Sarah Palin and her Situation

I have seen lots of posts on people's blogs over the last couple of days regarding Sarah Palin (the American Republican Vice-President nominee) and the situation she and her daughter have found themselves in. For those who don't know, her 17 year old daughter has found herself pregnant, and is planning on marrying the father of her child. Lots of the blogs have asked people to comment on the situation, and whenever I tried my comments were so long that I have given up, and decided to post on it myself!

My take on the situation is this:

I hope that the young people concerned are of the mature variety (and no, getting pregnant doesn't preclude that) and that their marriage and family life will be happy. I think that it is a personal and private decision and one which only this young woman and her partner (with the help and support of her family) can make.

I don't think that having a pregnant daughter is always a reflection on the parent - actually *most* teenagers end up having sex, however much we hope they won't, and many of them have unprotected sex - often because they are "good kids" and didn't intend to have sex outside marriage, so when the emotions and desires overtook them they were unprepared. Most parents are lucky that their kids don't come home pregnant. It sounds like this mum was one of the unlucky ones.

I realise that by even discussing this at all, I am fueling the belief that there is a right to discuss other people's lives in this way – and I really don’t think there is. My main feeling about this story is moral outrage – how dare people publish details relating to the daughter of someone standing for public office?

I am aware that at this stage that some people might want to bring up the Bible passage that talks about church leaders being people who have well-ordered families. Just as a point of clarifaction, this specifically refers to children under the age of 12/13, as this was the age at which the Israelites reached adulthood. It was also written about a situation in which a parent had the right to put their child to death for disobedience! When such sanctions were possible (I note, *possible*, not desirable!) having unruly children was seen in a very negative manner. I don’t see that this law can be applied to this situation.

So I ask myself – will my child lie to me? Will they always be honest with me – always respect me? I doubt it... I suspect there will be times when my child will behave in ways that they know I wouldn’t approve of, and so will try to hide this behaviour from me. I hope that they won't...I hope they will always feel they can come and talk to me...but experience of youth work has shown me that no parent knows everything their child gets up to. As a parent, our task is to equip our children to make the choices they need to, to be able to deal with the situations they face and, above all, to know that they are loved unconditionally.

If this story tells me anything at all – it's that a lass has got pregnant before she intended – probably to the “surprise” of her parents – and they are supporting her. Whatever your political affliation (and believe me, I have none when it comes to American Elections!) surely that is a positive outcome and the parents should be commended for it?

On a lighter note, I let my memory card reader at work last night, so won't be able to post the latest pics of the bump until this evening. Apologies if you tuned in just for that!

Yours Outrageously,

The Broken Man