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I totally agree with you but everyone says that means you discriminate. As I have mentioned before, our foster daugher, who is a lesbian doesn't believe in adoption for gays unless it is a very unusual situation. This isn't saying gay couples can not be loving parents, but it is always better for a child to be raised in a more main stream enviornment.
the way i see it the most important people in a family are the children , its wrong to use children as pawns - political footballs in an idealogical battle , thats what has happened with the whole gay adoption debate IMO , kids cannot expect to be open minded and pc , if kids in the school yard see that little tommy or jane has two dads or moms , they will be mercilessly picked on , kids cannot handle being hugely different like adults can
I'm on the same page as you and Irish_Bob on this....but since people have asked a couple of times about the "why", let's try to see if we can come up with some reasons why we feel the way we do on this subject....
i guess i'll start.......
please keep in mind that this is assuming everything else is the same (ie. both the hetero and gay parents are good, loving parents)
It might be better for a child to be raised in a house where there's both a female parent and a male parent because....
- The feelings that the male/female parents will convey to their kids is different than a gay couple....even though i understand most gay couples have different "roles" in their family relationships. i mean that the mom will be better positioned to convey the female feelings to her son/daughter than a gay guy would be able to. (in my opinion). Same goes the other way around.
- Sense of normalcy in a hetero family is more in the current society. Less teasing/etc. for the kids
-hmmm....i can't see to be able to think of any more at this
point. Anyone else care to add to this list?
i feel its important for a child to have both a male and female influence while growing up , it leaves them a lot more rounded , basic stuff
To be frank I would have rather have been raised by gay parents as opposed to taking the abuse that I did when I was growing up.
My hetero, god-fearing father was not a good father at all.
As I have observed through life seeing gay couples with children they always look so happy to me.
Gay couples should be allowed to adopt. I'm quite sure most, if not all children that are in unstable, temporary homes right now would love to have the chance to salvage what they have left of their childhood.
my father was not a bad person but he was a very poor father , that said , hard cases make bad policy and in general a mom and dad is the best deal going
While I think that gay couples can be better parents in many ways than at least some straight couples because they make a choice to become parents instead of just stumbling into parenthood, there is some evidence that having two parents of different genders makes a difference for kids. The problem is that we cannot tell whether that difference is significant or whether or not the difference makes things better for kids or just *different.*
Perhaps most significantly, mothers' and fathers' behaviors differed more in the play context than in the snack context. During play, fathers were more assertive whereas mothers displayed more facilitative and cooperative behaviors; in the caregiving situation their behaviors were much more similar. The authors suggest that children may pick up on these different behaviors and associate them with gender roles in the family i.e. males are more assertive whereas females are more compliant and flexible.
Given that we may be headed toward a more gender neutral society with gender roles being less defined, I cannot believe that having two parents of the same gender will actually be a detriment to the children, but I can see how those who support traditional roles might believe this.
I'm with john13, I never knew my father and my mother had no maternal instinct...I pretty much raised myself, not much support from adults at all. I'd rather have had two lesbians or two gay guys who wanted me and who loved me and who wanted to be together ..Too many people still think gays and lesbians are sexual deviants.
Quick summary:
Martin Gill is a foster parent in Florida. Florida was happy to allow him to foster-parent children, and he did so for many. You can read the article, but essentially the fact that babies are popular when it comes to adoption, and four-year-olds aren't, two brothers were going to be separated. However, Martin Gill wanted to adopt both brothers he was fostering and give them a permanent home, permanently together as brothers.
But Martin Gill is gay. So Florida denied his request to adopt them.
Happily, the boys remain together to this day. With a father, and with each other. And Florida's ban on adoption by gays is a thing of the past, because if failed the rational basis test. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/23/us/23adopt.html
I totally agree with you but everyone says that means you discriminate.
I would not call it discrimination per se. But I would call it baseless. There is nothing I am aware of at this time that suggests that a 1male+1female configuration is an "ideal" for the successful and healthy upbringing of a child. Single parents and gay parents would appear to be just as "ideal".
Quote:
Originally Posted by Thinking-man
i mean that the mom will be better positioned to convey the female feelings to her son/daughter than a gay guy would be able to. (in my opinion). Same goes the other way around.
