November 8, 2012
Onward to a Better Tomorrow! 
Election day in the United States was a day of disappointments for the pro-family community. The leadership of the country was given again to the most pro-gay, pro-abortion President the country has ever known. In addition, the four states that voted on traditional marriage ballot issues all favored moving towards a same-sex “marriage” agenda. This is the first time in the U.S. that the voice of the people has favored a same sex “marriage” outcome. When approval has been given in the past it has always been the legislative or judiciary voice.
While we are United Families International are greatly disappointed by these outcomes we are not discouraged. Rather, we find increased determination to reiterate the facts that elections can’t change–namely that marriage between a man and a woman is still the best possible foundation for a stable and successful society. In a series of four articles, Tom Christensen will make “The Case for Traditional Marriage”, complete with social science and historical evidence. As we study his research, we may find ourselves reiterating the coined phrase: “some laws we can’t break, we can only break ourselves against them!”
Let us not give up or give in to the voices, however loud or many they be, who would like to reconstruct families and our cultural heritage. Let us use every possible opportunity to learn and share those ideas that have proven build healthy societies. As long as there are families to preserve, we at United Families will be on the forefront preserving and protecting them. We invite to you join us in the cause.
Onward to a Better Tomorrow,
Carol Soelberg
President, United Families International
The Case for Traditional Marriage
(Part I: Health and Safety)
By Tom Christensen
My 26 year old daughter, Christine Beck, is a lawyer and a happily married mother of two young boys. Prior to law school, Christine interned at the Heritage Foundation in Washington D.C. for Patrick Fagan, a published scholar specializing in family sciences. At Heritage, Christine compiled data linking intact families with enhanced 1) physical/emotional health and safety, 2) educational outcomes, and 3) income and economic opportunity.
In this and coming articles, I will use Christine’s data and some of my own to build a case in support of the traditional family. While numerous lengthy studies have been published on the subject (see, for example, United Families’ Family Issue Guides), a few references are sufficient to make the point, namely: the continuity of the traditional family is key to individual life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and public health, safety, morals and welfare. For these reasons, it pays for individuals and private or public institutions to support policy that maintains and strengthens the family.
Marital Health Studies
The realization that a couple’s lives are permanently intertwined produces lasting physical and emotional benefits. Physician Micahel Roizen found that a happily married man is the equivalent of being one and a half years younger than chronological age, and for a woman half of a year. In contrast, two years are added to the age of a divorced female and three years to a divorced male. Nine out of ten married males will live until the age of 48 while only six out of ten unmarried men will do the same.
According to a review in the Journal of Marriage and the Family, “the non married have higher mortality rates than the married; about 50% higher among women and 250% higher among men.” Marowitz, a professor at Yale, found that divorce was as dangerous to a man’s health as a daily pack of cigarettes. Gallagher and Waite concluded that being unmarried holds greater risks than having cancer or heart disease. On average, heart disease shortens a man’s life by about 6 years while being single chops off almost ten years. [1]
Being married boosts the immune system. Married individuals who are sick recover faster and are far less likely to die in the hospital. Married couples are less likely to engage in risky behaviors, such as speeding and drinking, and are more likely to engage in healthy behavior such as getting adequate sleep and healthy eating. Married couples offer each other emotional support, financial security, and companionship. Talking and sharing deep emotions has proven therapeutic. Monogamous sexual relations is a virtual guarantee against AIDS.
