Babies for teh gaysFollow

I have to say, being an American myself, the Bush Administration is focusing on entirely wrong things. Marriage is about love, not man and a woman. Marriage is not about pro-creation. Because gays cannot have children, why can't they adopt?

Bush sucks.

Some homophobe didn't like this thread I see. Nuttin' but rate downs.

I tried to right some of the damage also.

Being brought up by gay people will make you gay, much like hanging around my 6'9 *** will make you tall. Jesus guys ... think of the children.

Ask my gay friend. He didn't seem to have much of a choice. Neither did his partner. Both lived completely normal lives.

I don’t contest that things like sexual abuse and other traumatizing events seem to be causes of homosexuality. I just find assuming all homosexual people to be products of their own environment, narrow minded.

Something to do with the degradation of the (prett)Y-chromosome.

Do you camp it up in a sailor outfit singing "I'm a little teapot" from Monday to Saturday, then play football and leer at chicks on a Sunday?

I think there are a lot of issues standing in the way of gay adoption. Right now, it's just an issue that neither side really wants to deal with directly. Certainly the re-writing of tons of statues has something to do with it, but that's just one factor.

Most of you have expressed it in terms of "a gay couple would be better for a child then foster care", which inherently places some kind of order in terms of preference. So a hetero couple who are biological parents is considered "best", then perhaps a single biological parent, then a hetero couple who adopt, then maybe a tie between a single adoptive parent of either sex and a gay couple, then some kind of foster care (this assumes that the base quality of each is normative; a horrible set of biological parents is going to be worse then foster care, but that's the exception and not the rule).

Of course, the Religious Right folks are going to oppose it for a number of reasons (they're gay being at the top of the list). But even moderates along the political spectrum will have concerns about children raised by a gay couple. And then there are even going to be folks pretty far to the left who'll have issues, not over them being gay, but the implications to other social structures that such adoptions represent.

We can talk about social adjustment all we want. But the reality is that a kid growing up with gay parents will run into far more "I don't want people to know who they are" moments then other kids. There's also some social arguments (even, and perhaps even especially, among the Left) that can suffer (or at least be hard to argue) whilst arguing for gay adoption. Some people argue vehemently that homosexuality is a biological issue. You're "born gay". But that then opens the door for treating it as a disease or syndrome. Some will argue the opposite. Being gay is a learned behavior. But that then opens the door for the religious folks arguments that you can be "turned gay", and also can be used as an argument against gay adoption (since if this is true then it would increase the chance that the child would be gay). And then there's the issue of the ranking as well. Does that not then imply that foster care isn't good enough? But that implies that the government *can't* take care of the people...

Even most Liberal groups don't want to touch the issue with a ten foot pole, simply because there are so many other lose-lose arguments that will arise as a result. So there really isn't a lot of political push on the issue from either side.

Liberals find themselves in a bind on a number of issues due to this sort of thing. All for genetic research, but not into a potential "gay gene", nor for any sort of food products. All for the importance of environment on developing children, but not if it implies that environment can affect sexual identity in any way. Heh. Conservatives have the same kinds of problems of course, and there are some issues that cause problems for *both* groups. Gay adoption happens to be one of them.

I don't see liberals or for that matter libertarians having the sort of dilemma you describe, gbaji. My own attitude toward peope who argue that "OMG TEH CHILDZ WILL CATCH TEH GHEY!!11!" is, "So?"

Assume for the sake of argument that gay parents are, for whatever reason, more likely to foster homosexuality in their children. Take your time.

...Uh huh. Is that all you got? Cause if that's the worst news, it's really not so bad. If the kid grew up in a loving, stable, secure environment with people who looked out for him/her and did their level best to instill good solid values and turns out to be gay like mom and mom or dad and dad.... that's okay with me. Worst case, the world has one more gay person who has his/her sh[i][/i]it together.

Oh, I agree completely Samira. I'm not arguing that *I'd* be concerned about it, or you, or most of the posters here. While I seem to get myself in trouble whenever I do this, I'm trying to espress the arguments that will be generated by others. Most people, while they will argue that there's nothing wrong with being gay, will still think of it as "less preferred then being straight". So while it's ok if someone ends up gay, we should certainly try to prevent it from happening when possible. Or at least we shouldn't create an environment more likely to make someone gay (assuming that's possible of course).

