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More than 100,000 children are adopted each year in the United States. Increasingly, these adoptions are being made by same-sex couples, raising questions about whether a child’s best interests can be served by same-sex parents. Are traditional homes still the best way to go, or are kids just as well-suited as part of a non-nuclear family?
This post is almost insulting in its complete lack of evidence or even a reasoned argument. Merely dismissing the other side is not an argument.
- tojo2000
December 6, 2008 6:58PM
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Sorry, buster, but this makes no sense. The evidence has all been refuted big time, and I was raised by my dad and my brother. My mom was a wacko alcoholic who thankfully didn't raise me. Yes, I had an unhappy childhood, but it would've been ten times worse has my mom been there - she's anything but motherly. Now that I'm in college away from my mom, I am as happy as can be. My first roommate, a girl, has been like a mother to me and made a much happier person out of me, but I'm also sexually attracted to her, so try to use your puny evidence to prove which one of those matters!!! And don't tell me that I'm attracted to her only because I never had a mother... that couldn't explain what being one of the happiest people in the world has to do with disadvantages in childhood.
- Ciuma December 8, 2008 7:35AM
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Did you ever try to find out why your mother is an alcoholic? Did you ever consider the ammount of love she has in her heart for you and that she knows shes a failure....WHAT HAPPENED TO THE LOVE that the homosexual community profess to have. Love your Mom and honor her no matter what kind of a mother she is and you will receive a blessing. No ones mother was ever perfect and you are fooling no one with the Im better without her and college is making me so happy. BS. You are hurting because you didnt get the love you needed in life and that was unfair to you. You want your mother to be what you need her to be and your child inside is crying to have her hold you and tell you that she loves you and you want to be able to trust and believe that you can rely on her and not be disappointed by her. Believe me she wants that too. If I was you Id grow and take your life into your own hands and make up with her even if you know she will never be reliable as a mother because someday she wont be there and you will regret not having had the nerve to walk up to her and say I FORGIVE YOU MOM...and until then dont blame the world for your chips and insecurities...YOU CHOOSE THE LIFE YOU WANT TO CHOOSE just be adult enough to own it. Gd bless you. Find a church . Quit drowning your sorrows in alcohol and partying, they wont go away that way and youll only compound your pain and suffering. Thats my motherly advice to you.
- perfecthope October 19, 2009 5:59AM
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sacrificing your life to a pagan false Gd...is that really truely what you intened to do with your life? I choose Gd and that means I reject the notion that homosexuality is normal and pleasing to Gd!
- perfecthope October 20, 2009 11:45AM
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But your concept of God is not one that is shared by a significant portion of the human population.
You may reject homosexuality due to your religious teachings... but those teachings are not objective fact.
- MrBook November 7, 2009 8:39AM
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Dr. Crawford highlights all of the facts that we all know to be true. All of his statements supporting his opinion are simply characteristics of our human nature. Few creatures on this earth do not look out for the wellfare their offsprings. However, the primary premise of raising children is not to make us feel good, but to promote procreation and continuation of the species. As childern grow up they see their parents as role models whether good or bad. Homosexual households are simply sending the wrong message to the maturing child.
- giscoord December 8, 2008 7:50AM
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By your 'logic', only those who are both capable of having children and fit into your idea of a role model should be allowed to marry or adopt, I'm guessing.
And these are not facts we all know to be true. Quite a few of these are outright lies or opinion. For example, your idea that the parents should be straight so the kids will be straight--and how many children of gay parents turn out gay? Did this 'fact' of yours just not apply when the gay parents themselves were raised by their straight parents? Most of all, how does this even begin to put kids at a disadvantage?
- Blue Linchpin January 8, 2009 3:48PM
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There are countless children waiting to be adopted. Many more children than hetero couples to adopt them. The choice for these children isn't whether it's better to grow up in a hetero or homo family. The choice is whether it's better to grow up in a homo family, or no family. The choice is obvious.
- State of Reason July 31, 2009 4:09PM
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I think you're making the wrong comparisons. You are comparing children born into a married heterosexual family to everyone else. However the question posed is to compare children born into a homosexual family to everyone else. Its clear that you have no research that supporting your argument but you try to spin other research to help you out.
- speedplane December 8, 2008 11:12AM
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Seeing how our son graduated with honors from UC Berkeley in the Fall, and is currently doing research via a Fulbright Fellowship in Africa and hopes to go on to graduate school, nope. We are more normal than is his girlfriend (who has a kid of three years) and her family both parents divorced a few times. All my GLBT parent colleagues report similar findings. Now as a professor, absolutely ALL of the extremely messed up, problematic kids come from heterosexual “traditional” families. As well, in the local high school I both volunteer in and do research with a teacher in, all the kids involved in gang oriented drug violent behavior come from “traditional” families, and despite being minorities, are the most homophobic and violent kids I have ever tried to work with. Thought folks would like to know… that when we talk of traditional families, the tradition doesn’t seem to be working so well. Earlier, I asked my son about this debate and he only laughed.
- oreyd December 8, 2008 3:58PM
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"no evidence to date indicates that same-sex parenting would be an improvement on any of these other forms."
neither is there any evidence suggesting it would be in any way deleterious. this so-called "argument" is a joke, and a bad one at that.
ed
- silverwhisper December 10, 2008 11:48AM
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Compared to children with a father and a mother married to each other and getting along with each other, the answer is yes. Compared to children living in an orphanage, it's hard to say.
- goznes December 10, 2008 12:46PM
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You aren't sure whether a child would be better off in an orphanage or with gay parents? Do you honestly hate gays so much you have no problem leaving them parentless instead of having them raised by gays?
- Blue Linchpin January 8, 2009 3:50PM
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Why assume that because we differ that we must hate homosexuals? If we want what is best for the child, and if a mommmy and daddy are proven to be the best environment for raising a child, then why say we "hate gays" for stating this?
- cheetosrapper January 17, 2009 11:31PM
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Sorry, I don't buy that.
Life isn't perfect, and research has shown that children are fine with same-sex parents. I don't see people like you clamoring to take children away from single parents or parents with monetary problems--only gays.
- Blue Linchpin January 20, 2009 9:51AM
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Could you please direct me to the research that you use so that I may review it as well?
- cheetosrapper January 20, 2009 9:54AM
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Quite a few organizations of actual experts on the subject support same-sex parenting. Here's just what a 5 minute search brings:
http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/pediatrics ;109/2/341?fulltext=&searchid=QID_NOT_SET
A growing body of scientific literature demonstrates that children who grow up with 1 or 2 gay and/or lesbian parents fare as well in emotional, cognitive, social, and sexual functioning as do children whose parents are heterosexual. Children’s optimal development seems to be influenced more by the nature of the relationships and interactions within the family unit than by the particular structural form it takes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_parenting
Organizations that have officially supported adoption by same-sex couples include the American Psychological Association, the Child Welfare League of America, the American Bar Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the National Association of Social Workers, the North American Council on Adoptable Children, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychoanalytic Association, and the American Academy of Family Physicians.
http://www.apa.org/pi/lgbc/policy/parents.html
Fears about children of lesbian or gay parents being sexually abused by adults, ostracized by peers, or isolated in single-sex lesbian or gay communities have received no scientific support. Overall, results of research suggest that the development, adjustment, and well-being of children with lesbian and gay parents do not differ markedly from that of children with heterosexual parents.
- Blue Linchpin January 20, 2009 11:14AM
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Sorry about the first link...I can't edit so will just attempt to re-post it along with the rest of the important information in the article:
http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/pediatrics ;109/2/341?fulltext=&searchid=QID_NOT_SET
or you could try
http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/pediatrics ;109/2/341
"Stereotypes and laws that maintain discriminatory practices are based on the assumption that lesbian mothers and gay fathers are different from heterosexual parents in ways that are important to their children’s well-being. Empirical evidence reveals in contrast that gay fathers have substantial evidence of nurturance and investment in their paternal role and no differences from heterosexual fathers in providing appropriate recreation, encouraging autonomy,5 or dealing with general problems of parenting.6 Compared with heterosexual fathers, gay fathers have been described to adhere to stricter disciplinary guidelines, to place greater emphasis on guidance and the development of cognitive skills, and to be more involved in their children’s activities.7 Overall, there are more similarities than differences in the parenting styles and attitudes of gay and nongay fathers.
Similarly, few differences have been found in the research from the last 2 decades comparing lesbian and heterosexual mothers’ self-esteem, psychologic adjustment, and attitudes toward child rearing.8,9 Lesbian mothers fall within the range of normal psychologic functioning on interviews and psychologic assessments and report scores on standardized measures of self-esteem, anxiety, depression, and parenting stress indistinguishable from those reported by heterosexual mothers.10
Lesbian mothers strongly endorse child-centered attitudes and commitment to their maternal roles11–13 and have been shown to be more concerned with providing male role models for their children than are divorced heterosexual mothers.6,14 Lesbian and heterosexual mothers describe themselves similarly in marital and maternal interests, current lifestyles, and child-rearing practices.14 They report similar role conflicts, social support networks, and coping strategies.15,16"
The problem here is that people assume same-sex parents are bad for the children because they're biased against gays, not because they have any actual reason to think so.
- Blue Linchpin January 20, 2009 11:20AM
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I had two dads LONG before this entire debate hit the spotlight and the only disadvantage I feel that I've had when compared to my best friend (who had a mom and a dad) is that I have to put up with all the talking heads wondering if I'm disadvantaged/in danger/abused/maladjusted/"influenced to be gay "/etc...
I may have a few quirks (find me someone who doesn't) but aside from that I'm about as boring as plain white bread. I'm straight, with my girlfriend (now fiance) for the last 2 years, I'm in college and almost done a bachelors degree in childhood education .
Want me to describe my childhood? In a word: Boring!
That's right! BORING!! Outside of a couple jerks (oh noes! bullies!) who gave me a hard time for having two dads, no one cared.
Especially not me. I loved them both and they loved me, we did a lot of "normal" family things that a good number of kids with only one parent never got to do, so on and so forth.
I think I had it pretty damn good and while I know a single individual does not a study make, I honestly think that kids with no or single parents are at a disadvantage, NOT those with two parents, no matter WHAT their sexes are.
- wonka April 16, 2009 11:28PM
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Being Raised by two lesbians was brilliant they are my moms
I was bullied but i got over it like most children .
But i would like to say that i believe that children from 'Normal' families are worse of.
I am healthier mentaly than most of my friends who come from Mom/Dad households, i dont take medication at all.
Funny that my Moms are still together after 20 Years while most of my friends parents have long since seperated
- Jack1990
September 28, 2009 10:44AM
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Same sex marriages are JUST AS MUCH capable, if not more, to provide the best environment, and love needed for a child, as opposing sex couples. And some people are saying you hate gays because of the way your talking. if you had said something like "i think same sex marriages can provide well, but opposing sex can do better, either way it works" then people wouldn't think you hate gays, but because your dissin on them and everything they think you hate them.
- BeAuTiFuLdIsAsTeR March 17, 2009 7:09PM
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all the research done to date about gay couples CAPACITY to raise children says that they have a clear adavantage. First they have to choose to have children by whatever means is available to them. they don't just have a litter and go from there.
Second, gay couples tend to not fight as much as heteros research says. They are more likely to assign things such as chores to the person who is most capable and or most interested in that chore rather than default to stereotypical roles. Roles where Dad is off the clock when he gets home except for repairing the roof where the mother's duties never end from sun up to sun down do not readily exist in gay parenting couples. The pettiness of conflict that come from resented roles does great damage to children much less teaching a boy that laundry is for girls and telling girls math and making money is for boys.
The fact that there are glass ceilings for women and that women declare this undesireable says that the way our society has been programing children has demonstrable failures. Any theories that children raised by same-sex parents face challenges beyond the threshold of those of any other child is an illusion. children get taught early and often to abuse the one in their midst who is different....poor...racially a minority....disabled. this has come from the stallwart defence of normality that is promulgated by white hetero christian society. Adults who are "other" have a greater capacity to understand and thus teach compassion and fairness.
I cannot imagine a gay couple allowing the N word to describe a person of color to be used in their house....but I have heard my straight father, grandfather, grandmother, cousins and uncles use the word.
The real need to raise a child is enlightened and insightful parenting. Parenting that can grapple with all of the issues that a child faces that the parents may have never experienced themselves at that age....both threats to wellness and never before seen opportunity. The parents must learn what they do not know on the fly and they must learn it well and fast. that learning curve and adaptablity has been demonstrated to exist more readily in gay parenting couples today. that is not to say that it does not exist in hetero couples nor is it to say that if gay parenting were more wide spread and made easier that these talents would not be diluted to the more base and laxidasial parenting styles we have seen over the decades.
- taoish December 17, 2008 9:09AM
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Perhaps I'm missing something, but can we see some of this evidence? Because all of the scientific or medical organisations I've gone to about this have said the exact opposite, and they've had studies on hand to back them up.
- journalnous
December 21, 2008 7:28AM
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I find it interesting, but not at all surprising, that the biased and anti-gay rights group thinks it knows more about children than the obvious expert in this argument.
Worse, there wasn't even an attempt at making an argument, but that's even less surprising: it's simply not possible to logically argue anti-gay opinions like this. It's because they're nothing more than hate and prejudice founded on absolutely nothing.
- Blue Linchpin January 8, 2009 3:44PM
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How does growing up in a family with two parents of the same sex put a child at greater risk for domestic violence and sexual abuse as this argument proposes? That would be a great example of ad hominem: you can't use your opinions of the care-takers sexual preference as a vice for whether or not they will be good parents, or sexual abuse their kids. That's really just sick.
- tripleayex February 25, 2009 8:42PM
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It seems that some believe that no matter the individual cases, a child is much better off being raised by a man and a woman rather than two parents of the same sex. Today, mariages fail almost as often as they succeed. Constant fighting between parents creates a very tense and unhappy environment for children. Divorce is never a pleasant thing for a child to go through. It can be emotionally draining for a kid to move back and forth between homes and almost live two seperate lives. However, they are still being raised by a man and a woman. So, does this still put them at an advantage over kids who are raised by homosexual parents? In my opinion, a child who has grown up being raised by two happy but same sex parents will lead a much stabler life than a child who is living in a broken family. Obviously this is just one situation for comparison but it just shows that kids are not always better off being raised by by a man and a woman.
I think growing up with two same sex parents can make children more open-minded and accepting towards others. These are very valuable traits in life.
- Emar March 1, 2009 4:31PM
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Children that grow up with single parents is no different then children that grow up with two fathers, or two mothers. Sexuality doesn't change the person you are. I'm bi, and I'm still the same person that everybody knew me as before they knew i was bi. So if I were to get a girlfriend, and we got married, and we wanted a child, we couldn't get one because we're both females? becuase people don't think the child would grow up like any other child? because people think that we are a disadvantage for that child? ..... your exact words are "children who grow up in any other family form single parent family, divorced, step family, or co-habiting parents- dont' do as well by up to half in these measures compared to children living with their own married mother and father"
I don't think that having same sex parents are any different then having opposite sex parents, ok, yeah their the same sex, they have the same parts, but it doesn't matter. They can still provide the money, and the home and everything else needed just as much as an opposite sex couple can.
- BeAuTiFuLdIsAsTeR March 17, 2009 7:05PM
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Does the phrase "it takes a village" mean anything anymore? Two people, no matter what their sexuality, are incapable of giving a child everything they need to form into a fully functioning healthy adult. For instance, a kid with two loving parents but no friends is not going to have the happiest of childhoods.
There is so much more to raising a kid than the parent's involvement. I mean, finances, location, the child's disposition, and access to education all play big roles.
And speaking of roles, I think the straight community sometimes gets confused when it comes to gay couples. Many of us see gay couples and think that one partner assumes the "male" role and one plays the "female" role. This is a myth perpetuated largely by the media , (and the existence of loud, overly effeminate drag queens).
I don't know how gay men are, but most lesbian couples don't really assume very defined gender roles. Of course we always notice the cliche "butch" chick with clear lesbian vibes, but more often than not, female gays tend to split the gender roles equally.Typically amongst straight couples, chores and activities are split into female and male roles. I.E., the father plays baseball with the kids, the mother takes them shopping; the father takes out the trash and mows the lawn, the mother does the dishes, etc. Within lesbian couples, both parents play baseball, go shopping, take out trash, do dishes, etc. While this means that the kid has neither a father figure or a mother a figure, it definitely does not equal having two dads or two moms. If both partners are well rounded enough to play both roles from time to time, I would imagine that this would teach a child that their activities (and personality, for that matter) are not defined by their gender. I don't see how this is a disadvantage.
- Livvy May 7, 2009 4:42PM
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These articles say it best for me anyway.
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Legal/Default.aspx?id=529214 This article was very sad because what kind of message are these adults sending to children ? Disrupt church services and break the law , what ever it takes, to force ourselves onto people. Is that a healthy lifestyle for children? No way it is.
Heres another article:
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=528376
More proof children should not be raised in this environment . When your an adult you can decide when you will become sexually active and with whom but this agenda is pushing it down the throats of American children and that is too heavy a burden for them to carry and it is in my opinion criminal to do so to them. Just my thoughts. Have a good day.
- Hope7 May 29, 2009 8:16PM
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"This article was very sad because what kind of message are these adults sending to children ? Disrupt church services and break the law , what ever it takes, to force ourselves onto people. Is that a healthy lifestyle for children?"
-Hope7
That link describes the actions of one fringe group, which is no more representative of homosexuals then the actions of the Westboro Baptist 'Church' are representative of Christians.
"More proof children should not be raised in this environment ."
How is that more proof? All it says is that sexual orientation may be a product of ones environment, and not just the result of genetics. Is there any evidence that children raised by homosexuals go on to be homosexuals (in a percentage significantly greater then the rest of the population)?
- MrBook May 29, 2009 9:36PM
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To tell the truth approx. 40% of children raised in same-sex families grow up to practice homosexuality . That comes from a conference in Rome several years ago where many psychologists spoke on this subject and infact this was a proven fact mentioned at this conference. Making adoption the number one recruitment tool for homosexual activists.
