It’s the same with the number of parents you have. I was very happy with one, I suppose I could have managed with two, and I would have been miserable with three or more. I missed out on having a father in the same way I missed out on having a sister: that is, not much at all, because you don’t miss the hypothetical. Please don’t ‘defend’ children of single parents with backhanded justifications that boil down to “well, it’s better than being abused.” If your single parent is capable, stable, and reasonably happy, it’s still harder for him or her to get all the work done, but it’s not some kind of misfortune for the kids. Sorry.

There is more to being a parent than being a convenient receptacle of biological material and being straight/gay/married/single or blue with yellow polka dots will make no difference if you are shitty human being.

I remember reading an article on Dorothy Allison, the lesbian writer. Her son had two moms AND two dads – Allison, her partner, the biological father, and HIS partner. What a lucky kid!

Having studied anthropology, and written a huge paper on egalitarian societies, I conclude that the best arrangement for children (and women) is not the nuclear family. It is the matrilineal, matrilocal extended family (like the Iroquois longhouse). I think we do need to strengthen family ties, but not the patriarchal nuclear family. Anthropologist Sarah Hrdy tells us that humans are “cooperative breeders” – like wolves, we evolved to raise our children in a network of extended kin and friends.

Man, that brotherly rape story distracted me, and now I’ve got a Steve Miller tune running through my head:

I’m a joker, I’m a smoker
I’m a midnight poker
I get my lovin’ on the run

Sorry about that.

Rape is not a joke, Hector. You’re banned.

The same way my brother doesn’t know how to make grilled cheese or macaroni and cheese from a box, things I’ve known since I was old enough to use the stove. I mean come on, how pathetic. He also doesn’t seem to realize that just because something doesn’t have microwave instructions, or even says that microwaves aren’t recommended, doesn’t mean you can’t use the microwave.

It’s because some parents just do too much for their children. Maybe if I was taught to clean after myself when I was young, instead of my mom cleaning up for me, I wouldn’t be such a slob now. Unfortunately, she didn’t start trying that until I was 13 or 14. It’s hard to change those habits.

I remember my brother-in-law asking his wife, the mother of their newborn if she was going to make lunch for him, trying to use guilt as a lever while the episiotomy was still healing, because otherwise he would have to eat in a greasy spoon.

Whoa. That sounds like the sort of situation where it’s time to get a divorce so as to only have one baby to raise, rather than two. How can a grown man not know how to make himself lunch?

My parents stayed married until I was 24. And when my dad finally left my mom, myself and my two sisters were all like, “FINALLY! What TOOK you so long?!” I think it was out of obligation than anything else.

Apart from a couple of minor details (20, not 24, mom left dad not vice versa, one sister) the same thing happened to me. No way to know how things would have turned out if the parents had separated when they stopped caring about each other instead of waiting until their kids were grown, but I can say that living with two parents who don’t love each other–even if they don’t fight and aren’t overtly abusive–is no fun. And screws you up in ways that growing up wit parents who are divorced probably doesn’t

I’m a joker, I’m a smoker
I’m a midnight poker
I get my lovin’ on the run

Sorry about that.

But in my own old-fashioned way, I would say every sexually active person should consider that they might become a single parent. A woman’s right to choose includes carrying the pregnancy to term. Comparing notes with other first-born boomers, I saw that the priest didn’t always beat the obstetrician by all that much. The early failure rate of marriage is high, and adding a baby strains any relationship. My first job I worked alongside many single moms whose husbands had turned out to be wackos or who just disliked the reality of marriage and fatherhood. Later I met ex-wives who had disliked the reality of marriage and motherhood.

I agree that staying together for the sake of the children is not such a super idea . First, it gives the kids a messed-up idea of what marriage can and should be like. One couple I knew grimly stayed together until their daughter’s graduation when the father finally moved in with his girlfriend. Another couple I knew stayed together because the father didn’t want to lose his share of their biggest asset, their modest ranch house.

And sometimes the most rational decision is to have a kid on your own. Your most fertile period may not coincide with meeting an ideal or even an acceptable partner. A friend’s genetically-transmitted disease made a lot of men shy away from having kids with her. Not that having a partner is always all the help it’s cracked up to be; I remember my brother-in-law asking his wife, the mother of their newborn if she was going to make lunch for him, trying to use guilt as a lever while the episiotomy was still healing, because otherwise he would have to eat in a greasy spoon.