No Social Ill is Too Big or Too Small to Be Solved by Marriage!

As long as I’m on the Bush shitlist, I might as well point out that their plan to cure poverty and all social ills in the US by promoting marriage is fucking retarded. The idea behind it is that since a large proportion of single mothers live below the federal poverty line, if they just marry the first guy that comes along, all will be well. Instant wealth and stability in the household for the kiddies! Maybe in some cases marriage helps, but there is much proof that marrying any person with a dick actually makes the situation worse.

Exhibit 1: Recently a seven year old girl was tied to a chair and beaten to death by her stepfather. He justified his cruelty by explaining that the girl brought these beatings on herself by misbehaving, such as the time she cut her sister’s hair. He says he felt he needed to use all his strength to beat her so that she would learn a lesson. The fatal beating was precipitated after the girl ate a yogurt without asking and jammed the family printer. The stepfather had just lost his job, so money was tight and he really felt that his stepdaughter needed to understand that she couldn’t waste money by eating any time she wanted or by breaking things. Exhibit 1 illustrates that children are obviously not all better off when a single mother marries, and that marriage does not mean a family will not have money problems.

Exhibit 2: A very large percentage of the working poor are married couples with children. Usually both parents are in the workforce. So clearly, marriage does not mean that families do not struggle to pay for housing, food, health care, child care, and other life necessities. Exhibit 2 shows that there are more effective ways to spend public funds to reduce poverty.

Exhibit 3: A good number of “eligible” bachelors in many low income communities are in jail or have records, often for petty crimes. How the fuck is marrying someone who will have a hard time getting a decent paying job going to help lift families out of poverty? Exhibit 3 is proof that other policies would prevent the marriage as a panacea plan from working even if it wasn’t based on fucking stupid in the first place.

Perhaps a better way to solve poverty might be to offer health insurance, rent assistance, child care subsidies, and other social supports to working people with children instead of offering free marriage counseling. I know; I am such a crazy socialist liberal pinko commie porno feminist for thinking that way, but I just can’t ignore the evidence as conveniently as our “compassionate conservative” leaders can.