To tell the truth the above statement regarding how brutal most homosexal activists are is more indicative of the whole population than you have implied. One would only have to recall the protests after Prop. 8 passed in Calif. to get a real picture of how brutal this organization really is at the core.To say anything otherwise is paint a false picture of this community.
To tell the truth to place children into homosexual families is to put them at significant risk for abuse. Quote: Pedophiles are invariably males: Almost all sex crimes against
children are committed by men.
Significant numbers of victims are males: Up to one-third of all sex
crimes against children are committed against boys (as opposed to
girls).Rest of article can be read here: http://www.hope7.highpowersites.com/page/page/4563078.htm
I could go on and on but if you google " statistics on homosexuality" it will shock the boots off your feet.The best scenerio for children is a home with a mother and father, the next best is with at least one of their biological parents. Just what I have researched and find quite grounded in truth.
- Hope7 May 29, 2009 10:24PM
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"To tell the truth approx. 40% of children raised in same-sex families grow up to practice homosexuality . That comes from a conference in Rome several years ago where many psychologists spoke on this subject and infact this was a proven fact mentioned at this conference. Making adoption the number one recruitment tool for homosexual activists."
-Hope7
[Citation needed]? One conference does not make a consensus, but I would like to see their methodology and their sample size.
"To tell the truth the above statement regarding how brutal most homosexal activists are is more indicative of the whole population than you have implied. One would only have to recall the protests after Prop. 8 passed in Calif. to get a real picture of how brutal this organization really is at the core.To say anything otherwise is paint a false picture of this community."
-Hope7
I do recall, and those protests were quite similar to other protests over the years... during the civil rights movement and such. Most protests are passionate, that's true, but not overly disruptive. Also, I'd again point out that there are some very violent anti-homosexual groups out there... so saying "they've got brutal groups" does not seem like much of an argument to me.
"To tell the truth to place children into homosexual families is to put them at significant risk for abuse. Quote: Pedophiles are invariably males: Almost all sex crimes against
children are committed by men."
-Hope7
Ok.... but then isn't that just an argument to prevent homosexual men from marring / adopting? A lesbian couple seems like the safest environment for a child to grow up in, following from that logic.
"Significant numbers of victims are males: Up to one-third of all sex
crimes against children are committed against boys (as opposed to
girls)"
-Hope7
Interesting.... And the rise in CO2 levels in the atmosphere has increased the acidification of the oceans, making it harder for shellfish to grow their shells. But neither of those statements is remotely relevant to the argument at hand.
"Rest of article can be read here: http://www.hope7.highpowersites.com/page/page/4563078.htm "
A good number of the sources you cite there are anecdotal in nature... the only one of real interest is the Danish study you show. Which indicates that the number of open homosexuals increases in places where same sex marriage is permitted. Which I would agree with, because in those situations people who are gay would be much more comfortable coming out and seeking partners. You seem to feel that this is a bad thing... but have so far failed to demonstrate why that is.
- MrBook May 30, 2009 9:20AM
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To tell the truth, when someone uses the phrase "to tell the truth" they're usually not telling the truth.
- State of Reason July 31, 2009 4:18PM
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"Practice" homosexuality ? "Recruitment tool for homosexual activists"?
These two are misnomers invented by the anti-homosexual religious right and do not exist in the natural world. I believe that if you interact directly with gay people on a personal basis you will see things differently.
Only among those who have created a mindset that homosexuality is a chosen lifestyle would use the term "practice". Most gay people insist that their attraction is natural and not subject to change , just as my orientation is heterosexual. I do not "practice" heterosexuality. I am attracted to people of the opposite sex .
Only among those who fear homosexuality think in terms of "Activists". Working for civil rights and protection from bigoted social attacks is entirely appropriate, in my opinion. My mother is a "homosexual activist" of this sort who attends gay rights rallies and stands with the Hateful Anti-Gay Christian Group, carrying a big sign that says, "This Straight Christian Grandmother Supports You". When the inevitable happens and a Hateful Anti-Gay Christian approaches her spewing hateful epithets, she listens quietly, waits for a long silence, and says "Father forgive them. They know not what they do."
- We the People December 9, 2009 3:04PM
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...in this "debate" is the state that children typically are in when they come to same-sex parents for foster care or adoption . My kids had been in and out of foster care eight times before they were permanently placed with us. My husband and I had to address years of abusive behavior, domestic violence that had been witnessed in previous homes, etc., with our kids. All of those things happened during their critical formative years, and the damage of all of them is difficult, if not impossible, to undo completely. And this is just one of many realities that Focus dismisses, ignores or rationalizes to support its political interests. If Focus were truly concerned about the welfare of kids, it would devote resources to placing more of them in loving homes rather than trying to undermine the ability of GLBT parents to be good parents to their foster and adoptive kids.
Let's be clear: I didn't make my kids. A heterosexual couple did. And that same couple abused, neglected and ultimately abandoned them. They are my children and my husband's children now. And we are "serving their best interests" in ways that have literally meant salvation for them both.
Focus and other far-right, anti-gay groups continually distort data regarding gay and lesbian parents to the degree that to call them "experts" in this area is like calling the Klan experts in race relations.
- Mowglior June 17, 2009 6:35PM
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I've read all the arguments and Focus on the Family had 1 excellent point. "the more precise question is “disadvantaged compared to what?”. After they say that they go on and on about how great it is when kids are raised by their married biological mom and dad. You know what, they may be right about that. On average (certainly not in every case but on average) kids are probably better off being raised by their married biological parents (BTW, those married biological parents could be gay). Thing is, that's not an option for these kids. Their biological parents can't, or won't, raise them anymore.
Kids that are up for adoption aren't being pulled out of the homes of perfectly good married heterosexual parents. Kids that are up for adoption are in orphanages, or bouncing around from one foster home to another. I think we can all agree that's not an ideal way for a kid to grow up.
So the real question isn't whether having straight parents is better than having gay parents. The question is, is it better to bounce from foster home to foster home, never living with the same parents for more than a few years, never setting down roots and making long term family or friend connections, or, is it better for a child to be raised by a loving gay couple who want to love them, and take care of them throughout their childhood.
Personally I think it's obviously better to be raised by loving gay parents but you can all make your own decision. The important thing is that you make that decision based on the facts, not some scare tactics FOTF is throwing out.
The choice isn't married straight parents or gays. The choice is orphanage/foster care or gays. Which do you think is better?
- State of Reason July 31, 2009 4:07PM
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According to Love Isn’t Enough: 5 Reasons Why
Same-Sex Marriage Will Harm Children By Trayce Hansen, Ph.D.
Hansen sites these five reasons in her article.
1.First, mother-love and father-love—though equally important—are qualitatively different and produce distinct parent-child attachments. Specifically, it’s the combination of the unconditional-leaning love of a mother and the conditional-leaning love of a father that’s essential to a child’s development. Either of these forms of love without the other can be problematic. Because what a child needs is the complementary balance the two types of parental love and attachment provide.
2. Only heterosexual parents offer children the opportunity to develop relationships with a parent of the same, as well as the opposite sex. Relationships with both sexes early in life make it easier for a child to relate to both sexes later in life. For a girl, that means she’ll better understand and appropriately interact with the world of men and be more comfortable in the world of women. And for a boy, the converse will hold true. Having a relationship with “the other”—an opposite sexed parent—also increases the likelihood that a child will be more empathetic and less narcissistic.
Overall, fathers play a restraining role in the lives of their children. They restrain sons from acting out antisocially, and daughters from acting out sexually. When there’s no father to perform this function, dire consequences often result both for the fatherless children and for the society in which these children act out their losses.
3.Third, boys and girls need an opposite-sexed parent to help them moderate their own gender-linked inclinations. As example, boys generally embrace reason over emotion, rules over relationships, risk-taking over caution, and standards over compassion, while girls generally embrace the reverse. An opposite-sexed parent helps a child keep his or her own natural proclivities in check by teaching—verbally and nonverbally—the worth of the opposing tendencies. That teaching not only facilitates moderation, but it also expands the child’s world—helping the child see beyond his or her own limited vantage point.
4.Fourth, same-sex marriage will increase sexual confusion and sexual experimentation by young people. The implicit and explicit message of same-sex marriage is that all choices are equally acceptable and desirable.
5. The emotional and psychological ramifications of these assorted arrangements on the developing psyches and sexuality of children would be disastrous. And what happens to the children of these alternative marriages if the union dissolves and each parent then “remarries”? Those children could end up with four fathers, or two fathers and four mothers, or, you fill in the blank.
Certainly homosexual couples can be just as loving as heterosexual couples, but children require more than love. They need the distinctive qualities and the complementary natures of a male and female parent. end of article
I think Hansen does a fine job in conveying the dangers of homosexual parenting . Other disasters below:
http://blog.taragana.com/n/duke-univ-official-charged-with-offering-5-year-old-son-for-sex-93039 /
http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=128&fArticleId=3171828
- childrencryingout August 4, 2009 2:45PM
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The problem with going with your ideas is...well, there are a few.
Firstly, in regards to points 1, 2, and 3. If those assertions were true, the heirarchy of effective parenting would be, at the top, heterosexual parents. Underneath that would be same-sex parents. Underneath that would be single parents. Do you believe that single parents deserve kids more than same-sex couples? If so, why?
In regards to point 4, that's just not true. There's no higher incidence of homosexuality with same-sex parents than there is with heterosexual parents.
RE: Gender Identity. In studies of children ranging in age from 5 to 14, results of projective testing and related interview procedures have revealed that development of gender identity among children of lesbian mothers follows the expected pattern (Green, 1978; Green, Mandel, Hotvedt, Gray, & Smith, 1986; Kirkpatrick, Smith & Roy, 1981). More direct assessment techniques to assess gender identity have been used by Golombok, Spencer, & Rutter (1983) with the same result: All children in this study reported that they were happy with their gender and that they had no wish to be a member of the opposite sex. There was no evidence in any of the studies of gender identity of any difficulties among children of lesbian mothers. No data have been reported in this area for children of gay fathers.
RE: Gender-Role Behavior. A number of studies have reported that gender-role behavior among children of lesbian mothers fell within typical limits for conventional sex roles (Brewaeys et al., 1997; Golombok et al., 1983; Gottman, 1990; Green, 1978; Green et al., 1986; Hoeffer, 1981; Kirkpatrick et al., 1981; Kweskin & Cook, 1982; Patterson, 1994a). For instance, Kirkpatrick and her colleagues (1981) found no differences between children of lesbian versus heterosexual mothers in toy preferences, activities, interests, or occupational choices.
RE: Sexual Orientation. A number of investigators have also studied a third component of sexual identity, sexual orientation (Bailey, Bobrow, Wolfe, & Mickach, 1995; Bozett, 1980, 1987, 1989; Gottman, 1990; Golombok & Tasker, 1996; Green, 1978; Huggins, 1989; Miller, 1979; Paul, 1986; Rees, 1979; Tasker & Golombok, 1997). In all studies, the great majority of offspring of both lesbian mothers and gay fathers described themselves as heterosexual. Taken together, the data do not suggest elevated rates of homosexuality among the offspring of lesbian or gay parents. For instance, Huggins (1989) interviewed 36 adolescents, half of whom had lesbian mothers and half of whom had heterosexual mothers. No children of lesbian mothers identified themselves as lesbian or gay, but one child of a heterosexual mother did; this difference was not statistically significant. In another study, Bailey and his colleagues (1995) studied adult sons of gay fathers and found more than 90% of the sons to be heterosexual.
Golombok and Tasker (1996, 1997) studied 25 young adults reared by divorced lesbian mothers and 21 young adults reared by divorced heterosexual mothers. They reported that offspring of lesbian mothers were no more likely than those of heterosexual mothers to describe themselves as feeling attracted to same-sex sexual partners. If they were attracted in this way, however, young adults with lesbian mothers were more likely to report that they would consider entering into a same-sex sexual relationship, and they were more likely to have actually participated in such a relationship. They were not, however, more likely to identify themselves as non-heterosexual (i.e., as lesbian, gay, or bisexual). These results were based on a small sample, and they must be interpreted with caution. At the same time, the study is the first to follow children of divorced lesbian mothers into adulthood, and it offers a detailed and careful examination of important issues.
And regarding point 5, that's the issue with every divorce. Homosexual marriages aren't more likely to split up than heterosexual marriages--At least, there's no evidence saying so.
- quantummechanik August 4, 2009 3:58PM
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The Focus on the Family have for years, been highly critical of any progressive or common sense thought! They are so far to the "right" on the political spectrum, that sensible and fair minded people should not give homage to these reactionaries! They are filled with hatred towards all gay people and those who support and more inclusive society !
A child adopted by a loving and caring gay 2 parent household, will grow
normally, feeling loved and accepted! The hetorsexual experiece has done a wonderful job in bringing about huge numbers of divorce families,
children out of wedlock esp in the Black community, and the children of ddivorced parents, feeling neglected and unloved! If 2 gay parents are
truly in love and in a committed relationship and have the financial and emotional resources to provide for that child-then whats the problem? The extreme right expoused by the Focus on the Family, believe fervently in the status quo and are always resistant to any change that can make our society better. I look forward to the day when ggays and lesbians will have the same equal rights as others have and
take for granted!
- philly53 August 29, 2009 10:40AM
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Focus on the Family has completely missed the point here. In most adoption cases living with the biological parents is impossible due to the parents being physically or psychologically able to care for the child. In a perfect world every child would have loving parents, a warm home, and plenty of food. Unfortunately we don't live in a perfect world.
- Ouabache December 8, 2008 7:01AM
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Most, if not all, of Focus on the Family's "research" which they use to "prove" that gay-parented families are inferior to straight-parented families are studies of children being raised either in single-parent homes because their parents were divorced or they were abandoned by one of their parents, or of children being raised in "blended" step-families. Such familial situations may very well NOT be ideal for raising children, but poor outcomes from such blended or single-parent families does not by any means equate to poor outcomes for children raised in stable, two-parent, loving, nurturing homes where the parents are of the same gender.
The studies of children raised in stable, loving, two-same-gendered parent homes show that such children are equally as happy, healthy and thriving as children raised in equivalent opposite-gendered-parent homes.
- Babaroni December 8, 2008 11:47AM
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What research? The title of this section implies that some kind of research will be cited. Instead, all we get is a series of statements like "reseach indicates" and "researchers find." This whole argument lacks substance.
- KerryC December 8, 2008 12:26PM
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I see that someone mentioned that it is in our nature to procreate and rear our children. sure to a degree, but then we would not have the problems we see if this were universally true. It is better to say that loving people will readily step in and raise a child to the limits of their ability. this is why people adopt often. I know several families where the parents chose to adopt rather than add another to the planet themselves. people provide foster care for children who are not theirs. cats will suckle and tend to a dog, apes tend to orphaned babies. Strangers will miss appointments to find the parent of a child roaming the mall. while SOME (most or many) may feel the need to procreate, even more feel the drive to nurture.
- taoish December 17, 2008 9:17AM
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All of the studies cited compared married biological heterosexual families versus other splintered heterosexual families. None of the studies considered same-sex couples as variables, so none of those studies can be said to reveal anything about children of same-sex couples.
If you want to discuss children of same-sex couples, then you must read a study that discusses same-sex couples, not one that discusses splintered heterosexual couples. Go ahead over to http://www.apa.org/pi/parent.html to see literally HUNDREDS of studies that actually looked at children of same-sex couples.
The big lie is that Focus thinks that a splintered heterosexual couple is equivalent to a committed homosexual couple. Nothing could be further from the truth!!!
There are several selection factors that actually make same-sex couples more fit parents , statistically speaking, than the average heterosexual couple. Mainly, same-sex couples can't have accidental children, meaning they only will adopt children if they plan to, you can't accidently get knocked up when you are gay .
Focus, will you stop lying and actually read scientific literature???
- blackmetalqueer March 26, 2009 2:03PM
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info from 1991, 1996, 2003, 2004.... nothing from 2005-6-7-8... APA which has info from 5, 6, 7, and 8, disagrees with this notion that children are disadvantaged with gay parents... So i guess recent research doesnt indicate children doing best when raised by married mom/dad families.
- zman676 May 29, 2009 4:14PM
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But what if the married mum and dad don't love one another? What if they do not love their children ? I would have rather been raised by same-sex couples rather than the evil bastards that were my parents.
- JessicaSideways October 7, 2009 2:37PM
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How can you say that kids who grow up in a home with 2 parents that are in a loving and committed relationship are at a disadvantage? The argument about kids needing to have a male parent to discuss some things with and a female parent to discuss other things with is off the wall. What about parents of single parents, either by divorce or death? Does society just write those kids off like the kids of same-sex parents? That’s not a very fair shake at life. The issue in any child-rearing environment is love, educational, support and consistency. If you offer that to your kids, they will end up just fine.
- FullofThought October 16, 2009 3:11PM
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This seems to be a growing epidemic among the experts on this site: A lack of positive evidence does not imply that the argument is false. There was a time that there was no proof of the existence of microbes, so at that time it would be perfectly reasonable to assume that illness was entirely caused by evil spirits. Everyone needs to stop making this argument.
- roy1167 December 8, 2008 11:57AM
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Here is a quote from a summary of studies done on gay/lesbian parenting:
"In summary, there is no evidence to suggest that lesbian women or gay men are unfit to be parents or that psychosocial development among children of lesbian women or gay men is compromised relative to that among offspring of heterosexual parents. Not a single study has found children of lesbian or gay parents to be disadvantaged in any significant respect relative to children of heterosexual parents. Indeed, the evidence to date suggests that home environments provided by lesbian and gay parents are as likely as those provided by heterosexual parents to support and enable children's psychosocial growth."
Link: http://www.apa.org/pi/lgbc/publications/lgpconclusion.html
Link to the study on the website of the American Psychological Association:
http://www.apa.org/pi/parent.html
From the second page, above:
"Part I is a summary of research findings on lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children written by Charlotte J. Patterson, PhD. Part II is an annotated bibliography of the literature cited in the summary. Part III provides some additional resources relevant to lesbian and gay parenting in the forensic context: APA amicus briefs, professional association policies, and contact information for relevant organizations."
