8:11 PM
> What's best for kids is loving parents.
There's no reason to think so but that it would be rilly conveeeenyint for adults if it were true... Suddenly our choices would be our own business.
You want it so badly to be true. And Mister Disney told you that if you want something very badly and hold your breath until you turn blue....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 8:20 PM
> Also, go fuck yourself
>
> Posted by: lujlp at February 19, 2012 6:42 P
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 19, 2012 8:20 PM
Whoa, guys, calm down! I'm sure we all graduated with degrees from fine institutions.
It's true that Amy is not a scientist, but it is also true that she carefully reads the works of scientists. Her knowledge is secondhand and not from direct observation, but she can still benefit from the direct observation of the scientists, as we all can. I mean, that's the whole reason we fund scientists!
Of course she has her personal biases, we all do. We all need to think about it and make choices when we come across two studies with conflicting results... whether we can find some way to reconcile them, or whether we choose one or the other to believe. Intelligent people can reach different conclusions.
Now, personally I agree with Crid that the ideal situation for kids is to be raised by their happily married, mentally stable, well-to-do, well-educated biological parents. Where I disagree with him is that I do think that gay parents, adoptive parents, and other stable family situations are a good close second. Very, very close second. Like, the first type wins by a nose.
I also think that not all biological paired parents are superior to all adopted single parents, or lesbian parents, or whatever. While you can make generalizations, and while they are useful, it is important to look at situations on a case-by-case basis.
NicoleK at February 20, 2012 1:52 AM
> Whoa, guys, calm down!
As Golda Meir once said — Don't be so pacific, you're not that accurate.
> it is important to look at situations on
> a case-by-case basis.
...The antithesis of "policy". There aren't resources or time to do that.
So I think we should go with what's best for kids.
And do you know what's best for kids?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 5:37 AM
When someone says…
…or they say……I think we should go ahead and believe them.
It will be difficult to admire them, though… It'll be tough to credit them with insight about anything about affection, development, balance, humility or kindness.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 8:33 AM
(But if they believe those things, they ought to be prepared to say them; Out loud and without shame.)
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 8:59 AM
I see then crid, you assumne the children of widoewed parents and homos will all grow uo to be malajusted, creul, unstable, prideful scociopaths.
A pity you can ever find anything to back up your twaddle
Also, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 20, 2012 9:14 AM
> you assumne the children of widoewed parents
> and homos will all grow uo to be malajusted
You love me deeply, and people can tell!
In turn, I'm grateful for the way you carefully document the flow of your reasoning... It will be helpful to others who read these comment threads as they pass their own judgments.
Win-win sitch!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 9:41 AM
Golda "A land without a people for a people without a land" Meir? Yeah, I'm gonna listen to HER views on peace!
I know what's best for -my- kid. And what is best for anyone else's kid, as I said, is to be decided on a case by case basis.
NicoleK at February 20, 2012 10:40 AM
Golda had a better sense of the costs of war than you give her credit for ... and a good sense of why they sometimes have to be fought:
"It is true we have won all our wars, but we have paid for them. We don't want victories anymore." -- Golda Meir
"The Egyptians could run to Egypt, the Syrians into Syria. The only place we could run was into the sea, and before we did that we might as well fight." -- Golda Meir
"There's no difference between one's killing and making decisions that will send others to kill. It's exactly the same thing, or even worse." -- Golda Meir
"We do not rejoice in victories. We rejoice when a new kind of cotton is grown and when strawberries bloom in Israel." -- Golda Meir
"We don't thrive on military acts. We do them because we have to, and thank God we are efficient." -- Golda Meir
"We have always said that in our war with the Arabs we had a secret weapon - no alternative." -- Golda Meir
"Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us." -- Golda Meir
"When peace comes, we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons." -- Golda Meir
=========================
And she had a sense of humor:
"Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!" -- Golda Meir
Conan the Grammarian at February 20, 2012 11:02 AM
> I'm gonna listen to HER views on peace!
She wasn't talking about peace, she was talking about pomposity.
> to be decided on a case by case basis.
Duzzen work that way. You're certainly welcome to review as many family court proceedings as you are able... But folks are more likely to concern themselves with the policy than with your singular judgment.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 11:32 AM
...Well, court proceedings and social strictures, which aren't working so well for us, either.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 11:35 AM
"Science! Science! Thank GOD you have the omniscience, the compassion and the courage to see beyond the example of everyone you ever met."
Glad to see I'm not the only one about whom you completely make things up. Sad to see you're not in any way closer to quitting that.
"So I think we should go with what's best for kids. And do you know what's best for kids?"
Nice to see you have the only solution. One that, by the way, is easily contained within Amy's answer. Use a Venn diagram.
