Uploaded June 2026 | Updated September 2026, 11 minutes ago
Delano Squires is correct that children have a right to be reared in a household unified in their parents' marriage.
He is also correct that this isn't a material argument. However, when we talk about rights, it can't be a natural one or a biblical argument.
But the proper argument is conceptual. In order for the children to have an intelligible self-conception, they need to have the aspects of the concept. One of those aspects is particularity, i.e., they need to recognize themselves as doing things one particular way and not the other, for a particular reason and not another. Marriage expresses the family's particular unity; split households undermine that unity.
If you are expected to do and think one way by one parent and another way by another parent, the children are unintelligible to themselves, undermining the foundation of any attempts at self-determination.
Delano Squires is correct that children have a right to be reared in a household unified in their parents' marriage.
He is also correct that this isn't a material argument. However, when we talk about rights, it can't be a natural one or a biblical argument.
But the proper argument is conceptual. In order for the children to have an intelligible self-conception, they need to have the aspects of the concept. One of those aspects is particularity, i.e., they need to recognize themselves as doing things one particular way and not the other, for a particular reason and not another. Marriage expresses the family's particular unity; split households undermine that unity.
If you are expected to do and think one way by one parent and another way by another parent, the children are unintelligible to themselves, undermining the foundation of any attempts at self-determination.
