Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E294: The Truth About Big Fertility, No-Fault Divorce, and Same-Sex Households | Lila Rose Show
Transcript
- 0:00What is going on in the world of big fertility right now is
- 0:02eugenics. The world of big fertility and
- 0:04adoption are polar opposites. 1 serves as a marketplace for
- 0:07adults, the other one serves as an institution on behalf of the
- 0:09children. And let's be clear, you're not
- 0:11making children with blue eyes, you're mass producing children
- 0:14and eliminating the ones who don't have the color of blue
- 0:17eyes. We.
- 0:17Have a lot of energy right now about Epstein.
- 0:19Imagine what not even in Epstein anybody can do because of
- 0:22surrogacy today. That's right, there's a long
- 0:24standing narrative that says the data actually shows that if
- 0:27you're raised in the same sex household versus a traditional
- 0:29household with a mom and dad, you're going to do just fine.
- 0:31Sometimes the outcomes are better.
- 0:32Tell me about what the data actually says.
- 0:35Good. This is actually something that
- 0:36everybody needs to know. What's the truth about no fault
- 0:43divorce? How did no.
- 0:45Fault divorce set us up for the Supreme Court decision called
- 0:48Obergefell, which legalized gay marriage across the country.
- 0:51These and many more questions are what we wrestle with today
- 0:54on the show with Katie Faust. We also discussed IVF, surrogacy
- 0:58and many other bioethical issues that surround the central
- 1:01question of what is best for children.
- 1:03Welcome back to the Lila Rose show.
- 1:05A huge thank you to everybody who's been supporting the show.
- 1:07Make sure that you hit that subscribe button.
- 1:09Leave this video a like. Also a big thank you to
- 1:11everybody who's supporting us at Patreon.
- 1:13When you become a paid annual member of our Patreon, you get
- 1:15access to your choice of one free item of merch.
- 1:18You also get ad free episodes and other perks.
- 1:21And if you're a monthly paying member, you get 30% off all of
- 1:24our merch. Thank you so much to all of you
- 1:26guys supporting the show. Katie Faust, welcome to the
- 1:28podcast. It's so great to be with you.
- 1:30I'm so glad you're here. This is such an important
- 1:32conversation we're going to have, and you came on two years
- 1:35ago remotely. We talked a little bit about
- 1:37some of the topics we'll be discussing today, but we did not
- 1:40talk about greater than, We didn't get people into your
- 1:42story and what's happening in the world.
- 1:44So this conversation is so important.
- 1:47Thank you. Yeah, well, thank you.
- 1:48You know, I have seen you and live action take on a lot of
- 1:53these issues where people would say, well, that's not pro-life.
- 1:56Like why? What's live action doing?
- 1:57That's not a pro-life issue. Yeah, it is like all of these
- 2:00issues of child defense, they go together.
- 2:03It's not just defending children from the baby taking industry of
- 2:06abortion. It's defending children from the
- 2:08baby making industry of IVF and the reproductive technologies
- 2:12that would deny them their mother or father or both.
- 2:15And it is the way that we conceive of a family and whether
- 2:18or not we decide that a mother and father are optional in the
- 2:21life of a child. All of these things are child
- 2:24centric. In all of these areas, we have
- 2:26to prioritize child defense. And I, I mean, I have like
- 2:30surrogacy, are you? Passionate about this I am.
- 2:32I am. We were praying beforehand and
- 2:34Katie was saying and, and that prayer really struck me.
- 2:37You were praying for us and you were saying there are lives on
- 2:40the line. There are lives on the line, so.
- 2:41We may, we've come to this, this conversation with a boldness and
- 2:45a clarity because there are human lives on the line.
- 2:47And that's why I think it's so important what you're doing for
- 2:50people that haven't come across you or your work yet.
- 2:52Give us a quick background and then I know we're going to get
- 2:55deeply into all of the the why behind what you're doing in the
- 2:57what well. I tell people, a lot of people
- 3:00in the conservative space in the Christian world are familiar
- 3:03with the pro-life action and the cause and the necessary work
- 3:09that goes along with defending children from abortion.
- 3:11That's pretty familiar to us. And so one way that I explain
- 3:15what we do at them before us is there's hundreds of
- 3:19organizations, as far as I know, that are defending children's
- 3:21right to life in a lot of different ways, in a lot of
- 3:24different venues. Culturally, legally, in terms of
- 3:28policy, we need every single one of them because the risk to
- 3:32children is grave. What we do at them before us is
- 3:35we defend children's right to their mother and father.
- 3:38We defend children's rights on this side of the womb.
- 3:41We talk not just about their fundamental right to life, but
- 3:43their right to be known and loved by the two people
- 3:45responsible for their existence. If children have a right to
- 3:49their mother and father, that has implications for every
- 3:53conversation about marriage and family, whether it's the
- 3:55definition of marriage or divorce or the rise of modern
- 3:59families, reproductive technologies, sperm and egg
- 4:03donation, surrogacy, IVF, how we properly think about adoption,
- 4:07cohabitation, platonic Co parenting, which I think the New
- 4:11York Times came out with a big promotion of platonic Co
- 4:14parenting last week. If it touches marriage and
- 4:17family at them before us, we say with the kid first their rights
- 4:22override adult desires. So I often will tell people like
- 4:27give me enough time and I will trigger you too.
- 4:30You will trigger them, yeah. Because the world of putting
- 4:33children. Because we're so obsessed with
- 4:34ourselves as the adults. Because it's when.
- 4:37It comes to our own sexual lives, our feelings, our
- 4:41identities, our longings. Very often adults will say,
- 4:45well, I believe children have a right to life.
- 4:46I think mothers and fathers are important until.
- 4:50Another adult wants to do what they want to do.
- 4:53Right until it runs up against an adult's self-interest.
- 4:56You know, I think that there's a lot of people that will say,
- 4:59well, well, I've heard people say, well, I am against abortion
- 5:04except in three cases, rape, incest and my case.
- 5:08And the idea is like we will make all kinds of
- 5:10rationalizations for what we want as adults.
- 5:14If something is interfering with our self-interest, especially in
- 5:17the romantic or the sexual realm, it's we will find endless
- 5:21ways to justify what it is that we want to do.
- 5:24And the world of putting children first, saying they have
- 5:27a fundamental, non negotiable, natural right to be known and
- 5:32loved by both their mother and father.
- 5:34It is a Wrecking Ball for adults that want a casual divorce or
- 5:39want to build a family around a same sex attraction or who want
- 5:43to deal with their their longing to have a child by procuring
- 5:48somebody else's egg to make it happen.
- 5:51Like this is a world that demands that everybody, single,
- 5:55married, gay, straight, fertile and infertile sacrifice for
- 6:00children and conform to those rights.
- 6:03And that's a hard message for a lot of adults to hear.
- 6:06So you are the woman with the hard message today.
- 6:08I am used to being that woman too.
- 6:10You know, also in real life, you're very fun, normal, you've
- 6:13got a beautiful marriage, kids. You're I don't think you set out
- 6:16to be the lady with the hard message as neither did I with
- 6:20the hard messages that I sometimes share and need to
- 6:23share on behalf of the most vulnerable.
- 6:25So I want to go back there and then I and then we're going to
- 6:28get to this or the crazy news story that broke from Los
- 6:32Angeles. But first, just for people's
- 6:34context, you mentioned them before us.
- 6:36You are speaking very passionately.
- 6:38Why? Why did you get into this?
- 6:41What was your aha moment that made you think, wow the whole
- 6:45world is wrong on this issue right now of treating children's
- 6:49as the priority instead of the adult desires?
- 6:53I did not set out to do this. My normal persona is pastor's
- 6:59wife. Like, I literally just want to
- 7:01bear your burden. I, I want to read the Bible with
- 7:03you. I'm much more of a grace giver
- 7:06than a truth teller by nature. Like I am not a confrontational
- 7:10person. I, I'm friends with all kinds of
- 7:12people doing all kinds of things that I disagree with.
- 7:15And I don't feel like it's my job to get in and be like, let
- 7:17me tell you what's right and wrong about that.
- 7:20I got into this because of gay marriage.
- 7:22I got into this because in 2012, right after Obama evolved on the
- 7:27topic of marriage, I saw a sea change, especially in media
- 7:32where they were now free to now that they had the president on
- 7:35their side, gay marriage activists were free to accuse
- 7:37everybody. And the media took their cues
- 7:39from that to say you are a bigot and you're a hater and you're
- 7:42homophobe. If you oppose.
- 7:44If you oppose gay marriage, that is the only reason.
- 7:46Animus. That's it.
- 7:48And I was like, well that's that's garbage.
- 7:50Because just like every other supporter of natural marriage, I
- 7:54have gay family and friends that I love, that I work to sacrifice
- 7:58for and be in relationship with and don't have any animosity to.
- 8:02Can you share about your mother because she, your mother has
- 8:06lived the lesbian lifestyle? You had a second mom, some
- 8:10people would call her growing up.
- 8:12That's definitely. If I was on the other side
- 8:14advocating for gay marriage, I would say I would usually.
- 8:17Mom, I've got 2 dads. Yeah, right.
- 8:19But there's no such thing. There's no such thing.
- 8:21So. But tell me.
- 8:22Yeah, tell me that experience. My parents were married until I
- 8:24was 10. I was very close to my mom and
- 8:26my dad and then they divorced and my father dated and
- 8:29remarried and very soon after the divorce my mom re partnered
- 8:33with a woman, a woman that she has been together with for 40
- 8:36years. So after the divorce, I split
- 8:39time between the home of my father and his girlfriend or
- 8:43subsequent wife and split time with my mom and her partner.
- 8:47And I love them. I have been in a relationship
- 8:53with them. They've been very stable.
- 8:55I've never really had any significant conflict with either
- 8:58one of them. They've been a part of my life
- 9:01all through my adolescence, college, early married, a part
- 9:05of my children's life. I mean, they're welcome and
- 9:08invited to holidays. I, I was just there the week, a
- 9:12week and a half ago, like hanging out with them.
- 9:14I mean, like they're after we launched our campaign to
- 9:17overturn gay marriage, which is something we'll probably talk
- 9:19about. You know, there's some writer
- 9:22for the Free Press who's like, I can't hold my tongue any longer.
- 9:27This woman is on a crusade against her own lesbian mother.
- 9:31She's trying to work out her mommy issues.
- 9:33But really, it's this nefarious plot.
- 9:35And I'm like, well, I'll let them know about my nefarious
- 9:39plot to destroy them at brunch tomorrow when I'm hanging out
- 9:42with them. It's very dark.
- 9:43Yes, What I'm doing is very, very dark.
- 9:45Obviously this is some kind of like personal retribution that
- 9:49I'm No, it's not like you can have a relationship with the
- 9:53people that you love who identify as gay and lesbian.
- 9:55In fact, you should. In fact, I think you should be
- 9:57the most sacrificial and compassionate person in their
- 9:59life. And none of that requires
- 10:02redefining the most child friendly institution the world
- 10:04has ever known. You can and should zealously
- 10:08promote the idea that mothers and fathers matter to children.
- 10:11And therefore we should promote the one relationship where
- 10:13children do not have to lose either one of them to be in that
- 10:15family and love your gay family and friends.
- 10:19There's no conflict between those two positions.
- 10:22Well, the media of course, will tell you, no, you can't.
- 10:25You are actually unloving. You're hateful if you don't give
- 10:29people who are not straight, don't give gay people marriage,
- 10:33the same marriage as everybody else.
- 10:35And before you give a response to that, I just want to know
- 10:38when you have that brunch, when you had that brunch with your
- 10:41mother, your beloved mother that you are very close with and her
- 10:44lesbian partner, right? What's the conversation like?
- 10:48They know what you're doing. They know about greater than
- 10:51your campaign to overturn Obergefell, something that I'm,
- 10:54I'm signed up for, I'm part of this campaign.
- 10:57How did that, what does that look like?
- 10:58What does that conversation look like?
- 10:59They have known where I stood about all of these issues for
- 11:04forever. I mean, ever since I became a
- 11:06Christian in high school, we've had conversations about the ways
- 11:10that our world view is not necessarily in alignment.
- 11:14But I hope, I think that I rank in the top 2 of people who love
- 11:19them the most. And so even if we disagree about
- 11:21policy, they understand that that is not an impediment for
- 11:25our relationship. And they also know because, you
- 11:29know, my mom has read my materials and followed my work.
- 11:32She knows that I am not saying oh gay people don't have
- 11:36dignity. No, gay people are second class
- 11:38citizens, what I'm saying? Gay people should go to prison
- 11:41if they are being sexual with another gay person or living
- 11:44with another gay person. That, of course, is nothing what
- 11:47you're saying. You're saying that the
- 11:49institution of marriage is something very unique, very
- 11:52specific, has been for not just centuries, but for all of human
- 11:56history, one man, one woman. And there's a very important,
- 12:00there's a number of very important and essential reasons
- 12:02for that. And the reason that matters the
- 12:04most is what does the gay marriage rubric require?
- 12:11It requires communicating that a child's mother and father are
- 12:14optional in their life. It requires me saying, hey, two
- 12:19men who might be completely unrelated could have replaced
- 12:22you mom with no impact on my development, my understanding as
- 12:27a woman, my own identity, my connection to her entire
- 12:31extended family, which is pretty fantastic with deep
- 12:34relationships that matter a lot to me and family stories that
- 12:38have like impacted how I Live Today.
- 12:41And you know, 2 random guys, totally unrelated, could have
- 12:45raised me in a way that didn't impact any of my development or
- 12:49my identity, my understanding as woman, or even how I mother my
- 12:51own kids. I often say I get so much of
- 12:56what I do well as a mother because of how my mother
- 12:58mothered me. So it's just, I think the height
- 13:02of dishonor to say, hey, mom, you're optional in my life.
- 13:06But that's what gay marriage communicates culturally and
- 13:10legally. So we, I don't speak for either
- 13:13of them. I don't share, you know, their
- 13:15opinions. But they both know that I
- 13:17fiercely love my mom. I don't consider her partner to
- 13:21be my mother, but I do consider her to be my friend.
- 13:24Yes, I remember an old acquaintance of mine, you know,
- 13:29very sweet. I knew in high school, etcetera.
- 13:32And he later on decided, you know, he was gay and he was
- 13:36going to be in a gay relationship and, you know,
- 13:38potentially gay marriage and all of this.
- 13:40And his mother was not able to accept this because she just is
- 13:45not God's design for you. It's not good for you.
- 13:48And anyway, she passed the mother and the son at the
- 13:51funeral was just weeping. My only mother, my only mother.
- 13:54I love her so much. She's my mother, my mother, my
- 13:56mother. And I remember thinking like
- 13:59this. And he's expressed he wants to
- 14:01adopt or he wants to do surrogacy or, you know,
- 14:02basically have his kids with his partner, his male partner.
- 14:05And I remember thinking, you know, what about that mother
- 14:09relationship that was so essential to your core identity
- 14:12and to everything that is for every human being, every human
- 14:15being, whether they have mommy issues or mommy joys, like
- 14:18they're so happy with their mother, their experience of
- 14:21mother being mothered. But so you're saying by design,
- 14:24you're going to bring humans into this world, right?
- 14:27That are you going to take humans that are already in this
- 14:29world that could have gone to a mother and a father if it's
- 14:31adoption, and you're going to, by design, remove the potential
- 14:36for them to know a mother the way that you knew a mother that
- 14:39was so essential to your identity?
- 14:41And again, I don't think he's thinking this.
- 14:43I don't think maybe it's, I don't, I can't imagine it's
- 14:45intentional. He's just so overridden with his
- 14:48desire to be with this man, to be normal, to have a family, to
- 14:52have a, to experience fatherhood himself.
- 14:54But his experience of fatherhood is more important than a child's
- 14:56experience of motherhood. And it's, it's, but it's, it's
- 14:59out there. And you see that with, you see
- 15:02that with surrogacy, with, you know, even heterosexual couples
- 15:05too. So we're, we're going to get
- 15:06into all of that. There's this expectation that
- 15:09what I want is the most important thing for for the
- 15:14adult. That's exactly right.