Radwaste at February 20, 2012 1:31 PM
Use an obstetrical speculum... Raddy, you wouldn't know logic if it were kicking you right in your gonads.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 4:20 PM
Hilarious, Crid. I use it every day at work. You?
Apparently not. Your hetero "parents" are, in this instance and in the real world, a subset of "all parents", which includes homosexuals acting as both parents - among whom are many success stories. Some of these Amy HAS actually met,
Glad you brought this up, because I noted a nice example of what you believe is a thought process because of a link you posted.
From Sudden Equal Rights, right in this blog:
Justin Case: "I'm not Crid, but as I understand him: the ONLY acceptable parenting arrangement for children is with a loving mother and father."
Crid: "This fucker is blind in both eyes.
I must have said it a hundred times on this blog. All of it except the last two weeks is on my local hard drive, so I suppose I could go count... But it doesn't matter.
Grown, taxpaying, licensed-to-drive men cannot comprehend this short sequence of small words: What's best for kids is a loving mother and a loving father."
What definition of "logic" do you use?
See, you've denied right there that "best" is "only". Make up your mind, because either you were lost then, or you are now. Cleanup in aisle Crid!
Radwaste at February 20, 2012 4:44 PM
Raddy, for fuck's sake, can you EVER be CLEAR? About anything? The more a point means to you, the foggier things get. Jesus Christ, you handle radioactive shit. Promise us you won't confuse your straw business forms with the pink ones or the green sheets, OK? Completely different destinations.
> Your hetero "parents" are, in this instance and
> in the real world, a subset of "all parents"
WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU QUOTING? Quotation marks for what? In what context, dickweed?
(For the record, in some tragically important respects, all parents are hetero parents. [I like knowing that seeing that in black & white shrivels your idiot little fuckunit even further.])
> See, you've denied right there that "best"
> is "only".
What you're saying doesn't make sense in the English language.
What's best for children is a loving mother with a loving father.
You, Lukoogmapitilik, Amy, and gone-but-not-forgotten Tressider are so pussied by your political culture, so inebriated by narrative outcomes of Walt Disney fulfillment, that you'll do anything, say anything to pretend it's not true, to sustain your own fartflap fantasy you're being compassionate... Rather than consigning some children to second best.
It's PATHETIC.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 5:30 PM
You don't want to have to say out loud that some kids deserve less than the best, right? It's what you believe... You just don't want to have to say it.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 5:50 PM
In turn, I'm grateful for the way you carefully document the flow of your reasoning
Acctually crid its YOUR reasoning, your problem is you never bother to think thru where your line of reasoning cant help but inevitably turn. You have no forward vision, you are a petulant child who cant see more than a few moments ahead or behind. Such niavity ay seem comforting to you, unfortunatly it is naught but a cripling cocoon, and I've yet to see a thought of yours that doenst die horribly under close examination
Raddy, for fuck's sake, can you EVER be CLEAR? About anything?
God in heaven crid, do I acctually have to point out the blatant hypocricy of this question comming from you of all people
You don't want to have to say out loud that some kids deserve less than the best, right? It's what you believe... You just don't want to have to say it.
Hate to burst your bubble, cupcake, but life aint fair - no one "deserves" anything. There is no god, there is no utopia, there is no perfection. You take what you can get. I'll let you in on another of life secets buttercup - ultimatums are the last resort of the desperate. Your insane little policy of the best or nothing insures, not the best, but nothing.
And, as awlays, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 20, 2012 9:13 PM
> no one "deserves" anything.
Perfect! Took a few years for you to get your blouse open, but there it is... You don't think the most defenseless people, our children, deserve anything from the culture that produces them, let alone the best it could offer. Your cynicism extends to exactly where we might have thought it did. You are that savagely bitter.
Good to get out of the closet, right?
Amy? Raddy? Anybody else wanna get in on this? Where's Tressider while this is going on?
There's some cosmically brutal, condemnatory, punitive shit going on in people's hearts with these topics... Transparent expressions of resentment at personal slights and unresolved jealousies. And I think it's just ducky that the internet has provided this gentle, breezy, dappled-sunlight forum for these, um, excortications.
I really feel we've all made an important breakthrough today. Golden.
Super.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 9:55 PM
I think I figured out what's going on with Raddy. I'm describing "best" as a constraint... And he's just not used to that! In a properly flattering consumer culture, the "best" is all about giving people options and having endless patience and flexibility and accessibility. So he can't believe his eyes. It's so novel, he can't find words for his befuddlement...
There are things that are more important than adult fulfillment.
I know! Weird, right?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 20, 2012 10:21 PM
So are democracy, radio, the free market, dentistry, anesthesia and sliced bread.
Which of those do you want to without?