I find it ludicrous that the organization in this country which has the most credible membership of both academics and practitioners of psychology is pooh-poohed and discounted by this tiny biased religious group, Focus on the Family, and it's various outgrowths (Family Research Council, Exodus International, etc.) who clearly have a strong religious bias in discrediting gays as "sinners" and "deviants" in every possible venue, and yet some people insist upon billing Focus on the Family as "experts" in the field. It is ridiculous.
Focus on the Family has but one goal -- to convince the world that gays are sinful perverts, sexual deviants, who should not have the same rights as heterosexuals. They denigrate our families, try to have our children taken away, and would (re)criminalize our private sexual behaviors if they could.
And yet they are given the same credence as the APA. I say again: Ludicrous.
- Babaroni December 8, 2008 12:32PM
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you have anything that is actually more recent than 2004...?
- zman676 May 29, 2009 4:27PM
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You think things have changed significantly since 2004? Studies take time to compile. Do you actually believe that an entire body of data spreading over the course of the last 30-40 years could show that children of same-gender parents are healthy, well-adjusted, and not at a disadvantage as compared with their opposite-gender-parented peers, but then somehow something would happen in the last 5 years which would turn all that on its ear?
Sure, whatever. If you can produce a study in the last five years which demonstrates that the last 30-40 years' worth of studies are wrong, please link it right up and I'll be happy to have a look.
- Babaroni May 29, 2009 6:00PM
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I see now that you are on the "No" side of this issue, and apologize if I was hasty in assuming that you were challenging the validity of the data.
There is research being done constantly, and there may be more recent studies. I don't think, though, that they have any significant argument with the existing material I linked.
- Babaroni May 29, 2009 6:03PM
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its cool, i get defensive on these subjects all the time... i have though attacked the other side because i was sure there was more recent data -hence they use data from 2004 and below-
- zman676 May 30, 2009 9:04AM
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Psychosocial Adjustment, School Outcomes, and Romantic Relationships of Adolescents With Same-Sex Parents. Jennifer L. Wainright, Stephen T. Russell, and Charlotte J. Patterson. Child Development, 2004, Volume 75, Number 6, Pages 1886-1898.
That's my first source. In it, the three find that "The results of the present study, which is the first based on a large national sample of adolescents living with same-sex couples, revealed that on nearly all of a large array of variables related to school and personal adjustment, adolescents with same-sex parents did not differ significantly from a matched group of adolescents living with opposite-sex parents. Regardless of family type, adolescents were more likely to show favorable adjustment when they perceived more caring from adults and when parents described close relationships with them. Thus, as has been reported in studies of children with lesbian mothers (e.g., Chan et al., 1998), it was the qualities of adolescent-parent relationships rather than the structural features of families (e.g., same vs. opposite-sex parents) that were significantly associated with adolescent adjustment (Golombok, 1999; Patterson, 2000)."
Have some other sources:
Patterson, C.J. (2000). Family relationships of lesbians and gay men. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 62, 1052 – 1069.
Huggins (1989). A comparative study of self-esteem of adolescent children of divorced lesbian mothers and divorced heterosexual mothers. In F.W. Bozett (Ed.), Homosexuality and the family (pp. 123-35). New York: Harrington Park Press.
O'Connor, A. (1993). Voices from the heart: The developmental impact of a mother's lesbianism on her adolescent children. Smith College Studies in Social Work, 63, 281-299.
Gershon, Tschann, and Jemerin (1999). Stigmatization, self-esteem, and coping among the adolescent children of lesbian mothers. Journal of Adolescent Health, 24, 437-445.
Golombok et. al.: Children in lesbian and single-parent households: Psychosocial and psychiatric appraisal. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 24, 551-572.
And I found these all spending ten minutes on my university's website. Don't tell me you don't have access to this kind of material.
- QuinceyQuick February 7, 2009 11:08AM
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It seems the "experts" from Focus think they can dismiss a growing body of work by dicing up the semantics of the APA's general statement. They could have instead taken a trip to google and found any number of research papers that directly address their question of what kind of heterosexual couple do the children of same-sex couples resemble.
Dufur, M. , McKune, B. A., Hoffmann, J. P. and Bahr, S. J. , 2007-08-11 "Adolescent Outcomes in Single Parent, Heterosexual Couple, and Homosexual Couple Families: Findings from a National Survey" Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, TBA, New York, New York City Online . 2009-03-04 from http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p184075_index.html
The abstract reads,"...In this study, we provide the first empirical analysis using national representative data that compares adolescents from these various family types on several different social outcomes. We utilize data from the National Survey of Adolescent Health (AddHealth) to compare a variety of academic and behavioral outcomes across seven family types: two- parent biological, single mother, single father, father/stepmother, mother/stepfather, two gay male parents, and two lesbian parents. Comparisons across these family types show that adolescents raised by gay and lesbian parents typically behave more like youth in two parent biological families, providing little support for gendered-deficit theories."
There is the answer, "...adolescents raised by gay and lesbian parents typically behave more like youth in two parent biological families..."
How can you call yourself an expert when you are not willing to do a 10 minute google search?
- blackmetalqueer March 26, 2009 12:40PM
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"How can you call yourself an expert when you are not willing to do a 10 minute google search?"
high five
- zman676 May 29, 2009 4:30PM
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In the previous argument the title states " Research Indicates Children Do Best When Raised By Married Mom & Dad." Yet this argument says that no reliable research indicates children in same sex homes do as well. Now clear something up for me. If there is "reliable" research to indicate an outcome in any comparison, there has to be reliable research based on the other end of that comparison. That means you can't say that kids do best with mom and dad and then say that there is no reliable research to the contrary. Either the first statement is made up, or the second is a lie. Lastly, how is this research performed? Who conducted it and what are the standards? None of this info is given. I, for one, was raised in a mom and dad household. And one that lived by Focus on the Family, none the less. However, I want to pull my hair out thinking about my upbringing. Going by textbook FOTF living, resulted in a pregnant teenage sister who got kicked out of high school, a gay brother, and me. I left the home at 16 and slept in my car at the park. My friend? Grew up with two dads. She excelled in school, is happily married to her military husband, and is well on her way to her Masters. Now tell me again. What are the standards?
- levi944 August 27, 2009 9:23PM
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Because of all the "rules and regulations", and headache that comes with being a gay parent, there doesn't really seem to be too many of them. But I promise this, you can mark a tally under the yes column when the research does start. I know I did the best I could regardless of my home situation.
- BigBadWoof October 6, 2009 12:04AM
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The entire premise of this argument rests on the premise that the current debate is analogous to a decision made 40 years ago, referred to as the Divorce Experiment. I am extremely skeptical of this assertion since divorce has existed for thousands of years and there has been no mention of who participated in or initiated this experiment.
The remaining point made in this argument seems to be that divorce is hard on children, and I wholeheartedly agree, but without any proof of the assertion of a similarity between the two "Experiments", the rest of the argument is a non sequitur.
If you read this comment, could you please explain what you mean?
- tojo2000 December 6, 2008 8:03PM
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This argument has been used many times before and with equal disingenuousness. This was the same argument used against interracial marriage -- "What about the CHILDREN???? :gasp:" Research DOES show that the children of same-gender parents do equally as well as the children of opposite-gender parents. The only "research" which disputes this is the mocked-up garbage disseminated by Focus on the Family, which draws upon studies of children raised by a single parent, generally as the result of traumatic divorce or abandonment.
Stop with the gasping and eyelash fluttering and start speaking the truth for a change.
- Babaroni December 8, 2008 8:19AM
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This debate is about same sex parenting, not the effects of divorce on children. Yes, it is true that same-sex parents all have step-families by default, but many (most?) times these are step-families since the time of the child's birth. I am assuming that most of this divorce research is done on children who are at some stage of development past the first year, when heterosexual parental bonding has already occurred. It appears this entire argument is invalid to the topic.
- Pat Cheney December 8, 2008 3:16PM
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Pat, I agree with everything you say here, except the point that all gay parents have step-families by default. Unless we consider that a heterosexual couple who creates their family by use of donor sperm is creating "step-children," then we cannot say this about lesbian couples who do the same, or gay men who conceive their children by way of a surrogate. We don't consider straight couples who use a surrogate mom to be step-parents. In fact, we don't even consider straight couples who adopt to be step-parents. So, no, gay couples are not step-families by default. There are all kinds of gay-parented families, just as there are all kinds of straight-parented families. Really, there are just all kinds of families. :)
Not, again, that I disagree with anything in the remainder of your post. You are absolutely right that FOF tries to turn this into a comparison of families parenting biological children vs. families parenting children as a result of divorce or abandonment, and that is a ridiculous comparison to make as "proof" that gays are "inadequate" or "substandard" parents.
- Babaroni December 9, 2008 7:14AM
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Yes, you are correct...I was only trying to be absolutely as bending and as accommodating as I could be in seeing FOF's side of the argument.
Pat
- Pat Cheney December 9, 2008 1:53PM
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Thanks for the clarification.
- Babaroni December 9, 2008 2:32PM
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so what you were saying about divorce is it is better for a child to witness the pain and stress of the parents in the home and most likely suffer from depression because of it? you beleive it is better for a child to be in a situation were they do not receive full love from the parents or were the only time they get attention is when parents are trying to get back at one another? oh and so you know according to research in pyschology and child devolpment, it is better for a child to have parents who love them, respect them, and will be able to provide physical and emotional needs.
- meghan288 April 7, 2009 3:43PM
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I think it is much less ethical to subject them to ignorant religious bigotry against our fellow human beings.
- JessicaSideways October 7, 2009 2:40PM
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Taking a claim out of context, distorting it to serve your purpose and pathetically placing a concept up as a scarecrow to knock down will not avail you.
Love has nothing to do with this... Sorry. You cannot hide behind it as a shield. Stay on context or don't contribute.
- visavismeyou October 11, 2009 3:12PM
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How is it that this is out of context? Just because those of us who are less educated say something is out of context does not mean it is so. They are referring to loving, caring relationships between two adults as "an untested social experiment" and you say that it is out of context? Sorry, I beg to differ.
Also, I would like to add that it is unethical to deny gay men and lesbians the right to adopt. Hell, the children will come out better people with stronger character because of the fact that they have successfully confronted homophobia in their lives. Much like children from interracial couples have overcome issues of race and identity, as well as prejudice from many groups of people.
Love has everything to do with a proper, healthy family. That is what these gay men and lesbians seek to form, a proper, healthy family. I am afraid that you cannot debate my comment on it's merits so you choose to cry "out of context! out of context!". I have distorted nothing and deep down, you know this. It is unfortunate that you choose to attack my argument rather than debate. Shame.
- JessicaSideways October 11, 2009 4:44PM
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Beg away, it is completely out of context. Context: we have a great deal of data about the various environs that a child can grow up in including but not limited to: Abusive father, abusive mother , orphaned, single mother, single father etc. et. al. These are tested social experiments...
Two fathers or two mothers, however, is not.
This has nothing to do with two people loving each other or not and the diminution of your argument is obvious by saying that it does.
The rest of what you said was wildly off topic.
- visavismeyou November 24, 2009 8:15PM
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You are terrible at understanding context. I will not respond to your statement, I will only inform you that you have missed my point and if you are actually interested in discussion you'd reread it and try again.
- visavismeyou December 14, 2009 5:11PM
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Then you are going to have to clarify what you mean by 'tested social experiments'.
- MrBook December 14, 2009 5:14PM
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We can only speak from experience and conjecture. Anecdotes, unfortunately, are all we have right now when talking about this topic. If there was some way to objectively gauge whether a child being raised in a safe , secure and calm heterosexual home was any better-off (or perhaps worse-off) than a child being raised in a safe, secure and calm homosexual home then we could talk about this topic intelligently. All we can do right now is make analogies and comparisons while talking about our own conjecture and limited experiences.
I am personally witnessing a boy being raised in a lesbian home and have been watching him grow for the last 15 years (he is 15 years old). The couple raising him are very intelligent and caring individuals, but there just seems something odd about the young man, the way he acts and talks, the things he says, are all odd, I will not go into detail, however, there definitely is something off about him.
Beyond that, I am not even sure it is causal, perhaps he would have been odd if raised by a heterosexual couple, I cannot know this, however, in the current lack of knowledge that we have as a culture, I am opposed to homosexual parenting .
- visavismeyou October 11, 2009 3:29PM
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Focus on the Family is correct in stating that taking children away from their natural parents and giving them to a homosexual couple to be raised in some bizarre social experiment would be unethical. That is not what anyone is suggesting, however. What is the question is whether children would be better off being adopted by a loving homosexual couple instead of being left to a foster home or government program in the event that no one else is there to care for them. While one could argue back and forth all day about whether being adopted by a heterosexual or homosexual couple makes a difference, and admittedly it probably does, there is little doubt that loving parents of any sexuality would be better than the alternative. The problem with this debate is that no one is willing to forget their own biases and prejudices and think about the kids. They can't seem to get past what they want for themselves or what their religion/society tells them is wrong.
- richardsonkr December 3, 2008 2:35PM
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Fundamentally same sex marriage is based on the rejection of the other sex. It is not in the interest of society to support that concept.
Discussing if an abandoned child would be better in a same sex home than whitout a home missing the point and the long term consequences.
It is the same with divorces. We cant use the exceptions to justify them because we ended up with no fault divorces laws and broke the heart of 42 millions children. Some of them after seeing their parents separating are now choosing the homosexual lifestyle.
And now we are discussing same sex marriages. We need ot go back to the causes and stop trying to fix the symptoms.
- soleil10 December 8, 2008 6:41AM
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Quite simply, your premise is completely wrong. Same sex marriage is based on love for another human being, not rejection of anything. It is preposterous to imply that homosexuals by nature have ill feelings toward those to whom they are not attracted sexually. If what you are saying is true, wouldn't heterosexual marriage be based on the rejection of one's own sex?
It is you who are missing the point; how do we address the causes of the abandonment of children? I do think that a child's biological parents should take responsibility, but life's not that simple. So please, elaborate on the causes of abandoned children and how to address them.
- roy1167 December 8, 2008 12:09PM
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I believe that somewhere along the way someone's emotional development can be altered or misdirected.
Same sex love is fruitless and cannot multiply. There is no descendance and no future blood lineage.
In the case of 2 magnets the + side reject the + side but join the - side.
Do not just disreguard what I am saying lightly.
It is the same with children. When I hear an adult saying: I do not like children but I love dogs or my cat is like my baby. I wander what happened in their life for them to speak that way.
The issue of abandonned children is a separate subject. In any case, some studies show that when children are raised by homosexuals, the chance for them to become homosexual or bisexuals increase 7X.(from 2% to 14% of the population). We are just increasing the problem of homsexuality
Do we have to create new organisations that will provide a mother or a father figure for these children like big borthers or big sister.
I do no buy the idea that a lesbian will play Dad while her partner will play mom successfully
We are just multiplying the problem for these children and the suffering that homosexuals say they endure because of their condition.
Still in order to satisfy your request for me to answer your question, I like to say the following.
I do no know the specific data but I hear that 500,000 children are in the family services' care.
250,000 or more are still connected to their original families and half of the 250,000 left are not small babies but are more dificult to adopt because they are older or have been abused or hurt in some fashion.
The answer is to raise the consciousness of the whole country on this issue big time and mobilise all the goodness in the USA to tackle this problem.
Most people are not aware of it.
Instead of adopting children, people with same sex attraction should be helped in healing themselves.
- soleil10 December 8, 2008 1:37PM
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I'm not taking anything you are saying lightly, simply frightening. The problem I have with the claims you are making is that they are inextricably bound to your system of belief. You are bringing to the argument the assumption that the purpose of human life is procreation, and that's not a belief that everyone holds. In fact, some would say that homosexuality is a perfectly natural measure for the purpose of slowing population growth in an already overpopulated group (I don't actually support this explanation, just an example). Some people have children of their own, and others don't. Having children is not a matter of right and wrong.
As far as people who love animals over human beings, I don't know why they believe what they do, and more importantly, I really don't care. As I said, some people choose to have children, others don't and value other things.
I don't expect to change your mind on the matter, but your characterization of homosexuality as a "problem," is just deplorable. It's not a problem. I wish I could make the point more clear, but while you may not think homosexuality is for you, it isn't objectively wrong. To be different is not to be inferior.
Nobody needs to "play" anything to raise a child. People can be themselves and have a well adjusted, healthy child, even when there isn't somebody doing "dad" things or "mom" things. This also gets to the point that you are bringing in the element of gender roles. What does it mean to "play Dad"? In our society, we have learned to accept some "man things" and some "woman things," but the fact is, virtually all of these divisions are arbitrary and unnecessary.
Next, please don't offer me statistics without citation (2% to 14%). Sorry, but I'm not just going to take your word for it. Also, your clever little magnet analogy is a nice way to simplify your argument for people who can't understand what you are saying in the first place, but it provides nothing new, so I will take that part lightly.
As far as your solution, I think you'd be surprised at how many people are aware of this problem, but do nothing about it. Just raising awareness won't make it go away.
By no means do I expect to convince you, because I think you need to take small steps towards the realm of respecting others before you can actually embrace those that are different from you. I don't think you are a bad person, and I apologize if I am coming off harsh. I hope you can treat these matters objectively and try to avoid allowing personal feelings and beliefs to cloud your arguments. I hope you get help to heal your self of the ill feelings you have towards homosexuals.
- roy1167 December 8, 2008 3:03PM
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I am sorry to say but since the beginning of time the fruit of love between a man and a woman comes out as a child. It is not a question of being for procreation or trying to save the environment through homosexuality. That is way to intellectual of an explanation
The child is from both parents, looks like both parents. The child is in the father and the father is in the child. Same as for the mother.
Anyone who go through that experience feels that it is a miracle.
For me the issue of homosexuality is wrong. It is no about being different. I do not think that there is a person on the face of the earth who has not stuggled with her or his sexuality. It is not an exclusivity of people dealing with same sex attactions.