- 15:16And that is the other part of why I got into this.
- 15:18It wasn't just the accusation that if you oppose gay marriage
- 15:21or some kind of hateful homophobic bigot, it was because
- 15:25what I heard from the gay marriage camp is kids don't care
- 15:29if they have two moms or two dads.
- 15:30They love it. They don't need the mom or they
- 15:32don't need the dads. That's it.
- 15:34That is the reality. What were they to say?
- 15:36I mean, it's just crazy. And, and like what you need to
- 15:40hear when somebody says kids loving have having two moms, You
- 15:45need to hear kids love being fatherless.
- 15:47And when somebody says kids are doing so well with two dads,
- 15:51kids love mother loss. That's how you need to hear it.
- 15:55And I, my husband and I had been doing youth ministry for years.
- 15:58I had been the assistant director at the largest Chinese
- 16:00adoption agency in the world. I had been a mother with lots of
- 16:04other kids of their friends in my home.
- 16:06I had a lot of close contact with children.
- 16:09And I'll tell you something that kids care about is does their
- 16:13mother or father love them or have they left them?
- 16:16And at minimum, if a child's not being raised by their mom and
- 16:20dad, at minimum they're curious, well, who are they?
- 16:23Well, I'd like to know. But very, very often that mother
- 16:26or father loss leaves a lifelong wound that results in self
- 16:29loathing, something that they're still, their chin is still
- 16:34quivering about when they're 50 or 60 or 70, like at them before
- 16:39us. We call it a primal wound, a
- 16:41wound that goes down to the core of who you are and your
- 16:45understanding of yourself as a person.
- 16:47Like these relationships that we have with the two people who
- 16:50made us tell us something about ourselves, our identity and our
- 16:54worth. And if you're raised at home
- 16:56without a male or a female parent, you actually are starved
- 17:00of one of the critical socio emotional components that all
- 17:03children need to thrive. Mother's love, father's love and
- 17:06stability. You cannot just starve children
- 17:09of something that they are made for and expect them to thrive.
- 17:14So that's the main reason I got into this.
- 17:15It was not because of some kind of like childhood deficit and
- 17:20wound or raging against my mother or whatever like that.
- 17:24It's it is because children are being victimized in the name of
- 17:27progress. We are weaponizing some of the
- 17:29greatest wounds children will experience to advance so-called
- 17:33adult political equality. And that is what got me kind of
- 17:36off the couch and behind the keyboard.
- 17:38Well, I'm so glad you're behind the keyboard and on this podcast
- 17:41because very few people have the courage that you have, Katie, to
- 17:45do this advocacy because you are called every like the worst
- 17:48names and there have been physical violence done.
- 17:51I think about ADF and their work to, you know, defend traditional
- 17:55marriage, natural marriage, I should say, and their work to
- 17:57defend life. But you know, people showing up
- 17:59at their offices to try to kill them and FRC and just the
- 18:02attacks that have been done on advocacy groups.
- 18:04So I want to show this video. This is an example of really,
- 18:09it's a it's a portrait, I would say live on TikTok and on X and
- 18:13Instagram of motherlessness treated as unimportant, as
- 18:22complete, as almost a joke. Like motherlessness is a butt of
- 18:25a joke as opposed to motherlessness is a primal
- 18:29wound. And it's something that no child
- 18:31should have to experience. So let's take a look.
- 18:33So this is to gay men who are like influencers and they have
- 18:37these two babies, I think via surrogacy, these little girls,
- 18:40beautiful little girls. And they're holding them their
- 18:42big bows on in a video for TikTok is what they say.
- 18:45So, the caption reads, your daughters are going to grow up
- 18:48without a mom. And the men go, they're they're
- 18:55dancing around. They go yes.
- 18:56And. Yeah, yes.
- 18:58And so what's going to happen to those girls growing up without a
- 19:01mom? Well.
- 19:03Like a meme. They made a meme, basically a
- 19:05meme of like, oh, you're someone's concerned that our
- 19:09daughters don't have a mother, ha ha.
- 19:10And you're like, screw you. Like who cares?
- 19:12And it's like, that's really what motherhood is to you.
- 19:16And these are the people that that the state, I think this is
- 19:19California. They're in California.
- 19:20They're they're. LA, most of them.
- 19:21Are the state of California and the United States has entrusted
- 19:25you because you can't have those kids naturally, that's
- 19:28impossible. Those are not your children.
- 19:31They one of them is biologically related to them potentially, but
- 19:34that's only through an unnatural process that is sanctioned by
- 19:38the United States and by the state of California.
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- 21:23Use code Lila at checkout. So first, let's talk about what
- 21:28those girls are going to lose. What kind of harm are they going
- 21:31to experience? Now what are what are the
- 21:33negative consequences of let's do motherhood and let's do
- 21:36fatherhood and what is the data bear out?
- 21:38OK, so first of all, let's talk about just the process of being
- 21:43commercially separated from your mom or dad.
- 21:45OK, so these children lost their genetic mother and that is going
- 21:51to result in very likely biological identity issues,
- 21:55right? Identity struggles.
- 21:57We now have donor conceived organizations that will survey
- 22:00their members and talk about like, how did this impact you?
- 22:03Overwhelmingly they will say being donor conceived is a huge
- 22:06part of who I am. Most of them will say I really
- 22:08would like to know the identity of my genetic parent, my
- 22:11biological mother or father. Gosh, it's really tough to not
- 22:14have complete medical records or be concerned that I have 12 to
- 22:1820 to 200 half siblings because my father was a serial sperm
- 22:22donor. I worry about accidental incest,
- 22:25unknowingly dating or marrying somebody who is 1/2 sibling or
- 22:28maybe a first cousin, of which there could be thousands
- 22:31depending on how often their father donated.
- 22:34Then you've got the commercialization,
- 22:35commodification aspect. Can I interrupt you really quick
- 22:37before going to that second point?
- 22:39What you just said is so important, and I also think it's
- 22:42another crucial distinction. You're talking about donor egg
- 22:45babies. Yes.
- 22:46We're not talking about adoption.
- 22:47We're going to get to adoption because there's a different
- 22:50context there that actually really matters, including on in
- 22:52the impact on the child. We're talking about women who
- 22:55willfully, by design, go. And sell their genetics.
- 22:58It's not like, oh, I got pregnant accidentally and I
- 23:00can't carry this child because of these other, you know, huge
- 23:02extenuating circumstances. I'm going to make this heroic
- 23:04choice of giving this baby to a family that can really care for
- 23:07the child. And there's a mother and a
- 23:08father intact in this family. You know, this is like, I'm
- 23:10literally you're selling your eggs.
- 23:12You're selling your. Children selling your children.
- 23:13That's right. You're selling your children.
- 23:15Those children are just as much your children as a child that
- 23:18you will have conventionally later when you're married, you
- 23:20will have the same kind of genetic relationship to the ones
- 23:22that you're that you sold. That's the ones that you're
- 23:24raising so crazy. There's no way for them to be
- 23:27less, less of your children than they actually are.
- 23:30So a lot of the kids created through sperm and egg donate and
- 23:34it's not donation. Nobody is donating sperm.
- 23:38Everybody is selling sperm. Yeah, that's right.
- 23:42Nobody is just donating your eggs.
- 23:43You are buying eggs and you are selling eggs.
- 23:45We have catalogs you can Google right now, egg donor catalog,
- 23:49sperm donor catalog. You can filter your child's
- 23:51genetic mother based on race, education, whether she wants to
- 23:54be a known or unknown donor price.
- 23:57Obviously so. Why do they call it Donor Katie
- 24:01and not just? Seller buy an egg selling.
- 24:03Yeah, well, because we want to make it sound like it's some
- 24:06kind of altruistic nonprofit, which it's not.
- 24:08And I'm glad we're going to talk about the distinctions between
- 24:11big fertility and adoption because there are similarities.
- 24:14And that is that children lose their mother or father, but
- 24:17that's it. Like the world of adoption is 1
- 24:20where adults do hard things for kids.
- 24:21And the world of big fertility is children sacrificing for
- 24:23adults. So we can we can go there.
- 24:25So back to the problems these girls are going to have.
- 24:27They're going to deal with issues of commodification,
- 24:30feeling like they were designed, bought and sold because they are
- 24:34like that. Feeling of being a designer
- 24:35product, like a eugenics project is not unusual for these kids
- 24:41because they were treated like a eugenics project.
- 24:43You are probably aware, because I think Live Action has written
- 24:46about it, that there are now boutique clinics that will help
- 24:50you select up to to 1200. They'll still genetically screen
- 24:54your child for up to 1200 characteristics.
- 24:56You can eliminate the ones with the possibility of early
- 25:00baldness or potential blindness or certain heart conditions.
- 25:04And then you've got boutique clinics here in California that
- 25:07will allow you to select a variety of different
- 25:08characteristics of your children from the color of their eyes.
- 25:12We're working towards getting different height controls.
- 25:14And let's be clear, you're not making children with blue eyes,
- 25:19you're mass producing children and eliminating the ones who
- 25:22don't have the color of blue eyes that you want.
- 25:25So this is eugenics in every sense that you could be
- 25:28manufacturing and selecting only certain attributes and
- 25:31discarding the undesirables. What is going on in the world of
- 25:34big fertility right now is eugenics, often in the name of
- 25:38progress and family building. So that's one issue.
- 25:40That's only one issue that these girls are going to be facing.
- 25:43They're also going to be dealing with mother hunger.
- 25:46Children don't just want to be loved by generic caregivers,
- 25:50right? They don't just crave being
- 25:53taken care of. That's right.
- 25:54They actually crave the love of a male parent and a female
- 25:58parent. They long to be loved by a man
- 26:01and a woman. They are made for it.
- 26:04There was one woman who was raised by two dads who said I, I
- 26:10didn't even know that there was such a thing as a mother because
- 26:12it was just my father. And Billy, his boyfriend.
- 26:16And I had really limited contact with the rest of the world until
- 26:19I was in, in kindergarten. I was five years old and we
- 26:23watched The Land Before Time. And she said, I certainly
- 26:27realized that there was a thing called mother and it was a woman
- 26:31who was your parent. And she said, I spent the rest
- 26:36of the day crying in the arms of teachers I would never see again
- 26:40for a mother I never knew I had. And then she it awakened and
- 26:43heard this mother hunger where she went to different teachers
- 26:47or her father's lesbian friends and would just go and say, will
- 26:50you be my mother? How about you?
- 26:52Will you be my mother? Can you be my mother because she
- 26:54hungered for a female parent even though she was well loved
- 26:58by her two gay dads. It's not enough to just have
- 27:00people love you and care for you.
- 27:02Children hunger for the love of a man and a woman.
- 27:06What is it that that mother was going to do other than meeting
- 27:09that emotional need? Well, especially for a little
- 27:12girl. She communicates something true
- 27:14about the girl herself, which is I am your future.
- 27:19You're going to grow up. Womanhood is in your future, and
- 27:22hopefully those girls have a mom who shows them.
- 27:25Womanhood is awesome. You should look forward to it.
- 27:29This is going to be incredible, but it's hard to do that when
- 27:32you do not have a woman in your home.
- 27:34Just on XA couple days ago some guy was talking about how he was
- 27:37a sperm donor for two women and his son had some mental health
- 27:44challenges. Ended up identifying as trans,
- 27:47demanded money from the biological father to go through
- 27:51a transition and the father said I couldn't do it, I had to cut
- 27:54the kid off and everyone's celebrating.
- 27:57Oh wow, you did the right thing. I'm like, you know, it's really
- 28:00hard to love the fact that you're a boy growing up into a
- 28:03man if you don't even have one in your house.
- 28:06Wait, he was talking about this is with a child that he
- 28:09ultimately abandoned into the arms of?
- 28:11Sold his sperm to lesbians. And then and then he wasn't
- 28:14raising this child. No, but had some contact would
- 28:16send some. Money, send a birthday card.
- 28:18And then later on the boy has identity issues.
- 28:21Surprise, surprise. That's exactly right.
- 28:23Surprise, surprise, little boy raised without a father whose
- 28:27dad literally sold him down the river.
- 28:29That's right, has identity issues.
- 28:31Is anybody shocked by this? Rejecting his own maleness.
- 28:34And then he was trying to score points with right wing Twitter
- 28:36by saying I'm not going to give money for the transition.
- 28:39Yeah, and like, I'm the hero now.
- 28:40Yeah, I'm the hero because I said no.
- 28:42Sounds like a raging narcissist. I don't use that lightly either.
- 28:45Well, it's I mean, but it's tragic because this is what the
- 28:47culture says is normal. Donate and they say, like you
- 28:49said, they say it's altruistic right to donate sperm, to donate
- 28:52eggs. Yeah, children need a male and
- 28:55female parent. If you're a little boy, you need
- 28:57a man in your home so that you go, I love being a man and being
- 29:01a man is great. And having a mother, an opposite
- 29:04sex parent in your home tells you this is how.
- 29:07This is what it's like to interact with the opposite sex
- 29:10and this is who I should be looking for as a counterpart
- 29:12when I grow up. Like we all have a same sex and
- 29:15an opposite sex parent in our home by design because it's
- 29:18critical developmentally, not only for your own self
- 29:21understanding, your own identity, your own idea of what
- 29:24you look like as an adult, but also interacting with the
- 29:26opposite sex and pairing up well when you date and marry.
- 29:30It is not uncommon for kids with two moms or two dads to really
- 29:34struggle interacting with the opposite sex because they've
- 29:37never seen that sort of two halves of humanity dynamic
- 29:41playing out before them everyday all day.
- 29:44I just interviewed Ross Johnson, who you had on your podcast.
- 29:49I was just thinking about him. And we?
- 29:52As you were talking. He.
- 29:54Great guy. He's great and he did US the
- 29:56gracious favor of doing a long interview with us for our
- 30:00Greater Than Campaign so that people can take a look at the
- 30:04real impact that it has on a child when they grew up without
- 30:07a father, even though they are loved, cared for, have a roof
- 30:11over the mouth and a belly full of food.
- 30:13And he was talking about how he really panicked when it came to
- 30:17dating and girls. He's he just was paralyzed.
- 30:20He didn't know what to do. He talked a lot about how I'm so
- 30:24excited his video is going to be up on the Greater Than Campaign
- 30:27website soon, but he talked about how he's not.
- 30:32You're trying to set him up. You found someone for him.
- 30:34Oh, I. We love you, Ross.
- 30:36We love you. We're praying for you.
- 30:37You're going to be such. A great dad.
- 30:39That's so sweet you're. Going to be such a great dad,
- 30:42but he talked about how I said, was there times where you had
- 30:46other men in your life that you really feel like connected with
- 30:50you? And he said there was a couple
- 30:51coaches and some of the fathers of my friends and he's like, one
- 30:55of them had this Mustang and it was like a muscle car.
- 30:59And the dad was so masculine. And he goes, I wanted to be near
- 31:03that man and in that car because I didn't, I wasn't around men.
- 31:08And the men that were around my house tended to be gay men that
- 31:12were very effeminate. And he said something about that
- 31:15masculine energy. I just gravitated towards it.
- 31:19Now that's father hunger, right? That's an example of a child
- 31:22hungering for that missing love. It wasn't that he was not well
- 31:26cared for. He had a roof for his head.
- 31:28He had resources. He had parents that took him to
- 31:30and from all of his activities. He wanted masculine connection,
- 31:35not because he's weird, but because he is a human child and
- 31:38that is what human children want.
- 31:39So you look at these two girls, they're going to be dealing with
- 31:41the commodification. They're going to be dealing with
- 31:44the identity struggles that go along with being cut off from
- 31:47half of their genetic identity. They're going to be dealing with
- 31:50the mother hunger that goes along with that and maternal
- 31:55deprivation that happens at the time of birth, after birth.
