Lovesbitch

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CrabbyCancer69

As long as a child is raised in a nice, safe, loving home where both parents are there for you, I don't see why it should be so different that you're raised in a heterosexual family or same-sex family.

In Fair Verona

I agree. Especially with gay adoption. I don't see what's so wrong with that. It's much better to be with two loving parents than to have no family at all. Reminds me of how the Republicans in Texas made an anti-Chet Edwards tv spot focusing solely on how he's bad for Texas because he's for gay adoption.

*Circe*

My little cousin's best friend is being raised by two women, and they are all really nice! They give car pool rides, and bake things for the kids at school, and are involved with the booster club and all that. They're very involved parents; the girl and the kids don't ridicule the her at all. There really isn't a reason too, anyway.

~Belle

Sparrowhawk

I believe an ideal situation is a biological mother and father raising a child, but as others said: better a loving couple raising a child than no family for that child at all.

Lovesbitch

Well, this study shows that a lesbian couple is just as ideal for raising a child as a man and women.

Sparrowhawk

Negative, they only studied adoptive children. If you read my statement, you see I make the distinction.

However, I also do not believe this study was comprehensive. I would like to see how this affected the children as they got into relationships themselves. I know from personal experience (no father, entirely female household) that only recieving perspective from one sex, with no role model for your own, distorts how one sees relationships and, in my case at least, is detrimental to knowing how to behave in a relationship.

I never missed having a father until I was in a relationship myself and had no male role model to identify with.

Ambular

That's a very good point, Sparrowhawk. Putting aside my beliefs about homosexual marriages entirely, I think I would agree on that. And not because I think that gay or lesbian couples would be less likely to raise a child in a loving, caring home, but I do think it can change how you view the other person in a relationship (unless of course the daughter of a lesbian couple grows up to be a lesbian herself, or a gay son of a male couple, similiarly). I would regard it the same as any situation where there is the absence of either a mother or a father.

dyxlecis gril

i think just because there's so much emphasis on it, that gay couples would be better at providing several different role models of either gender for their children. i know that's something i would focus on.

as far as learning how to be in a relationship, i see no difference in same-sex and opposite-sex relationships, so as long as there's two parents, that shouldn't be a problem. there's no huge difference in how people love each other, and take care of each other. i think it all depends on the circumstances anyway, because i grew up with only one parent, and i haven't had any problems with that.

i don't think it's ideal to have two parents of the opposite sex. i don't think it's ideal to have two parents of the same sex. i think it's ideal to have two caring, informed, involved parents. parents that love you and take care of you and support you no matter what. that's what i think is ideal. and that can't be based on whether you're straight, or gay or black or white, or christian or muslim or atheist.

Lovesbitch

I'm sorry, I thought the ideal parents would ones that loved each other and you.

And with that love shows you how wonderful it is to be in a commited, loving relationship and devote your life to raising your children and making a home.

And the survey showed that the adopted children of gay parents were just as well adjusted in relationships as those who were raised by two straight adopted parents.

How is this any different then children who are born and raised by them?

Sparrowhawk

Er, I sorta assumed that. We aren't talking about special circumstances where parents beat the child. I think that a child should be in an orphanage instead of an abusive family.

I wasn't talking about that. I was talking about role-models and identification with your own sex. And yes, it does matter that it is your own sex.

I know that, I read the article The sample size was not terribly large, so I suggest everyone takes it with a grain of salt.

Do you truly see no difference between being raised by adoptive parents and biologic parents? Sure, they may love each other and the child, but imo nothing replaces biologic mother and father. I'm assuming, of course, that both are loving couples etc.

Excuse me? Why in the world would you assume that? Sure, they might have aunts and uncles... but that's why I was talking about ideal. It is ideal that the child has a parent that provides a good role model. And a member of the opposite sex does not provide that. A child needs a member of their own sex to emulate and identify with. Not with everything of course, but they do need one in their life. A parent providing that role is ideal, though other things can suffice, such as a Big Brother.

See above. I know you don't want to admit it, but men and women think differently. They just do. Before I got into a relationship, I measured how I acted by how I thought I would react if someone behaved that way with me. Now that I'm in a relationship, I find that women are very irrational Seriously, though, I cannot figure out how women think. My g/f just does not react to things the way I would react, and it throws me. "Love" may be the same, but the thinking is wildly different. Why else would they say women are from venus, men from mars?

I grew up with a single parent and all sisters, and I've had a very hard time with my relationship. It might just be my situation, but I wish I had had a father to identify with and emulate. I would know how a man should treat a woman (or how not to, if it wasn't a good way).

It is ideal to have two caring involved parents. The most ideal is if they are biologic and of the opposite sex (obvious that they are opposite sex ). Other ways can work well, of course, but that is the most ideal.

Those other things can affect the child growing up, but biologic parents are the most ideal, all else being equal. Adoption just isn't the same, no matter if they're gay or straight.

dyxlecis gril

i'm not assuming anything. i honestly believe that a gay couple would try harder to find role models of the opposite sex for their children, simply because it's obviously more of an issue with a same sex couple. and i honestly don't think it has to be a parent. i don't see how it has to be a parent or a sibling, because there are plenty of people out there who are so close to their aunts and uncles that they'd almost consider them older brothers or sisters.

also not allmen think like men, and not all women think like women. in fact, according to all those studies they've done on what homosexuality really is , they've mentioned the fact that homosexual men seem to have brains more like heterosexual women and homosexual women seem to have brains more like heterosexual men. and what about relationships where one person is transgendered? should they not be allowed to adopt either then, because they were born with the wrong body?

because it's a stereotype. not all women are irrational or needy or emotional or into make up and fashion or what have you. just like some men are. and it has nothing to do with your sexuality, just so that's clear.

but how do you know you wouldn't have done just as well with a woman as a role model? a woman in a relationship with a woman, just like yourself. you don't know. you can say that you know, but you really don't, because you've never been the child of gay parents.



it's not obvious that they are of the opposite sex, there are plenty of gay people who have biological children. sometimes one is the biological parent and the other gave birth to the child. i don't see how genes make you closer to a child, honestly.

in my opinion, adoptive parents are often better parents, simply because a lot of them go through hell to get that child, tons of interviews and years of waiting. (not saying straight, biological parents don't appreciate their children, just that adoptive parents do more often. again, my opinon) and even if i go along with your "biology is ideal" idea, a child will always, always be better off in a loving home with same-sexed parents than in some awful orphanage in a third world country.