In my personal beliefs, I do have a reason for this situation. That is not the subject of this post.
I do beliefs that men (masculin) and women (feminin) express their love different for their children in a complementary way. We all experience that. Women can see from early age that boys and girls are different.
Gender roles are affected by the culture people live in but they are real. People who ignore them suffer a lot in their marriages and learn it the hard way. You can recreate the world to fit you personal views.I think that you are fighting the universe itself, not me.
I do not have ill feelings towards homosexuals. It does not mean that I have to agree with you just to please you.
On the issue of adoption, it is not on top of the list of the causes celebre like breast cancer or aids and others.
The study on the increase in homosexual behaviors if someone was raised in a ss home was made available by focus on the family. I do not have a copy with me. It is available on the web. It does make a lot of common sense since children do imitate what they parents do.
- soleil10 December 8, 2008 3:54PM
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I think a big problem here is the different ways we are approaching this debate. You said the matters I was discussing were "[too] intellectual." I think that says a lot. It seems to me that you want to accept seemingly "obvious" truths and come to simple conclusions based on those. In terms of moral and philosophical debate (which this is), I think that is an intellectually weak way to function.
I am not going to try to convince you of anything (at least not anymore); you believe what you believe and I have no expectation of changing that.
I do think struggling with sexuality is a universal experience, but I don't really know where that applies.
- roy1167 December 8, 2008 4:21PM
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What I meant by too intellectual was not that I do not believe in reason and presenting good argument
What I meant is that when intellectual debate starts to offuscate obvious and simple facts or truth,it becomes a bridge to no-where.
The agenda to erase gender for instant is one of these debat to nowhere
- soleil10 December 8, 2008 6:14PM
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The last thing I wanted to mention was your characterization of gender roles. Obviously we all know that boys and girls are different, but I think these differences are often greatly exaggerated, and sometimes entirely made up. I think most of the ways men and women express themselves differently are primarily a learned set of behaviors, not innate ones. "People who ignore them suffer a lot in their marriages..." is also a very telling statement, but I really don't have the energy to get into it. I don't intend to recreate the world or fight the universe, I just don't think we should impose our own beliefs onto others. If a man or woman wants to express him/herself a way that is different from what we normally see, that does not mean it is wrong or inferior, just different.
I'm sorry you'd rather not have an intellectually rigorous debate, but thank you for reading what I've had to say.
- roy1167 December 8, 2008 4:29PM
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Well, this country is quite open and tolerant.
We have seen during the last 4 weeks how intolerant the gay activits and been to the point of anarchy, retaliation, retribution, revenge, mocking and ridiculing their opponents in the most viscious way
Intolerance and imposing someone's own belief by silencing others through fear is for the gay community to deal with. I will never forget what I saw with my own eyes.
The experiences are marked deeply in my soul. I do not expect that it is the end of it but now my eyes are open and I am drawing the line for the protection of my family.
People can do what they want with their own life but they cant steal or hijack the core values of millions of people behind their back using some judgeocracy process and start a rampage if they do not get their way.
The debate is at the very different level now. Many people feel under assault by a ruthless mob and hopefuly will not take it anymore. I know I am not.
Sorry to be direct.
- soleil10 December 8, 2008 6:31PM
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Quote: "I don't expect to change your mind on the matter, but your characterization of homosexuality as a "problem," is just deplorable. It's not a problem."
While I agree with you there was a complete lack of tact in the way in which soleil10 has expressed their view, by any estimates, there is a significant public health risk/problem associated with homosexuality, as evidenced in these figures taken from the book 'Straight & Narrow?', (1995) Thomas E. Schmidt:
Drugs & alcohol with sex: “Whenever these studies consider connections, they show a direct correlation between the number of partners, drug use & the likelihood of unsafe sex. Specifically, a Boston study found that of 262 (homosexual) male subjects, 49% used drugs with sex, 9% weekly; 57% used alcohol with sex, 9% weekly. By comparison, in the general population 8.6% of men regularly used alcohol & 1.1% any drug before or during sex.”
Alcohol: “The current consensus of researchers is that about 30% of homosexuals (both male & female) are problem drinkers, as compared to 10% of the general population.”
Depression: “Depression is another serious mental disorder faced by a disproportionate number of male homosexuals. Two studies (previously cited in book) combine to show that 40% of male homosexual subjects had a history of major depressive disorders (compared to 3% of males generally).”
Suicide: “Jay & Young (The gay report - 1979) found 18% of male homosexuals & 23% of female homosexuals had attempted suicide (compared to 3 % of male heterosexuals & 11% of female heterosexuals).”
Paedophilia: “Several studies reveal that while no more than 2% of male adults are homosexual, approximately 35% of paedophiles are homosexual. Further, since homosexual paedophiles victimize far more children (average 150 each) than do heterosexual paedophiles (average 20 each), approximately 80% of paedophilic victims are boys who are molested by adult males.”
STD’s: “By comparison to even the most promiscuous segment of the general population, the male homosexual 75% lifetime STD incident rate & 40% annual STD incident rate are remarkable. Among those in the general population who had more than twenty-one lifetime partners, 40% report any infection in their lifetime. 6% of those who had more than five partners report an infection in the previous year. Overall, the general population has a 16.9% lifetime STD incident rate & 1.6% for previous twelve months.”
The book points out that these STD rates should not come as a surprise because from a anatomical point of view, the cellular makeup & other characteristics of the vagina are designed to take the penis & this is not the case for the anus. (Obviously anal intercourse is not confined to the homosexual population.)
I find it even more concerning that 'political correctness’ means those who research such facts can find it hard to get the backing to do so & others who try to present such facts as those outlined above, are labelled 'homophobic' for doing so.
- Setfree
February 23, 2009 7:37AM
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Cool. If you can cross-post, I can cross-post too. (Oh yeah, and you have comments waiting in the other place you made this post.)
"Perhaps the people polled were -not- chosen at random. Perhaps the people polled were pulled from parts of the country where promiscuity, drug use, alcohol, etc. were already rampant. Did the study report their findings on opposite-sex couples within their sample?
Furthermore, promiscuity, drug use, alcohol, etc. could very well have been the result of homosexuality being perceived as a social stigma, in which case -homosexuality- is not causing the promiscuity, etc. but -social stigmas-.
Or perhaps those are linked to lacking marriage. Are there studies that report these same variables with married and unmarried opposite-sex couples? I don't find this one to be a far cry from the truth either, because homosexuals would be promiscuous as a result of not needing to stay in a marriage.
I -will- be satisfied with data once the data is sufficient and can counterbalance some of the data I've found. Until then, I don't think you can draw your conclusions without sticking the word "premature" in front of them."
Furthermore, it was demonstrated that some of the studies cited actually came from people polled within AIDS clinics and the like.
Personally, I think hate crimes are a decent measure of how society responds to homosexuality: http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm (Table 1 for each year under Hate Crimes section) As you'll notice, hate crimes have neither had a dramatic increase or drop since 1995, suggesting that tolerance may only be getting -slightly- better (if we account for the population increase, though we have to counterbalance for cities lost within the samples). Furthermore, you and I both know that there's going to be a time-lag in the feedback system here. Information isn't spread instantaneously; people don't change their perception of themselves overnight.
As for the data I've collected, it revolves around -parenting-, and to infer that -parenting- is closely enough related to -mental stability-... I don't think there's a close enough connection. In any case, I pulled the information from here: Psychosocial Adjustment, School Outcomes, and Romantic Relationships of Adolescents With Same-Sex Parents. Jennifer L. Wainright, Stephen T. Russell, and Charlotte J. Patterson. Child Development, 2004, Volume 75, Number 6, Pages 1886-1898.
In the introduction, the author cites various other studies which I'm not particularly interested in, though the studies contend that same-sex parents have no effect on children's self esteem.
I believe that the study only used forty-four families, though, so you'll have to realize that the sample might be too small and not representative of the community.
“The results of the present study, which is the first based on a large national sample of adolescents living with same-sex couples, revealed that on nearly all of a large array of variables related to school and personal adjustment, adolescents with same-sex parents did not differ significantly from a matched group of adolescents living with opposite-sex parents. Regardless of family type, adolescents were more likely to show favorable adjustment when they perceived more caring from adults and when parents described close relationships with them. Thus, as has been reported in studies of children with lesbian mothers (e.g., Chan et al., 1998), it was the qualities of adolescent-parent relationships rather than the structural features of families (e.g., same vs. opposite-sex parents) that were significantly associated with adolescent adjustment (Golombok, 1999; Patterson, 2000).” p. 1895
- QuinceyQuick February 23, 2009 10:57AM
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The data I have previously presented is that homosexuality should not be presented as a healthy alternative choice, because it clearly presents significant physical/emotional health risks.
As the author of the same book says - "The point in bringing it out is only to explore the implications of suffering for personal morality. Or, to put it in the form of a question: Does homosexual behaviour incur a sufficient risk of harm to the self or others to call it wrong on health grounds alone?"
The data you have presented above is focused on the rather unrelated issue of the ability/outcomes of same sex couples to parent/parenting children.
- Setfree March 8, 2009 5:28AM
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“Across a diverse array of assessments, we found that the personal, family, and school adjustment of adolescents living with same-sex parents did not differ from that of adolescents living with opposite-sex parents. Consistent with the findings of earlier research (e.g., Huggins, 1989), we found that adolescent self-esteem did not vary as a function of family type. In addition, we found no differences as a function of family type in measures of personal adjustment, such as depressive symptoms and anxiety; in measures of school adjustment, such as academic achievement, trouble in school, or feelings of school connectedness; or in measures of the qualities of family relationships, such as autonomy, care from adults and peers, neighborhood integration, or parental warmth. The clarity of results from this broad array of assessments strengthens our confidence that adolescents living with same-sex parents were functioning well in many domains, both at home and at school.” p. 1895
“Most adolescents in our sample reported having had a romantic relationship in recent months, but only a minority reported having had sexual intercourse; there were no significant differences in this regard as a function of family type.” p. 1895
“An unexpected aspect of our results was the finding that adolescents' feelings of connectedness at school varied as a function of family type. Adolescents living with same-sex parents reported feeling more connected to school than did those living with opposite-sex parents. Inasmuch as school connectedness among adolescents has been associated with fewer problem behaviors and greater emotional well-being (Resnick et al., 1997), this finding suggests that adolescents with same-sex parents might be expected to show more favorable adjustment. For measures of adjustment such as self-esteem and depressive symptoms, however, we found no effects of family type. Consequently, the best interpretation of this intriguing finding remains unclear.” p. 1896
However, we cannot conclusively say here that (1) same-sex parents are just as good for their children (due to small population size and the fact that "good parents" might be a result of other things like community, etc.) or (2) same-sex parents are just as mentally stable as opposite-sex parents.
http://www.ojp.gov/bjs/glance/viort.htm
Violent crimes have decreased, meaning that the trend towards the slight decrease in sexually oriented hate crimes might be a result of crimes decreasing across the board as opposed to more sexual-oriented-based tolerance.
- QuinceyQuick February 23, 2009 10:57AM
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I wasn't aware that cross posting was a crime. I'll keep raising the issue of the high physical/emotional health risks of homosexuality whenever others in the back & forth of this debate keep ignoring/overlooking this issue & presenting/promoting homosexuality as a positive/healthy alternative - as previously stated, nothing could be further from the truth.
Your reference to hate crimes related to sexual orientation actually supports my position if anything, on closer examination of the figures - eg. Number of victims of male homosexual hate crimes - in 1997 - 927 victims / in 2000 - 1089 victims / 2002 - 984 / 2003 - 910 / 2004 - 902 / 2006 - 913. So with the exception of the yr 2000 (&2002 / 2006 to a lesser extent) there has been a downward trend in this type of crime. The same is true for female homosexual hate crimes - in 1997 - 236 victims / 2000 - 230 / 2002 - 221 / 2003 - 230 / 2004 - 212 / 2006 - - 202. When you account for the fact that the American population has increased during the same timeframe by approx 20 million - this can only be seen as a downward trend.
- Setfree March 7, 2009 4:13PM
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I have no Idea whether it's better for a child to be raised by a homosexual or heterosexual couple but my gut feeling is there is no reason why a child raised by a Gay couple shouldn't be just as well adjusted as one raised by a traditional family.
- tbcass December 8, 2008 7:35AM
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None of Focus on the Families arguments have any bearing on the argument. They say kids are better off in married 2 parent households with their biological parents. This is most likely true but the kids we're talking about have already been put up for adoption by their biological parents. This is no longer an option for them. The question we need to answer is whether they're better off in a gay household than an orphanage or bouncing from house to house in foster care. Nobody can argue that foster care or an orphanage is better than a loving home, whether the parents are straight, gay, black, white, religious atheist or anything else.
They also argue that divorce is bad for children. No kidding! Again, that has no bearing on the argument. Since we won't let same sex partners marry they can't possibly get divorced. Seems like, if anything, this is an argument for same sex adoption.
I'd argue that anything that gets children out of the foster system and out of orphanages and into a loving home is a positive step for the children.
- State of Reason December 8, 2008 7:40AM
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The only social experiment that we are doing that is undermining families in this country is economic. We have reduced wages in this country to the point that one person cannot support a household anymore leaving kids to fend for themselves or at daycare most of the time. We have increased class sizes to unmanageable levels because we can’t afford (or don’t want to) to pay teachers and when we do notice problems with our children getting help is next to impossible unless you have thousands of dollars you can part with to pay for it.
Most of us ignore reality thinking we know what a typical family looks like or is suppose to look like. We ignore what our children are really doing when they are out of our sight and refuse to take responsibility when they don’t turn out the way we think they should. There is always someone or something else to blame, TV, video games, drugs, how about we blame ourselves for a change.
Why is it that all of these arguments concerning gays, marriage, and parenthood are always waged by religious organizations? Why if there was any legitimacy at all to any of this we don’t have secular agreement. I respect the right of every individual to believe what they want but don’t state your superstition as fact.
- Jimmy P December 8, 2008 7:51AM
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SS men....where have I heard that before?
- truehappiness October 1, 2009 6:55PM
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Why do people keep comparing homosexuality to the Nazis? Don't you know that homosexuals were one of the groups sent to the gas chambers by the Nazis?
- MrBook October 2, 2009 6:52AM
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Does the author or anyone else know which peer-reviewed studies in particular are being referenced as proof of his assertion?
- tojo2000 December 6, 2008 8:05PM
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If you are refering to studies supporting same-gendered parents, then, yes. Here is a link to a good summary:
http://www.apa.org/pi/parent.html
- Babaroni December 8, 2008 12:56PM
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Within my varied circle of friends is a lesbian couple in their early 50s who have been together for 30 years. They live in inner-suburban Sydney, Australia, where pretty much, no-one cares about the gender(s) of a couple. They are happy, stable and affluent thanks to years of hard work and long, steady careers.
They have a son who has just finished high school. One of his parents is his birth mother; the other is related through the sperm of the father.
Their son is a handsome, good-natured, polite, clever and amiable boy with a bright future because in a free, open society like Australia, no church overwhelms the moral judgments of the population, and he is at no disadvantage.
In the US the problem is not the gender of the couple; it is the society around them that disadvantages the children. Unfortunately this kind of issue is always a numbers thing. The law moves slowly behind society - but when does any law on a moral issue precede the need or want of the population? So there has to be a critical mass of people demanding legal recognition: the pioneers. These pioneers have managed very well to raise children despite the lack of societal and legal support in the US.
It has always struck me as strange that a country who is so consumed by the supposed welfare of these children is only now beginning to look at a system of universal health care that many other developed countries (e.g. UK, Sweden, Australia, Canada, France) have had for decades. Certainly there would be more harm done to US children whose families are damaged or compromised by the burden of inferior public health care or unethical insurers than anything affecting children of gay couples. The US moral masses should get their priorities right.
By the way, Australia has just formally identified dozens of ways in which our current laws disadvantage gay people. Right now, these are in the process of being rewritten. It's a wonderful thing for our society. I look forward to the day when everyone is equal at law and our community is comprised of many different types of people, all contributing their diversity to a rich and elevated way of living. In Australia, it will come. In the US... well, I can't see it happening any time soon.
- cyberdog December 8, 2008 4:07PM
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I will assume that you are Australian and just have this compulsive interest in the United States. I would suggest that you stay where you are since it seems ideally suited to you.
- just a thought August 27, 2009 11:37PM
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I will assume you're an American, otherwise you wouldn't reply with a comment so unnecessary. You wouldn't know this, but for anyone else in the world, being informed about issues simmering along in the US is hardly compulsive.
I won't ever be travelling to the US, because I don't need to - your country makes its way over here, as so much of your media is exported to countries like mine. Unfortunately, so are some of the happy-clappy-type churches and their foreign moralities along with it.
You're right: at the moment, my country is ideally suited to me. Dnd due to people like you, it seems, it is in danger of not being so. I call that interference ... hence my interest in this forum and others like it.
- cyberdogaustralia August 28, 2009 12:36AM
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The assumption here is that we are comparing apples with apples. A 'good' heterosexual environment with a 'good' homosexual environment. But the facts are otherwise. More than one third of hetero marriages end up in divorce, and many that stay together are far from plain sailing.
I would have absolutely no doubt that children from a sound Same Sex home are better off than children from a bad marriage, or single mum home. Better off than an orphanage, better off than street kids.
Disadvantaged as compared to a strong heterosexual home, few though they may be? Probably yes. That's got to get the number one slot.
So I can't vote on this issue, it's not so straight forward as Yes/No.
Interestingly, I have been struggling with this very issue in my fourth book. The first third is available free on the internet at http://www.bernard-preston.com/A-Family-Affair.html for those who might like to sample a dozen or so chapters.
Bernie Preston.
- Barrie Lewis
December 10, 2008 12:08AM
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I am glad that I have a male parent to talk to about certain things and a female parent to talk to about other things. I don't think I would be as well adjusted if this were not the case. I am sure that some children of same-sex parents are happier than me, and others are less happy than me, but I don't think I would be as happy if I had same-sex parents.