Jeff Guinn at February 20, 2012 11:50 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2991351">comment from Jeff GuinnSliced bread. (Love when people think they're being clever -- without really thinking.) You want diabetes and a host of other diseases? Read Wheat Belly by cardiologist William Davis. Apparently, you have skipped every one of the countless posts I have made about how there's no such thing as "healthy whole grains," and how, per Gary Taubes' Why We Get Fat and Good Calories, Bad Calories, it is carbohydrates -- sugar, flour, starchy vegetables like potatoes, apple juice -- that cause the insulin secretion that puts on fat.
Do you understand that human psychology doesn't not update weekly with changes like electric toothbrushes and feminism? Apparently not. As I write in I See Rude People, quoting Leda Cosmides and John Tooby, we have "Stone Age brains." There are many "evolutionarily novel" things in our environment which do not work so well for our brains -- for example, the subject of my radio show with Dr. Barry Schwartz this week, how we can have too many choices. This causes us to keep looking endlessly or to choose poorly and regret our choices afterward (per research by Dr. Sheena Iyengar and others).
Listen to the show here: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/amyalkon/2012/02/20/advice-goddess-radio-amy-alkon
Amy Alkon at February 21, 2012 12:59 AM
Took a few years for you to get your blouse open, but there it is...
Nope sorry, I said it the very first time you brought it up. Pretty sure I say it every time you bring it up. Something is better then nothing. And your option of simply the best and nothing less gaurentees nothing.
Not every parnet is going to be perfect and married to a memeber of the opposite sex who is also perfect, homo doctors are prefferable to hetro meth cookers. Widowed parents are better then a stabel married hetro coupe where mommy drinks so she has plausible denabilty about daddy raping his daughters. Dont know if you knew this or not crid, but the vast majority of peple are like you. They are selfish, short sighted and mean.
You dont give a fuck about kids, this 'argument' of yours has no valid foundation, has no way of being implimented, has not been thought thru to it logical end and has more to do with you ego and pathological need to be crowned the winner of an argument then it has to do with the welfare of children
Also, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 21, 2012 4:41 AM
So are democracy, radio, the free market, dentistry, anesthesia and sliced bread.
Democracy is failing to mob/majority rule
The free market is being strangled by cronyism
Doctors fear the long arm of the DEA when it comes to pain meds, so I'm guessing anesthesia will soon go the way of oxy scripts
But Ill give you dentistry and radio, though some very the science behind radio and subsequenty cell phones for a rise in certian cancers
Also Jeff please note crid is willing to accept research which says nuclear familles are good, but he is not willing to accept research - often from the same researchers which say stable homes of homosexual parents are just as good in nearly ever comparison
What does that tell you about the underlying motivation of his argument?
lujlp at February 21, 2012 4:47 AM
> to be decided on a case by case basis.
Duzzen work that way. You're certainly welcome to review as many family court proceedings as you are able... But folks are more likely to concern themselves with the policy than with your singular judgment.
***
Actually, it does. Child placements are decided on a case-by-case basis.
There's "best" and there's "Pretty awesome" and there's "Good enough"
This reminds me of student evaluation forms I had to fill out when I worked at an Uni... the options were along the lines of:
*This person is the best student I ever worked with!
* This person is in the top 1% of all the students I am currently working with!
* This person is the best in their class!
* This person totally sucks and deserves to be homeless.
Some of these students were perfectly fine people, capable of going on the trip or program they needed the evaluation for, but no, they weren't the greatest person I'd ever met in my life.
NicoleK at February 21, 2012 6:10 AM
> There's "best" and there's "Pretty awesome"
> and there's "Good enough"
From now on, let's give YOUR kids, and the Negroes, "Good enough". And the retarded kids.
We'll save the "best" for the attractive white children.
Faaaaaabulous.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 21, 2012 6:14 AM
> Child placements are decided on a
> case-by-case basis.
Puh-leeeeze.
A man walks through the inner city with his wallet in his hip pocket. Should he be clubbed with a brick, breaking his eye socket, so his money can be taken?
Let's decide on a "case-by-case basis."
Or we can make it illegal to rob people.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.........
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 21, 2012 6:17 AM
Tell me crid, at what point would you suggest removing children from their widowed parents to place in "the best" homes?
Before or after the funeral?
Also go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 21, 2012 7:39 AM
Jeez people stop feeding the troll! Crid is obviously trying to get attention with his childish posts. He's been rather successful I see. Just ignore him and he'll eventually go away! I make it a point not to respond to him; even if he posts something directly referencing me.
Mike Hunter at February 21, 2012 7:41 AM
Jesus, Dude... Are we in third grade? There are seven people reading this blog comment. Seven and one tenth, if you include the Google cache.
Teacher, Bobby's just doing that for ATTENTION!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 21, 2012 8:11 AM
Here's some attention.
Crid... there isn't enough "Very best of the best" to go around.
So... what's the solution?
Only allow married gazillionaires to reproduce?
