[Torie]

And below is the actual hard data for Europe and the US on percentage of out-of-wedlock births. You can see, just by eyeballing it, that Dobson's and Kurtz's assertion that it has something to do with gay marriage is garbage on its face. The Scandanavian countries had relatively high out of wedlock birth numbers in 1980 (pre gay marriage), and still do, with the Russian Baltic Republics also shooting way up, to catch up with the gay haven neighbors. But the biggest percentage jumps are in such well known gay havens as Bulgaria, and Georgia. What a crock!

Dobson is a charleton. Always has been, always will be.

	       1980	2001
Cyprus a/	0.6	2.3
Greece b/	1.5	3.9
Azerbaijan	3.0	6.6
San Marino a/	3.3	8.6
Croatia	5.1	9.4
Italy a/	4.3	9.7
Macedonia	6.1	10.4
Switzerland	4.7	11.4
Poland	        4.8	13.1
Armenia  	4.3	15.3
Spain a/	3.9	17.7
Ukraine  	8.8	18.0
Slovakia	5.7	19.8
Serbia and Mont	10.1	20.4
Belarus	        6.4	20.5
Moldova  a/	7.4	20.5
Luxembourg	6.0	22.3
Germany a/	11.9	23.4
Czech Republic	5.6	23.5
Portugal	9.2	23.8
Lithuania	6.3	25.4
Romania  a/ 	2.8	26.7
Netherlands	4.1	27.2
Russian Fed	10.8	28.8
Hungary	         7.1	30.3
Ireland	        5.0	31.2
Austria	        17.8	33.1
United States 	18.4	33.2
Slovenia	13.1	39.4
Finland	        13.1	39.5
United Kingdom	11.5	40.1
Bulgaria	10.9	42.0
Latvia	        12.5	42.1
France a/	11.4	42.6
Georgia 	4.7	44.4
Denmark	        33.2	44.6
Norway	        14.5	49.7
Sweden	        39.7	55.5
Estonia	        18.3	56.2
Iceland a/	39.7	65.2

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

...Always has been, always will be.

So you're not only a know-it-all, you're also a prophet?

[ricktex401]

the research that Dobson cites is not his own. It was presented to Congress and is also presented by National Review. What the author did (cant remember the name) was look at marraige rates before and after acceptance of homosexual marraige/partnerships. He found that scandanavians usually got married after the first kid. Once homosexual unions became accepted, there is no pretense of getting married at all in these countries. I'll find the article and post the link.

[jwalsh07]

Kurtz is not a charleton and he addresses your statistics in his writings.

[PetroniusMaximus]

***And below is the actual hard data ***


Source?

[jwalsh07]

And by the way, thats "charlatan". :-}

[ricktex401]

See the article by Stanly Kurtz in the Weekly Standard

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/660zypwj.asp

The End of Marriage in Scandinavia
The "conservative case" for same-sex marriage collapses.
by Stanley Kurtz
02/02/2004, Volume 009, Issue 20

[AngieGal]

**And below is the actual hard data for Europe and the US on percentage of out-of-wedlock births.**

I appreciate your research on this point. I have read the article you posted and looked at your statistics. I'll look into it further (including read your article jwalsh07 - thanks).

However, rising rates of out-of-wedlock births in Scandanavian countries aside. I think Dobson has some very compelling reasons to believe that same-sex unions are dangerous. Even if Dobson made an error in this (and I'm not sure if he has). You must agree that putting a hole in one part of one point of an eleven point argument is not sufficient to crumble it.

[PetroniusMaximus]

Going Dutch?


http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/126qodro.asp