Matt Watson is the opinion editor at The Reflector. He can be contacted at [email protected].Regrettably, I look back over my eating habits during the past week and realize I ate a Whopper from our new Burger King and a cheeseburger and heavily processed chicken nuggets from Wendy’s. I even kept the sacred college tradition of ordering pizza after noticing the only food in my refridgerator was mustard and Dr. Pepper.
Keeping this in mind, I feel rather bad about myself after reading about a Missouri judge’s ruling that foster parent Gary Stocklaufer is unfit to adopt his infant cousin due to Stocklaufer’s obesity.
While officials, according to an Associated Press report, would not comment on why the adoption was denied, Stocklaufer, a truck driver by trade, and his wife believe it was all about his 558 pounds-so much so that Stocklaufer decided to receive gastric bypass surgery to reverse the ruling.
An ABC News report says that obesity is becoming an increasing factor in approving adoptions, although it is still a minor factor at this point.
While most people may foolishly object to denying adoption based on obesity, expert Keith Ayoob says obese parents are a danger to children, according to the ABC report.
He says “morbid obesity”-that is, more than 100 pounds overweight-can be detrimental to the permanency of a child and a bad influence.
That’s right-a bad influence.
At a time when so many children’s parents are drug addicts, wife beaters, obsessive gamblers and alcoholics, God forbid a child be reared by an overweight truck driver. It could be the last straw of a morally corrupt society.
We can only speculate about the wisdom of this Missouri judge’s decision. Maybe he was fearful that something we could call second-hand obesity would present a danger, that Stocklaufer’s excess body mass would permeate from his body into the vulnerable infant child in the same way “gayness” passes down from lesbian mothers.
This ruling was a landmark decision concerning the government’s duty to ensure children belong to perfect families.
But the battle is only half-won. It is high time that we let the government look into all families more closely.
We all know a good family consists of a wife, a husband, two to four children, a dog and a minivan. Stepmothers are out of the question, as well as single moms and fatsos.
Of course, gay fat people would have no chance under this much-needed reform of America’s most important institution.
I will rest my case for now. All this talk is making me hungry.