- 32:00It can have significant impacts on a child's long term
- 32:03development. And, you know, I'm an adoptive
- 32:06mom. I'm, I was in the adoption
- 32:09world. I think adoption is amazing,
- 32:12redemptive. It is, as a good adoptive friend
- 32:15of mine says, God's Plan B, God's divine Plan B when it
- 32:19comes to raising children. But adoptees also struggle very
- 32:24often with that primal wound, with those feelings of
- 32:28abandonment that they just can't shake even when they're growing
- 32:31up. A lot of adoptees struggle with
- 32:35behavior struggles as it relates to emotional regulation, as it
- 32:39relates to fearfulness, like always feeling like they're on
- 32:42high alert. That's mother deprivation.
- 32:45You know a lot of. Them not mother, to be clear,
- 32:48it's mother deprivation of their biological mother because they
- 32:51have a mother in many of these situations.
- 32:53A beautiful married couple that adopts them like you and your
- 32:56husband. And then but there's still
- 32:58there's still challenges. And again, not for all adoptees,
- 33:01right? You can't ever break too broad
- 33:03of a brush, but it can be the case for some or or even many,
- 33:06like you're saying. And so you're saying any any
- 33:09issues that a child with adoption may struggle with any
- 33:11of those are automatically going to be there for these situations
- 33:15of gay adopters and more. That's right and more.
- 33:17That's right, that that primal bond that we developed with our
- 33:21mother, the only think about it like it just blows me away.
- 33:25The only person in the world we will ever be connected to by a
- 33:30physical cord. We're trying to pretend like
- 33:33that doesn't matter and you can just cut the kids off like
- 33:37you're going to raise your child without a mother.
- 33:39Yes. And like, yes, and you damn
- 33:43traffickers, like no, you don't get to commercially sever a
- 33:47child from their mother so that they can function as some kind
- 33:50of accoutrement to your lifestyle.
- 33:51But they did, and there was no background check, right?
- 33:54They had the full right to do it because they're wealthy enough.
- 33:56They had enough money. Nobody stopped them.
- 33:58The law is like, whatever, do what you want.
- 34:01Yeah. And unless there's more you want
- 34:03to say specifically about those girls, this brings me to the
- 34:05next door that we got to talk about Speaking of Los Angeles,
- 34:07Right, Right. Right.
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- 34:13abortion, abortifacients, and other unethical services?
- 34:17Most people have no idea that they're footing the bill for
- 34:20procedures that go directly against their beliefs.
- 34:23Well, there are health sharing ministries.
- 34:25Some families need and want standard insurance.
- 34:28That's why I'm so excited to share about Presidio Healthcare,
- 34:31the nation's first pro-life Christian health insurance
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- 34:45can join the wait list and check out Presidio's nationwide
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- 34:54country. Go to presidiocare.com.
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- 35:49This news just broke yesterday. I think this New Yorker article
- 35:52came out. I was, I've been following this
- 35:54story since the summertime when I first heard about it.
- 35:57You know, mansion in Los Angeles discovered that there's over 20
- 36:01babies being raised in this mansion by this couple.
- 36:06And all of these babies were bought via surrogacy.
- 36:11Now, rarely will the media entity report them as being
- 36:13bought because they're not honest.
- 36:16That is what's happening now. You pay what?
- 36:18How much money is surrogacy? I believe that in California I
- 36:21was just looking at a Californian website for a
- 36:24surrogacy and they put it at 160 to 200,000 to purchase a child
- 36:28in California. Insane.
- 36:31And that's because you're paying for the donor sperm, the donor
- 36:34eggs, whatever the selection process involves.
- 36:37And then you're paying for the gestation, the mother that is
- 36:41not actually acting as going to act as mother, but she's
- 36:43carrying the baby and then. All of the IVF cycles, IVF
- 36:47cycles, the storage fees that go along with that, all of the
- 36:50legal fees, all of the clinic fees, all of the doctor fees.
- 36:54But notice who you're not paying.
- 36:56There's no social worker coming to your house.
- 36:58We're not doing any fingerprinting or background
- 37:00checks like those of us that have adopted.
- 37:03We also spent money. A lot of us spent 10s of
- 37:06thousands of dollars. And you know what never
- 37:09happened? Our money never went to the
- 37:12birth mother. Our money never went to the
- 37:14first family. I used to be responsible when we
- 37:18were when I was at the Chinese adoption agency, I was
- 37:21responsible for compliance with international federal and state
- 37:25level laws. The money went to lawyers, is
- 37:27what you're saying. The what?
- 37:28The money went to lawyers and bureaucracy is what you're
- 37:30saying. The money went to systems that
- 37:33were supposed to be set up for child protection.
- 37:35You think they do a good job in the adoption world?
- 37:37I would say that the adoption standards are good whether or
- 37:43not people follow them and really exalt the best interest
- 37:46of the child. That is where the problems
- 37:48happen. I, I, we can get into what I
- 37:50feel like are the problems with adoption, but adoption as an
- 37:53institution is set up and established around the best
- 37:56interest of the child. When you look at the
- 37:58regulations, when you look at the requirements, it is not to
- 38:01serve adults, it is to. Make sure to pay.
- 38:04The adults have to pay in every way.
- 38:05They have to pay money. They have to bend their lives.
- 38:07They have to subject themselves to pretty invasive questioning.
- 38:11They have to submit medical records and financial checks and
- 38:14and references from friends. Like the people come, they look
- 38:16at how you parent your other children.
- 38:17They look. What are the outlets like?
- 38:19I mean like it's an invasive process.
- 38:20And if they're accompanying a birth mother during her
- 38:23pregnancy, they have no rights over that baby until the until
- 38:27the baby's born and the papers are signed.
- 38:28So this happens. They could pay for the medical
- 38:30care, they can pay for the processing, they can pay for all
- 38:32the things, the checks, they can have their home prepared.
- 38:35And they're accompanying this birth mother who's like, I
- 38:37really don't want a mother. This is why I can't, whatever
- 38:38their situation is. And then she's delivers that
- 38:41baby and then she naturally has a deep, intense longing to be
- 38:45with her baby the rest of her life.
- 38:46She says, I just can't go through with the adoption, which
- 38:48is fully her right. And we bless her and support her
- 38:50and she should feel totally free to do that that.
- 38:53But then they walk, they have to walk off and whatever $40,000
- 38:57they've spent or more it, it is what it's, you know, what's done
- 39:00is done in surrogacy, though, that surrogate mother.
- 39:04And now I'm going to let you preach this, but I'm you know,
- 39:07she has no rights to protect her baby.
- 39:10That donor mother who wasn't a donor, she sold her eggs, has no
- 39:13rights to protect her baby. And that's what this story is
- 39:15about. That's right in LA.
- 39:16Let me, let me just read the read the was there anything more
- 39:19you want to add before we get into the story?
- 39:20Let me please do. Let me just set that up even a
- 39:22little bit. Little bit more please do with
- 39:26adoption. People pay money for adoption.
- 39:30That money never goes from intended parents to the birth
- 39:32mother. I mean, I know that there's ways
- 39:34you're like, well, we're taking care of our expenses.
- 39:36What is not happening is I'm giving you money to relinquish
- 39:39your parental rights. If that line is ever crossed,
- 39:42that is the bright red line in adoption.
- 39:44If that has ever crossed, it is no longer an adoption, it is
- 39:47trafficking. When money goes from intended
- 39:50parents to genetic or birth parents to relinquish their
- 39:52rights, it is trafficking. And that was one of the big
- 39:55things that me as sort of the compliance officer had to watch
- 39:58for was there, which was not hard in in Chinese adoption
- 40:01because the birth parents were never even known.
- 40:04But there are some countries and there are some scenarios in the
- 40:07United States where when that line gets blurred, you lose your
- 40:10license because that's not adoption.
- 40:13That is baby buying. But what is it that you're
- 40:16asking for? What do you pay money for?
- 40:18When you get a sperm donor or an egg donor or a surrogate, you
- 40:22literally pay them to relinquish their parental rights.
- 40:25In the contract, it will say, I am accepting this $200 for my
- 40:28sperm, and I promise to never have any contact with the child
- 40:32that might result. You talk about the laws across
- 40:36the United States. There is no state in the United
- 40:38States that will allow a birth mother to relinquish her
- 40:42parental rights before the baby is born.
- 40:44The law presumes that that mother and that baby belong
- 40:47together. Only afterwards, a couple days
- 40:50or sometimes a couple weeks, will she be able to relinquish
- 40:53her parental rights for an adoption.
- 40:56In the world of surrogacy we now have something called a pre
- 40:59birth order where women are forced to legally orphan the
- 41:02child they are carrying in the second or third trimester for
- 41:05surrogacy. When I talk about how the world
- 41:09of big fertility and adoption are polar opposites, I it's not
- 41:12hyperbolic. These two things are totally set
- 41:16up against one another. One serves as a marketplace for
- 41:19adults. The other one serves as an
- 41:21institution on behalf of the children.
- 41:23And so it the people that conflate surrogacy and adoption,
- 41:26I'm like, let's go from the child's perspective.
- 41:30They are. They're nothing alike.
- 41:33All right, that is very it's crazy to me what you're saying.
- 41:36The I mean, and there's a good reason why you're not allowed to
- 41:39pay a birth mother because children are not.
- 41:42You're not supposed to be able to buy human beings ever, ever,
- 41:45ever, ever. But that's exactly what's
- 41:47happening here. And people are just going la,
- 41:48la, la, pretending like it's not.
- 41:50So this is the headline. The babies kept in the New York
- 41:54in the excuse me, this is from The New Yorker.
- 41:56The babies kept in a mysterious Los Angeles mansion.
- 41:59Now more information has come out about this because what
- 42:01happened was last summer this news broke you're very familiar
- 42:04with this A wealthy couple obtained dozens of children
- 42:07through surrogates did they want a family or something else Now
- 42:11this is all about the surrogates like finding out and being so
- 42:13horrified oh, there's twenty other siblings how horrible
- 42:16what's going on No, the most horrible thing about this isn't
- 42:18the family size that's right. Technically you could have a
- 42:21family like, you know, I think about the Duggars, for example,
- 42:2319 and counting. And I know a number of like
- 42:25beautiful Catholic that was they get up to like 1213 kids.
- 42:27Like the issue is not the family size.
- 42:29Although when you have like if you go past 20, you're starting
- 42:32to get potentially unnaturally large because a woman has about
- 42:3520, maybe 25 years of fertility, maybe 30, you know, and
- 42:40typically you have a baby as you get older, you know, every two
- 42:43years is so there's a natural span for a woman to be able to
- 42:46have children. That's right.
- 42:48So to get past 20 kids in an intact household is highly
- 42:53unusual. It's like almost never going to
- 42:54happen. So there's a natural limitation
- 42:57to the number of kids. So but they're at 22.
- 42:59It wasn't 100, it was 22. It's still a lot, but like, OK,
- 43:02then. And then you have the the
- 43:03surrogates are being interviewed.
- 43:04I didn't know. I didn't know.
- 43:06OK, well, of course you didn't know because you gave your baby
- 43:08up. You sold.
- 43:09You sold your you sold your room Well and.
- 43:10Because there's no requirement to tell these surrogates
- 43:13anything about the intended parent.
- 43:15Well, it goes. It goes a lot in here about how
- 43:17there's this one surrogate that it follows and, you know, she's
- 43:22interacting with the mother, the adoptive mother, Sylvia, the
- 43:25purchaser, the purchaser who's this like Asian lady who shows
- 43:28up with this leather jacket at the hospital.
- 43:30And she's like handing out $100 bills to all the surrogates.
- 43:32And she thinks, oh, she's kind of an, you know, a little bit
- 43:34erratic, but, you know, she seems like on top of it.
- 43:37And, you know, she's just saying, well, she was so nice.
- 43:39She like gave me money. She like sent me a gift for my
- 43:41other kids. She was doing this with like,
- 43:43again, dozens and dozens of surrogates.
- 43:44But this was the part that really just sunk me.
- 43:47He was like, OK, what's what, what is their intention?
- 43:49And and their reason was, well, we just wanted a lot of kids
- 43:52like so it's still unclear. They're probing the case.
- 43:56But here is here is I would I would say a part of the big
- 43:59towel and it's buried in The New Yorker article.
- 44:02Like you have to like, you know, later on, child welfare cases
- 44:06are confidential. But given that Elliott knew
- 44:09Hayes full name and birth date and that she had recently given
- 44:12birth to her. Now, Elliott is one of the
- 44:14surrogate moms and Hayes was one of the children.
- 44:17She was able to get get through to a caseworker at the LA County
- 44:22Department of Child and Family Services.
- 44:23Now, again, the only reason The New Yorker knows this is because
- 44:26one of the surrogate moms did her own sleuthing and she was
- 44:28able to kind of bend the rules a little bit because she has no
- 44:30legal rights to this child, even though she should.
- 44:32But, you know, she, she relinquished them.
- 44:35And again, she's not the biological mother.
- 44:37She is the surrogate mother. So she just carried Hayes.
- 44:40The caseworker said that one of Sylvia and Gujon's infant sons
- 44:44had recently been hospitalized with head injuries.
- 44:46And I think this is this is what triggered the reporting because
- 44:49then police started an investigation.
- 44:51So this baby's in the hospital. What's going on?
- 44:54The baby had twenty siblings, the majority under three years
- 44:57old. That is unnatural.
- 45:00That's right. That's the thing when I talk
- 45:01about big families, it's impossible to have 20 kids under
- 45:043. That's right.
- 45:05You have maybe at most 3 or 4 kids if you have like triplets
- 45:08or and you know you and then you have older kids if it's a big
- 45:11family that help care and there's this beautiful dynamism
- 45:13that happens in the household. That's not what's happening
- 45:15here. All of them, including Hayes,
- 45:18has have been taken into foster care.
- 45:20Thank God, by the way, because listen to this next part.
- 45:22As for the rumors about child trafficking, the FBI was looking
- 45:26into them. A police affidavit that began to
- 45:29circulate last summer offered further clues.
- 45:31It included included photographs of the hospitalized baby
- 45:33restrained by headgear, whose injuries were consistent with
- 45:36those sustained during a car accident or from being shaken.
- 45:39Stills from video recorded inside the home showed a
- 45:42makeshift classroom where toddlers sat in rows at tables
- 45:46facing a whiteboard. Who does this?
- 45:49All the children had shaved heads, and nannies could be seen
- 45:52physically disciplining them, forcing them into squats.
- 45:55Who does that for like a 2 year old, spanking them on top of a
- 45:58table and hitting them in the face.
- 46:00The surrogates searched for the children they'd carried, but the
- 46:02pictures were too blurry to make out individual features.
- 46:05So it was. It was an abuse House of
- 46:07horrors. So this is horrifying for a lot
- 46:11of reasons. And I've been on several
- 46:14interviews asking about it because I'm, I'm actually really
- 46:16glad The New Yorker spent the time to dig into this because it
- 46:19was so it was one of several shocking surrogacy related
- 46:23stories last summer. But you know, the news cycle
- 46:25moves on. And so I'm really glad that you,
- 46:27like, looked into this. I've been on several interviews
- 46:30about this over the last couple months and people like, this is
- 46:32just awful. This is a case of surrogacy gone
- 46:34wrong. And I'm like, misunderstand.
- 46:38This is surrogacy as designed. This is exactly what surrogacy
- 46:41is supposed to do. There's nothing illegal here.
- 46:44There's nothing unethical. What's not illegal is you're
- 46:46saying because it's illegal to abuse children.
- 46:48Thank God. Thank God for that.
- 46:49It's still illegal to abuse children.
- 46:51But what you're saying is not illegal is to pay 20 surrogates
- 46:53to give you 20 babies. There's no paperwork, nothing.
- 46:56I mean, there's paperwork, but there's no legal, you know,
- 46:58enforcement beyond that. And then you're you're you're do
- 47:00whatever you want basically with those the whole.
