Babies for teh gaysFollow

No more significant than the fact that the children of black parents receive as much exposure to racism as their parents do.

People will be bigots. That doesn't mean we shouldn't to allow victims of those bigots to have families, just because they might encounter bigotry.

The ONLY factor that should be considered when a couple is adopting is whether or not they are emotionally and financially stable and up to the challenge of parenting a child. Discriminating against decent people who would be decent parents just because OTHER people whom the propective adoptive couple have no control over might choose to behave badly is absurd.





Edited, Tue Oct 18 20:34:36 2005 by Ambrya

psssst, hey Jbaji, they are talking about ya in that other post. You better get over there and defend yourself fyi kudos.


/bomb

The difference is that we cannot do anything to prevent that ostracism in those other cases. And in most cases, we can't say in what way any given kid might be ostracized, right?

In the case of gay couples adopting children, the rate of ostracism for those other reasons is *identical*. The kid is just as likely to end up being the geek that gets kicked around by the jocks. Or the shy kid that can't handle social situations well. Or the bucktoothed kid who gets made fun of. Or maybe he'll run into problems due to his skin color. Point is that all of those things are the same and are unchanged. However, we can say with absolute certainty that in addition to that, if he's adopted by gay parents he'll recieve ostracism because of that as well.


And acording to Ambrya's source, he's be ostracized *exactly* as badly as if he was gay himself. I'll ask again. If you were a parent, would you choose for your child to be gay? In terms of ostracism from peers, that's almost exactly the decision we're making when we decide to allow gay couples to adopt a child. We're making a choice to inflict that degree of hatred and biogotry on the child.


In all of those other things, we don't have a choice. In this one, we do. That's how they differ.

Lol. Yeah. But is he more or less likely to get his butt kicked as the friend of the black kid, or as the black kid? It's all about degrees here. And even more to the point, the kid *chose* to befriend his black friend in your example. The adoptee doesn't get to choose to have gay adoptive parents. We (society) make that choice for him.



Hold on there sister! I'm not arguing that that's a good reason to deny gay's adoptive rights. Pay attention. I'm arguing that's it's a legitimate reason for there not to be a whole lot of social traction on the idea. Sometimes the "right" thing doesn't get done, not because it's not "right", and not even because most people don't see it as "right", but simply because there isn't enough reason to do it in the first place.


Can we agree that there's a world of difference between opposing something, and going out of your way to push for something? My whole point has been that there really isn't a consensus on this particular issue because no one sees it as a "win" situation. It's not just one thing. It's a combination of things. Politically, you'd be pushing for something which would open up a whole range of debates that you maybe don't want to get involved in (those lose-lose situations I discussed earlier), all so that you can place children into homes in which they are guaranteed to be ostracized by their peers later in life?


Like I said. Not a whole lot of political motivation behind this. The gains simply don't justify the political cost, and that's ultimately what's going to determine if it'll ever happen.


Outside of gay family members becoming legal parents of a child and wanting their SO to share that status, there isn't a whole heck of a lot of push for this even among gays. I kinda place this into the catagory of issues that'll get resolved eventually, but we're not ready for yet...


And since I'm editing this. There is one other scenario that I've seen. It's not uncommon for lesbian couples to have children through some process of insemination (turkey baster in some cases). There's certainly some desire there to be able to adopt eachother's children. Right now, the most you can do is establish the SO as a legal guardian, which opens up the possibility of a family member taking the child away at a later date in the event of the death of the mother.

But honestly, there are custody battles even in cases of hetero couples where a spouse of someone with a child from a prior relationship has to fight to keep the child after the death of the biological parent. And it's not always due to challenges from the other biological parent either. One of the fallacies of the gay rights movement on this issue is the implied presumption that this only occurs due to gays not having certain rights. The fact is that it can happen to *anyone*, even married couples. Some states consider blood thicker then marriage, and will award custody to viable grandparents and siblings of the deceased if they challenge the spouse's claim. The primary sticking issue for gay couples is that since it's impossible for them both to be biological parents of the same child, this condition is going to apply to them at a much higher rate then among hetero couples, but it's based on the same basic legal approach.

Heck. What did you think the Schivo case was about? The blood relatives of the woman in the coma were able to fight for custody of her once she became incapacitated for over 10 years. Obviously, that's an extreme case, since the husband wanted to remove support mechanisms and end her life, so there's a whole different aspect to it, but the basic legal ideas are the same. Who has legal control over someone? Is a blood relation of greater precidence then a civil contract (like marriage)? It's incredibly misleading to imply that only gay couples have these sorts of problems.

Edited, Wed Oct 19 00:38:06 2005 by gbaji

Gbaji is all over this debate.

Okay Shadow.

You're starting to freak me out a little. This is like the third post in a row that has had a valid, understandable, and mature perspective on an issue. Not only that, but I ,freakishly enough, found myself agreeing with you completely.

I think about that, being a minority myself, and having had the option of foster care or adoption when I was younger, how different my life would have been if I had ended up in a home with gay parents. Instead, I remained ward of the state until I was eighteen, but the idea perked my interest.
Would I have been better off? Did I know other kids at the time that would have been?
Is being in an unorthodox home better than not being in any real home at all?

Oh Bob yes.
Even if they had told me the parents were gay ahead of time, I wouldn't have cared. I like to think that I would have dealt with the "ostracism" and the "bullying" (the latter of which wouldn't have gone on long in any case)) with thankful glee.
When you have nothing, anything is a drastic improvement.

-Nagafen