That's not my view, but that's the view that most people will have. Even among people who are up with gay people normally, there's a silent assumption that it would be better if they were straight. This is certainly going to have a chilling effect on the kind of political push needed to move towards gay adoption.

why do you argue a point you yourself claim you dont believe with so much passion, when you could instead turn that passion towards what you do believe. I think there are enough people on this board who believe the opposite of such debates that could speak for themselves.

Not if the kid isn't ashamed of the fact that his or her parents are gay. That's like saying a black teen would have to choose who he or she introduces to their parents more carefully because they are afraid of others ostracizing them because their parents are black. That's simply not proving to be the case among children raised by gay couples. A lot of this is because they get a message of self-pride and acceptance within the home from an early age that the kids of straight couples don't get.



Kids will find something to bully on, regardless of who your parents are. The idea that it should is a consideration against gay adoption is absurd.




It's been years since I read the study my mind keeps going back to, and if I still have a copy of it around here somewhere, I'm damned if I can recall where it is, but here's something I had saved to my hard drive from way back when:

Facts about kids with gay and lesbian parents

In the United States alone, there are millions of people with one or more lesbian, gay, bisexual, and/or transgender (LGBT) parent(s). While research shows that there are no significant developmental differences or negative affects on children of LGBT parents, these youth do report facing significantly more prejudice and discrimination because societal homophobia and transphobia. Youth report that schools are a key place where they face intolerance- from peers, teachers, school administration, and school systems that are affected by the homophobia in our society. According to a 2001 study, students who have LGBT parents experience harassment at the same rate as students who themselves are gay.

* As of 1990, 6 million to 14 million children in the United States were living with a gay or lesbian parent. (National Adoption Information Clearinghouse, a service of the U.S. Administration for Children and Families.)
* There is absolutely no evidence that children are psychologically or physically harmed in any way by having LGBT parents. There is, however, much evidence that shows that they are not.
* People with LGBT parents have the same incidence of homosexuality as the general population, about 10%. No research has ever shown that LGBT parents have any affect on the sexuality of their children. (Patterson, Charlotte J. 1992)
* Research claims that children with LGBT parents are exposed to more people of the opposite sex than many kids of straight parents. (Rofes, E.E., 1983, Herdt, 1989)
* Studies have shown that people with LGBT parents are more open-minded about a wide variety of things than people with straight parents. (Harris and Turner, 1985/86)
* Daughters of lesbians have higher self-esteem than daughters of straight women. Sons are more caring and less aggressive. (Hoeffer, 1981)
* On measures of psychosocial well-being, school functioning, and romantic relationships and behaviors, teens with same-sex parents are as well adjusted as their peers with opposite-sex parents. A more important predictor of teens' psychological and social adjustment is the quality of the relationships they have with their parents. (National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, 2004)
* Most "problems" that kids of LGBT parents face actually stem from the challenges of dealing with divorce and the homophobia and transphobia in society rather then the sexual orientation or gender identity of their parents.


I'm not pulling the statistics out of my ***. There are plenty of interviews out there, if you care to find them, with the children of gay parents, that demonstrate how we, the straight adults not related to them, comprise most of the dysfunction they encounter in their daily lives.




It would depend on how much confidence, pride, and acceptance I felt toward myself. What's the percentage of people who discriminate because someone's SKIN is brown? That's unquestionably genetic, and it doesn't seem to make a difference in the way others regard it. Bigotry is bigotry, and bigots will be bigots, period.



Edited, Tue Oct 18 19:13:14 2005 by Ambrya

This was the part I was going for. I'm not saying that the kids will be somehow more psychologocally screwed up because their parents are gay. As you say, there's no evidence to support that. However, I am saying that they're going to encounter more problems from the rest of society becuase their parents are gay. Which this study does confirm.


Again. It's not just an issue of equality, or moral right and wrong. When we're dealing with issues of raising children, and especially adoption, there's a real sense that we should ensure the "best" environment for the kid.

Answer this question: How many parents would want their child to be gay? Sure. Most (hopefully) would love their child gay or not, but how many would actively wish their child to be gay? Not too many I'm betting.

Don't you think a study showing that adopted children of gay couples recieve the same amount of negative peer response as if they were gay themselves is significant? Because while the parent of a child doesn't have a choice of that child being gay or not, we as society *do* have a choice as to whether to put the adopted child through the same problems and negative consequences by putting them into a gay couples home.


And *that's* the core issue I was going at. In an ideal world, this shouldn't matter. But we don't live in that world. I think it's reasonable to look at all aspects of an adoptive home, and I can certainly see how a heck of a lot of people would have concerns about gay adoption due to this issue.