What are "female feelings"? Adumbrate for me an emotion that females experience and convey that males do not. Or vice versa.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Thinking-man
Sense of normalcy in a hetero family is more in the current society. Less teasing/etc. for the kids
What is "normal" these days? Not much that I can think of. Especially in a world so punctuated by single parents, teen mothers and marital breakdown. I will take a happy and strong gay parenting couple as an "ideal" over what has become "normal" today. Appeals to "normality" are really poor in the discussion on gay parenting. Not to mention somewhat depressingly totalitarian in the sound of "IF you do not conform to our definition of normality your freedoms will be curtailed".
Also if one were to follow through on such an argument one would also be arguing against everything from inter racial couples... to single parents.... to parents with any kind of noticeable disability such as use of a wheel chair... and much more.
Should all these parents be considered "less ideal" because they do not conform to your ideal of "normal"? An ideal that barely appears to even exist in today's society? I would very much love to see you stand on a podium in front of a room full of people who were raised by parents with a noticeable physical disability and tell them all to their faces that their upbringing was "less ideal" than our own. IF you survive that without being lynched I will then happily take you to the next podium in front of a room full of people brought up by single parents.
Also teasing and bullying in groups of children is rarely caused by things like this. Victims of teasing and bullying are generally chosen by the cowardly based on their vulnerability and WHAT to tease them about is chosen second. You over estimate the thought processes of the average bully. They do not tend to seek out someone with something like gay parents so they can tease them. They seek out the weak and then find something to tease them about. If it is not gay parents it will be wearing glasses, or being bad at a sport, or being too intelligent and educated in class.... something, anything.
Quote:
Originally Posted by irish_bob
if kids in the school yard see that little tommy or jane has two dads or moms , they will be mercilessly picked on , kids cannot handle being hugely different like adults can
As I said above this is more a false argument of opportunism than any kind of actual fact. Bullies do not pick their targets based on them being different. They pick their targets based on them being vulnerable and easy to pick on.
WHAT they use as material for the following emotional and physical abuses is chosen in retrospect after picking a target. Targets are rarely picked based on the material first.
Also in a discussion about whether a particular person or persons are worthy or ideal as being parents... the poor and illegal actions of others is hardly a justifiable argument against them. "You can not have your freedom to do X because other bad people can not control themselves and might be naughty" is a lamentable argument. The argument that "Gay parents should not be allowed to adopt because other people might bully the child" makes... quite literally... as much sense as an argument like..... for example.... "Women should not be allowed out of their houses after dark because other bad men might be moved to rape them".
The example/analogy is extreme but the point is not. Curtailing or deriding a persons freedom to engage in something based on the possible bad actions of people outside the equation is poor reasoning. And as I said above the same "argument" taken to its logical conclusion could be leveled against single parents, parents in wheel chairs, or interracial couples.
Quote:
Originally Posted by irish_bob
i feel its important for a child to have both a male and female influence while growing up , it leaves them a lot more rounded , basic stuff
Again, why? I asked in my previous reply to you but you did not answer it... choosing instead to just repeat the same point unsubstantiated in this post some time later.
Quote:
Originally Posted by irish_bob
and in general a mom and dad is the best deal going
Yet again... why? In fact as nana053 pointed out there is some good argument as to why gay parents would be BETTER parents on average, not worse.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Thinking-man
You keep repeating the same thing again and again.
Ah good, I thought I was the only one noticing that.
What is "normal" these days? Not much that I can think of. Especially in a world so punctuated by single parents, teen mothers and marital breakdown. I will take a happy and strong gay parenting couple as an "ideal" over what has become "normal" today. Appeals to "normality" are really poor in the discussion on gay parenting. Not to mention somewhat depressingly totalitarian in the sound of "IF you do not conform to our definition of normality your freedoms will be curtailed".
Also if one were to follow through on such an argument one would also be arguing against everything from inter racial couples... to single parents.... to parents with any kind of noticeable disability such as use of a wheel chair... and much more.
Should all these parents be considered "less ideal" because they do not conform to your ideal of "normal"? An ideal that barely appears to even exist in today's society? I would very much love to see you stand on a podium in front of a room full of people who were raised by parents with a noticeable physical disability and tell them all to their faces that their upbringing was "less ideal" than our own. IF you survive that without being lynched I will then happily take you to the next podium in front of a room full of people brought up by single parents.
That is what I get for hoping for an answer containing any actual arguments or content. One word answers are worth exactly as much to me as the time and effort you bothered to put into them.
So you think your idea of "normal" should dictate what is the "ideal" upbringing for a child? Great for you. Totalitarian much? What makes your definition of "normal" the one to work from? What even IS your definition of normal and on what is it based? Alas all too often "normal" to most people seems to mean "Like me".
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