NicoleK at February 21, 2012 8:50 AM
> there isn't enough "Very best of the best"
> to go around.
Bogus quotation marks are foul play.
And in this case, they aren't even a distant paraphrase— What's best for kids is a loving mother with a loving father. You didn't take the bait on skin color or intelligence. The reason you didn't is that you understand perfectly that it's not about excluding adults (although it's OK with me when it does), it's about giving kids what they deserve.
We hold people to standards.
You shouldn't pretend this is exotic thinking. We do it all day every day in all kinds of contexts... Sometimes through government and sometimes through social responses and sometimes through both.
Besides, who said anything about money? Interesting that your thoughts would go that way....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 21, 2012 9:10 AM
Come on crid stand up for the beliefs you cailm to believe in
Before or after the funeral?
Otherwise admit that the love of a father or a mother isnt important
Also, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 21, 2012 11:54 AM
Amy:
You missed my point entire, which has absolutely nothing to do with the advisability of eating bread.
… the nuclear family is a very recent invention in human history. is a ridiculous argument, which you have made just about every time this topic comes up, so stop making it.
lujlp:
Noted. I also note that the vast majority of social "science" "research" is agenda driven -- e.g., all studies demonstrating some heinous gender pay gap are bollocks, start to stop. Wherever social "scientists" contradict common sense, then the social "scientists" should be rejected absent huge piles of corroborating evidence.
Crid's point is that the role a hetero-normal biological father plays in a family cannot be replicated by a woman or a gay man. Further, that, ceteris paribus the children from families in any configuration other than committed hetero-normal parents will not do as well as those from a nuclear family. Therefore, those who knowingly bring a child into the world outside the traditional nuclear family are egoists who are much more concerned about their own gratification than their children's welfare.
So I think his underlying motivation is just fine. Amy, et al, need to examine their own motivations, and assertions about human psychology. To accept that argument as given is requires stating that men, other than as sperm donors, are completely dispensable.
(Crid, apologies as required.)
What proponents of gay marriage never seem to address is why, recent invention or not, marriage exists as an institution in the first place. And that is before they make the pervasive mistake of the left: that evolution stops at the neckline.
Oh, by the way. For the love of God, do us all a favor and type your comments into a text editor. Between typos and spellos, it is a real chore reading what you write.
Jeff Guinn at February 21, 2012 1:50 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2992264">comment from Jeff Guinnnuclear family is a very recent invention in human history. is a ridiculous argument, which you have made just about every time this topic comes up, so stop making it.
It's very likely how we're adapted to live -- like, you know, in our genes -- so it's an excellent argument.
Men also evolved to want young, beautiful women (what we consider beautiful being signs a woman is healthy and fertile). I can tell you that you should forget how a woman looks and only choose her for her character, and that isn't going to work out ultimately if the "beautiful on the inside" lady doesn't have what you're attracted to on the outside. When we shift how we evolved to live, because we still have very old psychology we're working with, it often doesn't end well.
Amy Alkon at February 21, 2012 2:58 PM
Wow off topic argument above .....
Anyway, back to the disparities in marriage rates, I have 3 thoughts:
1) Absolutely idiotic obsession in this country with a huge, fairy-tale, massively EXPENSIVE wedding. I personally know at least 5 couples who co-habitat to avoid the cost of a wedding. A marriage license is cheap and easy to obtain, but people still insist on society's idea of a dream wedding.
2) Related to #1- the absolutely idiotic obsession in this country with fairy-tale romance. I am 30, having been married 11 years. Marriage is HARD and totally worth-it. We have young kids so we will keep working it our marriage to stay connected and stay married.
3) Young people need to hear more about the facts greater likelihood of negative consequences for kids born to single or divorced parents. Just because we see a few examples of people who thrived in those situations doesn't make it true on a population level.
Rachel Schwenke at February 21, 2012 4:28 PM
It is a ridiculous argument because the apparent recency of nuclear families is independent of current suitability--the argument is ridiculous, no matter how correct your conclusions, because the antecedent does not lead to the consequent.
(Classical liberal government is a recent invention. Therefore, what?)
But you imply, without stating, what is the way in which we are adapted to live?
NB: Neolithic tribes in New Guinea still practice polyandry. Middle Eastern Bronze Age societies practiced polygamy.
Second, within the context of our society, can we expect that, ceteris paribus, two mommies or two daddies can produce results that are better, worse, or the same as, prototypical nuclear families?
Jeff Guinn at February 21, 2012 4:30 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2012/02/19/births_outside.html#comment-2992336">comment from Jeff GuinnSecond, within the context of our society, can we expect that, ceteris paribus, two mommies or two daddies can produce results that are better, worse, or the same as, prototypical nuclear families?
Love when people just pull it out of their ass that they aren't. Judith Stacey's research shows exactly that -- that kids of gay parents, on average, do the same or better than kids of straight ones. (Gay parents don't have accidental children.)