- 47:02Point is to sever children from well, the way I talk about it is
- 47:07what is surrogacy from the child's perspective.
- 47:10Surrogacy splice is what should be one person mother into 3
- 47:15purchasable and optional women. The genetic mother who
- 47:18contributes her egg that helps children answer the question
- 47:21about biological identity. That's critical when it comes to
- 47:24identity consolidation. It's very hard for kids to
- 47:28answer the question, who am I? If they can't answer the
- 47:31question, who's am I? Which is why in the United
- 47:35States today, 95% of adoptions are open adoptions because
- 47:39children benefit from as many connections to and a
- 47:42relationship with, when it's safe, their first family.
- 47:46The second mother is the birth mother.
- 47:48This is the woman with whom we formed that the neutral bond
- 47:52that the child can then build on throughout the rest of their
- 47:54life as it relates to trust and attachment.
- 47:56It's critical. And then the third is the social
- 47:59mother, the woman who provides that maternal love.
- 48:02That female satisfies the female hunger every day.
- 48:05So surrogacy splits up these three women.
- 48:08The child always loses their birth mother, sometimes their
- 48:11genetic mother, sometimes they don't have a social mother at
- 48:13all. OK, so that's what started. 20
- 48:14babies didn't have social mothers, they had abusive.
- 48:17They have nannies, babies, institutionalized scale of care.
- 48:21Now what is another detriment about the 2 girls being raised
- 48:25by the boy, by the two men and all these other children that
- 48:29are procured through sperm and egg donors and often surrogates
- 48:32is they have unrelated adults in the home.
- 48:36So we've been studying family structure for close to 50 years
- 48:41and we know something about what it takes for children to be safe
- 48:44and loved. And it is Raised by their own
- 48:47biological mother and father in a lifelong union in a low
- 48:50conflict relationship, scholars on the left and the right will
- 48:53say the biological parents are the most connected to, invested
- 48:57in and protective of them. What elevates risk for children?
- 49:02Unrelated adults in the home? If there's unrelated adults,
- 49:05especially new stepparents or boyfriends or girlfriends, risk
- 49:10of abuse and neglect increase. That's the very reason why
- 49:14adoptive parents go through vetting and screening because
- 49:16social workers are not idiots. You can't simply walked into
- 49:19adoption agency and say I intend to parent this.
- 49:21I'd love to be a parent. I really I want to be a mom.
- 49:23They won't hand you a child. They'll say thanks.
- 49:26You're actually a statistical danger to this kid.
- 49:28So we're going to come look at your house.
- 49:30We're going to ask your friends, we're going to get some
- 49:33fingerprints and then we'll decide whether or not you can
- 49:36adopt A child. There are heroic step parents
- 49:41out there who are filling the gap of a negligent biological
- 49:44parent, but anytime on a on a population wide level, if you
- 49:49have a family structure that includes an unrelated adult,
- 49:52what are you going to get? Massive skyrocketing rates of
- 49:57abuse and neglect. What do you what does it take to
- 49:59have 15 children under the age of three years old?
- 50:03Lots of unrelated adults in the home.
- 50:05So it's not unfortunately a surprise that these children
- 50:08were subjected to abuse because these other adults are not going
- 50:12to love and care for them and invest in them the way their own
- 50:14parents will, even if they're well paid, right?
- 50:16I mean, good heavens, the terrible videos that we've seen
- 50:19of children being abused in daycares recently, that is
- 50:22another example. They don't have the same level
- 50:24of investment and protectiveness as you will for your own kids.
- 50:28We have no idea even if these children are the genetic
- 50:30children of Sylvia Jiang and Shen Guojun.
- 50:33Like we don't know because nobody cares.
- 50:36Big Fertility doesn't ask. It actually is completely
- 50:38immaterial whether or not these babies go home to their genetic
- 50:41parents. In fact, it's preferable if they
- 50:43don't. A lot of these people don't have
- 50:45a sperm or an egg to create the baby.
- 50:48So the whole premise of surrogacy is commercial,
- 50:52intentional separation from mothers, the commodification of
- 50:56children. So this is not surrogacy gone
- 50:59wrong. This is surrogacy as designed.
- 51:03The whole design is to separate children and distribute them to
- 51:06anybody with a ballot contract. Well, I think to the way even
- 51:10this article is written and certainly the way that surrogacy
- 51:14is talked about in virtually all media today, and certainly how
- 51:17it's presented on social media by influencers, you're like, I
- 51:20did surrogacy and they're like the same sex couple.
- 51:22Whatever is, it's all about the experience of the adults.
- 51:26And there's almost nothing ever talked about the the only
- 51:29reference of the experience of the child in this entire New
- 51:32York article was that one line about the shaved heads.
- 51:35There's nothing about like any of what you're saying about the
- 51:37impact on these children lifelong about what other
- 51:40horrors they've been enduring. Nothing.
- 51:42The only time it mentioned sort of like stress on human beings
- 51:46besides these children for just that one line in this like very
- 51:49long, I don't know how many words it is, but it's multi
- 51:51pages of an article. Surrogates.
- 51:53It's all about the poor surrogates, poor girls that they
- 51:57they have the emotional baggage now of knowing that the babies
- 52:02that they help sell are now abused and they are suffering.
- 52:06Here's a nine surrogacy is The New Yorker again, I don't mean
- 52:08to hate on this this woman writing this article.
- 52:11Of course, God bless all of everyone, everyone including
- 52:14her. But it just shows the the utter
- 52:16blindness and it's why your work is so key.
- 52:18Katie. It she writes the author.
- 52:21Surrogacy requires a kind of emotional rigor.
- 52:24For who? Part of the job involves
- 52:26training oneself to not get too attached.
- 52:28Who's training? Why do you have to do that?
- 52:30Why do you have to untrain yourself to get attached?
- 52:32Do you think attachment is normal?
- 52:34Go ahead. And again, it's all about the
- 52:35woman. Forget, it's not about the rigor
- 52:38that surrogacy demands of the child, right?
- 52:40But the more the women learned about the intended parents, the
- 52:43more they started to wonder if the moral thing to do was to
- 52:45intervene. So the the entire question of
- 52:48morality in this article is framed about the dilemma.
- 52:50And again, again, I knew she was trying to look for a trendy
- 52:53angle, but the whole article instead about the morality of
- 52:56surrogacy is the moral questioning of the surrogates
- 52:59about whether or not they're allowed to intervene in the fact
- 53:02that the babies that they sold are now effectively being
- 53:04trafficked and they were abused. Yep.
- 53:06So that is the pattern. I will say every issue that we
- 53:10deal with, whether it is challenging gay marriage,
- 53:13whether it is objecting to no fault divorce laws, whether it
- 53:16is all the reproductive active technology, trending items, it
- 53:19is always obsessively focused on adults and what they want and
- 53:22how they feel and their backstories and their longings
- 53:24and their losses. The children, their rights,
- 53:28their needs, the way they've suffered, their wounds, their
- 53:31losses are secondary or completely ignored.
- 53:35And that is why we have all of these revolutions, the
- 53:39technological revolution. That's why we've had the legal
- 53:41revolution. We've overhauled parenthood,
- 53:43we've overhauled marriage to make it a vehicle of adult
- 53:45fulfillment. We've redefined parentage laws,
- 53:47which only is something that makes this possible.
- 53:50You know, we have completely changed the way we think about
- 53:53marriage and family culturally, because we've said if the adults
- 53:56are happy, the kids will be happy or kids are resilient or
- 53:58love makes a family, all of them is obsessively focused on
- 54:01adults. Nobody looks at it from the
- 54:03child's perspective. Nobody allows the child, gives
- 54:06them a voice, shares how they are going to be harmed if the
- 54:10adults get what they want. And so that's one reason why
- 54:13them before us is so unpopular because we really do work to
- 54:16say, well, in this situation, we're going to tell you how the
- 54:19child is going to be divorced if you run off with your trainer,
- 54:21but he's because he's the guy that really gets you.
- 54:23And my husband doesn't do 50% of the dishes and doesn't
- 54:25understand my unseen mental load.
- 54:28You know, whatever the divorce pornographers on Instagram,
- 54:31these women. That's a that's a good take,
- 54:33Katie. But, and now we're going into
- 54:36another very important thing I wanted to address in this
- 54:38interview, which is it's not just about, oh, same sex couples
- 54:42wanting to be married so they can adopt or create these kids
- 54:44via surrogacy and how problematic and harmful that is.
- 54:47And it's not just about these like more extreme cases of these
- 54:49babies that are in this, you know, mansion, but it's also
- 54:52about divorce. It's also about decisions and
- 54:55just, you know, other more normal marriages.
- 54:58Before we get to that though, I I want to ask you, and this is
- 55:01this is connected, of course, but I I need to ask you a couple
- 55:03things. First of all, in terms of the
- 55:06social data about the outcomes for children raised in same sex
- 55:10couples households versus more traditional households.
- 55:15There's a long standing narrative out there that says,
- 55:17oh, the data actually shows that if you're raised in the same sex
- 55:20household versus a traditional household with a mom and a dad,
- 55:23you're going to be just fine actually.
- 55:24And sometimes the outcomes are better.
- 55:26Yeah. Tell me about what the data
- 55:28actually says. The surveys that have been done
- 55:30over the last few decades actually say about outcomes for
- 55:33children raised with same sex parents versus.
- 55:35In a household with a mother and a father, good.
- 55:37This is actually something that everybody needs to know.
- 55:39You need to be able to answer this question because if you've
- 55:42ever been in a conversation, especially online with somebody
- 55:44and you're like, kids need mothers and fathers.
- 55:46Somebody is going to like 5 seconds later drop in the
- 55:49Cornell aggregate. Oh, 75 out of 79 studies to show
- 55:53that kids with two moms or two dads, fair, no different or even
- 55:56better. And you need to know how to
- 55:57answer that because that looks pretty damning.
- 55:59You know, it looks like, Oh well, you've got an airtight
- 56:01case at our then before a sub stack.
- 56:04I wrote a month and a half ago about those studies.
- 56:07I said, let's look at all 75 of those no different studies and
- 56:11let's just see how did they come to their conclusions?
- 56:13What kind of data did they pull? How did they get their
- 56:15information? Who did they invite into their
- 56:17studies? And this has been long known.
- 56:19A Heritage Foundation did a write up about this in 2015.
- 56:24But all of those studies that showed no differences, It's so
- 56:27strange because nobody was even asking the question about same
- 56:29sex parenting until Bergerfell, until like, that gay marriage
- 56:34legal regime came on the scene and they needed some kind of
- 56:37data to say, actually, the kids are going to be fine.
- 56:40And so you see this glut of studies arrive on the scenes in
- 56:43the, you know, really like 2008 to 2012, right?
- 56:48Suddenly there's just this explosion of studies.
- 56:51So when you look at the methodologies of those studies,
- 56:54what do you see? Like a gold standard would be,
- 56:57we are going to survey the actual outcomes of kids.
- 56:59We're going to look at their report cards or their medical
- 57:02records, or were they ever arrested?
- 57:04Were they on welfare? Did they have an IEP?
- 57:06We're going to get these people at random.
- 57:09We're going to like pull from government data.
- 57:11We're going to study them over a long period of time.
- 57:13We're going to have adequate control groups.
- 57:15That's kind of how you know whether or not the conclusion of
- 57:18the study is something that can be extrapolated for the general
- 57:20population. Of those 75 studies, do you know
- 57:24how many of them actually followed what we would consider
- 57:28to be the gold standard for scientific research?
- 57:31How? Many one.
- 57:32And what did the one find? It found that in cases of
- 57:36children raised by lesbians, there was no effect on the
- 57:40graduation rates. That's it.
- 57:43So that's graduation rates. Now the other 75, and I make a
- 57:46comment really quick, is that in part because if you're a lesbian
- 57:49couple and you go through the process of being able to adopt A
- 57:52child or do you're usually of means?
- 57:54Yes, And so it's probably a socioeconomic advantage.
- 57:57Did they control for that? That one I don't know if they
- 58:00did. But that would be interesting
- 58:02because if you're like, you know, again, if you're, if
- 58:04you're have more money, you're more, it's going to be much
- 58:06easier to, you know, usher a child through graduation, high
- 58:09school graduation. To be fair, there was another
- 58:12study done in the Netherlands in 2000 after this Cornell
- 58:15aggregate was formed that found the same thing.
- 58:18Lesbians in the Netherlands had children whose academics were
- 58:21not affected by having same sex parents.
- 58:24But again, that probably had to do with higher socioeconomic
- 58:27levels, not necessarily the absence of a father.
- 58:30But then you look at the other 74 studies and you're like,
- 58:33well, then how did these 74 studies, you know, they
- 58:36generally used recruited participants.
- 58:38It's the kind of thing where they went to the LGBTQ center
- 58:40and said, hey, we're doing a study on same sex parenting and
- 58:43how kids are fair. Who wants to who wants to
- 58:46participate in this? By the way, it could have
- 58:48implications for marriage equality in the future.
- 58:50And So what they would do is they would give these lesbians a
- 58:53survey and they'd be like, check off how's your kids doing in
- 58:55terms of health? Do they love having a same sex
- 58:57parent? Are they doing well in school?
- 58:59There was self reported data. It was the parents reporting how
- 59:02they felt like the children were doing while the kids were still
- 59:04in their home with. No objective measures beyond
- 59:07that. That's right.
- 59:08That's insane. That's insane.
- 59:10That's not following the science that is creating the bias.
- 59:12That's what it is. It's biased studies.
- 59:15And again, these were not randomly derived participants.
- 59:18They were recruited. And so it's interesting because
- 59:21of the studies that did not recruit their participants, all
- 59:25of them found disadvantage. OK, so let's talk about that.
- 59:27So you mentioned these 75 studies, 7 right, 75 Yep, 74 of
- 59:31them junk. It's just like, you know,
- 59:33basically promotional, yes, materials for probability.
- 59:37One of them is interesting about the lesbians when the higher
- 59:40probably higher socio economic who the kids have good outcomes
- 59:42with graduation doesn't get into identity disorders or mood
- 59:45disorders or you know anything else later in life.
- 59:47But that's interesting. What does the data outside of
- 59:51the Cornell meta study whatever say about same sex upbringings
- 59:56for kids versus in a more traditional household?
- 59:58This is the question, and the way that I help people think
- 1:00:01through this carefully, is whenever sociologists are
- 1:00:05studying any family structure other than same sex headed
- 1:00:09households, they all agree on several things #1 biological
- 1:00:14parents. They're the most connected to,
- 1:00:17invested in, They spend more time and money and protective of
- 1:00:20kids, less likely to abuse, less likely to even allow household
- 1:00:23accidents. They're more attentive to the
- 1:00:25children. Biological parents advantage
- 1:00:27children #2 mothering and fathering is different, like men
- 1:00:32and women offer distinct and complementary benefits to
- 1:00:36children. We just had this incredible
- 1:00:37study come out just this last week about a father's
- 1:00:40involvement when a child is 10 months old.
- 1:00:42The father's involvement at 10 months old had these incredible
- 1:00:45implications from when the child was four and five years old,
- 1:00:48different from what mother provided.
- 1:00:50There was something like what? What does that look like?
- 1:00:52It was levels of like cognitive development ability, resilience.
- 1:00:56Engagement with the child just. Engagement with the child and
- 1:00:58the mom, it didn't necessarily. She was sort of the baseline.
- 1:01:01It wasn't like more maternal love or more increased
- 1:01:04connection with mom changed anything.
- 1:01:06Mom was the baseline. What did dad provide?
- 1:01:09And he had these incredible benefits years later.
- 1:01:12Just by throwing a baby in the air, I mean I'm imagining what a
- 1:01:15dad interaction with dad interaction at 10 months.
- 1:01:17But let's talk about how they interact differently, why it's
- 1:01:20so beneficial to children. So mothers tend to care for
- 1:01:24kids. Fathers tend to play with kids
- 1:01:27and I will often illustrate this.