Ambular

Thought I'd add this information that I found....Please keep in mind that I did not write this, so if you disagree, you are perfectly welcome to say so, but don't start flinging accusations at me thinking that this is my opinion. Thanks

It's very long, but very well thought-out, and it would be nice to hear feedback for it.


_____________________________________


Men and women, from childhood on, have very different biological and social imperatives. They are naturally disposed to different reproductive strategies; men are (on average) larger and stronger; the relative levels of various hormones, the difference in the rate of maturity, and many other factors make it far, far easier for women to get along with other women and men to get along with men.

Men, after all, know what men like far better than women do; women know how women think and feel far better than men do. But a man and a woman come together as strangers and their natural impulses remain at odds throughout their lives, requiring constant compromise, suppression of natural desires, and an unending effort to learn how to get through the intersexual swamp.

And yet, throughout the history of human society -- even in societies that tolerated relatively open homosexuality at some stages of life -- it was always expected that children would be born into and raised by families consisting of a father and mother.

And in those families where one or both parents were missing, usually because of death, either stepparents, adoptive parents, or society in general would step in to provide, not just nurturing, but also the appropriate role models.

It is a demonstrated tendency -- as well as the private experience of most people -- that when we become parents, we immediately find ourselves acting out most of the behaviors we observed in the parent of our own sex. We have to consciously make an effort to be different from them.

We also expect our spouse to behave, as a parent, in the way we have learned to expect from the experiences we had with our opposite-sex parent -- that's why so many men seem to marry women just like their mother, and so many women to marry men just like their father. It takes conscious effort to break away from this pattern.

So not only are two sexes required in order to conceive children, children also learn their sex-role expectations from the parents in their own family. This is precisely what large segments of the Left would like to see break down. And if it is found to have unpleasant results, they will, as always, insist that the cure is to break down the family even further.

Of course, in our current society we are two generations into the systematic destruction of the institution of marriage. In my childhood, it was rare to know someone whose parents were divorced; now, it seems almost as rare to find someone whose parents have never been divorced.

And a growing number of children grow up in partial families not because of divorce, but because there never was a marriage at all.

The damage caused to children by divorce and illegitimate birth is obvious and devastating. While apologists for the current system are quick to blame poverty resulting from "deadbeat dads" as the cause, the children themselves know this is ludicrous.

There are plenty of poor families with both parents present whose children grow up knowing they are loved and having good role models from both parents.

And there are plenty of kids whose divorced parents have scads of money -- but whose lives are deformed by the absence of one of their parents in their lives.

Most broken or wounded families are in that condition because of a missing father. There is substantial and growing evidence that our society's contempt for the role of the father in the family is responsible for a massive number of "lost" children.

Only when the father became powerless or absent in the lives of huge numbers of children did we start to realize some of the things people need a father for: laying the groundwork for a sense of moral judgment; praise that is believed so that it can instill genuine self-confidence.

People lacking in fundamental self-esteem don't need gold stars passed out to everyone in their class. Chances are, they need a father who will say -- and mean -- "I'm proud of you."

This is an oversimplification of a very complex system. There are marriages that desperately need to be dissolved for the safety of the children, for instance, and divorced parents who do a very good job of keeping both parents closely involved in the children's lives.

But you have to be in gross denial not to know that children would almost always rather have grown up with Dad and Mom in their proper places at home. Most kids would rather that, instead of divorcing, their parents would acquire the strength or maturity to stop doing the things that make the other parent want to leave.

This is not trivial damage. Kids thrive best in an environment that teaches them how to be adults. They need the confidence and role models that come from a stable home with father and mother in their proper places.

So when our children go through the normal adolescent period of sexual confusion and perplexity, which is precisely the time when parents have the least influence over their children and most depend on the rest of society to help their children grow through the last steps before adulthood, what will happen?

Emzmit

I'm just going to jump on in.

If a couple that are raising a child love him/her than it is irrelevant whether or not the parents are adoptive or biological. I don’t see either of those options as more ideal as the other because a biological connection to a child does not mean a parent magically loves them more.

Obviously a child may have issues regarding their adoption, why their biological parents had them adopted, when they found out they were adopted etc. But those are issues separate to the couple that are raising them (assuming there was no secrecy involved that has caused a rift or anything) and is not actually anything to do with how good the adoptive parents are at raising the child.

I disagree. All things being equal, in an ideal situation I don't think it makes any difference whether the role model is a parent or not. Other people can do just as good a job as a parent would.

dyxlecis gril

illegitimate birth? i'm pretty sure my birth was real. unless c-sections are considered illegitimate. i really resent that. most of my friends (because i live in an awesome european city. not as awesome as sweden, but almost) didn't have parents who were married. some lived together as married people, some did not, but neither me or my friends are damaged in any way, and my life sure as hell hasn't been devastating. what's this person talking about, the ghetto?

illegitimate birth? god, i hate organized religion. i jokingly said i was a bastard to a mormon lady once (she was a mother of two young children too, i was horrified) and she said "well, at least you admit it." they teach their children that ****, it's disgusting.