- ufcarazy February 5, 2009 11:07AM
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That's an interesting way of looking at things, but if I may be so rude as to question you, I am simply going to ask "WHY do you think you wouldn't be happy?"
I grew up with two dads and I would definitely consider myself happier than most. Yet a single case a study does not make.
I will, however, say that kids with only one parent or worse yet, NO parents are significantly more UNhappy than MOST kids with two parents...
Just a question and a thought, pay me no heed if you wish.
- wonka May 19, 2009 3:52PM
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It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that being gay just means being human. The "Yes" argument conists of "Well, isn't it obvious gays are evil?". *Shakes head*
- Ree
April 16, 2009 3:42PM
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I would assume that the "expert" MD is gay?
- just a thought August 27, 2009 11:33PM
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“I would assume that the "expert" MD is gay?”
How does their orientation alter the truth of their statement?
- MrBook August 28, 2009 5:12PM
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And what do these gay's teach their adoptees about sex education? I'm sure they do not bring up how is an unatural sexual arrangement, an sin in most the the religious communities.
I sure hope they dono't try and discuss it on a intellectual level with 10-13 year old boys and girls.
- Big O December 8, 2008 9:48AM
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We teach our children the same things any parent teaches his or her children. That seems rather obvious to me.
First they learn about their own bodies. They ask questions and a parent answers those questions honestly, but at the level of detail appropriate to the age of the child. Then they notice differences about the other gender (in our case, our daughters observed that the family dogs were built a little differently). The parent again explains what the child has observed, at a level appropriate to the child's age and questions.
There is nothing particularly difficult, here.
- Babaroni December 8, 2008 12:16PM
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You right, there is nothing difficult because you and the good doctor avoid the real issue. Describing the physical differences between a male and a female is not the issue. Its about two same sex adults not being capable of giving emotional and experience laden guidence to maturing children of the opposite sex. This being the case it's obvious that the children are at a disadvantage from the situation.
A female cannot possiblely give guidence a male parent can to a boy about a boy growing up and visa-versa. It would be exactly the same as having no male influence in the family.
- Big O December 9, 2008 9:33AM
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Just because my genitalia might be different from my child's does not mean I'm incapable of giving him or her guidance about sexual issues, feelings, experiences, fears or misunderstandings. And if an issue comes up in which input from a person of the opposite gender seems necessary or important, there are other family members and trusted friends to turn to for additional help and guidance. To declare this as a reason why same-gender parents are inadequate to parent children is simply ridiculous. It's equivalent to claiming that a black child cannot be adequately parented by white parents because they will not be able to give the child guidance with regard to his/her race. Good, loving parents meet challenges as they come up and use the resources available to them to care for their children.
Prejudice is what puts children at a disadvantage, not loving parents.
- Babaroni December 9, 2008 9:56AM
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First of all, I have to say that I am highly insulted by your comment. To say that a mother cannot give her male child guidance (or father to daughter) is ludicrous and inflammatory. I have been a single parent to a son for most of his 16 years and he is very well-adjusted, well-informed and open-minded (if I do say so myself ; ) ).
Secondly, while I have no studies to support my claim, I have lots of personal experience. I am raising my son with my same-sex partner, and as I've already stated, he is doing exceptionally well. I know several same-sex couples who have adopted and I can't think of one instance where these children are "disadvantaged". Can there be challenges in these circumstances? Of course. But what child doesn't provide a challenge to their parent(s) at some point.
If anything, I would say that these adopted children are better off than many children. They were given to families who wanted them with all of their hearts, and who had to fight every step of the way to bring them home. Once there, they are showered with love and affection. The only thing that might make their lives easier would be if they were not stared at with contempt by the bigots of this country.
- Jules December 9, 2008 10:13PM
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My response didn't get thru so I'll try again.
I really don't care if your insulted by the truth or not, that's your problem. How can you really think a female can give a male perspective? Thre are experiences in life that are sex oriented and no matter hom much you want it not to be, some things are impossible.
Please explain how a male can possibly explain the mother instinct to a male adolescent? Please comment on the relationship a mother has with a son, if your a male?
We are our experiences and nothing can change that.
Please explaine "well adjusted" and "open minded". Is one inclusive of the other? Who says so, you? The neighbor?. The only thing same sex parenets cannot give a child is the same as an only parent.
The emotional and experience of the opposite sexual parent. A family experienced of a father and mother.
Your perspective that all's a child need is love and affection is rather limited in itself. Love an affection have nothing to do with the focus of discussion so why mention it?
Most adopted kids want to know who their biological parents are. There is a bond that is undeniable and has nothing to do with the love and kindness of another.
You talk about bigots like straights have a corner on the market. Waht about the gay's threatening the lives of christians? I suppsoe that's OK since they promote you agenda. Or pedophiles wanting to become parents haveing close access same sex children, schools, and friends.
Or do you say that this doesn't exist?
The only thing that is relevant is what the child and or cannot get from same sex parents.
- Big O December 15, 2008 9:46AM
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"Please explain how a male can possibly explain the mother instinct to a male adolescent? Please comment on the relationship a mother has with a son, if your a male?"
I agree that some experiences in life are gender-specific. But there are resources available. If you are that father trying to explain a mother-son relationship, could you not use your experience as a son as an example? Hmmmmm...
"Please explaine "well adjusted" and "open minded". Is one inclusive of the other? Who says so, you? The neighbor? "
Yes, one is inclusive of the other. Who says so? I do. This is my forum, my opinions, so I decide.
I agree that children of same sex parents or single parents lack a parent of one gender. I just don't believe that necessarily makes them "disadvantaged". There are other family members, friends, loved ones, etc. that a parent can turn to if the need arises. For myself, I can't think of a time when my gender hindered my parenting. But that's just me.
"Your perspective that all's a child need is love and affection is rather limited in itself. Love an affection have nothing to do with the focus of discussion so why mention it?"
I certainly never stated that ALL a child needs is love and affection. Wouldn't that make this an easier world? I was simply using this as an example to illustrate that children with same-sex parents are not at a disadvantage. And I have to disagree that these things have "nothing to do with the focus of this discussion". I find as a parent, that things like love, affection, understanding, etc. help get us through a lot of life's rough parts. Don't you agree? These things are the foundation of ANY solid parent-child relationship.
"Most adopted kids want to know who their biological parents are. There is a bond that is undeniable and has nothing to do with the love and kindness of another."
I agree. Not sure of the relevance to this discussion, however. Seems like that is true whether the child was adapted my moms, dad, or one of each...
"You talk about bigots like straights have a corner on the market."
I never said any such thing. Bigots come in all shapes, sizes, and sexualities.
"Waht about the gay's threatening the lives of christians? I suppsoe that's OK since they promote you agenda."
I haven't heard of any gay people threatening the lives of Christians. Can you please direct me to that news story? If it has happened, I would say it's NOT okay. When's the last time you say a protest sign that said "God Hates Church-Goers" or "Kill all Baptists"??? I didn't think so.
My only "agenda" is to live my life the best I can.
"Or pedophiles wanting to become parents haveing close access same sex children, schools, and friends. Or do you say that this doesn't exist?"
I'm not sure what your point is here. What does this have to do with bigotry? Of course pedophiles exist, and of course I don't agree with them.
- Jules December 17, 2008 9:32AM
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I was going to start with a sarcastic comment, but I'm just not sure they play on this forum. Anyway, "unnatural" is a subjective term. What you think is unnatural someone else thinks is natural. Who's right? NOBODY. It does not matter what we consider "natural," because it has no bearing on anything. We do plenty of things that are "unnatural" but seemingly positive, for example, synthetic treatments for deadly diseases: totally unnatural.
Anyway, as far as religious communities go, I am heterosexual man, and also an atheist. I do not have any interest in the opinions of religious communities on sin or most other matters. I'm not saying religious communities have nothing to offer, just that their ideas of right and wrong aren't an overriding factor.
Finally, your last comment about intellectual discussion. While I don't have any readily available research, I think most professionals in fields relating to childhood psychology and education would agree that treating children as capable thinking beings is a good thing. Difficult issues are not made better, in general, by lying or oversimplifying to a child. Obviously, we cannot over-intellectualize with children (which I have to constantly remember when posting to this site), but treating kids like they are stupid or ignorant about issues that they are dealing with in their lives is a method of parenting which ignores children as people.
- roy1167 December 8, 2008 12:21PM
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Equal Civil Rights are the most pressing issue. NO gay-parented family in this nation has the same rights as a straight, married couple and their children. Even those legally married in MA, CA or CT do not have any of the more than 1000 rights, protections and privileges granted by federal law to married couples.
But worse than this is the fact that many, many gay people live in one of the 30 states which do not have even the most basic of Civil Rights protections for gays, such as the right to not be fired from a job or refused employment because one is gay, or the right not to be denied the purchase or rental of a home because one is gay.
These Civil Rights (or the denial thereof) affect gay-parented families even more than they do gay individuals, because an individual might be presumed to be straight, but a couple with children become extremely obvious to prospective landlords, home sellers or real estate agents. And employers are not in most places compelled to offer equal access to employer-paid health insurance to the spouses of gay employees. And if they DO offer such benefits, it is generally not of much benefit, anyway, since gay couples have to pay income taxes on benefits paid for gay spouses as though they were part of the employee's taxable income, making such benefits often as costly or more costly than purchasing health insurance privately.
Since many gay parents cannot form a legal relationship to children adopted by or born to their spouse, they also cannot cover these children as dependents on their employer health insurance. The children will not be eligible to receive Social Security payments if that parent dies. And if the biological or adoptive parent dies, the children may lose both parents simultaneously, because they may be taken away from the remaining parent to be placed in foster care with strangers.
There are far too many ways in which gay-parented families are disadvantaged by being denied equal civil rights which are granted as a part of civil marriage to list them all here, or even a tiny fraction of them. But suffice to say that THESE are the ways in which children of same-gender parents are disadvantaged as compared to children of opposite-gender parents -- not because their parents love them any less or cannot parent them as well as opposite-gender parents.
- Babaroni December 8, 2008 12:45PM
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The lifestyle compromises morals, health , mental security and sound thinking, it compromises wise choices, and it ultimately compromises the children as well. To put children into these situations is to bring a compromised state of being onto them as well. I read this story and I thought it quite moving and tragic and if for no other reason than this we should do all we can to prevent ss couples from adopting children if just to prevent them from enduring this kind of consequence from sexual lifestyle choices that compromise them.
In 1992, while I was serving as the chief spokesman for a high-profile anti- homosexuality ballot measure in Oregon, my family took in an ex-homosexual man who was dying of AIDS . I was somewhat fearful of the disease (I never really trusted the assurances of the public health services) yet I felt very strongly that God wanted us to care for Sonny. My feelings were confirmed when God miraculously provided a uniquely suitable house for us all to live in (the only rental we could afford in the only school district we had chosen), complete with a separate daylight basement apartment for him. Sonny lived with our family for the last year of his life.
Sonny had suffered the ravages, both spiritual and physical, of the homosexual life, beginning when he was raped at the age of seven in the men’s room of a YMCA. He confessed to me his involvement in twenty years of activities too defiling and sordid to describe here. Yet when faced with his own imminent death, Sonny invited Jesus Christ into his life, renounced homosexuality, and was born again. God blessed his decision by providing him, during the final months of his life, with friends, a Christian family, and the love he had never previously known.
I was privileged to share Sonny’s last moments of consciousness in the hospital on the night that he died. Four of his closest Christian friends, two former Satanists, an ex-lesbian and myself (a recovered alcoholic and drug addict) showed up unexpectedly in his hospital room (one had even brought her guitar) and sang Sonny’s favorite worship songs with him. Then the four of us laid hands upon him and asked the Lord in His mercy to take him home. It was one of the sweetest experiences of my Christian life. Sonny drifted off to sleep and died later that night. He was unafraid and at peace. Part of the Scott Lively story.You can google his name and read it in full.
- TheLordrocks October 28, 2009 2:59PM
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Anecdotal?
"The lifestyle compromises morals, health , mental security and sound thinking, it compromises wise choices, and it ultimately compromises the children as well. "
I've seen no evidence supporting this statement, either in my own interaction with homosexuals or (more importantly) in the literature regarding homosexual relationships.
Your 'Sonny' story is nothing more then an anecdote... and while tragic is no more applicable to the homosexual population then a story about a heterosexual dying of aids is applicable to the heterosexual population.
- MrBook October 28, 2009 8:33PM
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Are Children with Same Sex Parents at a Disadvantage?
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Say What's On Your Mind ...
The question attempts to disguise in a kinder and gentler way a very ugly assertion - homosexual individuals are unfit to parent. That assertion has little or nothing to do with children and everything to do with unsubstantiated prejudice and brutal politics. Those who ask it believe homosexuals to be somehow sub-human or dysfunctional in their abilities and lesser in value to the heterosexual and then set out to find trivialities to support their prejudices. The problem with this thinking is its generalities which cannot fit every single specific case - homosexual OR heterosexual. It is an elementary thing to show that any single heterosexual can be every bit as dysfunctional in parenting as any single homosexual. I believe it also elementary to show that any single heterosexual couple or group to be every bit as dysfunctional in parenting as any single homosexual couple or group. Of course, the opposite of this is also likely true: there are very capable heterosexual AND homosexual couples or groups when it comes to parenting.
What matters most in a parent-child relationship isn't who the parent has sexual relations with but whether or not there is mutual love and support and healthy relations between parent and child. Is the parent an adequate guardian? Are the child's emotional needs fulfilled? If one's concern is with the child, then ask questions regarding the child's state of happiness, not whether or not the parent is sleeping with who you believe they ought to be sleeping with. One's true focus is revealed in the question itself.
Those who attempt to make a very ugly value statement about homosexuals without, in their minds, being obvious about it wish there to be some truth to their generalities and "on averages". A human being is not a generality. A human being is an average. A human being is not a label, or class, or category. A human being is a specific with truths applicable to them and them alone. What is true of one is not necessarily true of another unless that truth has been substantiated in close examination. The mean-spirited will find something true of one or a few individuals and then wash thousands with that isolated truth to advance their agenda of meanness. Those genuinely interested in the truth will seek fact and apply whatever truth can be extracted from those facts to those examined and they alone. To apply those truths in general ways to those you perceive to be members of a class can only be a tentative exercise. Substantiation is required before one can justify acting on what one believes to be true.
Why not ask such generalities as - are children with heterosexual parents at a disadvantage? The question as stated is unanswerable. Some children are and will be, some will not. It depends as much on the qualities of the child as it does on the qualities of the parent or parents. Are heterosexual parents at a disadvantage with same-sex children? Some believe they are, others do not. Again, it depends on the qualities of parent(s) and child. Are homosexual parents at a disadvantage with same-sex children? Same conclusion. Aggressive generalities will treat some individuals too kindly and some too savagely.
Keep your prejudices all you like. Dressing your ugly prejudices to make them appear as unbiased scientific inquiry works with some, not with others. You believe homosexuals to be sub-human? I'm convinced you'll never prove it and will do yourself and others more harm than good in the process.
Do you authentically want the truth or do you wish to comfort your own mean spirit?
What one should ask is: Is this child happy and cared for adequately? The answers necessarily depend on specifics belonging to no one else but the child in question. As we all know, happiness is only an individual assessment. It cannot be made for you or by you for another.
- Naumadd
December 3, 2008 6:10PM
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philosophical bantering
Too much talk about something that is a biological mistake of nature.
If homosexuals were left to their own, literally, they would eventually cease to exist, unless within their confines they abandoned their sexual practices and reverted to normal reproductive sexual intercourse. This being evident , homosexuality is clearly outside the norm (un-natural) opposing nature etc.
That being said, consideration of what is best for children lies with either what is natural or what is unnatural. You may consider wealth, location, and other environmental conditions . In the end, it is only a matter of opinion; what happens in the mental and psychological development of a child is relevant to its genetics.
Emotional and philosophical bantering are just that.
- dingo1 October 20, 2009 12:08PM
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bantering is what we do here...
“Too much talk about something that is a biological mistake of nature.”
Describing homosexuality as a mistake is an interesting choice of terms. It seems to represent a sound survival strategy for a species, by creating individuals who can care for young without producing young of their own. This is similar to the survival advantage brought by menopause, where women lose their reproductive capability after it becomes unsafe for them to reproduce… yet they are still able to care for children .
“If homosexuals were left to their own, literally, they would eventually cease to exist, unless within their confines they abandoned their sexual practices and reverted to normal reproductive sexual intercourse.”
It is true that if you were to place a population of homosexuals on an island and then come back in a hundred years you would likely not find anyone alive. However this ignores the fact that homosexuals arise from within the heterosexual population, so even if you somehow isolated ‘all’ the homosexuals there would still be new homosexuals being born.
“This being evident , homosexuality is clearly outside the norm (un-natural) opposing nature etc.”
How exactly does homosexuality go against nature? Being outside the norm is far from un-natural, rather it is often an aspect of evolution .
- MrBook
October 20, 2009 6:22PM
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I would oblige you but,
you don't seem to be equipped intellectually. Your comment is unintelligble at best.
No offense intended.
- Timexx
October 20, 2009 6:36PM
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consistency
None taken, your tactic of ignoring those that offer reasonable counter-arguments rather obvious at this point.
- MrBook
October 21, 2009 6:55PM
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Eh?
I've almost never agreed with Mr.Book, but I do have to give to him the he is a smart guy. And talks a good game.
Your comment makes no sense to me.
- Nivarion
November 15, 2009 10:57PM
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unnatural things in nature?
seeing as animals born in NATURE can exhibit homosexual tendencies, it is clear that it is the norm (natural) for a slight proportion of the population of any species--including humans--to be homosexual.
- userk
October 26, 2009 6:51AM
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Seeing as some people...
are born blind it must be normal!
I don't think you get it pard. Your analogy is baseless.
- CitizenZebra
October 27, 2009 2:10AM
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thanks for agreeing with me :)
ya, actually it is normal for some people to be blind.
- userk
October 27, 2009 2:03PM
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You don't get it...
I didn't agree with you, I pointed out how ridiculous your commet was!
