"I believe every child has the right to a mother and a father. Men and women are not the same. That's not to say they're not entitled to equal rights, but they are not the same"
About this Quote
The insistence that “men and women are not the same” works as a kind of biological common sense argument, the verbal equivalent of a shrug: surely we can all agree on basic differences. The subtext is that those differences are essential, not just descriptive, and therefore socially necessary in parenting. It’s less about celebrating mothers and fathers than about implying that two mothers or two fathers necessarily leave a deficit. The quote never says “gay” or “same-sex,” which is part of the technique: keep the target implicit, keep the speaker sounding moderate.
The final sentence anticipates the obvious rebuttal and inoculates against it. “Equal rights” is conceded in theory to avoid the charge of bigotry, while “but they are not the same” reasserts hierarchy in practice. It’s the classic move of separating legal equality from social legitimacy, suggesting you can support fairness abstractly while denying recognition where it matters: family, status, and belonging.
In context, this reads like culture-war positioning dressed up as child welfare: a bid to make traditional gender roles feel like a neutral baseline rather than an ideological choice.
Quote Details
| Topic | Family |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Davis, Mark. (2026, January 15). I believe every child has the right to a mother and a father. Men and women are not the same. That's not to say they're not entitled to equal rights, but they are not the same. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-believe-every-child-has-the-right-to-a-mother-166256/
Chicago Style
Davis, Mark. "I believe every child has the right to a mother and a father. Men and women are not the same. That's not to say they're not entitled to equal rights, but they are not the same." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-believe-every-child-has-the-right-to-a-mother-166256/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I believe every child has the right to a mother and a father. Men and women are not the same. That's not to say they're not entitled to equal rights, but they are not the same." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-believe-every-child-has-the-right-to-a-mother-166256/. Accessed 21 Feb. 2026.