Amy Alkon at February 21, 2012 4:59 PM
Remember ceteris paribus?
That is the prime directive without which social "science" is worthless. Which pretty much covers all social "science". And which you stomped all over in your second sentence.
Taking your conclusion to its conclusion, then it is better for children to have two mommies or daddies than one of each. To be precise here, you are saying that gay parents are better than straight parents.
Right?
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.
Jeff Guinn at February 21, 2012 8:22 PM
What proponents of gay marriage never seem to address is why, recent invention or not, marriage exists as an institution in the first place. And that is before they make the pervasive mistake of the left: that evolution stops at the neckline.
Acctually what proponets of gay marrige say about the institution of marrige isnt that it is a recent convention, ut that it changs all the time - ie 50 yrs ago mixed race marriges were illegal, 100 yrs ago arranged marriges were the norm and mixed class marriges while not illegal were grounds for disinhereitence and often condoned violence on the part of scoiety against those that engaged in it, 500 yrs ago marriges were only 'offical' for royalty, for the peons all that was required was a public decleration to paperwork or government approval needed. And just as an aside we arent debating the merits of gay marriage but gay parenting, 1500 yrs ago plural marriges were more common then not.
Oh, by the way. For the love of God, do us all a favor and type your comments into a text editor. Between typos and spellos, it is a real chore reading what you write
Wouldnt help, believe me I've tried; the way I mispell common words the spell checker spits out homophones or words simillar in struture but totally out of context. I see what I write as a whole, not as individual words, I usually tend to read that way as well gleaning the proper meaning of a word I cant 'see' properly from the context of an entire sentence- the time span required for my brain to work around that problem for the things I write is more than a day, which makes responding to crids moronic logical fallaices nih impossible
Second, within the context of our society, can we expect that, ceteris paribus, two mommies or two daddies can produce results that are better, worse, or the same as, prototypical nuclear families?
As Amy has already responded, and as I wrote to you at 447AM today reaserch shows that they do.
lujlp at February 21, 2012 8:28 PM
> willing to accept research which says nuclear
> familles are good
1. You meant families, not familles. I tease you about this not to be especially cruel (though I'd be lying if I said it wasn't fun), but because I think your offerings are such a flopping cudgel of small-mindedness that it doesn't matter whether you're offended or not. Spelling is the least of your problems. You're making the best arguments you can make, people can read them, and I'm cool with that.
2. Research on this topic means very little to me, and has never been a big part of my argument. Research in every topic is dicey, and never more so than in social science, where every postgrad and five-dollar-whore has an axe to grind. I think the self-centeredness (and naivete) of those who oppose me on this is howlingly loud.
It's 2012: A bunch of bright-eyed, head-tiltly little dumplings contend that science is finally, finally giving us reliable information on how sex and families work?
Great. Go home... I'll call you if I need you.
> Crid's point is that the role a hetero-normal
> biological father plays in a family cannot be
> replicated by a woman or a gay man.
Actually, not so much. Thanks for your backup, but that ain't really so. I don't think fatherhood is about heterosexuality, I think it's about loving, masculine engagement with the (female!) mother of one's children every day. Gays have always been parents. When they treat their opposite-sex spouses and children the way they ought to be treated, I'm out of arguments. The interior lives of adults are not my concern.
> What proponents of gay marriage never seem to
> address is why, recent invention or not,
> marriage exists as an institution
Do you ever get the feeling that you never saved the books (articles, blog posts, whatever) that meant the most to you? That happens to me all the time. A favorite from a recent year gave me this aphorism: You should never strike a law from the books (or even a rule of thumb from your consciousness) until you understand how it came to be. Gay marriage advocates are incapable of this. They want to assume last few thousand years of human custom are just wrong, and they don't want to have to say why. Despite never having done anything exemplary in their own lives in any context, they think the rest of us should just ASSUME that they're the smartest, most erotically clever, most emotionally alive, and most courageous people who ever lived.
Once you understand that none of those qualities should actually be ascribed to them, every argument is Christmas morning.
> we still have very old psychology we're
> working with
Speak only for yourself. I'm the latest and the greatest.
> Young people need to hear more about the
> facts greater likelihood of negative
> consequences for kids born to single
> or divorced parents.
Yes, yes: Yes yes yes.
And there are bad impacts on the rest of us, too.
> kids of gay parents, on average, do the
> same or better than kids of straight ones.
Where they're a statistical freak anomaly, that may well be true. When idiot gays are as able to make babies as idiot single mothers are, that extra eagerness for parenthood will fall away... As I presume you'd concede, if you take your own argument seriously...
...Which seems unlikely at this late hour.
By the way, Amy, how come you can't ever just say in a short, single sentence that a mother's love is not essential to a child's well-being? Or a father's? Isn't that the quintessence of your argument? Why are you afraid of the plainest wording?