- 1:01:29What is it that mothers do that's so distinct?
- 1:01:32They promote attachment in children.
- 1:01:33We are constantly pulling them in, nurturing, soothing,
- 1:01:38connecting with, very concerned about the immediate emotional
- 1:01:40well-being, responsiveness to infant distress.
- 1:01:43That's like our lane. I even when I'm when, even when
- 1:01:46it's not my kids, I'll like be on a plane and a baby's crying,
- 1:01:49you're behind. Me.
- 1:01:50Give me the baby, I'll take care of them.
- 1:01:52I literally have gotten up and said, can I just do you mind if
- 1:01:56I is that OK? And sometimes the dad, he's
- 1:01:58like, you know, and. There's some here, the baby art.
- 1:02:01We hear a baby crying the night and my husband is like Uber
- 1:02:03sacrificial. He will do anything.
- 1:02:05But I'm the one who just jumps up.
- 1:02:06That's right, Because it's just that's I have to.
- 1:02:08She's my baby. I'm going to get her, you know.
- 1:02:10Erica Komazar, who wrote Being There, The Importance of
- 1:02:13Mothering in the First Three Years, talks about this study
- 1:02:15where they sign they like simulated baby cries.
- 1:02:19When a man and a woman were asleep together, asleep
- 1:02:22together, they simulated baby cry.
- 1:02:25Mom woke up immediately. Dad.
- 1:02:27Yeah. And then they simulated a sound
- 1:02:29that sounded like rustling in the leaves outside.
- 1:02:31Mom slipped through it, and Dad was like, let's fight.
- 1:02:33That's so funny. It's like our auditory
- 1:02:36differences manifest themselves in parenting too.
- 1:02:39Even in sleep. So moms tend to care for kids.
- 1:02:43Their natural interactions with kids lend themselves to children
- 1:02:46developing their fine motor skills.
- 1:02:48So it's with mom that they're coloring or they're cutting or
- 1:02:51they're pasting, they're using their fingers.
- 1:02:53What happens with dad interaction?
- 1:02:55He plays with kids, he wrestles with them, he throws them in the
- 1:03:00air. He runs up the street, he swings
- 1:03:02the hammer, he builds the tree house.
- 1:03:05Dad interactions develop children's gross motor skills.
- 1:03:08You see like this incredible balance.
- 1:03:10And there's no switch that a mom can flip to be like, now I'm
- 1:03:14going to toss my child in the air whenever I see them.
- 1:03:17Like I I'll do this all the time at conferences.
- 1:03:19I'll say, raise your hand if you've ever seen a baby thrown
- 1:03:21up in the air and everybody raises their hand.
- 1:03:24And I'll say, keep your hands up if the person throwing the baby
- 1:03:27was a woman. And two or three hands stay up
- 1:03:31out of, you know, a room of hundreds.
- 1:03:33Women don't throw babies. Men throw babies.
- 1:03:36Men throw babies in South Korea and South Carolina.
- 1:03:38Men like everywhere. And it's so important because
- 1:03:44mothers promote attachment, but fathers promote separation even
- 1:03:48in those early months of life. And it's critical to a whole and
- 1:03:51healthy development. So think about the kids with two
- 1:03:54mothers or two fathers. They're starved of either
- 1:03:57maternal or paternal love. Their development is going to be
- 1:04:01Hanford. They will either be missing that
- 1:04:05parent who everyday, all day, all throughout their childhood
- 1:04:08promotes attachment, even if you're not like swaddling and
- 1:04:11wearing them around the house. You know, I do tend to be the
- 1:04:14parent at home where the kids call me, where they're like
- 1:04:17trying to work out a relational conflict with a friend or
- 1:04:20something like that, right? They call their dad when they
- 1:04:22need a problem solved. They're like, I don't know how
- 1:04:24to transfer this money to the account, right?
- 1:04:26And he's encouraging them towards independence all the
- 1:04:29time. So you get these developmental
- 1:04:32distinctions with mother and father.
- 1:04:33Sociologists agree on that. Men and women are different.
- 1:04:35So biological parents distinctly invest, mothers and fathers
- 1:04:39distinctly develop. And then you've got the aspect
- 1:04:44of maternal or paternal loss. A child in a home with two
- 1:04:47mothers or two fathers have lost their mother or father either to
- 1:04:50death, divorce, abandonment, or commercially at conception.
- 1:04:57When you study each of those independently, children don't
- 1:05:01rise to the level of the well-being of their kid, their
- 1:05:04peers raised by their married mother and father.
- 1:05:07Maternal or paternal loss through death, divorce,
- 1:05:10abandonment or third party reproduction always hinders
- 1:05:13kids. And 4th unrelated adults in the
- 1:05:16home always increase risk of abuse and neglect.
- 1:05:19It doesn't mean they're always going to be abused and
- 1:05:20neglected, but it will always increase risk.
- 1:05:23So much so that sociologist Brad Wilcox, who I know you
- 1:05:26interviewed, said the most dangerous place a child can find
- 1:05:30themselves in the country today is in the home of an unrelated
- 1:05:34man left to care for the child himself.
- 1:05:37So take those 4 sociological truisms, what we know about
- 1:05:42children, what we know about family structure, and then lay
- 1:05:46that over the top of same sex parented homes, they're always
- 1:05:50missing at least one biological parent.
- 1:05:52Lower levels of investment, connection and protection.
- 1:05:55They're always raised by an unrelated adult, increased risk
- 1:05:58of abuse and neglect. They're always suffering
- 1:06:00maternal or paternal loss, death, divorce, abandonment,
- 1:06:03abandonment, third party reproduction.
- 1:06:05They're always starved of maternal or paternal love.
- 1:06:09Any study that says that kids fear no different is a
- 1:06:14sociological miracle it it does not exist in the real.
- 1:06:17World it doesn't exist, it just doesn't exist too on top of that
- 1:06:20it. Can't.
- 1:06:21Exist, have have there been? It's like, can we do a study and
- 1:06:25prove that gravity doesn't exist?
- 1:06:26Well, you could manipulate, you know, research and put yourself
- 1:06:29in a air, you know, a weightless room and you're floating around.
- 1:06:32You're like, gravity doesn't exist.
- 1:06:33It's like you were in the weightless room.
- 1:06:36So like Katy Perry, you know, going to the going out, out of
- 1:06:39orbit on the spaceship. You know, she's floating, but
- 1:06:42she's out of orbit is the point, right.
- 1:06:44So, but have there been studies that have been done of large
- 1:06:49sets of same sex couples that were not that followed gold
- 1:06:53standard? You know, were the gold done in
- 1:06:55the gold standard way, you know, with a, with the right control
- 1:06:58groups that show outcomes? I mean, yes.
- 1:07:00And what do we see? There have been a couple stand
- 1:07:04out. Studies and those are probably
- 1:07:05controversial to do. They probably don't want to do
- 1:07:07those. Oh my gosh.
- 1:07:09The first one was done by Mark Regnerus in 2012.
- 1:07:12Oh, he got hated for that one. They just, they wanted to
- 1:07:15destroy him. They wanted to destroy his
- 1:07:18study. They wanted to destroy his
- 1:07:20career. I remember that they wanted to
- 1:07:21destroy him and they meeting the LGBT lobby.
- 1:07:24Yeah, well, all of academia. All of academia.
- 1:07:27I mean, there has been complete institutional capture in
- 1:07:30academia, especially among the soft sciences.
- 1:07:33And they relentlessly tried to destroy him.
- 1:07:36He stood firm, Thank God his his university stood behind him.
- 1:07:40And he's been so vindicated, like his methodology and
- 1:07:44conclusions have withstood, even under incredible scrutiny.
- 1:07:48So what? What did his study show?
- 1:07:50Well, he found his participants at random.
- 1:07:55He actually talked to the kids themselves when they were old
- 1:07:58enough to report what they had experienced.
- 1:08:02He used adequate control groups. And what did he find?
- 1:08:06Higher levels of violence, higher levels of sexual abuse,
- 1:08:09sexual assault, lower levels of academic attainment, higher
- 1:08:13levels of welfare dependency, higher levels of delinquency and
- 1:08:16substance abuse. I mean it was like 27 different
- 1:08:19markers where once you actually used robust methodologies the no
- 1:08:23difference turned into massive detrimental difference.
- 1:08:27All right. Quick question about the Mark
- 1:08:28Regnera study. So when you say the control
- 1:08:31group versus, you know, the, the, the reported data by the
- 1:08:34child when they're old enough to report it and it's randomized,
- 1:08:39who was the control group? Was the control group just
- 1:08:43anybody that's not a same sex parent?
- 1:08:44It was. A heterosexual married.
- 1:08:46Couple. It was a mother and a father.
- 1:08:47Their own biological mother and father, Yes.
- 1:08:49And that's another problem. A lot of the, you know, when
- 1:08:52you're talking about surrogacy research because we were like,
- 1:08:54well, what? Where's the data showing that
- 1:08:56kids are harmed through surrogacy?
- 1:08:58Well, first of all, we don't do that research because it's
- 1:09:01actually unethical to separate children from their mothers.
- 1:09:04We are not allowed to test this on human infants because it's
- 1:09:07considered unethical. So most of the information we
- 1:09:10have about mother deprivation is from rodents because we're fine
- 1:09:15separating those pups from their mothers, but we won't do it to
- 1:09:17human infants. But even then those studies,
- 1:09:20they don't compare children with heterosexual biological parents.
- 1:09:24Often times it's with other IVF created children where you're
- 1:09:27like, well that's not an adequate control.
- 1:09:29So the controls really matter. Controls matter.
- 1:09:30And I think the other point here, because people might be
- 1:09:32listening and saying, well, OK, maybe it's not as ideal as being
- 1:09:37raised in the household with your biological mother, your
- 1:09:40biological father. They love each other and they've
- 1:09:42staying together because, well, what about all the couples that
- 1:09:45divorce? What about all the heterosexual
- 1:09:47couples where one abandons the other?
- 1:09:49What about the ones where whatever I mean divorce or
- 1:09:52abandonment would be the two things right And your your
- 1:09:56response to that would be? You, that's the right
- 1:09:58comparison. Yeah, that's exactly the right
- 1:10:00comparison. Because children with two
- 1:10:01mothers or two fathers, it's just another form of broken
- 1:10:04home, right? The child has to lose their
- 1:10:06mother or father either full time or part time to accommodate
- 1:10:10what the adults want. That's right.
- 1:10:12And people throw that, you know, objection all the time.
- 1:10:15Well, you must be so concerned about divorce.
- 1:10:17That's why you're I'm like I am. Now I have.
- 1:10:19Been writing about this forever. In terms of adoption, Katie has
- 1:10:22it and you were going to mention other studies, so I do want to
- 1:10:24go back to that. But before we move on from this
- 1:10:26first study, was there a study done comparing a same sex couple
- 1:10:30adopting a child versus a heterosexual couple adopting a
- 1:10:36child? Because in both those cases,
- 1:10:37you're going to deal with biological disconnection, right?
- 1:10:41No, I haven't seen that would be.
- 1:10:42Specifically, I mean, I know what the I know what the results
- 1:10:44will say. I already know.
- 1:10:46But it would be nice to have that to just prove because I
- 1:10:49think there is an argument made when it comes to adoption.
- 1:10:51Let's just, let's just say everybody agrees.
- 1:10:52Listening to the show right now. Oh, yeah.
- 1:10:54Commercial fertility, like, you know, surrogacy.
- 1:10:57Yeah. It's all bad.
- 1:10:57It's being done. It needs to stop.
- 1:11:00We agree. We all agree.
- 1:11:02Well, but gays should, should they be allowed to adopt?
- 1:11:04Why can't gays adopt? Well, they're still
- 1:11:06intentionally severing that child from a future mother or
- 1:11:08father, and so any data that shows mother or father issues is
- 1:11:13going to show up somehow in that data if the study is done
- 1:11:16correctly. Adopted children are usually
- 1:11:19raised by parents who are wealthier, better educated, and
- 1:11:25who even spend more time with their children compared to the
- 1:11:29average heterosexual married biological parent.
- 1:11:32So adoptive parents are actually bring advantages to they tend to
- 1:11:36have more stable marriages too. They break up less often, and
- 1:11:39yet adoptees still don't fare as well, even if they're raised by
- 1:11:42loving, heterosexual, biological, I'm sorry, loving
- 1:11:45heterosexual adoptive parents, a mother and a father.
- 1:11:50They don't fare as well as as the ideal.
- 1:11:52They don't fare as well as children raised by their married
- 1:11:54biological mother and father, even though the adoptive parents
- 1:11:57bring some measurable advantages to the.
- 1:12:00Child, They probably fare better than being raised by a single
- 1:12:04mother who in that case didn't want to parent because, you
- 1:12:08know, and I'm just saying if adoption was God forbid,
- 1:12:11illegal, right, or something like this, and a single mother
- 1:12:14courageously chooses life, she doesn't abort, thank God.
- 1:12:16And she's like, well, I can't adopt this child out.
- 1:12:19You know, the point is that the child, despite having it be the
- 1:12:22Plan B, the plan C is, is not as good as Plan B and plan C,
- 1:12:28meaning single mothers trying to do this.
- 1:12:30She doesn't want to be doing this.
- 1:12:31She's not motivated. And then there's a lot of other
- 1:12:34issues going on. And again, I'm not knocking some
- 1:12:36heroic single mothers who've done a phenomenal job.
- 1:12:38You know, Doctor Sears works on my project over at Chaley that
- 1:12:42we're going to be launching. And he was raised by a single
- 1:12:44mother, father of eight, grandfather of a dozen, plus,
- 1:12:47you know, doing phenomenal work to help families.
- 1:12:49So it's not saying you can't be raised by a single mother and be
- 1:12:51successful. But what we are saying is like
- 1:12:53the data shows the ideal is the ideal and that's what we should
- 1:12:56be. That's.
- 1:12:56Right. You know, promoting ultimately.
- 1:12:58And we, you know, when you look at like race of abuse, there is
- 1:13:04data that comes from the 4th National Incidence of Child
- 1:13:07Abuse study from the United States from 2010.
- 1:13:10I think it's the last wave of information that we have.
- 1:13:12And it shows that the lowest rates of abuse are children
- 1:13:15raised by their married biological mother and father.
- 1:13:18The second lowest is a single mother.
- 1:13:20It is increased, but it's not drastically higher.
- 1:13:24It is when you start including unrelated adults in the home
- 1:13:26that you start to see radical increased.
- 1:13:28Rates of the single mother has live in boyfriends.
- 1:13:31That is the. Number one problem, yeah, but if
- 1:13:33you're a single mother and you're being really smart,
- 1:13:36you're chased. You're like, I'm not going to be
- 1:13:37having men in the home unless I vetted them and married them and
- 1:13:40they're like adopting my child right then that that the child
- 1:13:43can fare well. That's right.
- 1:13:45That's that's a great distinction.
- 1:13:46It's. And so I, you know, I know that
- 1:13:50I'm an adoptive mom. I believe that adoption, I know
- 1:13:52that adoption can be redemptive, but I am totally in support of
- 1:13:57a, a young mother who's pregnant who wants to keep her baby.
- 1:14:02Then we get in on it with her and we all support her because
- 1:14:07that baby needs that woman and that baby's made for that woman
- 1:14:11and another for her. And if we can get around them
- 1:14:13and support the mom and the baby, outcomes for the child are
- 1:14:19going to it's there's hurdles for sure, single mothers, lots
- 1:14:23and lots of hurdles, but it doesn't it's not necessarily
- 1:14:25better. You can't just automatically
- 1:14:27say, well, it's better if she remarries or even it's better if
- 1:14:31the child is adopted. There's a lot of variables when
- 1:14:34it comes to adoption as well. And so it's really just who's
- 1:14:38doing the hard thing on behalf of children.
- 1:14:40A lot of women are single mothers because they were the
- 1:14:43only parent willing to do hard things for kids.
