Appearing Wednesday on ABC's The
View, Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum conceded
that gay and lesbian couples can make good parents.
When openly gay co-host Raven-Symoné
asked Santorum to explain his opposition to marriage equality, the
politician answered that it was not in the best interest of children
or society.
“The whole purpose of marriage is to
encourage – for society to encourage men and women to come together
to form permanent bonds for the benefit of each other … But the
greater purpose of marriage that society has always valued is to
bring men and women together so when they have children, there's a
permanent bond by which those children can be raised by their natural
mother and natural father.”
“When you have a law that says, as
the court said, that marriage has nothing to do with children
anymore. What you're going to have is – you're not going to have a
society encouraging the behavior that is in the best interest of
children and the future of society.”
Raven-Symoné
followed up by asking Santorum, a vocal opponent of LGBT rights, why
he thought that LGBT people can't raise “a very beautiful, smart,
intelligent child.”
“I'm
not saying that a same-sex couple can't have a very positive and
nurturing environment,” Santorum responded.
“But,”
he continued, “the natural mother and natural father of that child
is what historically, and I think sociologically we look at today, is
in the best interest of that child to be raised by their natural
mother and natural father. It's in the best interest of their
parents to raise them.”