I think I know why.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 21, 2012 8:36 PM
To be precise here, you are saying that gay parents are better than straight parents.
See this is what pisses me off about getting harped on abut my spelling
You know, I'll admit I have a problem with spelling, but at least I understand the MEANING of words
To be "PRECISE" Amy is not saying that gay parents are better, she is saying that research done thus far shows that on average the childerne of gay parents raised in stable homes are equal or better.
Have you read the study in question? DO you know the criteria on which the judgemnts were made?
Mental health, physical heath, socilization skill, reading, writting, math, and so on and so forth.
Have you stopped to consider that the reason gay parents do so well is because gay parents in a commited stable relationship cant get pregnant accidentally? That in order to adopt or concive they have to spend a shit load of cash, they have to plan in ways most hetero parents never bother
For the love of god is it really that fucking difficult to THINK, to ponder, to ask just a few simple fucking questions, to just run the damn senarios for a few moments in your mind to see what some of the outcomes might be?
Take crids petulant positon. A mother and a father, nothing less.
Well what happens when one parent dies?
Sure, you may think me an ass for pestering crid to answer that ridiculas question, whether to take the children from the surviving parent before or after the funeral - but if it truly is two hetero parents and nothing less, well, I'm afraid one parent is less than two. Isnt it?
lujlp at February 21, 2012 8:46 PM
As for those of you complaining about my spelling and what not, be gratful you arent this guy
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=365294740156189&set=a.280675981951399.75157.139729956046003&type=1&ref=nf
lujlp at February 21, 2012 8:54 PM
> A mother and a father, nothing less.
Never said that, or you'd have offered a link. Right? I mean, you never offer links or quotations for ANY of the words you put in my mouth, because you're having a masturbatory puppet fight under the blanky in your teenage bedroom. You wanna quarrel with Jethro Bodine, not James Bond.
(Parental death is not a willful disregard for the well-being of children.)
What's best is a loving mother with a loving father.
Why are you afraid of saying what's best? I think I know why.
Also, "ridiculas" is a misspelling of ridiculous.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 21, 2012 9:07 PM
Sorry crid, I've been playing the semantics game with you for far too long, the truth is you are a coward, you hint and hem and haw, meandering around your 'values' like a cat toying with a mouse.
So you never said 'nothing less', but any time anyone suggests anything other than your approved parenting arrangement you demand they put in writing that they beleive children dont deserve the best and the love of one parent is expendable.
Seems to me that pretty much sums up the concept of 'nothing less'
Studies show that gay parents are just a good as most straight parent and better then many, but thats not good enough for you
Seems to me that pretty much sums up the concept of 'nothing less'
Oh hey, I almost forgot, great job on breaking open the story that I cant spell, lets see, I've been posting here now for several years and have been fairly upfront about my dyslexia. But I'm sure without your laser sharp grasp of the plainly obvious no one else would have noticed a thing.
Whats next in your bag of tricks douchebag? Heading down to your local VA to make fun of the guys with walkers for not being able to walk unassisted? Or maybe you'll harass autistic kids for being socially akward? Well what ever you do I'm sure you're an asshole
And, as always, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 21, 2012 11:58 PM
Besides, who said anything about money? Interesting that your thoughts would go that way....
***
Yep. My thoughts go that way. We waited until my husband had tenure before having our baby because we wanted a stable financial situation for our kid.
Health care, education, these are big expenses which require money. Read the thread about the guy who didn't wait till he had tenure and couldn't provide insurance for his kid.
So yeah. I think money is an important part of child raising. I think parents should have enough money to feed the kid, keep it healthy, and educate* it. Sorry if that makes me a snob.
* I realize different cultural/social groups have different concepts of what a suitable education is. Let's allow for that.
Crid, I agree with you in that social pressure against unmarried parenthood is a good thing. I disagree with you in that there should be a law against it (If I am reading your posts wrong, please correct me, but you did mention laws against theft a few posts back).
Lujip has a good point about gay parents adopting/in vitro-ing being in a more stable position than many straight, married parents, because in order to do those things, by definition, you need to be in a stable position. And the studies do show that those families tend to do well. All other factors being equal, would a straight parent family be better? Maybe. It's hard to come up with matched pairs. But the fact is, a lot of gay families will have happier families than a lot of straight ones.
Because there are a LOT of factors involved in creating a good situation for kids.
NicoleK at February 22, 2012 3:43 AM
BTW, I understand you are using your freedom of speech to swear like sailors.
I am going to use MY freedom of speech to ask you to please tone it down a bit, it's getting out of hand, and everyone's making some good points which could get lost due to the aggressive tone of the debate.
NicoleK at February 22, 2012 3:44 AM
The difference with a dead parent, is that widowhood isn't a result of your planning (hopefully!).
