HELL YEAH! Books, movies, and TV shows a lot of the time make step-parents out to be evil, so kids usually have a bad image of a step-parent. But I know plenty of step-parents that love their step-children just as much as they love their blood kids. My younger cousin has a step-dad and he's been MUCH more of a parent than his birth dad ever has and still loved him just as much as his blood child that is almost a year old. Part of showing love is to discipline the child, so they don't end up doing something their regret. Besides, blood doesn't make a family, love does. A step-parent can be just as much of a parent as any normal parent and sometimes can be more of a parent than the biological one. So they should be allowed to have the same rights as any parent does.

^^^stole the words right out of my mouth

My Dad is the step-father of my two older half-sisters, and he's always been much more of a father to them than their biological dad.

Pretty much, everything said above.

BennieBear27: More like stole the words out of your hand !!!!

It depends almost entirely on the situation at hand, and in most cases I think step-parents should be treated like normal parents. I can't think of any real world examples that I know of where this shouldn't have been the case.

To me, however, this really brings into question what warrants authority and who gets authority, so in my mind it's more of a philosophical question than anything.



Going to say no here, not because I think that step parents should never be given the same rights as biological parents, but because I think that they shouldn't always be given the same right as biological parents.

And since there was no in-between option I personally think its safer to say no.

If they can be good at teaching or disciplining children, why not? It's extra help for the parents.