You know, these issues might be handled differently if there were an allowance of real sex education in this country. I admit that in my day that there were a few too many slides of sex organs afflicted with venereal and sexually transmitted disease, but I struggle to think where teens can go if caught in a situation like this. Where can teens go if they find themselves in relationship and are aware of urges about being physically intimate with their boyfriends and girlfriends? I admit that the quick and easy response is to say "no," and maybe put some bullshit promise ring on one's finger, but apparently Bristol didn't get the message.
"She's keeping the baby and wants to get married to the father" is all fine and well, but for Palin to say that would assume that her situation applies to everyone else having children and feeling unprepared for it. The Palins have a familial and economical security blanket already prepped and warmed. Bristol can marry the father and maybe she wants to be a homemaker, but if she wants to go to college, there are two families in play that can ease childrearing responsibilities. Contrast that with someone within lower SES groups. True, they might have some supportive family members in play, but that extra mouth to feed accurately strikes them in a way that it doesn't some pro-baby, pre-privileged lot would. Maybe the teen mother has to get right back to work, or maybe being sick and on pregnancy leave made her that much more replaceable at her place of work. Or maybe she's on her own.
Either way, she's getting a golf clap from me. I applaud any family rallying around a situation like this, but I think it's going to be served more as a political ploy than anything. I can imagine bark-happy conservatives pointing to Palin and saying that the pregnancy/marriage worked for her (in that specific situation), then it should work for everyone and fuck family rights, promoting higher-quality family leave, neonatal care, etc., etc.