So called “gay marriages,” even when affirmed by government or society, are less likely to last, be monogamous, and provide a healthy setting for the raising of children. Research conducted in one of the most gay-affirming societies in the world, the Netherlands, points to gay behavior as the engine that drives mental distress among gay couples. As reported in the Archives of General Psychiatry, “psychiatric disorders were more prevalent among homosexually active people compared to heterosexually active people. Homosexual men had a higher prevalence of mood disorders…than heterosexual men. Homosexual women had a higher 12-month prevalence of substance abuse disorders than heterosexual women…More homosexual than heterosexual persons had 2 or more disorders during their lifetime…The findings support the assumption that people with same-sex sexual behavior are at greater risk for psychiatric disorders.”[2]
An American Journal of Public Health study also found that gay males are at greater risk for committing suicide: “There is evidence of a strong association between suicide risk and bisexuality or homosexuality in males.” 28.1% of bisexual/homosexual males reported suicide attempts vs. only 4.2% of heterosexual males.[3]
Adolescent Health Studies
In general, children from intact homes are more stable emotionally. Repeated studies report that children of divorced parents, even after they are grown, are significantly more vulnerable to depression.[4] The mental and physical well-being of children whose parents were never married is worse than those children from divorced families.[5] Children who attempt suicide are more likely to live in non-intact families, even after controlling for factors such as age, income, race, and religion. In one case study, over half of those children who had attempted suicide lived in houses with one or less biological parent.[6]
Marital disruptions, such as divorce, affect psychological well-being before and after the breakup.[7] Children from single parent homes have a greater risk for psychiatric disorders: nearly four times for girls and three times for boys.[8] Adolescents in one-parent families are more than three times as likely to be referred for mental health services.[9]
A recent study by New York University and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds that not just a mother’s but a father’s parenting behavior and communications have a profound influence on a child’s sexual health, academic success, and peer relationships. Even after accounting for familial, ecological and personal disadvantages associated with a father’s absence from the home, the absence of the father is strongly correlated with early sexual activity and teen pregnancy.[10]
Next month: Part II: Income and Academic Outcomes
Tom Christensen, former CEO of United Families, is a successful father, attorney, and politician. He has written extensively on the natural family and has addressed UN delegations in behalf of UFI in Istanbul, New York, Nairobi, the Hague, Lisbon and Geneva.
[1] The three studies are cited in Waite, L.J. & Gallagher, M. 2000, “The Case For Marriage,” Doubleday, New York.
[2] Sandfort, T.G., de Graaf, R., Bijl, R. V. & Schnabel, P. (2001). “Same-sex behavior and psychiatric disorders,” Archives of General Psychiatry, 58, p. 85.c disorders.”
[3] Gary Remafedi, MD, MPH, et al. (1998) The Relationship between Suicide Risk and Sexual Orientation: Results of a Population -Based Study, American Journal of Public Health, 1998;88:57-60.
[4] Aro, Hillevi M. & Ulla Palosaari 1992, “Parental Divorce, Adolescence, and Transition to Young Adulthood” A Follow-Up Study” American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, vol 62 (July), pp: 421-429. Ross, Catherine E. 1999, “Parental Divorce, Life-Course Disruption, and Adult Depression” Journal of Marriage and the Family Vol. 61, pp: 1034-1045.
[5] Moilanen, Irma & Rantakallio, Paula, 1988, “The Single-Parent Family and the Child’s Mental Health” Social Science Medicine Vol. 27 (Summer), pp: 181-186.
[6] Velez, Carmen Noevi & Cohen, Patricia 1988, “Suicidal Behavior and Ideation in a Community Sample of Children: Maternal and Youth Reports” Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Vol. 273, pp: 349-356.
[7] Sun, Yongmin & Yuanzhang Li 2002, “Children’s Well-Being During Parents’ Marital Disruption Process: A Pooled Time-series Analysis” Journal of Marriage and Family, Vol. 64 (May) pp: 472-488.
[8] Moilanen, Irma & Rantakallio, Paula, 1988, “The Single-Parent Family and the Child’s Mental Health” Social Science Medicine Vol. 27 (Summer), pp: 181-186.
[9] Zwaanswijk, Marieke, Van der Ende, Verhaak,.; Jozien M Bensing, & Frank C Verhulst 2003, “Factors Associated With Adolescent Mental Health Service Need and Utilization” Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Vol. 42 (June) pp: 692-700.
[10] Guilamo-Ramos, Bouris, Lee, McCarthy, Michael, Pitt-Barnes, & Dittus, 2012 “Paternal Influences on Adolescent Sexual Risk Behaviors,” PEDIATRICS, http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2012/10/10/peds.2011-2066.abstract.