gbaji wrote:
That's not exactly the direction I was going in. Most children, especially teens, go through a phase at which they're embarassed of their parents, don't want them involved in what they're doing, etc. I was simply going for the pretty obvious issue that a child of gay parents will have to choose more carefully who he introduces to his parents, right?
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.
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And this isn't going to be just the teen years. The fact that little timmy's parents are joe and steve will not be secret, right (or if it is, that's going to be unhealthy as well having to hide it). We can argue right and rong all day long, but that doesn't mean much to 8 year olds who'll find *something* to be cruel about. I can't see how this wont have some sort of effect on the child.
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.
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I'd really need to see those studies. While I'm not an advocate of the "they'll end up raiving lunatics" theory, I would be frankly surprised to find *no* negative social effects across the board from being raised by gay parents. The fact is that as much as we'd like to say otherwise, a good percentage of the population is *not* accepting of gays in general, and gay parents even less. There's no way for that not to have some effect on the child.
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.
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If 35% of the population was likely to discriminate on you based on whether your hair was brown, you might care if it was a genetic trait or not, right?
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