Bruce took Dick in when he was a little boy (when he most certainly did need a father) and raised him, fulfilling the role of father in every way.
That’s exactly the issue I have, really. I have yet to see a story, flashback or otherwise, where it’s Bruce who fulfills that role for Dick in any practical sense. Bruce gives him love, training, a purpose, and a home, but he also relies on him extensively for both physical and emotional support, and puts him in incalculable danger on a nightly basis. It’s Alfred who feeds him, clothes him, and does the build-me-up chats. To me that makes the relationship different and difficult to confine to one single category. Obviously it would be silly to suggest that there’s no familial or parental component to their relationship at all, but suggesting it both begins and ends with that alone sells it a little short, for me.
I think it does undermine their connection and obvious love for each other to suggest all those emotional moments around the words father and son, and even the legal adoption, doesn't make them father and son compared to a blood relationship, even between strangers.
Again, I don’t think the issue is adoption versus blood connection at all, since I do think that by the time Jason and Tim came along Bruce was ready to take on a more explicitly defined parental role, hence why he adopted Jason right away and Tim as soon as soon as he’d been orphaned. And it’s equally clear to me that post-adoption, both Bruce and Dick have made a stronger effort to define their current relationship in terms of a father/son bond. But it’s something they’ve come to accept as it developed over time, not (to me) a reality that necessarily existed from the beginning.
Based on what I've read in interviews that are then repeated in the books I feel like GM isn't hiding this intention at all. It's not, it seems to me, that he's trying to diss the other boys, just that he sees Damian as Bruce's first son and assumes everyone else would see it the same way.
I have to admit I haven’t read any Morrison interviews relating to this arc at all, but if that’s the case I’ll definitely be annoyed. To be clear, the idea of genetic predestination/superiority does bother me quite a bit where Damian is concerned. I’m just hoping to see the story develop in a different direction instead. :)