Although, I'm sure there are families where a parent is in some high-risk profession, like mining, or the military, who decide to have children anyways. I suppose we could consider them irresponsible, too
But the whole taking kids away from parents to raise them by better people thing has been done. See recent post on Spain and the Church. Or Native American history. Society tends to regret it.
NicoleK at February 22, 2012 3:48 AM
> So you never said 'nothing less'
And yet you said I did. Izzin' nat sumpin'? I bet most of your choking, infantile anger is self-inflicted. You've done that hundreds of times, violently twisting words, struggling to convince other people that I said things I never said. You may never have answered a comment without adding an imaginary translation or a pathological extrapolation.
It's repugnant of you and it's stupid, but not worth getting upset about: I've noticed that no (ZERO) other commenters have ever taken the bait. The actual words are right there on the same computer screen, black pixels and white pixels... They can see that you're furiously battling your own cartoon characterization of an adult argument. Casper the Friendly Ghost has you by the throat with one spook-paw and by the balls with the other, and you're starting to black out....
But "no one 'deserves' anything", right? So maybe congestive rage is as good a fate for you as any.
> Health care, education, these are
> big expenses which require money.
And yet generation after generation of parents tell me that beyond a gentle threshold of maturity and preparedness, there's no point in waiting, because you're never comfortably "ready" for kids.
In any case, money is not a virtue. Of the personal characteristics I'd demand of parents (kindness, integrity, industriousness, charity, courage, fidelity etc.), wealth is low on the list.
Not that anyone (besides perhaps you) is asking. And with a third of the planet mired in grotesque poverty, this isn't going to go away through policy (or anything else) very soon anyway. I mean…
> I realize different cultural/social groups
> have different concepts of what a suitable
> education is. Let's allow for that.
…How generous of you! So flexible, so inclusive.
Now, of course, some people love money more than they love anyone or anything. That perspective is out there, in the hearts of some people, so we need to keep that in mind as well. When we talk. To some people.
> All other factors being equal
Are you saying that for you, this is mostly a petty little heart-experiment, a child's classroom daydream about how she can think purer, kinder schoolgirl thoughts than the Catholic in the deskchair to her left?
Because things are very rarely equal. That's why we have policies and principles. We concentrate on doing the best with what we know, not being distracted with unavailable and unimportant details.
Specifically:
> would a straight parent family
> be better?
Yes, it would. All other things being equal, children's lives are powerfully enriched by a loving mother with a loving father. The difference in character between a man and a woman is the biggest predictable distinction in human nature, even if no one has yet condensed it into a single sentence (or a single chapter or a single book. Or a single library). Children need to see how that difference is resolved everyday, in intimate matters and mundane ones. Children are literally delivered at the intersection of a man and woman... That means something about what they need, and what's in their future.
> a lot of gay families will have
> happier families than a lot of
> straight ones.
Happy families and good ones sometimes live in different homes.
> I understand you are using your freedom
> of speech to swear like sailors.
Again with the generosity!
> please tone it down a bit
No. Not for all the tea in China. Not for all the gold in Fort Knox. I don't like you enough, and no sane man ever could. Participation in this forum optional... If we tire of it, we can leave, Nicole, and no one will ever, ever miss us.
And if your heart breaks that easily, it was due to shatter soon anyway. Serious discussion involving things that mean a lot to people will involve everything from blood to mud. Patently theatrical constraints on language are doubly offensive.
> I suppose we could consider them
> irresponsible, too
Only if we were categorically insane. I think you might have forgotten that life is tough. This woman lost her husband in the Sago collapse, the one with the cruel misconduct by the mining officials. The father of her children didn't squander his life in thrill-seeking behavior; he was trying to feed them. (That picture is the sharpest portrait of righteous anger I've ever seen, and the second-best news photo of the decade.)
And…
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 22, 2012 11:34 AM
…And for my money, the liberal Aussies are still the champion baby-takers.
(But competition is ongoing.)
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 22, 2012 11:34 AM
Damn.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 22, 2012 11:46 AM
And yet you said I did.
No, acctually I never said that you said nothing less, to be accurate I said your position was X v nothing less.
And then I laid out a couple of examples which bore out my idea.
But once again rather then refute, or debate the arguments I made against you which show your position is nothing less, you instead choose to focus your argument on how you never said the exact words, when I already admited to the fact that you never said the exact words otherwise I would have used quotes
As for "pathological extrapolation", somebodys has to do it. You just throw out ideas of what scociety should be forced to do and never bother to think things thru to their logical conclusion.
You need to learn to think ahead crid, try playing chess. Maybe in a few years you'll be capable a formulating a postion which doesnt collaose under the weight of you ignorance and bigotry
Oh, I alsmost forgot, go fuck yourself
lujlp at February 22, 2012 12:44 PM
"Raddy, for fuck's sake, can you EVER be CLEAR? About anything? The more a point means to you, the foggier things get."
