WE KNOW WHAT'S BEST FOR OUR KIDS

The cultural war is compromising our right to make decisions about our family and children.

Three weeks ago I slipped and fell down our basement steps. This is no small incident. We live in an old, 1920s farm house. These are cement steps and they terminate in a cement floor. All right. I wasn't seriously hurt. Just a trip to a local hospital and over night observation. It really wasn't all that much to worry about, BUT I could have been seriously injured, and it did prompt Karen and I to think about what might happen to our children if both of us were ever involved in a serous accident.

In other words: Who gets the kids if we should die before they turn eighteen?

This is not an easy topic to discuss. No one likes to admit that they are mortal, but if you're going to be honest you have to face the fact that you're going to die. Next you find yourself wondering just who in the hell would make the best parents. Who will have the financial resources to raise your children? Who will be the most likely to raise them in a manner that you would see fit? Who will love them and care for them?

We immediately ruled out Karen's family. They simply do not get along. They piss and argue over anything and everything. The generation gaps in that clan can be measured in light years. Their family values are at best abysmal, and they would not provide the loving climate in which our children (or any children!) should be raised. Having ruled out the Family From Hell, we looked at my side of the family.

This produced some interesting results.

Initially we had thought about Brandon and Kelli. They're engaged and will be getting married in June. But Brandon and Kelli want to wait five years before they have children and they're already talking about adoption--racially mixed children, or difficult to place children. We applaud their attitude, but this also means that they're going to have their hands full. And if you want to know the honest to God's truth, Brandon and Kelli do not possess the required finances to raise three children. At least not for the time being.

Trevor and Rachel were another possibility. Our values are similar and they really would make fine parents. But Trevor and Rachel already have three children (triplets) and to make matters even worse, Trevor has already gone through one bout of cancer therapy. Besides the economic setbacks associated with his illness, we are also worried about a relapse of melanoma. For this reason we have ruled out Trevor and Rachel.

Advocate1, while not a family member per se, is a godfather to our two youngest, but he is currently single and he lives in a small, one family house which is too, too small for three very curious and very active children.

This ironically, leaves Danny and CJ.

Oh yes. I can hear the homophobes gasping in horror right now. "YOU'RE GOING TO LET A COUPLE OF FAGGOTS RAISE YOUR CHILDREN?!"

Nooooo, we're going to let my half brother Danny and his partner CJ raise our children. No matter how you dice it, Danny is everything you could ever hope to find in a parent. He and CJ have the required finances (and patience!) to raise three very precocious kids. They have recently purchased a two story, three bedroom house, replete with an expansive back yard. Despite his off the wall sense of humor, Danny is actually a very sweet, loving, and responsible individual. And to sweeten the pot, our oldest daughter, Tammy, absolutely adores him. Moreover he would gladly go out of his way to raise our children as we would see fit. By any standard, the team of Danny and CJ is the logical choice for this task.

Yet, for reasons which defy basic logic, the Wisconsin State Assembly voted (yesterday) to place another one of those bigoted, "pro marriage" amendments* on the ballot this November; and to be frank, I now feel as if the long arm of the Christian Right has extended itself into my household. I have no doubt that the Republican homophobes and theocrats in the Wisconsin State Legislature will, at some point attempt to out law gay adoption. The measure is already on the ballot in five other states, and if the batch of hate-mongers and gay-baiters up Madison is any indication as to how ignorant and spiteful the Republican Party has finally become, I have no doubt that they will try to outlaw gay adoption at some point in the future--perhaps even going so far as to remove children who have been living in gay families for years.

The homophobes may not want to hear this, but we know what is best for our children. The bigots and homophobes in the state legislature do not. We know our kids, we know Danny, we know CJ., and we know the situation better than some right wing politician in a far away state capital. Whether the people we choose to take custody of our children are gay or straight is of no interest to us. All we care about is whether or not those people are honest, caring people. That's the bottom line.

And if the Christian Right doesn't get it. then I would humbly invite them to take a brief trek down our basement steps.

*The idea that these marriage protection amendments in any way protect families or marriage is ridicules in the extreme. What can you say about a bill, like the one in Wisconsin, which bans both, gay marriage and civil unions, but which would legally recognize a marriage between an 18-year-old prostitute and a 58 year-old child molester? That was a rhetorical question. DOn't bnother to answer.