IVF and the worth of fathers

[GeratTzedek]

Britain recently changed its laws, so that single women and lesbian couples have equal access to invitro fertalization. This means that doctors will have to offer IVF to those who DELIBERATELY choose to have children without a father in the home to parent them (as opposed to two gender homes or to those who intend to have fathers present but the marriage ends in divorce).

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

Or are fathers unecessary?

 

[morningstar2651]

If a virgin has IVF, does that mean she has a virgin birth?

 

[quatona]

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

I don´t know that there is such a right to be raised by both a father and mother, and if such a right existed, it has failed to be effective since day one.

Or are fathers unecessary?

Unnecessary for what? For a child to grow into a healthy adult? Yes.
For me, there is no reason to assume that single mothers, single fathers, same sex couple are per se unable to assist a child in growing into a healthy adult, just like a mixed sex married couple is not necessarily equipped with this ability.

 

[BigBadWlf]

Oh no! Lesbians being treated like, like, like human beings oh the humanity!!. Where will it all end?!? Won’t someone please think of the children!?!GerTzedek: Do you still want to pretend you aren’t homophobic?

 

[Gremlins]

Well actually it's not as bad as you make out, since the identity of sperm donors isn't protected in the UK; a child can still find out who filled up the turkey baister

 

[GeratTzedek]

Wow, no one here is willing to admit that a child is better off being raised by two parents, one of each sex?

 

[Bombila]

GerTzedek, it all depends on many factors. You have to remember that quite aside from modern divorce or out of wedlock pregnancies, children growing up fatherless has been a fact of life forever. Every war that ever was has reduced the number of available fathers. Where I live, many fathers are away for months at a time working, or in the navy. The small percentage of women who choose to have a child without a father will hardly make a dent in the statistics.

More importantly, you don't seem to grasp that few children up isolated entirely from significant persons, male and female, other than their parents. Most will have grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, neighbours, family friends with more or less influence in their lives.

Because of the kind of work I was involved in, I have known many, many single parent families, a few same sex parent families, and lots of two parent families. In all cases, Mom, Dad, or Mom and Dad were supplemented by relatives and close friends in the care of children. Families don't have to be cloned stereotypes of Mom and Dad to raise healthy, happy kids.

There's very little evidence that children are better off emotionally with a Dad, but they often are financially better off with a Dad. That says more about the way we employ and pay women than about the importance of Dads.

Conversely, single dads are quite capable of raising children on their own, employing the very same support system of relatives and friends.

When my parents were children, it was fairly common, if a family felt another baby on the way was too much for the finances, to give the baby or another child to an aunt or uncle to raise. Our stereotype of the isolated two parent nuclear family is more informed by television than reality.

 

[quatona]

Wow, no one here is willing to admit that a child is better off being raised by two parents, one of each sex?

1. Take a close look at your OP question. It didn´t offer this option.
It antagonized between "it´s a child´s right to be raised by a father and a mother" and "fathers are unnecessary."
If you want a reasonable discussion make sure you ask questions that allow for such.

2. No, I am not willing to admit that your statement is correct.
Which parent(s) a child is better off with depends on who the persons in question are - not what gender they are.

3. I definitely think that it´s better for children - with everything else being the same - to grow up in the countryside than in a town. Yet, I don´t think there is a right for children to grow up in the countryside, and I won´t propose a ban for people living in towns to raise children.

Bottom line:
There are countless important factors that play a part in the quality of the upbringing of children - the gender and number of the parents at best being a minor one, and a certain combination definitely not being a sine qua non that would justify the prohibition of other combinations.

 

[sidhe]

I was certainly better off being raised by my mom on her own, with a couple weeks each summer with my dad. Even living in the same town as both of them now, I see my mom every day (and we work for the same system of libraries, so we have professional contact, too), and see my dad about once or twice a month, if that often. It all depends on the family.

IVF = a good thing.

 

[Maren]

Britain recently changed its laws, so that single women and lesbian couples have equal access to invitro fertalization. This means that doctors will have to offer IVF to those who DELIBERATELY choose to have children without a father in the home to parent them (as opposed to two gender homes or to those who intend to have fathers present but the marriage ends in divorce).

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

Or are fathers unecessary?

Let me try the opposite reasoning:

You submit that a child has a right to both a mother and a father. So, to ensure this right, should we require abortions for women who are single or who have divorced? Should children be removed from the remaining parent when a spouse dies and put with a family with a mother and father?

If you say no to either, than you have no right to deny women from IVF just because you feel the child deserves a father.

 

[HaloHope]

Britain recently changed its laws, so that single women and lesbian couples have equal access to invitro fertalization. This means that doctors will have to offer IVF to those who DELIBERATELY choose to have children without a father in the home to parent them (as opposed to two gender homes or to those who intend to have fathers present but the marriage ends in divorce).

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

Or are fathers unecessary?

Personally I think this overall is a good thing, I think as long as a child is raised in a loving family gender is irrelevant. I was raised in a incredibly dis-jointed family environment and while eventually my Mother took care of me, I would have certainly preffered to have been raised by her and just her all my childhood than being ferried around between family members like I was in my younger days.

Love is what makes a family, and should be the primary concern of all famalies.

On another note I do think same-sex couples and single parent famalies can provide both gender roles, but then as I'm increasingly convinced gender is a lot more fluid than whats between your legs and or what your chromosones say, and a lot of people have it in their temporement to provide both sterotypically fatherly and motherly roles regardless of gender.

 

[katautumn]

Wow, no one here is willing to admit that a child is better off being raised by two parents, one of each sex?

