A Parent 2's Outrage

The U.S. State Department announced last week that passport applications would no longer ask for the applicant's mother and father, but instead would require the listing of "Parent 1" and "Parent 2". This prompted me to wonder how to decide the pecking order of one's parents. Now the Secretary of State has tried to cleared up the confusion. Henceforth, the application will ask for "Mother or Parent 1" and "Father or Parent 2."

I suppose that's better than "Thing One" or "Thing Two", but Hillary's hybrid hardly eliminates my confusion. Does she mean to convey "Parent 1" as synonymous with "Mother", thus implying the female is the most important parent? Or does she mean to leave us the option to place our father in the "Mother or Parent 1" box if he is the immediate ancestor the applicant most reveres?

Either way, the qualitative choice of which parent is number 1 -- whether decided by son, daughter or Secretary -- is sure to lead to outrage. Perhaps not Obamacare-level outrage -- but outrage nonetheless.

It's just like the government to decide it needs to decide something like which parent is number one or number two. When that happens, both parents are subservient to the nanny state -- more precisely, a nanny Secretary of State.