Wow, irony.
That's the trouble with working with what you post. You were, and remain, confused. Just read back.
Also, quotation marks do NOT always signify what another person has said/written/posted/cited. In that case, they are merely used to indicate the existence of a definition.
Gee, you called names. You're really lost.
Make up some more stuff about me.
Meanwhile, the set {hetero parents} is contained within the set {all parents}, provided the definition of "parent" is "an authority figure recognized to be engaged in raising children". I think that's commonly accepted.
Radwaste at February 23, 2012 12:55 PM
> Just read back.
People love you enough to decode? Like with Loooklbijtz? Everyone's supposed to ignore the plain meaning of the things you actually say, whip out a decoder ring and a ouija board and spend a few hours doing speculative, inferential decryption of the provided lunacies?
Putting words in your mouth, trying to guess what the fuck you were talking about, is too much work.
It's easier just to wait for pearls like this…
> the definition of "parent" is "an authority
> figure recognized to be engaged in raising
> children"
…which dovetails tightly with "nobody deserves anything".
A loving mother, or a loving father, is merely "an authority figure."
That's what your parents meant to you, and what theirs meant to them, and so on all the way back, right? Gender was not a factor in how your great-great-great-grandmother raised her sons... Might as well have been one of her blacksmith cousins, just out of the Army, clutching them to his ribcage just under his sulfur-stinking beard. Her femininity meant nothing to the formation of their character; It was just a penny-fungible unit of "recognized authority."
Right?
Because otherwise, this is just a pose of compassion, a pretense of Rosa Parks-style courage from an idiot drunkenly entranced by the political fashions of the moment.
One or the other. Guess which I think it is.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 23, 2012 8:14 PM
OK, pearls don't dovetail.
But STILL...
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 23, 2012 8:23 PM
People love you enough to decode? Like with Loooklbijtz?
You know what crid, you want to claim I'm stupid based on my reasoning, thats fine
You want to claim I'm stupid based on my ideas, thats fine
You want to claim I'm stupid for no reason what so ever thats fine as well
But what sort of sick fuck constantly ridicules another pesrson for a learning disability?
Answer me that douchebag
lujlp at February 24, 2012 6:27 AM
> But what sort of sick fuck constantly
> ridicules another pesrson for a learning
> disability?
One who's been convinced by thousands of your messages that the "pesrson" is weak-spirited, naive and profoundly antisocial personality... A "pesrson" so desperately isolated as to have zero understanding that other people have opinions and justifications as well... A "pesrson" so juvenile as to stomp the flow of any conversation with a fart joke for an ego-boost, as would a toddler throwing mashed potatoes across the dinner table.
The first several years, I gave you the benefit of the doubt. Golly, communication is a problem for this guy... He doesn't understand how he's being perceived by others. Turns out you actually just don't give a rats ass; not about courtesy and not about policy. You think the world begins and ends with your wounded little soul.
Make fun of you, not make fun of you... What difference does it make? "No one 'deserves' anything...."
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at February 24, 2012 9:41 AM
One who's been convinced by thousands of your messages that the "pesrson" is weak-spirited, naive and profoundly antisocial personality...
Oddly enough my antisocial personality comes from my jaded outlook on life, its not I who is weak willed, its the people I am forced to deal with how are incappable of taking responsibility for their actions
A "pesrson" so desperately isolated as to have zero understanding that other people have opinions and justifications as well...
I see, so if I or anyone for that matter didsagrees with you, we have no understanding that you have your own opinion, but if you disagree with us . . . what is that exacty?
A "pesrson" so juvenile as to stomp the flow of any conversation with a fart joke for an ego-boost, as would a toddler throwing mashed potatoes across the dinner table.
Holy shit, are you serious? I make one scatological pun on a subject that hardly had any participation on it what so ever - almost 6 months ago, and you are STILL obsesing over it? Christ, man, get a life
The first several years, I gave you the benefit of the doubt. Golly, communication is a problem for this guy...
So, you still dont undertand what dyslexia is then? I hate using wikipedia for a link but its good enough for this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyslexia
Read it, then maybe we can talk about this subject AGAIN
He doesn't understand how he's being perceived by others.
Acctually I did, which is why I mentioned that I am dyslexic
Turns out you actually just don't give a rats ass; not about courtesy and not about policy.
So, just want to be clear here, I misspell the occasional word due to a structural abnormality in my brain, and that makes me an inconsiderate ass - but you ridicule me for a biological defect and that makes you a paragon of virtue? Did I just have a stroke?
You think the world begins and ends with your wounded little soul.
Technically the world will end by being roasted by an expanding sun
lujlp at February 27, 2012 2:58 PM
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