- 1:14:45And sometimes the hard thing is relinquishing the child for
- 1:14:48adoption and then the adoptive parents do hard things for the
- 1:14:50children, even though those kids do tend to experience a lot more
- 1:14:54challenges when it comes to emotional challenges or academic
- 1:14:57challenges or behavioral challenges.
- 1:14:59I. Went down a little bit of a
- 1:15:01rabbit show, but a good one. What was the you you were going
- 1:15:03to mention a second study after Rick Mark?
- 1:15:05Rick Naris's 2012 study. Yeah, Doctor Paul Sullins did 2
- 1:15:09great studies. One used more data and had more
- 1:15:13participants than any of the no different studies combined.
- 1:15:16He pulled from U.S. data and had like it was like 2,000,000
- 1:15:20different samples and from that he got like 520 children with
- 1:15:23same sex parents and used the gold standard.
- 1:15:27And what he found was drastically different rates of
- 1:15:29especially emotional distress in children where they had higher
- 1:15:33rates of daily fearfulness and crying and and mistrust for
- 1:15:37parents. And this should be no surprise
- 1:15:40to us at all, right? Then he reconfigured another
- 1:15:44study that had long been touted as one of those no difference
- 1:15:47studies, Wainwright and Patterson, that had been kind of
- 1:15:50used as the flagship study showing that kids fair no
- 1:15:53different. He realized, hey, I'm going to
- 1:15:55look at this because that's so weird that you are getting that
- 1:15:58that conclusion is so out of step with the rest of the data.
- 1:16:01So he actually went back and looked at the original samples
- 1:16:04and realized that Wainwright and Patterson had misidentified some
- 1:16:07of the couples in the studies attributing same sex when it
- 1:16:11actually wasn't a same sex couple.
- 1:16:12And when he corrected the numbers, he found that these
- 1:16:15kids fare much worse where you had been saying Wainwright and
- 1:16:19Patterson that they would fare no different.
- 1:16:20They're actually faring much worse.
- 1:16:22And one thing that that showed, it's the only study that I know
- 1:16:25of that shows differences between cohabiting same sex
- 1:16:29couples and married same sex couples.
- 1:16:33It's a small sample size but the data was good comparing outcomes
- 1:16:39of kids with married same sex parents and unmarried same sex
- 1:16:41parents, and the kids with unmarried same sex parents did
- 1:16:44better and the kids with married same.
- 1:16:47Sex, parents like they were married, basically.
- 1:16:49Well, I that's what that is. I asked Doctor Solis.
- 1:16:51I'm like, what do you think that is?
- 1:16:53And he said probably because the kids with cohabiting same sex
- 1:16:56parents still had some kind of connection with their missing
- 1:16:59parent, whereas the married parents, the kids with same sex
- 1:17:03married parents, probably had very little contact.
- 1:17:05Maybe it was missing third party reproduction?
- 1:17:07Right. Much more likely.
- 1:17:08To that would be an interesting study to do too.
- 1:17:10It would be great to have data on, but no.
- 1:17:11One wants to study this part of the problem.
- 1:17:13It's too costly. In every way.
- 1:17:16Mostly it's costly professionally, politically, but
- 1:17:18it costs money to do a good study and the people that have
- 1:17:21the money to fund this a good study would never fund it.
- 1:17:24All right, before we talk about a Bergerfeld and we talk about
- 1:17:27greater than your new campaign, I want to ask you a little bit
- 1:17:31about divorce. Yes, this is very controversial
- 1:17:34that we're going to move on. I think it's very clear that we
- 1:17:37should not be permitting same sex adoption.
- 1:17:40I don't think we should be permitting same sex third party
- 1:17:42reproduction. I think 3 third party
- 1:17:44reproduction in and of itself is problematic and should it be
- 1:17:46permitted? Ban the whole fan surrogacy ban,
- 1:17:48IVF ban at all? And people listening maybe that
- 1:17:51sounds shocking when I just said what I just said because we're
- 1:17:53so again, obsessed with doing what the adult just wants to do.
- 1:17:57I have the choice. I have the right to bring if I
- 1:17:59can pay enough money. I have the right to bring a
- 1:18:01child in the world however I please.
- 1:18:02No you don't, right? There's a natural order to
- 1:18:05things and children, like you're saying, deserve a mother and a
- 1:18:09father when at all possible. You know, obviously it could be
- 1:18:11death or some accident or some abuse that might separate that,
- 1:18:14but you don't intentionally create children to then deprive
- 1:18:17them of what they're what they deserve, Right?
- 1:18:19So, but let's talk about divorce because I mean, we'll say, well,
- 1:18:22you're just you're, you're a homophobe.
- 1:18:23This is about you don't not liking same sex couples.
- 1:18:26No, it has nothing to do with that.
- 1:18:27We're talking about you, you, you, your mother is living in a
- 1:18:29same sex relationship. You love her dearly.
- 1:18:32It's not about personal animus against any person or their
- 1:18:35lifestyle or anything. It is about what is best for
- 1:18:37children. That being said, divorce is, I
- 1:18:41don't know if it's an all time high.
- 1:18:43I think it's actually leveled off in the last few years, which
- 1:18:45is good. The 50% divorce rate.
- 1:18:47I don't think that's the accurate data either, which is
- 1:18:49good. We do know though, that since no
- 1:18:51fault divorce and I would say just as importantly, since the
- 1:18:54sexual revolution, divorce has ballooned in this country and
- 1:18:58you see almost daily a story about some celebrity or some
- 1:19:02like buddy who's a divorce apologist talking about how we
- 1:19:06grew apart. So there's no serious abuse or
- 1:19:10neglect. This is like we don't like each
- 1:19:12other anymore, or our careers don't align anymore, or like we
- 1:19:15just don't want to do the same things anymore.
- 1:19:17Chapter of our life has ended. Right, we still love each other.
- 1:19:19We're going to Co parent and then part of the diverse apology
- 1:19:23is always we're going to be private now for the sake of our
- 1:19:26like as if it's all for their kids.
- 1:19:27Like no, you just, you did something shameful.
- 1:19:29You don't want to this. Is not about your kids,
- 1:19:32obviously, it's about you. Now, I want to start off by
- 1:19:35saying, and I know you're going to agree with this, I'm not
- 1:19:38talking about serious abuse. And people would say, well,
- 1:19:42Lila, the difference between abuse and serious abuse, All
- 1:19:45abuse is serious if it's really abuse.
- 1:19:47So I'm not one for like, oh, it's emotionally abusive If I
- 1:19:50raise my voice with my husband or if I'm irritated with him, I
- 1:19:53think it's wrong and I shouldn't do that.
- 1:19:55But abuse, I think is when we're going to talk about abuse, I
- 1:19:59think we should define it as something it's it's a serious
- 1:20:01action. It's not like, ohh, I made my
- 1:20:04wife do the dishes or I was tired and went to bed and left
- 1:20:06the house and mess. Like, yeah, unfortunately these
- 1:20:08things get blurred. But I also don't want to
- 1:20:11downplay the significance of abuse, right?
- 1:20:13Because there's also situations where like, well, I'm not
- 1:20:15abusing you. And they've basically isolated
- 1:20:17this person that took her money. Like lock her up sometimes.
- 1:20:21Don't let her have friendships with her family.
- 1:20:22Like it like that's, you know, could be abuse in a situation of
- 1:20:26control or neglect. So what is the reality of the
- 1:20:29impact of divorce on children? OK.
- 1:20:32I'm glad you started out with, hey, there are times where a
- 1:20:35marriage might need to end. We used to call that at fault
- 1:20:38divorce somebody was at fault for violating their vows that
- 1:20:43they made to having to hold through sickness and in health
- 1:20:45for richer for poorer to death. You part.
- 1:20:47It was supposed to be this mutual full self giving through
- 1:20:51thick or thin, and we're going to stay together no matter what
- 1:20:54unless somebody's being really significantly hurt, objectively
- 1:20:59hurt. Not just I'm going to call him a
- 1:21:01narcissist because I feel like he's.
- 1:21:04He's not doing the dishes. Yeah, he's not doing the dishes.
- 1:21:06OK. You and I both agree that those
- 1:21:08terms of abuse or narcissism is overplayed, I would say so that
- 1:21:13people can justify an easy exit from their marriage.
- 1:21:16So we're not talking about that. We're talking about there are
- 1:21:18really cases where people are at fault and sometimes the marriage
- 1:21:22at minimum needs a separation, sometimes needs to come to an
- 1:21:24end. What were those cases where we
- 1:21:27would say, yeah, that actually justifies ending a marriage?
- 1:21:30So you're saying before no fault divorce was legalized?
- 1:21:32When was that the? Fault.
- 1:21:33The 60 9 was the first time that we had.
- 1:21:35We first started in California. Yeah, Governor Ronald, Governor
- 1:21:39Ronald Reagan passed the first no fault divorce law in 69.
- 1:21:43He would later come to say it was his biggest political
- 1:21:45mistake because it did not have the effect that he thought that
- 1:21:49it would have. But before we had no fault
- 1:21:51divorce, we would say divorce can happen in cases of adultery,
- 1:21:57addiction, abuse, abandonment. Somebody has really violated
- 1:22:02their vows, and then what would happen?
- 1:22:04The innocent party would receive favor from the courts in terms
- 1:22:09of alimony, in terms of child support, and especially in
- 1:22:12custody. Custody in terms of social
- 1:22:15support. The person who is at fault is
- 1:22:18stigmatized and punished, and the faithful innocent spouse was
- 1:22:21rewarded. OK, that's at fault divorce.
- 1:22:24So then in 69 we passed no fault divorce soon after that.
- 1:22:28What was the reason for that? Why?
- 1:22:31Because people wanted the marriage to end, but nobody had
- 1:22:34been at fault. Nobody committed adultery.
- 1:22:36Nobody was an addict. But they're like, but gosh.
- 1:22:40You don't really want to be. Married anymore and so it's
- 1:22:42really uncomfortable because if we want to get a divorce, one of
- 1:22:44us has to. Or there's an affair, but one of
- 1:22:46the one of the spouses wants to make it work.
- 1:22:50I mean, this happens too, right? Or this would happen and if the
- 1:22:53person is having the affair, they couldn't call off the
- 1:22:55divorce. It would have to be the other
- 1:22:56partner, right? With fault divorce.
- 1:22:57So they were. There's just a way that if they
- 1:23:00want to escape without anybody being punished or blamed, then
- 1:23:03they want to split things evenly.
- 1:23:05They would have to lie and say somebody here has committed an
- 1:23:09offense that justifies a divorce, and then that person
- 1:23:12would be punished socially or legally.
- 1:23:15And so it was really an avenue of adult convenience.
- 1:23:19And what did that lead to? It communicated that marriage is
- 1:23:25not an institution and it really is not important for the kids.
- 1:23:29That was the first time that we legally communicated this is
- 1:23:32about adult happiness. And if you cease to be happy, it
- 1:23:36can cease to be a marriage. And so when we think about
- 1:23:39marriage, there's three different characteristics of
- 1:23:42marriage that distinguish it from all of our other human
- 1:23:46relationships, from our relationships with our parents,
- 1:23:48relationships with our siblings, relationships with our tennis
- 1:23:51partner, relationship with our business partner.
- 1:23:53OK, what are those 3 characteristics?
- 1:23:56This relationship, marriage is marked by three things.
- 1:23:59The first one is permanence. It's supposed to be until death.
- 1:24:02The second one is complementarity.
- 1:24:04It requires both halves of the human species to be involved,
- 1:24:08and the third one is monogamy. It's only supposed to be those
- 1:24:13two people excluding all others, forsaking all others.
- 1:24:17And we can get into it if you want, but those 3 attributes
- 1:24:20were not plucked out of the ether.
- 1:24:22They actually have very, very specific child benefits that go
- 1:24:25along with it. We didn't just go, let's just
- 1:24:27make up these different characteristics for marriage.
- 1:24:29All of them are very specifically tied to child
- 1:24:32well-being. So no fault divorce was the
- 1:24:35first time that we actually redefined marriage.
- 1:24:38We said we don't need permanence.
- 1:24:41We'll keep the complementarity and the monogamy, but it doesn't
- 1:24:44need to be until death do us part.
- 1:24:46So what did that communicate? It communicated.
- 1:24:48This isn't. This isn't the building block of
- 1:24:51society. This is a vehicle of adult
- 1:24:53fulfillment. And if you cease to be happy, it
- 1:24:55can cease to be a marriage. And the kids just have to suck
- 1:24:57it up. And the kids, they're going to
- 1:24:59love it because now they have two Christmases, right?
- 1:25:02Those lucky kids. Divorce propaganda?
- 1:25:04No, there's more. Adults than love.
- 1:25:06Them. Yeah, a bonus parent.
- 1:25:07That's right. And kids are resilient.
- 1:25:09They'll get over it. I mean, we had all of these
- 1:25:12different mantras going back to the divorce era of if the adults
- 1:25:15are happy, the kids will be happy.
- 1:25:16Well, kids don't want unhappy parents.
- 1:25:18They would rather have divorced parents who are happy.
- 1:25:20Well, like, let me just say, the gay marriage world just took all
- 1:25:23those arguments, recycled them and applied them to the
- 1:25:25destruction of the second component, which was
- 1:25:27complementarity. They said, well, if, if marriage
- 1:25:32is a vehicle of adult fulfillment, if we don't need
- 1:25:34permanence, well, we don't need complementarity because being
- 1:25:37married to somebody of the same sex makes me happy.
- 1:25:40And if marriage is just about adult fulfillment, this is what
- 1:25:42fulfills me. And now of course, you see the
- 1:25:45polygamists and the promoters of open non monogamy talking about
- 1:25:49how well we don't need monogamous marriage either,
- 1:25:52right? That's hinders my fulfillment
- 1:25:54and my happiness. So yes, divorce is damaging for
- 1:25:58children because children need the permanence that marriage
- 1:26:02brings to their family in their home.
- 1:26:04Now, do you think that at the time when no fault divorce took
- 1:26:08it on its own political, you know, actualization right first
- 1:26:13in California and then it became nationalized?
- 1:26:16Do you think that there them some of the critics of only for
- 1:26:19fault divorce were that well, in a situation of abuse, she
- 1:26:23doesn't have proof and so she's not able to get out and she's
- 1:26:26left penniless and or he's like this crazy narcissistic abuser.
- 1:26:30And so he's able to hide all of the abuse and he's like really
- 1:26:34persuasive in court and he's the one with the bank account and
- 1:26:36she doesn't like. So there were these sob stories
- 1:26:39that helped, you know, mainstream this not just those.
- 1:26:43There were other stories to like, well, I'm just I don't
- 1:26:45want the marriage. I should have the right to
- 1:26:46divorce. That was more prevalent.
- 1:26:48But they're worse for the people that are maybe more like, I
- 1:26:50don't want to do it for adult happiness.
- 1:26:53There were the sob stories of these cases of these women or,
- 1:26:55you know, or a man, but mostly women who weren't able to get
- 1:26:58the divorce that they desperately needed for their
- 1:27:00safety or their security. So that's real.
- 1:27:02It is real that in a case of abuse, I mean, you know, I've
- 1:27:05walked through this. We've been in ministry for a
- 1:27:07long time. So I have walked through cases
- 1:27:10where people are in situations where you're like, OK, that's
- 1:27:13obvious abuse or that looks really close, what is going on
- 1:27:17there? And then you have to get in it
- 1:27:18and be like, how can we help you?
- 1:27:20What's happening? Like what's even real?
- 1:27:21And a lot of times it is true. It is hard for women to prove
- 1:27:24abuse sometimes. Sometimes the the process of
- 1:27:28collecting information so that they can prove abuse is
- 1:27:33dangerous or makes them remain in a situation where you're
- 1:27:37like, I'm not sure if this is dangerous or not, but I'm right
- 1:27:40on the edge. And the stakes are so high.
