Mark Regnerus (and by the way I don’t take his study in isolation, there needs to be a lot more studies, and he’s admitted this too), but he
discusses the Hawthorne effect etc. and how these kids in his study live in a “fishbowl,”
I am expanding here, but those who gave grown up in same-sex households could be well educated, they can have grown up in a loving home, they can have a stable job, but that doesn’t mean they don’t feel an emptiness or loss from not having a Mother or Father around. Taking a different situation entirely, but there are people that have grow up in loving homes with their biological Father and Stepmother, but they still seek out their biological Mother, because they seek that biological attachment, among other things.
Going back to those raised in same-sex households who feel the loss of a permanent presence of a Mother or Father, such individuals will not nessesarily come out and publicly speak about this, they may not want to upset the family that did raise them, and/or because they’ve likely grown up in a LGBT friendly home, they wouldn’t want to negatively harm the larger community and what they’ve fought for in the way of the right to adopt.
Would you reject a study that found negative outcomes for children raised same-sex couples? I guess you would, but you can correct me if I am wrong. Methodology matters because people find things to criticise in any study that open itself up to have holes poked into the research because arguably the best methodology has not been used.
(Sorry for the late reply)
I’m sure there are some children of same sex couples who “feel an emptiness” as a result of a mother or father being absent. By your own admission, children being raised by a single parent, grandparent, extended family member or an adoptive parent sometimes feel the same thing.
Considering how much more common it is for a child to be raised in any of those other circumstances, one has to ask why same sex parents should be singled out. I understand the belief that “a child being raised by the biological parents is the most desirable situation”, but I disagree with it completely.
Obviously, if a man and a woman have a child, the most desirable thing to happen would be for those two to raise the child. But that simply isn’t the world we live in. There are many children born whose ideal upbringing is by anyone BUT their biological parents.
And then we have children where having their biological parents in the picture is no longer an option, for whatever reason. Your idea of what the model family that surrounds this child should be is now unavailable. At this point, we are left with the many situations a child could end up in. I don’t think it’s fair to say a gay couple should be avoided, because there are many same sex couples who are far more suited to parent than many of their heterosexual counterparts.
As for a study whose results denounce same sex parents, I would look at any credible results with an open mind, but the fact remains that every single study out there is or will be perceived as bias in some way by the detractors. That leaves us with the real life, nitty gritty of these situations. And the overall consensus there is that these children are doing absolutely fine.
There are exceptions, of course, as with any other arrangement, but the reality is that these are families. And I don’t think these families are any more or less of a family than my own, your own, or anybody else’s. They ALL deserve to be respected. And any person or any couple who has willingly become a parent, either by foster, adoption, or another situation, and who is raising a happy, supported and encouraged child deserves to be commended.
I always ask this question but never seem to get an answer: What do you propose we do about the tens of thousands (or more) children already being raised by same sex couples? Do you believe these kids should be removed from their homes and yanked away from their parents to be placed with a more traditional family? I understand your desire to somehow prevent these situations from happening to begin with, but you cannot, and these families will continue to exist as they always have.
So what do we do with the existing children? Should my grandchildren, who were adopted out of foster care by my son and his husband, be taken away by the government and given to your family or someone else’s?
I do not understand the goal here. You have an idea of what you think a “real” family should be, as we all do, but that idea ignores the millions of other families who don’t meet that criteria. What exactly is the remedy to all of this?