- CitizenZebra
October 27, 2009 4:16PM
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observed
Homosexuality has been observed in over 400 species... it is not an aberration, any more then left handedness is.
- MrBook
November 7, 2009 8:31AM
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Ill bet you didn't finish school, or if you did ...
you had terrible grades.Your logic sucks... if you follow your logic it is normal to be born without hands, legs, eyes, ears etc.. I really wonder how this country getS by with the lack of education present in some!
- Argenious November 11, 2009 4:21PM
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Your definition of "normal" is deficient
"Normal", in this context, would mean "that which can be expected." You're confusing it with what the disabled community would call "typical". A person being born blind is perfectly normal, in that it is to be expected that some people will be born blind, but not typical, in that most people are born sighted.
So the question is, "Is it right to punish that which is normal but not typical?" Left-handed people are not typical, should they be punished? Down Syndrome sufferers are normal but not typical, should they be punished? Epileptics are normal but not typical, should they be punished?
I hope that we, in an enlightened society , can all agree that the answer in each case is "no". It is interesting to note, however, that each of the above groups have been severely punished in the past, being beaten or killed for their natural, normal deviation.
There is an emergent consensus that homosexuality is equally natural and normal: it exists in many species of the animal kingdom, and has existed throughout recorded human history. If it is natural and normal, while atypical, why do we punish homosexuals for being homosexual?
The answer: we shouldn't.
- hteasley
November 28, 2009 8:29PM
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The vicous circle of anti-gay parenting
I've been in these discussion before, and a common refrain from the anti-same sex parents contingent is to say tha children with same-sex parents are subject to teasing and discrimination that leaves them emotionally damaged. If this is true, and it seems reasonable, the solution is not to condemn same-sex households, but to stop discriminating. If same-sex parents were given equal societal and legal status as heterosexual parents, many of the challeneges children of same-sex parents face would disappear.
- Langston Burroughs
December 4, 2008 9:48AM
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Yes, teasing is not a good excuse for banning
This was the very excuse given me by my mother when she explained to me why two people of different races should not marry. She carefully explained to me that, "while there was nothing wrong with black people," still, there were "cultural differences" which would make such a marriage more "difficult" and the children would be "negatively impacted" by the teasing they would face from other children.
Therefore, ipso facto, interracial marriage should be illegal (or immoral, or both). Please. :roll-eyes-and-sigh:
- Babaroni
December 8, 2008 12:08PM
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Ne plus ultra...
In a perfect world there would be no disadvantageous parental situations. BUT, we don't live there! What a child needs are two committed, loving and courageous parental units REGARDLESS of their sexual perver... ahem... orientation.
The only disadvantage I see is when the child hits puberty and the inevitable raging hormones kick in. That time of life, I'm sure everyone would agree, is the most stress laden and mind altering time in our lives. It's the birthplace of all manner of psychosocial upheavals. The fact that a child will have to come to terms with their place in the world with the baggage of having same-sex parents AND acne, it makes me shiver. BUT, as long as the parents can provide a united front and a touchstone of love and tolerance for said youngun, then perhaps perfection isn't needed or even warranted.
- BLZeebub
December 8, 2008 7:17AM
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Two?
You should, perhaps, question your assumptions that a child "needs" two parents. For the reasons I stated before - the variable personality of the child and variable personality of the parent(s), one can make general statements of what is common to all children and common to all parents, but one really can't say definitively that the specific needs of one child are the same specific needs of another. You will no doubt find individuals in all cutlures who got along just fine with only one parent - of either gender - and likely will find individuals who had more than two who profited from that arrangement. You will also find plenty of individuals who had what is considered by some to be the "optimum parental arrangement" - two parents of opposite genders who are permanently scarred by that experience.
All of this to say - the assumption that a child needs two parents of opposite gender to grow up happy and well-adjusted is likely as false as the assumption the child needs two. I dare say - and from personal experience - some children need no parent at all.
- Naumadd
December 8, 2008 10:24PM
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Unbelievable.....
I don't mean to insult you sir/madam but your commentary is so long and boring that it's shocking. I know you think it is eloquent and highly intelligent but you just need to relax a little. Thank you.
- just a thought
August 27, 2009 11:46PM
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Thanks
It's ironic you advise me to relax. I take it for granted some will find what I have to say interesting and even agreeable while others will not. I thank you for making your position with regard to that particular fence clear. As it happens, I have no real need of others to read what I write or to agree with its content. Neither of these are reasons for the thinking and writing involved. Take that to mean your discomfort and/or disagreement is irrelevant to me. Perhaps you are shocked because you are ill-acquainted with this level of discussion. It is an unfamiliarity easily remedied by further experience beyond your usual comfort zones.
Perhaps, in the future, you'll find it within you to intelligently address what is being said, not for the sake of the writer/thinker, but for your own.
- Naumadd
August 28, 2009 12:42AM
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I second that!
Some people think they know it all... and want you to know that they know it all!!!
- dingo1 October 20, 2009 12:12PM
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i don't mean to insult you, sir/madam
your attention span is so short and wavering that it's shocking. i know you think reading a paragraph is difficult, but you just need to tough it up. you should try reading books, it might lead to an enlightening experience.
- userk
October 26, 2009 6:55AM
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as I said........
lighten up - read a book ......it may be shocking.......
- just a thought
October 26, 2009 7:41AM
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kinda
reminds me of hitting puberty and dealing with the baggage of having different-sex parents which was so confusing and made absolutely no sense to me as a gay teenager who was attracted only to boys...
- passerby October 6, 2009 11:51AM
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Social Engineering
The question of advantage or disadvantage might more appropriately be asked about same race (of the child’s, each other, yours or predominate in their society), same religion (of the child’s parents, each other, yours, predominate in their society or the true one), income of parents, assets of parents, quality of neighborhood…
Why limit your inquiry to this issue unless you have a transparent agenda of a particular group you wish to discriminate against?
The only true family values are love and commitment.
- RichNau
December 8, 2008 10:49AM
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The Wrong Question Will Always Yield An Irrelevant Answer
This is a pointless and fruitless debate, even though the answer is clear: Yes, of course children with same-sex parents are at a disadvantage compared to the children of stable, monogamous, traditional families. Boys learn how to relate to women and girls substantially through their relations with their mothers; girls learn how to relate to men and boys substantially through their relations with their fathers. A same-sex couple is all but certain to under-serve one of these developmental needs.
But the question is still irrelevant. The proper questions are:
1. Are children with same-sex parents disadvantaged in comparison to children who are never adopted?
2. Would any degree of disadvantage, assuming we could measure such a thing objectively, justify forbidding same-sex couples to adopt children?
The answers to these questions cannot be collectivized. The answer to #1 is "Sometimes; it depends on the adoptive parents." On #2, there cannot be a satisfying consensus, because we don't know how to measure "advantages" and "disadvantages" in a way that will both command agreement and satisfactorily control for non-environmental factors. After all, heredity and free will always play a part, and one cannot "run the experiment" a second time.
- fporretto
December 8, 2008 1:56PM
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lol what?
By saying
"
Yes, of course children with same-sex parents are at a disadvantage compared to the children of stable, monogamous, traditional families."
you bluntly push the idea that gay couples are not any of the adj's listed above...
so gay couples are not stable? Monogamous? Or traditional (by their standards, not yours)? On what grounds can you say this without any doubt?
" Boys learn how to relate to women and girls substantially through their relations with their mothers; girls learn how to relate to men and boys substantially through their relations with their fathers. A same-sex couple is all but certain to under-serve one of these developmental needs."
by what proof do you have that supports your analyzation?
the rest i agree with
- zman676
May 29, 2009 4:22PM
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he didn't bluntly say any of that
they never stated gays could not be stable or monogamous. a "stable, monogamous, traditional" couple is being used as a control for comparison. an "ideal" situation if you will. many opponents of gay marriage seem to have no problem with separated parents, single working moms /dads, or couples in a strenuous and unstable relationship being parents to children . they're simply touching on the concept of "unideal" family conditions .
i would encourage you to look into ANY published writings on the psychological, emotional, and familial development of children. it is without a doubt that young boys and girls will learn intergenderal (not a word, but so what!) relations from their parents (as well as others).
and gay marriage is WITHOUT A DOUBT not traditional! neither was interracial marriage , but we learned to be okay with that one too :)
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:06AM
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an obvious disadvantage
Disclaimer: I'm not anti gay. I voted "NO" on prop 8 and protested side by side with the gay community outside the Mormon temple in Westwood.
I am a parent. I have two daughters and two sons. Being in a heterosexual marriage I can see the advantages of having parents from different sexes. There are times that I can not connect to one of my children because I see things from a man's point of view. At those times my wife is the one who has a totally different perspective and manages to understand something that I never could. This works the other way around too. The simple fact is that men and women are different and a child growing up needs both points of views to be able to make good balanced decisions.
I'm sure children with same sex parents will grow up well enough to become very good citizens but my beliefe is that they are at a disadvantage and have to learn things the hard way.
- alexkz
December 8, 2008 2:15PM
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Your personal feelings do not constitute scientific evidence
Alex, thanks for voting "no" on prop 8, but as to your personal feelings about which of you - you or your wife - is best suited to answering questions from your children on various topics, this does not constitute valid evidence that children raised by same-gender parents are disadvantaged as opposed to children of opposite-gender parents.
There are many times I refer my children to their other parent to answer certain questions or address particular topics. There are also many times when she does the same to me. We each have individual areas of expertise, and individual areas of responsibility within the family. This is not something unique to heterosexual couples, nor is it necessarily gender-specific. There are many men (even heterosexual men) who might gravitate towards some "traditionally feminine" areas of expertise, and vice versa for women. Getting hung up on which parent has which sort of genitalia ignores the fact that all of us are different and bring different skills, abilities, perspectives and interests to our relationships and to our parenting.
Evidence clearly demonstrates that same-gender-parented kids are equally happy, healthy and well-adjusted as compared to their opposite-gender-parented peers. Try not to get hung up on the physical appendages or lack thereof, and focus in on the fact that we are all human, all individuals, and all have a great deal to offer our children as parents.
- Babaroni
December 8, 2008 3:18PM
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No scientific evidence available or needed
My dear Baba,
as a scientist in a different field, I can tell you that there has not been enough time to come up with a scientific proof either way. Besides, I did say that the children from homes with same sex parents will grow up and become very good citizens. But that's not the point. Just like the kids growing up in certain areas like East LA, Compton etc are at a disadvantage but can grow up to become the president of the united states. But the disadvantage is still there and those kids will either have to work harder to learn what is a given to the kids with opposite sex parents or they may never get to know certain realities until they get married to the opposite sex and discover a whole new world.
Another point many of us forget is that science is not everything. When it comes to emotions of a human being, or the behavior of a child science has a long way to go. There are 1000s of therapists trying to help people but they admit that help comes from within, therapists (who could be the scientist in this case) ca only give opinions. no facts involved. This is not Math or Physics, it's feelings.
Finally as a father I know facts about my children that no doctor, psychiatrist or scientist could tell me. It's not a matter what I can answer or my wife can. It's the difference between a femail sensitivity and that of a man's that makes my wife and I a perft team to deal with our children's emotional needs.
- alexkz
December 8, 2008 3:44PM
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How many years of study are needed?
How many years of study are needed to evaluate whether children raised by same-gender parents are essentially equivalent by standard measures of health and psychosocial wellbeing to their opposite-gender-parented peers?
- Babaroni
December 8, 2008 5:15PM
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A life time of studies are needed
Before I go any further please note that I'm talking about being at a "disadvantage" and not that they're not going to be equivelant.
As for the number of years needed, well lets see. I don't know if there's ever really been a real study about this. As a SIMPLE scientific test, I would be getting at least a 100 samples of each group. 100 from same gender parents and 100 from heterosexual parents. I would then devide these into groups of 10. These groups would be of the equivelant social standing. ie 10 middle class families of each group, 10 of minority groups of the same standing, 10 of groups with siblings and 10 with no siblings and so on until major groups of families are represented. This would be a simple experiment otherwise a lot more than 100 from each group would be needed.
Then we would study these children and compare as they grow up, go to school, middle school, high school, college, University. We would continue as they get jobs and begin the journey of life. The study would continue when they get married, their marriage would be studied. Their behavior with their spouses, and when they have children how they treat and deal with their children. This would have to continue until they're about 60 years old.
The data would constantly be compared and only then we MAY have some kind of an idea of how these children were Influenced, disadvantaged or not. Many scientific studies which involve human behavior have taken generations of scientists who inherit the study from previous scientists who spent a lifetime studying certain people.
Now you know why I said there can not be aby scientific proof as yet, since the adoption policy by the same gender parents has not been out for long enough time.
Again let me reiterate that I'm not saying we shouldn't let same gender partners adopt children or have custody of children, but what I am saying is that those children are at a disadvantage.
- alexkz
December 9, 2008 1:29AM
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You're forgetting something...
Alex, you are completely bypassing the fact that children have been raised by same-gender couples for far longer than there have been adoption policies to place adoptive children with such couples. Thousands and thousands of children have been raised by couples who brought up children from a previous marriage or relationship by a member of the couple, or by couples who intentionally got pregnant as a couple, or who brought up the unwanted child of a friend or family member without benefit of being able to adopt him or her, just as "declared guardians" of the child by permission of the biological parent.
There have been formal studies in place on gay-parented families since the 70's, and further data is available on people raised by same-gender parents since long before that time (I know a few of these people, myself, none of whom happen to be gay, by the way). They are happily married to people of the opposite gender, and raising children of their own, who are normal and well-adjusted as far as I can tell (some are teenagers, so "normal" and "well-adjusted" are relative terms! :) But really, they are good kids by any measure).
So, while I'm happy to hear that you don't oppose same-gender couples adopting children, it's odd that you feel the need to come here and add fuel to the fire against gay couples raising children without being aware of the body of evidence which consistently supports the fact that children raised by same-gender parents ARE equally healthy and well-adjusted as compared with children of opposite-gender parents.
- Babaroni
December 9, 2008 7:00AM
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Additionally
I note that you make a dinstinction between "equivalency" and "disadvantage." I am hard-pressed to see where "equivalent" parenting equals "disadvantaged." The only disadvantage I see for children of same-gender parents has to do with outside prejudice, such as their parents not being able to protect them with full and equal civil rights because some folks very selfishly want to claim the word "marriage" as their own exclusive belonging. This kind of prejudice is what disadvantages children of same-gender parents, not the genders of their parents.
- Babaroni
December 9, 2008 7:05AM
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kids
Can you juts give examples of what kind of things that kids raised by homosexual parents would struggle to understand but which kids raised by heterosexuals would find a given!?
At the centre of your argument is this disturbing assumption that kids raised by heterosexuals are just better, more balanced in their general deminure, that the homosexual run household is comparable to a ghetto while the heterosexual run household is automatically more of a suburb and hence kids raised there can more easily become the president of the USA as compared to kids raised by homosexual couples simply because the one parent has a penis and the other a vulva. I also find quite naive and absurdthis this assertion that because we are all male we are locked in a certain mode of uniform thinking, that we have the same way of seeing, analyzing and doing things. I differ with a lot of men in seeing and doing things and incidentally a lot of my thinking and behaviour is inline with that of numeous women, which is just a coincidence because I differ with a lot of women in my thinking and doing in just about the same measure. Individuals and their values make good parents not their genitals and genitals do not predispose people to any set rule in thinking or doing things, popular culture and the roles it assignes to the sexes in rearing children maybe but not the genitals of the parents.
Thre is nothing that you can say about how heterosexual couples see and do things that you cannot say about homosexual couples when it comes to raising children. The disavantages that kids raised in homosexual homes face are all a result of the very unfounded sense of false superiority and entitlement that kids raised in heterosexual homes have which they inturn get from their parents such as yourself.
- passerby October 6, 2009 12:58PM
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c'mon babaroni!
we all know same-sex couples' children are at a disadvantage. they have just as much opportunity to achieve happiness and success as any other child, but they definitely have some unique obstacles to overcome (as do nearly all groups of people).
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:08AM
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But what you are neglecting to mention...
But what you are neglecting to mention is that those obstacles are societally instigated. They are not intrinsic to the parenting such children receive. When comparing parenting, it is important to distinguish between problems children might encounter because of the prejudice society holds towards them or their parents, vs. problems which occur because of some lack in the parenting provided in the home.
In the case of same-gender parents, there is no discernable difference in the quality of parenting from same-gendered parents to opposite-gendered parents and the outcomes for children of either group are equal, given other equivalent factors (two stable parents in the home, similar economic setting, etc). External prejudice is not the fault of the parents. It is the fault of society.
If we were to use the effects of external societal prejudice as a reason for discriminating against certain groups of parents and suggesting that such people should not be allowed to have or raise children, then it would be necessary to make a similar determination against ALL groups which face discrimination in our society, such as blacks, immigrants, interracial couples, Jews, etc. If the pressures children of minority groups will face outside the home are to be considered in evaluating the effectiveness of the parenting in those groups, then no one but white, middle-to-upper class couples from Protestant backgrounds should be allowed to have or parent children.
Right?
- Babaroni
October 26, 2009 10:53AM
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i'm fully aware it is societally instigated
unfortunately, the intolerant will continue to exist throughout the history of man. it is a damned shame these people cannot open their hearts to others, but it's the way it is.
the distinction is important, but was not specified in the question. you have admitted yourself that they are put at a disadvantage. it is up to us to discuss [as we have been] the source of those disadvantages.
- userk
October 26, 2009 4:33PM
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Yes, by all means
Yes, by all means lets discuss what can be done to reduce societal discrimination against gay parents and their children , and level the playing field for them.
But let's also be absolutely clear that societal discrimination against a minority group is not a valid reason for denying any human or civil right to that group, including and especially the right to reproduce and to parent their children.
Are we on the same page, here, userk?
- Babaroni
October 26, 2009 5:25PM
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outside the scope of this thread
while i am in full accord with your points, the second point is a little outside of the scope of this thread. you seem to be regarding this thread [or possibly my previous comments] as "Children of same-sex couples are at a disadvantage, so we shouldn't allow them to adopt." though some have taken that view, i certainly have not. your defense of it is just slightly excessive. but, as i said, i do happen to agree with both of your points. i feel you're just mentioning them at an inappropriate time or place somehow.
