Homophobia = Sexism, plain and simple

11/15/2010

Sociology is always a good topic to make me mad. Or maybe just a good topic to make me depressed at how truly stupid people can get. Gender and sex, specifically. It's one of my favorite topics, but it's also one of the most infuriating.

Since our main subject right now is "inequality" we get to study civil rights and discrimination. As many of us may know, one of the hottest civil rights topics right about now is not race, but sexuality. So, fittingly enough, we watched a 1996 journalism program about same sex marriage.

In this program, I think heard the possibly most blatantly and public sexist statement since the 1960's, possibly 30's. High-ranking official goes on prime-time television and says, "Raising a boy in a lesbian household is child abuse. Depriving a boy of a father is child abuse."

Wait a minute. Consider a few situations, if you will: a single mother-- a widow, no less; a woman raising her grandson; a woman helping her daughter or sister raise a son; and just about any situation that would force a boy to be raised without the presence of a father-figure, sexuality of his guardian(s) completely withdrawn from the picture. Are any of these inherently child abuse? Is this guy trying to say to us that a widow is ABUSING her son simply by CARING for him without remarrying? Basically what this pans out to is that a woman, a pair of women, or even a GROUP of women are simply incapable of responsible and HUMANELY caring for a boy without a man present. But… hold it… who's supposed to be the nurturing gender, the one who takes care of the kids? Oh, right, that's supposed to be a "feminine" role.

So a woman's place/responsibility is to raise children, but she can't do it with out a man supervising her. I can't tell if this is a double standard, a statement to how incompetent this guy thinks women are, or just clear stupidity*. Probably all three.

*(If you look over this scenario closely you find that it is a case of someone being supervised by someone who's considered to be worse at the task they are performing than they are.)

Well, maybe women just aren't good enough to raise BOYS. But, no. Mr. High-And-Mighty catches himself-- he corrects that girls raised in lesbian household are also victims of child abuse. So apparently, women aren't even capable of raising girls on their own.

But don't worry, this guy is a pig in both directions. Apparently, children can't be raised without a mother-figure either. Sorry, single dads, you're all neglectful child-beaters, too.

Honestly, when you think about it, if a child is going to be raised without a dad (or without a mom) shouldn't it be better to have two loving parents and no dad (or mom) than just one parent and still no dad (or mom, as the case may be), loving though they may be. No offense to single parents, and by no means should a child be removed from their loving parent. At the end of the day, if you're going to evaluate family structures, and claim that some are better than others, you'd better be willing to accept the implications. Otherwise, STFU.