Law Professor Argues Child-Parent Relationship Only Exists Because Of Government
As the left continues to advocate for restricting parental rights, footage has resurfaced of a law professor suggesting that parenthood is only allowed because the government guarantees it.
William and Mary Law School professor James Dwyer, who has been a strong advocate for the state playing a much bigger role in children’s education, claimed in the resurfaced footage that government — not nature — gave parents the right to raise and care for their children.
The comments came while Dwyer was attacking people who want the government to have less power to regulate homeschooling.
“The state needs to be the ultimate guarantor of a child’s wellbeing,” he claimed, suggesting there was “no alternative.”
Dwyer then argued that the only “reason parent-child relationships exist is because the state confers legal parenthood on people through its paternity and maternity laws,” and claimed that “it is the state that is empowering parents to do anything with children; to take them home, to have custody, and to make any kind of decision about that.”
These comments resurfaced amid a tense battle over parents’ rights — where conservatives have been calling for expanding parental rights through homeschooling, School Choice and other policy positions. Meanwhile, the left has argued that the government should dictate what children are taught — while the only “parental right” being mentioned by the left is the right to put their children through irreversible and dangerous transgender procedures, though they argue that parents who don’t let their children transition should be overruled by the government.
The issue was exacerbated recently by comments from President Joe Biden, which were shared in a tweet from the White House pushing the LGBT agenda on children.
“These are our kids. These are our neighbors. Not somebody else’s kids; they’re all our kids,” Biden can be heard saying in the clip while photos of the White House lit up with rainbow colors are shown in the background. “And our children are the kite strings that hold our national ambitions aloft. It matters a great deal how we treat everyone in this country. LGBTQI+ Americans, especially children, you are loved, you are heard, and this administration has your back.”
The tweet was met with a lot of backlash, with thousands of comments condemning the attempt to claim that the government owns children.
“You are the government. They are NOT your kids,” wrote Twitter CEO Elon Musk.
The phrase “our kids” becomes more and more popular among the left, with leftists arguing that parents don’t know what is best for their children. Dwyer has essentially agreed with this assertion for a long time now — arguing in 2022 that parents shouldn’t have any control over what their children learn in school.
According to the law professor, “a realm in which talk of rights is not very helpful to children.”
“If the concern is state control over children’s minds, it’s worth noting that even if a child attends public school, parents will have exclusive control over 80% of the child’s awake life,” Dwyer added.
He went on to claim that “if parents cannot, in that other 80%… communicate their views, discuss them with the child, explain why they as parents think differently… then I wonder what’s going on in the family.”