- userk
October 26, 2009 5:36PM
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True?
The key point that gets missed in the this discussion is that parents aren't the only ones who raise children. I grew up with a single mother, and while she certainly did her best, she couldn't answer all my questions as a boy. That's why I had a grandfather, uncles, family friends, teachers, coaches and others who I could rely on. Every situation is unique (in my case I was likely better off without my father in my home), but I absolutely feel that their collective help but me at no disadvantage. There's no reason to think that the children of same-sex parents couldn't use similar resources.
I would challenge you to re-consider if two opposite sex parents really are so necessary.
- Langston Burroughs
December 10, 2008 2:01PM
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...and you were not disadvantaged???
Thank you for your note but the word "Disadvantage" is exactly what you were. Instead of having someone at home you had to go to alternatives. That is called "being at a disadvantage."
Based on that same experience you had, the children that live with same sex parents will have to go o alternatives hence being disadvantaged.
Please notice that disadvantage doesn't mean "not as good," it simply means not having the same opportunities.
Thank you
- alexkz
December 10, 2008 6:13PM
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easy fix
to get over all this hubbub. let's just have all males and females contribute eggs and sperm to a bank. then we'll only have test tube babies and we can all put in for however many kids we want. If this sounds silly or stupid. so does this contraversy over same sex marriage and adoptions.If Christians really knew how to Love as Jesus did we would not need to talk about any of this. Read your Bible and see how much jesus loved and was tolerant over so many things that seem to upset christians today. He did not stay the course with his own jewish teachings but went against them when they were not in line with what was lovingly right.
- john5021
December 8, 2008 4:28PM
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The simple truth
I am all for same-sex marriages, and same sex parents, but, truthfully, if people found out, and started making fun of him, then that WOULD be a disadvantage.In a disadvantage of any other sort, I would probably say no.Let's face it:Kids talk.
- Kawaii
December 15, 2008 4:32PM
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Not so simple
First, that's all the more reason to be more accepting of it and encourage this to be more normal!
But secondly, I wonder if there's any research that supports your claim. Children as far as I've seen are not initially hostile towards children of same-sex parents: when they are hostile, it's thanks to the parents being intolerant.
Research has shown that children of same-sex couples are happier and more confident, so perhaps it's not as simple as you claim.
- Blue Linchpin
December 16, 2008 11:03AM
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i somewhat agree
perhaps they are stronger, happier, and more confident by having overcome this disadvantage with which they are presented. additionally, intolerant parents will always exist. let's face it: kids talk!
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:12AM
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proof please
Not having any study to hand as I write this my memory only calls up research that show no difference in children raised in same-sex and opposite sex families.
I have read here that there is a disadvantage but with no evidence apart from opinion. What studies validate the anti-gay agenda?
- KitG
January 1, 2009 5:26AM
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On Statistics.....
Statistics may not show that children in homes with homosexual parents do not do as well....
But statistics do show that homosexual relationships do not stay as committed as heterosexual marriages do, and homosexual partners tend to have more partners than heterosexual couples do. This is not a personal attack on homosexuals, but is rather a question of the stability of the children who are potentially in these homes. I do not think it's right for a child to be placed in this kind of situation, nor do I think it's right for a child to be the victim of his parents decisions. I recognize that heterosexual parents also have a low committment rate. However, even as high as their divorce statistics are, homosexuals' rates are higher, and even less promising.
- boyswannafight2010
January 25, 2009 5:38PM
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re: statistics
black people are statistically more likely to be unfaithful than white people. and yet i doubt you would condone the abolition of black rights to parenthood?
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:14AM
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Children Learn What They See
I have no objection to same sex marriage. People should be left alone and be allowed to do whatever they think will make them happy as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else.
I do, however, strongly oppose adoption by same sex couples. In that case, you're taking a unique individual and placing that individual in a situation in which they have no say in the matter.
I'll put this question to those with an opposing view: How many of you have ever regretted NOT being raised by a same sex couple? If you were making the choice for yourself, is it what you would have chosen?
My parents were divorced when I was 7. There were many times growing up I wished they had stayed together. Never once growing up did it even cross my mind to wish either would find a member of their own sex so the two could raise me together. In fact, I wasn't all that crazy about most of their opposite sex partners.
With that said, the greatest advantage comes from growing up in a loving home, with the two people who gave you life in the first place. Anything else is a disadvantage by definition. From there, the argument becomes one of assiging a value to the degree of disadvantage. That's no easy task and involves infinite shades of gray.
Never the less, if it's possible to identify the best solution, it should also be possible to say the farther alternate and lesser solutions deviate from the ideal model, the greater the resulting disadvantage.
You can say society should be more accepting of alternate lifestyles, and no doubt it should. That does not change the fact that it does not. You can say a child's peers shouldn't haze them for being part of an alternate lifestyle, and no doubt they should not. That doesn't change the fact that they do.
It is irrefutable that it is only possible to produce children through heterosexual means. Millions of years of evolution has defined heterosexuality as having the highest advantage for every life form higher than bacteria. In the game of survival of the fittest, that's what works best. A child raised with the tools to form a lasting bond with members of the opposite sex has the greatest advantage, by the only definition that matters. It is what works best in terms of both survival of the individual and of the species.
- Don Earl
February 26, 2009 2:39PM
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Got Research? Part 1
"Anything else is a disadvantage by definition."
Cool. Got research to back that one up? Because I have tons that tell you that you're wrong.
Psychosocial Adjustment, School Outcomes, and Romantic Relationships of Adolescents With Same-Sex Parents. Jennifer L. Wainright, Stephen T. Russell, and Charlotte J. Patterson. Child Development, 2004, Volume 75, Number 6, Pages 1886-1898.
“The small body of research that has focused on adolescent offspring of families headed by same-sex couples includes Huggins's (1989) study of 36 adolescents, ages 13 to 19, 18 with divorced heterosexual and 18 with divorced lesbian mothers. In this study, Huggins reported no differences in adolescent self-esteem as a function of mothers' sexual orientation. Daughters of lesbian mothers also had higher self-esteem if their mother had a romantic partner who lived in the home, if their fathers did not display negative attitudes about the mother's sexual orientation, and if they learned of their mother's sexual orientation at an early age. Huggins also reported that one adolescent with a heterosexual mother, but none with the lesbian mothers, identified as nonheterosexual.” p. 1887
“O'Connor (1993) studied 11 young men and women, ages 16 to 23, who were the children of divorced or separated lesbian mothers. Qualitative findings suggested that participants expressed strong love, loyalty, and protectiveness toward their mothers, and a desire for others to understand the benefits of having a lesbian mother, such as increased sensitivity to prejudice. Informants, however, described worries about losing friends or being judged by others and their need to keep their mothers' sexual orientation a secret from at least some people external to the family.” p. 1887
“Gershon, Tschann, and Jemerin (1999) studied self-esteem, perception of stigma, and coping skills among adolescent offspring of lesbian mothers. They conducted interviews with 76 adolescents, ages 11 to 18, and examined the impact of societal factors on self-esteem. The participants had either been born to women who identified as lesbians (25 adolescents) or had been born in the context of their mother's earlier heterosexual marriage (51 adolescents). Gershon et al. found that adolescents who perceived more stigma related to having a lesbian mother had lower self-esteem in five of seven areas, including social acceptance, self-worth, behavioral conduct, physical appearance, and close friendship. They hypothesized that the presence of various types of coping skills would moderate this relationship between perceived stigma and self-esteem. However, their results showed that only good decision making had a moderating effect: In the face of high perceived stigma, adolescents possessing better decision-making skills had higher self-concept in the area of behavioral conduct.”
“A slightly older population was studied in Tasker and Golombok's (1997) longitudinal study of young adult offspring of lesbian mothers. Forty-six young adults, ages 17 to 35, were interviewed in this follow-up to Golombok et al.'s (1983) study of children raised in divorced lesbian mother or divorced heterosexual mother families. In this generally well-adjusted sample, young men and women who were raised by lesbian mothers were no more likely than those raised by heterosexual mothers to experience depression or anxiety. Adult children from lesbian mother families were also no more likely than those from other families to have sought professional help for psychiatric problems. They reported having close friendships during adolescence and were no more likely to remember peer group hostility than were those from other families. Offspring of lesbian mothers were also no more likely to report same-sex sexual attraction or a gay, lesbian, or bisexual identity than were those from heterosexual families. They were, however, more likely to have considered a gay or lesbian relationship as a possibility for themselves and to have been involved in a same-sex relationship, suggesting that although sexual attraction and identity may not be related to parental sexual orientation, the likelihood of considering or entering a same-sex relationship may be associated with parents' sexual orientation.” p. 1887
- QuinceyQuick
February 27, 2009 12:34AM
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Got Research? Part 2
“The results of the present study, which is the first based on a large national sample of adolescents living with same-sex couples, revealed that on nearly all of a large array of variables related to school and personal adjustment, adolescents with same-sex parents did not differ significantly from a matched group of adolescents living with opposite-sex parents. Regardless of family type, adolescents were more likely to show favorable adjustment when they perceived more caring from adults and when parents described close relationships with them. Thus, as has been reported in studies of children with lesbian mothers (e.g., Chan et al., 1998), it was the qualities of adolescent-parent relationships rather than the structural features of families (e.g., same vs. opposite-sex parents) that were significantly associated with adolescent adjustment (Golombok, 1999; Patterson, 2000).” p. 1895
“Across a diverse array of assessments, we found that the personal, family, and school adjustment of adolescents living with same-sex parents did not differ from that of adolescents living with opposite-sex parents. Consistent with the findings of earlier research (e.g., Huggins, 1989), we found that adolescent self-esteem did not vary as a function of family type. In addition, we found no differences as a function of family type in measures of personal adjustment, such as depressive symptoms and anxiety; in measures of school adjustment, such as academic achievement, trouble in school, or feelings of school connectedness; or in measures of the qualities of family relationships, such as autonomy, care from adults and peers, neighborhood integration, or parental warmth. The clarity of results from this broad array of assessments strengthens our confidence that adolescents living with same-sex parents were functioning well in many domains, both at home and at school.” p. 1895
Furthermore, consider the following:
Mental Health Issues in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Communities. Eds. Billy E. Jones and Marjorie J. Hill. American Psychiatric Publishing: Washington, D.C., 2002.
“Hopefully, psychiatrists and other mental health professionals know that there is no one lesbian or one gay lifestyle or point of view on matters that are important to the parenting of children. Therefore, any lesbian or gay parent must be given the benefit of an individualized assessment as it relates to her or his lifestyle and point of view and how these might or might not impact on the parent's ability to offer the child permanence, stability, a moral environment, guidance, and a generally healthy upbringing. Of course, to perform such an assessment, the psychiatrist must be able to integrate accurate knowledge and a sound understanding of parenting and the needs of developing children with an equally accurate knowledge and a sound understanding of gay and lesbian parents. Similarly, when testifying in child custody and visitation proceedings involving a gay or lesbian parent, psychiatrists must help the court understand that there is enormous diversity within the gay and lesbian community, that the testimony being given is based on an individualized assessment of the particular parent, and that the opinions rendered are supported by the information gathered during the process of the evaluation and by a well-informed body of knowledge that has been used to interpret that information.” p. 46
- QuinceyQuick
February 27, 2009 12:35AM
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Got Research? Part 3
Furthermore, your idea that children should be left to their biological parents (while holding no water) is moot in a discussion of -adoption-. The children, if put up for adoption, will presumably -not- be raised by their biological parents.
So let's see what evidence you have.
"How many of you have ever regretted NOT being raised by a same sex couple? If you were making the choice for yourself, is it what you would have chosen?"
In light of the evidence I presented above, that argument is equivalent to any of the following arguments:
Have you regretted not being of the opposite gender?
Have you regretted not being born ten seconds after your actual birth?
Have you regretted not being of a different race?
Have you regretted not being born ten miles away?
You get my point. The argument you presented in that quote is moot, because (1) one can never make such a judgment unless compelling scientific evidence has arisen (which has not been provided); and because (2) aspirations of an individual don't translate to aspirations for the society.
"You can say a child's peers shouldn't haze them for being part of an alternate lifestyle, and no doubt they should not. That doesn't change the fact that they do."
So you would punish the child and the child's parents for an injustice committed by -someone else-? That's harsh.
- QuinceyQuick
February 27, 2009 12:36AM
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Your Citations Have No Statistical Significance
First of all, these groups are too small to have any statistical meaning. Second, there is no indication of how these so called studies were conducted, how participants were chosen, how questions were phrased, or answers were graded, or even the least indication of anything resembling a double blind. Among other major considerations, what passes for a control group is children from broken homes. Give me a break!!!
RE: "So you would punish the child and the child's parents for an injustice committed by -someone else-?"
Is English your second language? Your own quotes refute your position and show that children raised by same sex couples are at least as screwed up in the head, and likely more so, than children raised in broken homes. I don't know how you define "disadvantage", but this clearly is one, which happens to be the essence of the topic in the first place.
No one is talking about "punishing" anyone. If you are part of a same sex couple, you are quite obviously well aware that union WILL NOT PRODUCE CHILDREN. You are evidently of the view that human children should be a free market item of commerce, as available as a puppy at a pound. Even adoption of puppies these days is subject to a certain amount of screening by the better run shelters. Do you have a fenced yard? Do you have a stable home? Are you tempermentally suited to caring for a puppy? Etc.
As stated previously, a stable, opposite sex parent home, is the ideal environment to raise children. Your three post rant shows nothing to refute that claim. That the researchers you cite won't waste their time trying to compare same sex couples to that model speaks for itself. They know better, and if you are at all honest, so do you.
If you're gay, accept yourself for what you are and try to live the happiest and best life you can on that basis. If you can do that, my hat's off to you. If you're insecure in what you are, and believe you can prop that up by dragging an innocent child into the mix, you are selfish, irresponsible and unworthy of respect. Anyone who thinks they should be able to buy a kid in order to feed their ego is not a good person.
- Don Earl
February 27, 2009 2:20AM
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"Is English your second language?"
"First of all, these groups are too small to have any statistical meaning. Second, there is no indication of how these so called studies were conducted, how participants were chosen, how questions were phrased, or answers were graded, or even the least indication of anything resembling a double blind. Among other major considerations, what passes for a control group is children from broken homes. Give me a break!!!"
Two points: (1) Just because I didn't place the entire study in my post you presume that the studies weren't controlled for many variables? (2) I haven't seen you provide anything other than speculative reasoning to back up your point.
"No one is talking about "punishing" anyone."
I was relating this to the idea that children belonging to same-sex couples would be bullied, and I thought that your post was using this to create an argument.
"As stated previously, a stable, opposite sex parent home, is the ideal environment to raise children. Your three post rant shows nothing to refute that claim. That the researchers you cite won't waste their time trying to compare same sex couples to that model speaks for itself."
Except... they did? I don't understand how you think they would have come up with those numbers without comparison to opposite-sex couples within the same community at the same time raising similar children, etc.
- QuinceyQuick
February 27, 2009 8:04AM
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In Harm's Way
RE: "I was relating this to the idea that children belonging to same-sex couples would be bullied, and I thought that your post was using this to create an argument."
It is an argument. If you know there's a war, you don't send innocents into the war zone. If an adult, of his or her own free will, wants to become martyrs for a cause, that's their call to make. I'll refrain from expressing an unvarnished view of what I think about adults who martyr children as their proxies.
- Don Earl
February 27, 2009 9:09AM
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Which studies in particular...
Gershon et al. and the main one, Wainright et al. (though the Gershon one ... the way it was cited in the study confuses me, and may also be, as you said, a "broken" home, and the Wainright one -does- have forty-four participants).
- QuinceyQuick
February 27, 2009 8:10AM
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Statistical Universes
RE: "the Wainright one -does- have forty-four participants"
These so called "studies", as described, amount to polls. Split into two groups, your margin of error is on the order of plus or minus 25% for each group. In other words, comparing the two groups would involve potential errors of close to 50%. It's not a study that can be taken seriously, or cited with any credibility.
A serious study would involve several thousand participants, which would give you a margin of error in the 3% range, with a level of confidence around 95%. I'd also argue that you'd want your participants to be more in the 25 to 40 age range, rather than teenagers. At that age, they'd have more perspective, be less succeptable to slanted surveys, and have more life experience to draw from.
Of course, propagandists don't do serious studies.
- Don Earl
February 27, 2009 9:45AM
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congratulations
You have stated the truth and all the whining can't change it. Leave children out of trying to defend lifestyle choices..
- just a thought
August 27, 2009 11:58PM
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bully
“You have stated the truth and all the whining can't change it. Leave children out of trying to defend lifestyle choices…”
So children should be prevented from entering into a loving home where they will be cared for just because some people will act like jerks?
- MrBook
August 28, 2009 5:11PM
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the verdict is actually still out...
Wainwright's study did not control for divorce. Moreover, the study did not provide a way for students to report that they were living in a shared custody situation, so the study discarded the responses of students that reported both living in a same-sex household and residing with a father.
This should raise significant concerns, as should the comparison of single lesbian mothers to divorced heterosexual mothers as in Huggins & Tasker and Golombok.
O'Connor & Gershon, Tschann, and Jemerin really isn't relevant to the topic being dicussed. (eg whether same-sex parenting puts kids at a disadvantage)
It also doesn't address questions that can't be answered by a study: eg do children of lesbians ever wonder who their actual dad is? and is it fair to intentionally create a kid that will never know his or her father/mother?
- rae
June 10, 2009 9:59PM
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Gosh
Paragraph by paragraph all your staements are naive assumptions which are in addition very very unfactual!
What say do kids born to heterosexual couples have over who their parents are?
People dont regret being raised by heterosexual or homosexual parents, people regret being raised by unfit parents, which come in both heterosexual and homosexual packages. Ask a lot of the happy thousands of kids and adults raised by homosexual couples if theyd prefer to have been raised by heterosexual couples and the answer will be different from your assumption.
