SSM WON'T WORSEN CRISIS IN THE BLACK FAMILY: Earl Ofari Hutchinson

...A Pew Research Poll taken immediately after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld same-sex marriages last year found that far more blacks than whites disagreed with the court's decision.

The two reasons most often heard for their rabid opposition is a biblical passage decrying homosexuality and deep resentment at comparing the gay marriage fight to the civil rights struggle. But the reason frequently whispered is that gay marriage will wreak mortal damage on a black family deep in crisis.

A higher-than-average divorce rate and a chronic shortage of marriageable men due to double-digit unemployment and the staggering imprisonment and mortality rates for young black men make that argument appealing to many blacks.

But the fear that gay marriage will further shatter the black family hinges on the shaky premises that there are thousands of gay men and women lying in wait to subvert traditional family values and that there is even a recognizable traditional stable family.

No one really knows how many black men or women consider themselves exclusively gay. An estimated 3 million same-sex couples in the United States maintain households, and the number of blacks living in same-sex households is only a small percentage of that number. That pales in comparison with the nearly 60 million traditional married couples in the country. ...

In 2000, nearly 70 percent of black children did not live in traditional two-parent households, one out of four children was born out of wedlock to a single woman and one out of two children was born out of wedlock to a single black woman. Half of all marriages ended in divorce.

Meanwhile, more than 50 percent of black women never married. All types of family and child-rearing relationships and parenting combinations have evolved over the past decade that were barely existent a generation ago.

There are single working women, single working men, custodial grandparents, single male and female couples, step-parents, foster parents, designated guardians, foster caregivers and even children raising siblings.

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posted by Eve at 2:31 PM VOTE

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