- 1:27:42The stakes are high because it's their potential physical safety
- 1:27:45and their kids say, but it's also custody, yes, because they
- 1:27:48again, in the in the before no fault divorce, if the woman is
- 1:27:52asking for the divorce, she could lose custody.
- 1:27:54She could lose everything, but she's asking for it for the sake
- 1:27:57of safety. That's right.
- 1:27:58But she can't prove that it's her safety.
- 1:27:59Yes. So when people say, yeah, but
- 1:28:02without no fault divorce, it will be harder for women to
- 1:28:04leave abusive husbands, that's true.
- 1:28:07There are times where it is more difficult to leave without a no
- 1:28:09fault divorce. I know women who have used no
- 1:28:12fault divorce to make a quick, clean exit from somebody that
- 1:28:16was very clearly abusive. That's true.
- 1:28:18And that is a problem that you have to contend with.
- 1:28:20But then, but just to add to that, then they're dealing with
- 1:28:23custody because if there's no fault in the.
- 1:28:25Divorce. This is the problem.
- 1:28:27They're still going to have to prove everything for custody.
- 1:28:29So I know cases personally, and it's a this is kind of like the
- 1:28:33there's always another problem with skipping over the first
- 1:28:35problem. And what I know multiple cases
- 1:28:38personally where they did the no fault divorce, they were being
- 1:28:40abused, there's an abusive situation, they did the no fault
- 1:28:42divorce, but then the. Child is still living with the
- 1:28:45abusive spouse. Part time and that the mom's not
- 1:28:48there to like monitor anything and she's like praying to God
- 1:28:52and and begging that she can get custody.
- 1:28:54And this is of course why some women still to this day stay
- 1:28:56with the abuser to to to watch over the kids because of the
- 1:29:00fear of losing custody. So it's not like no fault
- 1:29:02divorce solved that problem. It might have given a quicker
- 1:29:06exit for for for mom, but now it actually might endanger kids,
- 1:29:10maybe more potentially if she can't get the custody that she
- 1:29:13deserves. And that's where, you know,
- 1:29:15we're not we're not. We haven't solved the problem
- 1:29:17with no fault divorce. We've kind of punted the ball
- 1:29:19maybe. On that issue, we've punted.
- 1:29:21But what No Fault Divorce did is it created unquestionably more
- 1:29:28significant, dangerous situations for more kids.
- 1:29:31And why do I? Say that objectively speaking,
- 1:29:33I'm saying. Objectively speaking, because
- 1:29:37now what happens post divorce, now there's new partners, new
- 1:29:40girlfriends, new spouses that are coming in and out of the
- 1:29:43child's home. Those There are situations where
- 1:29:46biological parents are abusive and the law should come down
- 1:29:50hard on them. But the unrelated adults who are
- 1:29:53joining the family later are objectively and statistically
- 1:29:57much more dangerous to children. Even in cases where a biological
- 1:30:02father abuses children, the kind of abuse that children endure,
- 1:30:07like when it's sexual abuse, the kind of abuse that children
- 1:30:10endure at the hands of mother's boyfriend or stepfather is more
- 1:30:13extreme more. I mean like, I don't know if I
- 1:30:15can say this on your show, but like they sexual abuse from the
- 1:30:18biological father is not penetrative in as many cases as
- 1:30:22it is with mother's live in boyfriend or her new stepfather.
- 1:30:26Like so even the kinds of abuse are more.
- 1:30:28It's all horrible and evil, but the point is there's natural
- 1:30:32there. There's there's distinct
- 1:30:33differences that we would be fooled to not acknowledge about
- 1:30:36the differences between biology and non biology.
- 1:30:39So the case is. And by the way, if you're being
- 1:30:41in any way abused by your father, then he should go to
- 1:30:43jail. I mean.
- 1:30:44Obviously that's exactly right, but this idea that like, well,
- 1:30:48like any 2 will do. And the same with physical
- 1:30:50abuse, by the way, starting her. But like you mentioned, the
- 1:30:52sexual abuse is objectively, if there is sexual abuse, horrific
- 1:30:55that you're comparing biological sexual abuse with, you know, non
- 1:30:59biological sexual abuse at large.
- 1:31:01The non biological sexual abuse is more severe, right?
- 1:31:04It sounds like you're saying is that same with is the same true
- 1:31:07with physical abuse? So emotional abuse and physical
- 1:31:09abuse. My executive director Josh Wood
- 1:31:13at them before us just did a deep dive into abuse because
- 1:31:17once we launched the Greater Than campaign and we were
- 1:31:19talking about how unrelated adults pose distinct risks to
- 1:31:22children, everyone's like, oh, you want to protect children?
- 1:31:24Oh, so you're attacking gay marriage.
- 1:31:26Why don't you go after the pedophile priests and the
- 1:31:28pastors that are praying on them?
- 1:31:29We're like, let's do a little deep dive into who abuses
- 1:31:32children, shall we? Let's take a look at that.
- 1:31:34And So what he said he measured specifically sexual abuse as it
- 1:31:38relates to risk of sexual abuse. And it largely happens in the
- 1:31:41home. It does not necessarily happen
- 1:31:43at church or at school, even though obviously it can.
- 1:31:47School teachers are more of a risk to children than for
- 1:31:52example. Like pastors, Is that true?
- 1:31:54Statistically, yes. You're more likely as a kid to
- 1:31:56be abused at school than at church.
- 1:31:57To suffer some kind of abuse at school.
- 1:32:00Yes, by other adults though, or other kids.
- 1:32:02That is where the data is less clear, but they have received
- 1:32:06some more abuse at public school than you would necessarily at
- 1:32:10other institutional settings. But the idea is like, actually
- 1:32:12the risk to children is people that share living spaces with
- 1:32:15them. That's really where the risk is.
- 1:32:17Yeah, we need to be on guard and vigilant about anybody that is
- 1:32:21caring for our kids or in connection to our kids or having
- 1:32:26relationships with that. We do need to like scrutinize
- 1:32:28coaches or pastors or teachers for that kind of thing.
- 1:32:32Absolutely, 100%. But a lot of it has to do with
- 1:32:35access, and people that share living spaces with children have
- 1:32:39pretty much open-ended access. So anything more that you would
- 1:32:46say on the issue of divorce before we go to a Burgerfile?
- 1:32:49And do you think that we that we should reinstitute at fault as
- 1:32:52divorce? We should roll back no fault
- 1:32:53divorce. I'm not sure if we should call
- 1:32:55it at fault divorce. I've heard Brad Wilcox call it
- 1:32:59divorce justice. We need divorce justice so that
- 1:33:02the innocent spouse and the children receive favor in the
- 1:33:07eyes of the public and in the courts.
- 1:33:09You should be rewarded for trying to work things out and
- 1:33:12keep your marriage together. Like there should not be a
- 1:33:15reward financially or socially for you cutting ties and leaving
- 1:33:19when there isn't a fault involved.
- 1:33:22You know, you talk about divorce rates declining.
- 1:33:25They have, but mainly because marriage rates declined.
- 1:33:29We're not seeing as many divorces because we're not
- 1:33:30seeing as many marriages. And I would say that's also a
- 1:33:34product of divorce that children my age, you know, who are raised
- 1:33:38at the height of the no fault divorce epidemic in the 80s and
- 1:33:42the 90s. What did divorce teach you?
- 1:33:45Well, it taught you no fault divorce taught you anybody can
- 1:33:49leave you for any time for any reason.
- 1:33:53You'll never see it coming and there's nothing you can do about
- 1:33:56it. So children who grow up in
- 1:33:58divorced homes are less likely, less able to form and maintain
- 1:34:02their own healthy relationships later.
- 1:34:04They're less likely to marry. If they do marry, they're more
- 1:34:07likely to get divorced themselves.
- 1:34:09So I think that a lot of the declining marriage rates that
- 1:34:12we're seeing is because that generation learned cohabitation
- 1:34:16is safe, marriage is risky, so I'm just going to shack up
- 1:34:20instead. So this leads us to a burgerfowl
- 1:34:24tell explain to everyone what the the the Supreme Court
- 1:34:27decision of Obergefell found was decided and then what your
- 1:34:31campaign greater than is doing. What was Obergefell?
- 1:34:35It was the Supreme Court decision in 2015 that mandated
- 1:34:39gay marriage for the entire nation.
- 1:34:42What did it do? It prohibited making any
- 1:34:45distinctions between same sex and opposite sex couples.
- 1:34:49That's what Justice Kennedy said in his opinion for that
- 1:34:52decision, that same sex couples needed to be afforded the full
- 1:34:56constellation of benefits of marriage, that we needed to
- 1:35:01treat these two pairings exactly the same.
- 1:35:04Now, you could make a case that they have the same strength of
- 1:35:07feelings. They definitely have the same
- 1:35:09dignity. People that identify as gay and
- 1:35:11people that identify as straight have the same level of dignity.
- 1:35:14They're both made in the image of God.
- 1:35:16But as it relates to these two couplings, there are areas where
- 1:35:19they will never be the same. What is that area?
- 1:35:23And and quick interjection. They should have the same legal
- 1:35:25status individually, right, With all the Soji laws.
- 1:35:28Yeah, like, like, like an individual person who identifies
- 1:35:32as gay. It's not like he should get more
- 1:35:33of a speeding ticket than a person who's heterosexual.
- 1:35:36He if he does a crime, he gets more punishment than
- 1:35:38heterosexual. Like, that's ridiculous.
- 1:35:40How do you identify? Equal protection under the law,
- 1:35:42regardless of your sexual interests.
- 1:35:44Right. Yeah, but that's not what they
- 1:35:45said, right? They said you can't make
- 1:35:47distinctions between these two pairings.
- 1:35:50Now that is a problem because when it comes to making babies
- 1:35:54and raising babies, there is a massive distinction between same
- 1:35:59sex and opposite sex couples. But now, based on the
- 1:36:02Constitution, you're not allowed to elevate one relationship
- 1:36:06above the other. In fact, you need to make sure
- 1:36:09that same sex couples have equal access.
- 1:36:11So what does that mean? It means that as relates to
- 1:36:14marriage and family in parenthood, parenthood
- 1:36:17especially, the law had to accomplish something that
- 1:36:20biology prohibits, and that was making two adults of the same
- 1:36:24sex parents of a child. That's never something that
- 1:36:26nature is going to accomplish on its own.
- 1:36:28So the law had to deliver it. OK, So what has happened in the
- 1:36:31last 10 years in the name of adult equality?
- 1:36:36We have erased all distinctions in the family as it relates to
- 1:36:40law. We have scrubbed the words
- 1:36:42mother or father from parenthood laws.
- 1:36:44We have allowed unrelated adults on children's birth certificate.
- 1:36:47We have rewired, reoriented parenthood statutes so that
- 1:36:52people can take possession of an infant even if they're not
- 1:36:56biologically related, and they haven't gone through an adoption
- 1:36:58process. That has largely happened
- 1:37:01through a law called the Uniform Parentage Act that uniformly
- 1:37:05stripped children of their right to their mother and father in
- 1:37:07the name of Obergefell era parenthood mandates.
- 1:37:12So that is why everybody comes to California to acquire these
- 1:37:16third party reproduction surrogate babies.
- 1:37:18Because California was one of the first states to adopt the
- 1:37:21Uniform Parentage Act. It mandated these pre birth
- 1:37:25orders that said that women can, should, especially if the buyers
- 1:37:29want it, relinquish their parental rights to the child
- 1:37:31before the baby is born. It instituted intent, right?
- 1:37:35I intend to parent this child, therefore give them to me.
- 1:37:38Even if I'm a pedophile, even if I'm ACCP member, even if I'm
- 1:37:42before a national, even if I'm a 74 year old man, give me the
- 1:37:47baby like it erased there's. No check for sexual abuse.
- 1:37:50There's no background checks. No check for criminal record, no
- 1:37:53nothing. It's insane.
- 1:37:54It's not adopting. You could do 20 babies if you
- 1:37:56had and you. Can mass produce them?
- 1:37:57If you want, you can mass produce them here in the United
- 1:38:00States. We've got billionaires in China
- 1:38:02that are mass producing. There's one that both said he's
- 1:38:04got more than 100 children through Californian surrogates.
- 1:38:07Why is it that they come to California?
- 1:38:09Because they have followed sooner and better the dictates
- 1:38:14of the Obergefell world. That said, if an adult wants a
- 1:38:17baby, it's discriminatory if they are not given the baby.
- 1:38:21There's no distinction made for a biological parent.
- 1:38:23Adoption screening, whether it's male or female, the number of
- 1:38:26parents that can take a child home.
- 1:38:28There's no distinctions as it relates to a medical status.
- 1:38:32Are they infertile? Is that why they needed it?
- 1:38:34No, it doesn't matter, right? They're socially infertile.
- 1:38:36Therefore, now insurance companies can subsidized the
- 1:38:39manufacturing of motherless and fatherless children.
- 1:38:42What Obergefell did in law, it didn't just redefine marriage,
- 1:38:47it redefined how we think about the human child.
- 1:38:50It's no longer children born into a pre political
- 1:38:54relationship with the two people who gave them life.
- 1:38:57In the Obergefell world. The only familial contours, the
- 1:39:01only distinction that makes a family is did the adult get the
- 1:39:04baby that they wanted at the time they wanted in the way that
- 1:39:06they wanted. And they can kill any babies
- 1:39:09along the way that they don't want.
- 1:39:10Destroy the undesired. Born or they're an IVF.
- 1:39:13Separate them from their mother and father, take them across
- 1:39:16borders. The only kind of distinction
- 1:39:19that makes a family in the Obergefell world is did the
- 1:39:22adult get what they wanted? They've erased all of the other
- 1:39:26contours of the natural family, the procreative aspect that
- 1:39:30there's a man and a woman, that biology makes the baby, that
- 1:39:34unrelated adults, disadvantaged children like.
- 1:39:37All of those different contours of the natural family don't
- 1:39:40exist in the Obergefell era parenthood laws.
- 1:39:44So the technology makes it possible to mass produce 21
- 1:39:49children, three of which are under the age 15, of which are
- 1:39:51under the age of three. But that is hard to do if you do
- 1:39:54not have laws that cement those technological decisions under
- 1:39:59the guise of adult equality. So you have to have both, right
- 1:40:02to get these mass produced children.
- 1:40:04You have to both have the technology to sever children
- 1:40:07from their genetic mother or father, but you have to have the
- 1:40:09legal pathways that streamline access for unrelated adults to
- 1:40:13acquire the children. So what did Obergefell do?
- 1:40:17Well, when you make husbands and wives optional in marriage, it
- 1:40:21requires that mothers and fathers be optional in
- 1:40:23parenthood law. But for children, their mother
- 1:40:26and father are never optional. They always need that man and
- 1:40:28that woman. It always leads to their
- 1:40:30thriving. It always redounds to their
- 1:40:32protection. They need it for identity
- 1:40:33formation and they need it for their own healthy development.
- 1:40:36So we are spearheading along with.
- 1:40:40And, and quick interjection, the only way that we can even create
- 1:40:43safeguards in like adoption as an example, is if we acknowledge
- 1:40:46the realities of what children deserve.
- 1:40:48But if you remove that, as you've done with the Burgerfile,
- 1:40:50you could justify removing, you could justify removing all of
- 1:40:54the safeguards in adoption right now.
- 1:40:56Well, for the same reasons that we've removed the safeguards,
- 1:40:58we've never had safeguards in IVF or surrogacy.
- 1:41:02Right now, you've got this bizarre personality split in law
- 1:41:05that says these adults who are adopting a baby have to undergo
- 1:41:08significant vetting, screening scrutiny, background checks and
- 1:41:11home studies. These people who purchased the
- 1:41:13child, they're also unrelated. They can walk out of the
- 1:41:15hospital with nobody. So at some point the law is
- 1:41:18going to have to figure out who they are.
- 1:41:20I mean there should be a class action lawsuit of children who
- 1:41:22are who are the bot children and who suffer adverse consequences.
