That's just biology

Dropping my son off for school this morning, I got myself into an interesting exchange with some of the boys in his class over whether one of them would ever get married.  It roughly went as follows:

Child #1 (largely apropos of nothing):  I'm never getting married!

Me:  Okay.

Child #1:  No, really!  I'm NOT getting married!

Me:  Okay - you don't have to.  But you might change your mind someday.  Or you might not.  Maybe it's best not to decide when you're six.

Child #1:  No.  I've already decided.  I'm NEVER getting married!

Child #2:  But you have to get married SOMEDAY, Child #1!

Child #1:  No.  No, I don't.  I'm NOT getting married!

Child #3:  But if you don't get married, you can never have a baby.

Me:  No, that's not true.  You don't have to be married to have a baby.  That's just biology.

As the debate continued behind me, I looked down at my son, who was crunching Ritz crackers and watching keenly, then over to my son's teacher, who was snickering.  Then it hit me: it is entirely possible that Child #3's parents had told him that you have to be married to have a baby - and it was even more than just "possible" that if they did tell him that, it was because it is a core value or ideal to them that you should be married before you have children.

Yikes.  I am SO going to get a phone call.

Now, in my own defense (because this is MY blog and I can do what I want here), what I said was technically accurate.  It is not a biological requirement to be married before a child can be produced.  My guess is that if it WAS a biological requirement, we would not be having so many other debates in this country about the availability of contraception, access to abortion, gay rights, etc. etc. etc., and there would not be nearly as many single mothers (and fathers, natch) out there. So, at least as far as the "structural integrity" of my statement goes, I feel pretty good.

Plus, it was, is and will always be important for me to ensure that my adopted son understands that there was nothing that his birth mother (who was not married when she had him) did that was wrong.  I also do not want him thinking that he has to get married when he is older; if he meets someone and falls in love and they want to get married... great!  More power to him.  If not, I am perfectly fine with that as well.  If he wants to have a baby but he isn't married (for whatever reason!), I want him to know - intellectually as well as deep down inside - that this is OKAY.  I won't judge him, and I will defend his choice to my dying day as vigorously as he will allow me.

And, well, let's face it... the reality is that I sometimes speak before I think things through.  There were probably other more subtle ways of accomplishing my goals, and perhaps I should have availed myself of those methods.  Alas, I am human, therefore I occasionally (RARELY) err.  Get used to it.  Or, you know... forgive.  Isn't that the divine thing to do?

But...

Thanks to the benefit of hindsight https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?action=DocumentDisplay&crawlid=1&doctype=cite&docid=55+Case+W.+Res.+633&srctype=smi&srcid=3B15&key=51bb52d52fa56821384344a7c7b23a44 (darn you, hindsight and your associated bias!), I also understand that my response MAY have UNINTENTIONALLY flown directly in the face of the values of others, and I probably shouldn't have responded so flippantly without knowing whether my statement would have the relative weight of "Santa Claus doesn't exist" or "The sun is hot and really far away".  And it wouldn't be COMPLETELY ridiculous for those other people to pick up the phone and ask me to be a bit more careful in the future.

I mean, after all, that's just biology.