It's not that no one is willing to admit. It's that most people have a broad enough mind to understand that a child being raised by a father and a mother within the context if a life-long, heterosexual marriage is not only idealistic, it's also not the norm. Even when it was the only socially acceptable manner in which to raise a child, it didn't always yield optimal results.

My grandfather was the product of such a union. His parents had two sons. After she fulfilled her "wifely obligations", they ceased to sleep in the same room and rarely ever spoke to one another. She was neglected as a wife, he married her to appease his family, yet they stayed together out of social obligation. Divorce was unheard of. They remained married until the day he passed away. My great-uncle died as the result liver cancer because he was an alcoholic. He beat his wife and when his daughter was born without her left arm, he blamed his wife and raised his daughter telling her that she was a "freak" and that no man would ever have her.

My grandfather got my grandmother pregnant out of wedlock and they married right out of high school. He was also a drunk, a womanizer and my grandmother divorced him when my mother was eleven years old. My mother will tell you, flat-out, that her life was far better being raised by my grandmother alone than it was when her father was in the house.

 

[fuzzymel]

My grandfather was the product of such a union. His parents had two sons. After she fulfilled her "wifely obligations", they ceased to sleep in the same room and rarely ever spoke to one another. She was neglected as a wife, he married her to appease his family, yet they stayed together out of social obligation. Divorce was unheard of. They remained married until the day he passed away. My great-uncle died as the result liver cancer because he was an alcoholic. He beat his wife and when his daughter was born without her left arm, he blamed his wife and raised his daughter telling her that she was a "freak" and that no man would ever have her.

When I was reading that it occured to me that people actually think those were the good old days. Everyone was happy when no one got divorced. Staying together for the children hardly helped the next generation did it? Suddenly they grew up thinking thats how marriage should be.

 

[KET20]

Britain recently changed its laws, so that single women and lesbian couples have equal access to invitro fertalization. This means that doctors will have to offer IVF to those who DELIBERATELY choose to have children without a father in the home to parent them (as opposed to two gender homes or to those who intend to have fathers present but the marriage ends in divorce).

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

Or are fathers unecessary?

Plenty of people deliberately choose to have kids without a father in the home. Single women get pregnant all the time and plenty of them choose to have their children. I know people who have told me that they would rather just get pregnant and have a child and raise it on their own without a husband. It's not that uncommon.

I also don't understand how the "intent to have the father present" makes any difference at all. The heart of the matter though, is that there is no such "right" for children to be raised by both father and mother. It might be better sometimes, but it's certainly not a right. I can say that I'm glad every day that my parents got a divorce. I was better off raised by my mom. A couple does not have to be certain genders to be competent to raise a child. Any couple (same-sex and opposite-sex) that wants to experience the joy of raising a family together should be able to do so.

Edited to add that single women who want to raise children should be able to do so if they wish as well.

 

[LittleNipper]

Britain recently changed its laws, so that single women and lesbian couples have equal access to invitro fertalization. This means that doctors will have to offer IVF to those who DELIBERATELY choose to have children without a father in the home to parent them (as opposed to two gender homes or to those who intend to have fathers present but the marriage ends in divorce).

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

Or are fathers unecessary?

For a people who appreciate the problems of over population, it would seem that they are shooting themselves in the foot. If people really want children, then they should appreciate the sex involved and not look at children as simply a commodity owed them.

 

[katautumn]

When I was reading that it occured to me that people actually think those were the good old days. Everyone was happy when no one got divorced. Staying together for the children hardly helped the next generation did it? Suddenly they grew up thinking thats how marriage should be.

I know that my mother told me that my grandmother had said that she stayed with my grandfather as long as she did because her friends and family pushed her to stay with him "for the sake of the kids". It was hardly a beneficial situation for my grandmother, mom and aunt. I had a good friend whose parents were Catholic. His dad was a raging alcoholic and abused my friend and his brother all throughout their childhood. When both kids grew up, moved away and went to college his parents divorced. He was so angry with his mother for staying with his father all of those years, thinking it was best for the kids when really he felt she enabled his abusive ways. He said he would have much preferred his parents divorcing when he was younger. It took him until his late-thirties to reconcile with both of his parents and at the time it was mostly due to the fact that his father had a terminal illness.

If people really want children, then they should appreciate the sex involved and not look at children as simply a commodity owed them.

Would you say the same thing to a married, heterosexual couple undergoing rigorous fertility treatments in hopes of producing a child?

 

[Belk]

Britain recently changed its laws, so that single women and lesbian couples have equal access to invitro fertalization. This means that doctors will have to offer IVF to those who DELIBERATELY choose to have children without a father in the home to parent them (as opposed to two gender homes or to those who intend to have fathers present but the marriage ends in divorce).

The Chruch of England has raised the issue: Doesn't the right of children to be raised by both a father and mother outweigh any right to IVF treatment?

Or are fathers unecessary?

Hey look, I can hide my bigotry behind a false pretense of concern for the welfare of children.

 

[pgp_protector]

Do we take away the children from the mother if the father dies ?
no ?
Then we agree that a single mom can raise a child.

 

[Skaloop]

For a people who appreciate the problems of over population, it would seem that they are shooting themselves in the foot. If people really want children, then they should appreciate the sex involved and not look at children as simply a commodity owed them.

Overpopulation is not a lesbian-only issue, and it is not a problem issue for all lesbians. Bringing it up is a red herring.

 

[Aeris]

I think ideally a child should have atleast one role model from each gender but it doesnt have to be the childs parents it could be anyone, an aunt or uncle, grandparents, a friend of the family. As some people have already mentioned there are many out there who are better off being raised by one parent since the alternative was an abusive home. As for IVF for lesbians, I dont know, you might end up with too many children being raised to accept people who are different than themselves, what a tragedy that would be!