- 1:41:25The problem is it's a mass social experiment.
- 1:41:27It's a mass. The youngest child that's, you
- 1:41:29know, being creative via IVF and surrogacy today, you know, is
- 1:41:32maybe 30 years old Max. And there's just a few of them.
- 1:41:35That's right. The the, the, the wholesale of
- 1:41:36it being done today. You know, the, the potential
- 1:41:38millions globally and certainly thousands here.
- 1:41:42They're they're little, they're under 20.
- 1:41:43They're still figuring out life. They're sometimes them are
- 1:41:45babies. So we're, we're, we haven't even
- 1:41:47begun to hit what what we will see in the future with the
- 1:41:50stories that will emerge. Across borders, we already know
- 1:41:55that pedophiles have used these technologies to acquire
- 1:41:57children. Lord have mercy.
- 1:41:59Are are they California like hire a surrogate?
- 1:42:01Yeah, what would stop a man? Nothing.
- 1:42:03Katie, what would stop a man from hiring?
- 1:42:06Buying a donor egg? They could use their own sperm
- 1:42:08if they wanted to, or buy sperm hiring a California surrogate.
- 1:42:12Oh, I'm a nice single man and I just love children.
- 1:42:15And, you know, I, I tell the story.
- 1:42:17I'm going to pay you all this money, whatever.
- 1:42:19And she delivers him the baby and she comes to the baby and
- 1:42:22picks up that baby and he takes that baby.
- 1:42:23And the sole purpose of bringing that baby to the world was
- 1:42:25abuse. Yeah, What's stopping that from
- 1:42:27happening? It's already happened.
- 1:42:29How do we know what's happened? I documented 5 different cases.
- 1:42:32I was probably 3 years ago at the Federalist and it was
- 1:42:34something, I think we called it Meet 5 Convicted Pedophiles who
- 1:42:38Acquired Children Through Surrogacy.
- 1:42:39So we already have these cases. How did those children get
- 1:42:42rescued? Some of them, the parents were
- 1:42:45found out because there were trenches of pornography that
- 1:42:48were discovered on their computer.
- 1:42:50So, so the way the children were rescued was because of the FBI
- 1:42:56looking into see Sam child sexual assault materials and
- 1:42:58discovering that the parent had or there was some other
- 1:43:01conviction and they found and then they found out the sexual
- 1:43:03rights. So it was never like, because
- 1:43:04when you're a child and you're and you're in a home.
- 1:43:08You can't cry for help. Yeah, There's no way for you.
- 1:43:10You represent yourself. The answer is some of the
- 1:43:12children weren't removed from the home.
- 1:43:13Some of them are still living with the parent who was
- 1:43:16convicted of sexual offenses. What?
- 1:43:19Because they are the legal parents.
- 1:43:21Where are they going to send them?
- 1:43:22Foster care. Why not foster care?
- 1:43:24Because they haven't abused that child, right?
- 1:43:26Sometimes. That's a that's permitted.
- 1:43:28So you can be, you can be the non biological or the biological
- 1:43:31parent for that matter of a of a young child and the soul
- 1:43:36guardian even. And you can be literally have
- 1:43:39just gotten, you know, whatever added to the child registered
- 1:43:44child sexual abuse list for your C Sam on your computer and
- 1:43:47there's a baby at your house and the baby's not removed.
- 1:43:50So I know that there was one situation in Norway, there was
- 1:43:55he was actually a psychologist that worked in the field of, of
- 1:43:59sociology, like doing child welfare kind of things.
- 1:44:01And he had acquired two children through surrogacy and as a
- 1:44:05single man. And there was all kinds of child
- 1:44:08porn that was discovered on his computer.
- 1:44:10And I believe the children were removed temporarily but returned
- 1:44:13to his care. I mean, one, one thing we don't
- 1:44:16have time to talk about today, but the, the, the lack of
- 1:44:19seriousness, which which we take child sexual abuse in this
- 1:44:21country. Just an anecdote.
- 1:44:23I know of a case where there were these two men and, you
- 1:44:26know, very educated, you know, same sex couple, whatever, and
- 1:44:30they end up being found out to have like incredible amounts of
- 1:44:34C Sam. They were trying to meet up with
- 1:44:36real young children in real life to do sexual abuse.
- 1:44:39They were offering to babysit their friends babies.
- 1:44:43I don't know if they got access to any, but they were like, oh,
- 1:44:45we're happy to we have a date night out.
- 1:44:47I mean and and get guess how much time they spent in prison.
- 1:44:50Oh my gosh. Guess how much?
- 1:44:52I don't know. Two years and then they were let
- 1:44:55free to roam the streets. The thing is that this is if
- 1:44:58you've got the money, this is the obvious choice for predators
- 1:45:01because a lot of them can't find a woman to have a baby with.
- 1:45:05And none of these men, none of them would be approved for
- 1:45:08adoption. Some of them already have
- 1:45:10convictions in their past that would automatically exclude
- 1:45:13them. There was a case a year ago of a
- 1:45:16veterinarian in Chicago who like was known for being a judge at
- 1:45:22dog shows or something, and they busted him as some, I saw that,
- 1:45:27yeah, an underground chat that he was in talking about how in a
- 1:45:31couple weeks I'm going to go pick up my surrogate born child
- 1:45:33in California for to abuse them. Like he explicitly said I'm
- 1:45:36going to have my way with that surrogate baby.
- 1:45:38And thankfully they discovered him.
- 1:45:40But then what? Happened the ones that weren't
- 1:45:42discovered that. Has not been discovered, That is
- 1:45:44how. Many hundreds or thousands are
- 1:45:46not discovered. That's right.
- 1:45:48We have a lot of energy right now about Epstein and I.
- 1:45:50I have the energy. I'm so disturbed and upset about
- 1:45:52the files. It's happening now because of
- 1:45:54surrogacy. That's right.
- 1:45:56It's happening now because of surrogacy.
- 1:45:58Epstein, if Epstein hadn't had surrogacy, imagine what he could
- 1:46:01have done. And he did what he did without
- 1:46:03surrogacy. But imagine what not even in
- 1:46:05Epstein anybody can do because of surrogacy.
- 1:46:08Today. It's it's so back to a
- 1:46:10burgerfile. What is what did, what did they
- 1:46:11get logically wrong? You kind of already explained
- 1:46:13it, but and how are we going to overturn a burgerfile?
- 1:46:16They equated 2 things that will never be equal.
- 1:46:19Two men are never going to be equal to a man and a woman.
- 1:46:21Two women are never equal to a man and a woman.
- 1:46:24What is the difference? A child raised by a heterosexual
- 1:46:27couple that is a product of their sexual union will be
- 1:46:30raised by the two people responsible for their existence.
- 1:46:33The two people to whom they have a natural right.
- 1:46:34The two adults who are the most connected to, invested in, and
- 1:46:37protective of them. The household that where they're
- 1:46:39most likely to be safe and loved, the place where they're
- 1:46:42going to get all of their biological identity and their
- 1:46:44development is going to be maximized.
- 1:46:46What happens in the child the the life of a child with two
- 1:46:49moms, they are always losing a parent.
- 1:46:52They're always in a statistically riskier household.
- 1:46:55They're always denied their biological identity, their
- 1:46:57developments, always Hanford. These two things are not the
- 1:46:59same. But Obergefell forbid states
- 1:47:02from elevating the one family structure where children don't
- 1:47:05have to lose their mother or father to be in it.
- 1:47:07And then they rewrote all the laws to permit not just same sex
- 1:47:11couples to acquire children, but anybody to acquire children.
- 1:47:14That is the necessary consequence of Obergefell.
- 1:47:17There's a Direct Line between gay marriage and child
- 1:47:19commodification. It's not an accident, it is the
- 1:47:23way that it was supposed to go. Otherwise, adults can't really
- 1:47:26be equal if they cannot have access to unrelated children.
- 1:47:31So we launched greater than you can go to
- 1:47:33greaterthancampaign.com and you can look at the direct
- 1:47:36connection between gay marriage and child victimization.
- 1:47:39We have the stories. What how do children feel when
- 1:47:42they lose their mother or father when they are starved of a
- 1:47:45connection with one or both biological parent?
- 1:47:47How they feel the mother hunger or father hunger they
- 1:47:49experience, even if they have two loving moms or two loving
- 1:47:52dads, like what is that like for them?
- 1:47:54And then we have this incredible coalition of, you know, close to
- 1:47:59100 different partners, about 50 of which are listed on the
- 1:48:02website, who are all speaking with one voice.
- 1:48:04Conservatives, Christians in media and academia and policy,
- 1:48:08lawyers, influencers, All of us are saying the same thing.
- 1:48:13And that is, don't touch the kids.
- 1:48:15We're going to retake marriage on behalf of children.
- 1:48:18It is not a vehicle of adult fulfillment.
- 1:48:20It is the primary metric, the primary way that nearly every
- 1:48:24country, every culture, every religion, all throughout
- 1:48:27history, it is the tool that everyone has used to give
- 1:48:31children their own mother and father.
- 1:48:33We have not found anything else that does it better than the
- 1:48:36insistence that a man and a woman commit themselves to each
- 1:48:39other for life, for the sake of their kids.
- 1:48:42So there's been 38 countries that have legalized gay marriage
- 1:48:45across the world. Nobody's even tried to wrestle
- 1:48:49back the definition of marriage for the sake of children.
- 1:48:52But that's what we're going to do.
- 1:48:53I'm so happy that you are spearheading this Greater Than
- 1:48:58and I'm so proud to be a part of it.
- 1:49:00Katie, thank you for the love in your heart because we're doing
- 1:49:04this for the future generations, for the little ones.
- 1:49:07And they don't ever get a seat at the table because they're
- 1:49:10little. That's right.
- 1:49:11They're little. They're they're they're
- 1:49:12vulnerable, they're voiceless. How can people support greater
- 1:49:15than and what do you think the time frame is going to be like
- 1:49:19to accomplish this mission of overturning a burger fell?
- 1:49:21You should go to greaterthancampaign.com.
- 1:49:24You should see right on the homepage, we've got this
- 1:49:25incredible like preview video, Lila's in it and it's just, I
- 1:49:30don't know, star-studded. Like, we have Albert Mohler in
- 1:49:33that and Allie Stuckey and Michael Knowles and Josh Hammer
- 1:49:36and just superstars, superstars of people that have never
- 1:49:40flinched, never wavered, even when they were supposedly on the
- 1:49:44wrong side of history. They're like, no, we're not.
- 1:49:47And now we're going to take this back because this is a matter of
- 1:49:50justice for children. So go and watch the trailer.
- 1:49:52Sign up for the newsletter. We won't spam you.
- 1:49:55We'll just keep you posted about what's happening.
- 1:49:57What does the timeline look like?
- 1:49:59I don't know. You know, I am doing this
- 1:50:03because this is what justice requires.
- 1:50:06And in all of the different things that God has led me into,
- 1:50:10I never know, like, am I going to succeed?
- 1:50:12Am I going to fail? How long is it going to take?
- 1:50:13And sometimes I'm like, how's this going to go?
- 1:50:16God? And he's like, not your
- 1:50:18business. Your business is obey.
- 1:50:21Wow. I will take care of what's
- 1:50:23happening in the future. Right now you work with all your
- 1:50:26might. And it's amazing to have this
- 1:50:28incredible coalition of people from all different corners of
- 1:50:33Christianity and from all different parts of the
- 1:50:35conservative world who are speaking together and saying you
- 1:50:38don't get to have this institution.
- 1:50:40It doesn't exist for your validation.
- 1:50:42It's a critical piece of a just society's way of protecting the
- 1:50:46most vulnerable. So we totally would love
- 1:50:50everybody to come go to greaterthancampaign.com, take
- 1:50:54our little gay marriage quiz, find out how much you really
- 1:50:56know about gay marriage. Sign up for the newsletter,
- 1:50:57especially so that we can keep you in touch.
- 1:51:00Definitely financially support, like we are up against giants
- 1:51:05and we're triggering all the right people, but that does come
- 1:51:08at some expense. We want to produce and will be
- 1:51:10producing videos of kids who grew up motherless or fatherless
- 1:51:14so that you can understand that adults who don't get what they
- 1:51:18want are not the victims, children who are denied their
- 1:51:21rights or the victims. And that is what this campaign's
- 1:51:24about. Before we close out, there's one
- 1:51:26more story that I want you to share with people.
- 1:51:28Brittany Pearson, another California surrogate, was in
- 1:51:33just the last couple years one of the most devastating stories
- 1:51:36that I've ever come across, but one that I think encapsulates
- 1:51:38exactly what we're fighting against with the in the whole
- 1:51:41picture. What?
- 1:51:42What is the story of Britney Pearson?
- 1:51:43She was commissioned by two men to carry a surrogate born baby.
- 1:51:47And she was diagnosed, I think when she was like 20-3 weeks
- 1:51:49with cancer and needed to immediately have treatment that
- 1:51:53was not going to allow the pregnancy to continue, I
- 1:51:55believe. And so she said we can deliver
- 1:51:58the baby, We can try to make sure that the baby's life is
- 1:52:02preserved. And the two commissioning men
- 1:52:05said no, because that baby's probably going to have some
- 1:52:07medical problems. We didn't order a baby that had
- 1:52:10medical problems. We ordered a baby that was full
- 1:52:12time. Yeah, that's what.
- 1:52:14And she said, OK, well, that's fine.
- 1:52:15I will then find somebody to adopt the baby.
- 1:52:18And they said, no, we don't want our genes out there.
- 1:52:21Because one of the one of the men had been the sperm donor.
- 1:52:23Had been the genetic father, right?
- 1:52:25And so we don't exactly know she's been Brittany was pretty
- 1:52:28opaque when she talked about what happened, but the baby
- 1:52:30didn't live. We don't know whether it was
- 1:52:32aborted or whether she delivered and the baby died, but what's so
- 1:52:36interesting to me? About that, I thought they they
- 1:52:38intentionally with healthcare. I'm not sure exactly.
- 1:52:42I I maybe don't remember the exact details.
- 1:52:45I have never heard her put her finger on exactly how the baby
- 1:52:48died. But what's so interesting to me
- 1:52:50in that story is the two people who bought the baby, the genetic
- 1:52:54father, had less concern than the supposed oven for their bun.
- 1:52:59I mean, that's so often how surrogacy is betrayed.
- 1:53:01Oh, I'm not the mother. I'm just the oven for somebody
- 1:53:02else's bun. Why did the oven care more than
- 1:53:04anyone else? Why?
- 1:53:07Because women bond with babies, and very often it is that human
- 1:53:10woman, the birth mother, even if she's not genetically related,
- 1:53:13who is the one who actually loves and cares for and wants to
- 1:53:15protect the children the most. Unfortunately, when you're
- 1:53:18paying six figures for a child, very often that does not carry
- 1:53:22over to the specific love and connection and protection that
- 1:53:26we're told that if these kids are so loved and wanted,
- 1:53:28obviously they're going to do just as well.
- 1:53:30It looks like biology matters and birth mothers matter and
- 1:53:33women matter as it relates to child well-being and even child
- 1:53:36survival. Katie Faust, thank you so much.
- 1:53:40Incredible work cheering you on and and proud to be a part of
- 1:53:43it. Very glad to have you on board.
- 1:53:45We're so thankful for live action.
- 1:53:46We're so thankful that you guys have chosen to spotlight stories
- 1:53:50of child protection, even if they don't specifically relate
- 1:53:54to abortion. All of this comes down to
- 1:53:57whether or not we are going to force the weak to sacrifice for
- 1:54:00the strong, and it can't be that way.
- 1:54:01It needs to be us, the adults sacrificing for children and not
- 1:54:04the other way around. Amen.
- 1:54:06Thank you so much, Katie. Thanks.
- 1:54:07A big thank you to our channel partner.
- 1:54:09EWTNEWTN is the world's largest religious broadcast network,
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