Your parents having divorced when you wree so little is regrettable, but what you really wished for at that age is the idea of a happy loving couple to raise you as you have no idea what the reality of that union would have been. You could have been raised by a bickering always-at-each-other's-throats couple and you would have begged your parents to divorce under those circumstances.
People who give you life in the first place are not guaranteed to build a happy home and living with them in an unhappy home is a huge disadvantage and anythiong else becomes an advantage.
a heterosexual loving couple is nomore of an ideal than a homosexual loving couple, this is purely a matter of different strokes for different folks, lets open our minds and thinking a bit here.
Some kids and folks are nasty, it does not mean we should ban interracial, huge age gap and homosexual marriages and families as long as both parties involved in the home building and parenting are adult and of sound mental health .
U say "It is irrefutable that it is only possible to produce children through heterosexual means. Millions of years of evolution has defined heterosexuality as having the highest advantage for every life form higher than bacteria. In the game of survival of the fittest, that's what works best"...and I say take time to pull out a scientific article or watch a documentary or two on homosexuality and parenting in the animal kingdom and you will see that homosexual parenting in the wild is not only happening but is quite widespread in some species and that but same-sex parents in some species have exhibited a higher frequency of raising their young to adulthood as compared to their heterosexual counterparts.
http://www.scientificblogging.com/news_articles/more_just_bromance_same_sex_animal_behavior_pretty_common_says_study
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/article1288633.ece
- passerby October 6, 2009 1:56PM
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Poor arguments
Next you'll be telling us we should all catch bugs in a web and eat them because it works for spiders.
Men and women are not the same, politically correctness to the contrary. Millions of years of evolution have caused men and women to adapt to the best model to preserve the species. One is not less than the other, but they are different. It takes the combined natural adaptations of both to produce an individual that is able to survive and reproduce in turn.
You can argue until hell freezed over but you will never legislate natural law out of existance. Yeah, maybe it'd be better if pi was equal to 3 instead of 3.145926....., but wishful thinking will never make it so. It is what is and we are what we are. I do not mean to be unkind, but homosexuality is not a survival characteristic, it's an evolutionary dead end. You can argue that other alternatives to the traditional family unit are equally contra survival, perhaps even with some small merit, but that doesn't change the fact that the traditional family unit provides the best possible benefits to children .
Children are not pets . I can't even begin to express how low my opinion is of anyone who would use children as bargaining chips as a way to legitimize their own lifestyle choices. If you want a pet, get a puppy or a kitten. Better yet, start with a nice house plant and if it's still alive after a year, get a fish or a hamster. With experience, you may eventually become competent to care for a critter as complex as a baby cat or dog. The big difference between a pet kitten and a human child is with the kitten, you are not responsible for teaching it everything it will need to know to survive for the 50 plus years it will live after leaving your care.
I have a high opinion of free will even though I don't always agree with the way it is exercised. If you're gay, I fully respect your right to be left alone to make the best life you can for yourself. The moment you say you should be allowed to impose your will on another, you will find me in adament opposition to your position. Do what you like as long as you do me no harm in the process, and leave children alone.
- Don Earl
October 6, 2009 8:23PM
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pets
“I do not mean to be unkind, but homosexuality is not a survival characteristic, it's an evolutionary dead end.”
Actually there is evidence to the contrary. Male penguins raising a chick together are a good example of how homosexual parings can promote the survival of the species. This lends credence to the idea that homosexuals help with population survival buy providing additional caretakers for the young while not contributing young of their own.
“You can argue that other alternatives to the traditional family unit are equally contra survival, perhaps even with some small merit, but that doesn't change the fact that the traditional family unit provides the best possible benefits to children .”
That argument has been made before… and as before I have to ask what evidence you base that assumption on?
Furthermore children adopted by homosexuals are already without a ‘traditional family unit’, and so all that really needs to be shown is that being raised by a homosexual couple is better then being left in foster care.
“The big difference between a pet kitten and a human child is with the kitten, you are not responsible for teaching it everything it will need to know to survive for the 50 plus years it will live after leaving your care.”
So couples need to be careful when considering having children? No part of this entire rant applies exclusively to homosexuals (which is to say it is a statement that could be made to any couple regardless of the couples gender).
“The moment you say you should be allowed to impose your will on another, you will fnd me in adament opposition to your position.”
How is this imposing anyone’s will on you?
“Do what you like as long as you do me no harm in the process, and leave children alone.”
So children should not be placed in potentially loving homes?
- MrBook
October 8, 2009 5:43PM
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Dead conversation
RE: "So children should not be placed in potentially loving homes?"
Children should be in homes where they have some chance to grow up normal. If you want a gay penguin for a pet, go for it. You have absolutely no right to impose your will and lifestyle on an innocent child. Your lame rap about how it should be okay because other people who aren't gay screw up children's lives is disgusting. Two wrongs don't make a right. My last post on the topic.
- Don Earl
October 8, 2009 9:26PM
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some final thoughts...
"Children should be in homes where they have some chance to grow up normal."
Yes they should, and evidence suggests that children raised by homosexuals are no worse off the those raised by heterosexuals. Further, as I stated above, a child adopted by a homosexual couple is already one that will not have a 'traditional' upbringing.
"Your lame rap about how it should be okay because other people who aren't gay screw up children's lives is disgusting"
I'm not sure where you are getting this. All evidence shows that homosexual couples are as caring and supportive as heterosexual couples.
"Two wrongs don't make a right."
Quite true... a child denied the family that that were born into is further wronged by being denied a loving home just because the couple is homosexual.
- MrBook
October 8, 2009 10:11PM
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re: Pets
Actually there is evidence to the contrary. Male penguins raising a chick together are a good example of how homosexual parings can promote the survival of the species. This lends credence to the idea that homosexuals help with population survival buy providing additional caretakers for the young while not contributing young of their own
Are talk about when the female leave the group to go the oceans to fish for the young. Then yes then males do all look after the offsprings together. BUT when the female come back the family unit is restored. And the mother and father look after the young. So what your saying is if more than one male looks after an offspring it is evidence of homosexuality . WOW that is awesome, awesome scentific reasoning.
- Really
November 5, 2009 6:48PM
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Roy and Silo
Actually I'm referring to the penguins at the New York zoo called Roy ans Silo
{ http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/07/arts/love-that-dare-not-squeak-its-name.html }
Another interesting bit about homosexuality in the animal kingdom was in Seed where they mention that homosexual behavior has been documented in ~450 different vertebrate species... including big horn sheep, giraffes, dolphins , killer whales, grey whaled, manatees, bonobos, macaques...
{ http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_gay_animal_kingdom / }
The focus of the article is Dr. Joan Roughgarden, who posits that homosexual activity presents an evolutionary advantage among social species... strengthening the bond between individual members. A rather interesting hypothesis!
- MrBook
November 5, 2009 8:27PM
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men v. women
there is actually VERY little difference between men and women , aside from the behaviors imposed upon them by culture. sure we have different body parts and our brains operate slightly differently, but these differences are VERY slight. physical strength aside, there is very little difference in propensities between the genders.
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:21AM
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Re: Mean Vs Women
What are you talking about? Men are very different than women . They are equal but they are different. They have different hormones that course through their body, heck we even have structural differences in our feet. Our brains are even different. A women speech centre in the brain is on both hemispheres of the brain. Because women do not receive a testosterone bath while in the uterus that severs the majority of connections between the right side and the left. And there actually differences in our behaviours. As babies girl and boy develop very differently. And guess what babies have not been, as you are proposing, brain washing by our culture.
- Really
November 5, 2009 7:06PM
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hormones
There are differences between men and women , but much of the psychological differences are cultural in origin (not biological).
There is a great diversity among the personality of men and women, so a blanket "men are X and women are Y" is not accurate.
There is no reason why two women or two men cannot raise happy, healthy, well adjusted children (as is shown by studies done on gay parents).
- MrBook
November 7, 2009 8:28AM
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hey don one question
i read some time ago of a Japanese firm's attempts to combine the genetic material of both same-sex parents [male or female] in a viable egg. if they were to succeed and it was possible for same-sex couples to father/ mother a baby to which they both "contributed life," would you consider condoning parenthood for these parents?
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:18AM
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A more interesting question
The gay issues aside, or included, how about a person raising their own clone? No genetic manipulation, just a carbon copy?
About the best I can say is I'm undecided, and there aren't many topics I'm undecided on. Ask me in two hundred years when more information is available. It's an interesting question, though.
- Don Earl
October 26, 2009 7:38AM
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Is the open mind a disadvantage?
If were going to say having same sex perents is a disadvantage you might as well bubble rap your self in plastic and never leave the house.
If you present the agrument that children will get teased by having same-sex parents your right, the simple and blind view of socierty is to not except anything that is too different. But as children we have to learn how socierty functions, whats the different young or later on when they dont follow the conformity of high school life.
Yes the child of a family with homosexual parents may get teased but dont we all. Children have been taught buy there parent to reject to anything they dont understand. The children that do the teasing have been raised in familys no better then a same-sex family because they are already at a young age taught to disriminate.
Children from homosexual familys arn't disadvantaged, they have the amzing choice to think freely about the world. They have the habit to think about thinks before they judge.
- youth opion May 11, 2009 3:56AM
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Gay men are still men
I think too often we fail to recognize that two men, whether they are gay or straight, are still two men. I know many gay men who have characteristics that I view as inherently male (I.E., men are more visual than women. It doesn't matter what sex they are attracted to).
This means that two men, no matter how accommodating they are to their children , will most likely not be able to provide everything a mother would. I'm not sure what that means for the future, but to say that a child raised by two women or two men is equal to a child being raised by a man and a woman is just not true. There are certain gender characteristics that are immune to sexual preference.
- Cheerikiara May 12, 2009 3:45PM
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Why should it matter?
There are currently about half a million children in America's foster care system. Why deny any of these kids the love they'll receive from someone who wants to raise them? Love they may never have gotten had their biological parents kept them.
Other than the fact that they share the same reproductive organs, a gay couple is no different than a heterosexual couple.
- asweetlittlebullet
June 19, 2009 10:33PM
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don't be ridiculous
"a gay couple is not different than a heterosexual couple"???????As I see it the only difference is that the gay person has shunned and is unable to interact with the only other existing species of human on the earth. No different?????????l
- just a thought
August 28, 2009 12:05AM
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species?
“As I see it the only difference is that the gay person has shunned and is unable to interact with the only other existing species of human on the earth. No different?????????l”
First… in what way has a ‘gay’ person shunned anyone by being gay? Can you describe exactly how not sleeping with someone is shunning them?
Second… What other species? Men and women are members of the same species, H.Sapiens
- MrBook
August 28, 2009 5:11PM
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you just proved his point!
as he stated, a gay couple is no different than a heterosexual. sorry "just a thought," but what you speak of is the way in which the couple is regarded. that is different from their inherent nature :)
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:24AM
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It is interesting
that Florida has no problem with gay foster parents only with gay adoption . It's not about whats good for the child but, like gay marriage , being hung-up on a word.
- mike1948
August 28, 2009 8:53AM
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CB School teacher tells class, "it's ok to be gay"
http://judiwheeldon.blogspot.com/2009/08/council-bluffs-public-school-teacher.html
- Judi Wheeldon
August 28, 2009 5:03PM
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And
the teacher is right in his / her assertion that "it's ok to be gay". The only time it's not ok is when in the presence of the ignorant.
- tek August 29, 2009 2:46AM
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why not?
Why isn't it OK to be gay?
- MrBook
August 29, 2009 7:32AM
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KIDS WITH SAME SEX PARENTS ARE CONFUSED
a basic tenet of education is to teach both what is and what is not. therefore, in order to grow up normally as an adult male, a boy needs to learn via observing his parents know how to be a man, and how not to be a woman. conversely, a girl in order for her to grow up normally needs to seeing how it is to become a woman, and how not to become a man.
- wongarg
September 16, 2009 2:08PM
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confusion?
That is an interesting hypothesis... but the evidence does not support your claims, rather it shows that children in same sex families are as well adjusted as those in heterosexual families.
- MrBook
September 16, 2009 8:38PM
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Right
The only way the child could get confused is if the parent's were not honest with the child about the situation... Haven't you ever seen "The Birdcage"?
- ttut21
September 17, 2009 7:46AM
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Robin WIlliams
Yes, it is a movie I rather enjoy.
- MrBook
September 17, 2009 6:14PM
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it seems to me
like you strongly enforce gender roles. can a boy not be a stay at home father, while the mother goes out to work as the primary bread winner? people can act in whatever way they please, i promise you their gender will not change over night or any period of time.
- userk
October 26, 2009 7:26AM
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This blows my mind
I'll tell you what, the best thing that my parents ever did for me was get divorced, yes it was rough on my single mom and hard for me to comprehend, but they would have eventually killed each
(literally) had they stayed together. Something that cracks me up is a comment about kids with divorced parents never wishing that their parents had same sex partners...watching my dad be emotionally abusive to all his girlfriends and my mom be emotionally abused by all her boyfriends, in hindsight I bet had my parents had same sex relationships things would have gone a lot smoother. I think that might even be true of them today, watching them in their current relationships. I don't care where babies come from; what's most important is that they are loved when they get here. Whether you're gay, straight, bi-curious or a unicorn, if you are comfortable with who you are and you can pass that on to your kid, the lesson is not "be like me" the lesson is "be yourself". If two people who love each other are willing to invest positive time and energy into their children , it doesn't matter whether one is a man and the other a woman, a child just needs to be loved, respected and allowed to have a chance at a happy childhood. There are so many reasons why this argument is ridiculous...I could go on and on but I don't want to hog all the space.
My Questions for You:
*Do gay people really wish gay-dom on their children, knowing the adversity they may face in their future?
*Isn't being molested as a young person more likely to effect your sexuality (in any regard) in your future more so than having two loving parents who happen to be of the same sex?
* Do you think that adopted children are thinking "my parents are pushing their gay agenda down my throat and that is too heavy a burden for [me] to carry and it is in my opinion criminal" (according to Hope7) or do you think they are thinking "hey i have two parents who love me, awesome".....?
*Does the phrase "it takes a village to raise a child" actually mean a bunch of same sex couples or does it really just mean a positive support system, made up of people who have the child's best interest in mind?
- camantonio
September 24, 2009 1:48AM
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Insider view....
Being brought up by two lesbian parents and being a boy with no male role model in my life (other than gay friends of my mom's) i would have to say that it does not put you at a disadvantage.
Kids will pick on you for a huge list of reasons. If that means i was saved from names such as 'big head' or 'four eyes' because children would choose to focus on the sexual orrientation of my parents, so be it.
Both my moms gave me love and attention and supported me through education , relationships and anything they could.
I must say that i am a very camp man but i harbor no homosexual desires, im completely straight. This is without any heterosexual influence.
Now im in my late teens , i didnt go to college , unfortunatly but instead i work in a large investment bank, earning as much as any graduate in my job.
In conclusion having gay parents hasnt affected me, i have a nice job, a beautifull girlfriend and im debt free. This is all the product of the so called 'broken home'
- Jack1990
September 28, 2009 10:25AM
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Well They're Definitely Not at an Advantage!!
I grew up the oldest boy out of three, in a Midwest model American home with a mother and a father until the age of twelve. Up until then I believed everything was just as perfect and I would have to say that I was probably at an advantage over most of the other families I knew, simply because of the fact that we were all still a family.
One day my father caught my mother cheating on him with another female. Now, kudos to both of them because I will have to say they did one heck of a job keeping us three kids out of the mess that had been created. Of course, divorce followed and soon I watched our family crumble into pieces from that day forward. I knew what was going on, but I never brought it up. It was a little embarrassing, so as far as everyone else, I was just a good kid going through tough time at home.
Eventually, my mother came out to us and it was not different than it was before. For two-thirds of the time under my parents roof, everything was great. The last third was a mess!! Not because, she was gay, or even the fact that I was gay, it was the ugly, messy divorce. The odd thing was that my father never really met anyone until many years later, but my mother had a girlfriend who lived with her.
I am here to tell you now that homes with two parents, any parents whether they are gay, straight, blue or brown, are the ones at an advantage. For the most part I was better off living with my mother and her girlfriend than with my father, not because money , or lifestyle, or anything else. It was simply because of the single parent home versus the two parent home factor. It was hell going through all of that, and the only thing that put me at a disadvantage was the divorce.
- BigBadWoof
October 5, 2009 11:58PM
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children of gay parents are most certainly at disadvantage
it is quite obvious and clear that children of same-sex couples are most certainly at a disadvantage. it is a shame that intolerant americans still exist to this day, but they do and will most certainly attempt to complicate the lives of said kids . that being said, are children of poor couples at a disadvantage? most certainly! and yet neither of these "disadvantages" should deem a parent incapable of raising a healthy individual.
- userk
October 26, 2009 6:49AM
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Are Children With Same Sex Parents at a Disadvantage?
Of course children with same sex parents would be at a disadvantage: First, embarrassment,
degradation, deprivation, humility, confusion, hurt, pain, shyness, hostility etc. Will the "Bible" be
thrown out. Vulnerability to pedophiles, etc. Why did the creator make man and woman. Men and
women with deviates natures could resort to pedophilia with the child... then what. I can see that
law makers (as we call them) are crazy/insane and have apathy towards their own human race .
Any sexual deviation is ABNORMAL and should not be placed upon innocent children. If there were
less human beings in the world it would be a much better place for all... and leave animals out of
the picture they are all absolutely normal when not interfered with by humans. I just love animals -
they are so pure. People should learn from animals, especially if they have problems with their life.
- darling sapphire
October 28, 2009 2:09PM
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I don't think so.
I'm not for gay marriage but I don't think children in a homosexual home are at a disadvantage, in most things.
Granted, when mom and mom have to explain the birds and the bee's to son , or help daughter with boy problems, there might be some trouble there but, I don't think its anything they can't work around.
I draw my evidence from history. Through the ages there have been countless individuals raised in Monasteries or Nunneries who have come out just fine.
- Nivarion
November 15, 2009 11:06PM
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