At the Illinois Family Institute’s website, Micah Clark (of the American Family Association of Indiana) has written a brief article about a recent U.S. Department of Justice report (PDF) that “examines patterns in serious violent crime and simple assault” against youth.

Clark highlights one of the report’s main findings:

Perhaps even more interesting was the finding that youth were 380 percent more likely to become the victim of a serious violent crime if the teen lived in a home where the head of the household was unmarried than if he or she lived with his married parents. In 2010, 7.4 out of every 1,000 youth living with married parents became the victims of a serious violent crime. That year 27.8 out of every 1,000 living with an unmarried householder became the victims of a serious violent crime.

In short — and for any number of reasons — there appears to be a strong correlation between living with an unmarried head of household and being the victim of a violent crime.

Clark’s point is that the stability provided by marriage is good for society: “Married moms and dads mean safer homes for kids,” he writes.

Well, he threw the “moms and dads” in there out of nowhere because the report doesn’t say the married couple has to be straight. In fact, it suggests that kids living in a stable household are better off, period, without specifying whether the households have to be gay or straight.

How hypocritical do you have to be to promote a study like this while, at the same time, opposing any form of gay marriage that would lead to more safety and stability for children?

If anything, Clark’s article is just support for why we ought to legalize gay marriage as soon as possible.

So… um… thanks!



