Once upon a time, and most recently around mid-20th century, most people in the U.S. relied on the “nuclear family” and saw it as the way things should be. It’s a phrase that appears in the Project 2025 document only a few times, but the word “family” appears countless times.
This (from the Project 2025 section titled Department of Health and Human Services) is how the Project defines “family.”
Now let’s see another description, from Britannica:
“... a group of persons united by the ties of marriage, blood, or adoption, constituting a single household and interacting with each other in their respective social positions, usually those of spouses, parents, children, and siblings. The family group should be distinguished from a household, which may include boarders and roomers sharing a common residence. It should also be differentiated from a kindred (which also concerns blood lines), because a kindred may be divided into several households. Frequently the family is not differentiated from the marriage pair, but the essence of the family group is the parent-child relationship, which may be absent from many marriage pairs.”
I would amend one phrase to read, “…united by the ties of marriage, blood, adoption, or enduring commitment…” and another to read, “Frequently the family is not differentiated from the marriage pair; but because the essence of the family group is the parent-child relationship, in some cases there might be only one parent.”
Are families with more than one adult more likely to fare well than families with only one adult? Yes. statistics bear this out. From the costs of child care to the need for paid support in the home to the fact that only one adult is earning, single-parent families have more challenges.
Do families with same-sex parents have more challenges than those with mixed-sex parents? Statistics bear this out as well, and much of the challenge comes from pressures from outside the family, pressures from people and organizations that don’t see same-sex parented families as... well, as families.
What’s clear is that where the need is greatest, Project 2025 would instead support those less in need.
Throughout the document, Project 2025 throws its support behind its definition of the “nuclear family” (a heterosexual married pair with children) to the detriment of any family that does not meet that definition. Perhaps the expectation is that discouraging non-approved families will result in individuals choosing the 1950s family for themselves. If so, this thinking is woefully ignorant.
Heterosexuality, homosexuality, and bisexuality are orientations, not choices.
I recall hearing a radio person-on-the-street interview broadcast over NPR (National Public Radio) in 2004, when the Massachusetts State Supreme Court was debating whether it was unconstitutional to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Here’s how one anonymous woman felt about the question, quoting her verbatim:
“If we allow men to marry men, and women to marry women, pretty soon there won’t be enough children in the world.”
There are so many flaws in this “thinking” that it’s hard to know where to start. But I’ll try.
Q: Is the world in any danger of running out of children? A: No. Nowhere near.
Q: How many couples would have to stop having children for the world to be concerned? A: It’s true that some U.S. organizations are concerned about the drop in U.S. birth rates and about the number of heterosexual married couples who decide not to have children, but are these statistics exacerbated by gay couples marrying? Hardly.
Q: What is the percentage of homosexual people in the general population? A: For now, we say around 7%. When the discrimination, the mistreatment, and even the murder of LGBTQ individuals are behind us, maybe we’ll be able to get a more accurate number. So even if no gay couples had children, the demographic is too small to have a big effect on childbirth statistics.
Q: Is it true that gay couples don’t have children? A: No. In fact, in addition to having their own children, gay couples adopt and foster more children than straight couples.
Q: If the gay couples who brought the legal suit in Massachusetts were denied legal marriage, would they sigh sadly, give their current partners one last kiss, marry someone of the opposite sex, and start having children? (No answer needed.)
Q: Is this woman afraid that if the court finds in favor of the gay couples, all of a sudden everyone will want to be in a “gay marriage?” (No answer needed.)
The astounding lack of rational thought exhibited by this woman is not very different from the apparent delusion of Project 2025 (that making life more difficult for families outside its definition will lead to individuals in non-approved marriages and relationships suddenly changing their lives and conforming).
The images below contain wording directly from Project 2025.
From the Project’s foreword:
From the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) section:
From the International Organizations section:
From the Agency for International Development section:
From the Conclusion section of the Department Of Labor And Related Agencies:
Anyone familiar with the Star Trek TNG phenomenon of the Borg might see what I see here: that Project 2025 would take a square-shaped box composed of their ideals about family and force it onto every U.S. citizen.
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I’m an inveterate observer of human nature, writing novels about all kinds of people, some of whom happen to be gay or transgender or bisexual or intersex—people whose destinies are not determined solely by their sexual orientation or gender identity. Check out my work on my website.
Excellent piece, Robin. Project 2025 is both irrational and cruel. Our society has changed dramatically since the 1950s. The notion that Christian fundamentalists could somehow force the rest of us to return to the farce of nuclear happy families is dellusional. We define who our families are, not the government or archaic religious dogma. My family is where love resides with my husband and my beagle. My extended family are my dearest and closest friends. The hell with the fascist patriarchy and their toxic ideas.