Homosexual adoption/ART

[De Spook]

In response to Muzby's question about homosexual adoption in the marriage thread i though i would start a new thread on that.

should homosexual couples be allowed to adopt children or have access to assisted reproductive therapy?

 

[preacha]

as much as i don't want to be the first person to reply, i gotta say no, but this will open a can of worms.

typically, humans reproduce by using the male and the female of the species. it's of my opinion that children should be raised in an environment which promotes the path that evolution has dictated for us as a race.

in no way am i saying that homosexual/lesbian couples are incapable of being good parents. i'm merely trying to say that confusion CAN (and i'm not saying WILL) arise in the child during their formative years.

but hey, look on the bright side, with all of the medical advances in producing humans without the male of the species, we won't be needed anymore and evolution will phase us out

if i've offended anyone indirectly, apologies in advance.

 

[anna!]

I think that homosexual couples have as much right to raise children as heterosexual couples who can't conceive children naturally.

I was talking to a woman from Queensland last night who's a lesbian, and she and her partner are trying to conceive. At the moment, the only options available to them are to either find a willing man and do it the old fashioned way (not especially desirable, I'd imagine!) or to get donor sperm and inseminate using a syringe. So far they've been unsuccessful for 18 months.

Her doctor will not refer her to fertility medication, send her for ultrasounds or do anything else (certainly within his power) to try to help her conceive, because he knows she's a lesbian. Whereas Mr and Mrs Hetero next door could conceivably have already worked it out and had a baby by this point.

That makes me sad. Here's a woman who is prepared to shoot sperm into her cervix via a syringe every month in the hope that she and her female de facto could raise a baby, even after many months of disappointment. That shows a pretty dedicated mum-to-be to me, but no one will help her.

I think anyone who's willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars on IVF has some pretty good "obviously we would really love and adore this baby" leverage, and their sexuality shouldn't come into it.

What about parents who realise later on that they're gay? Perhaps they should be issued with restraining orders from their kids?

 

[diegoblunt]

What about parents who realise later on that they're gay? Perhaps they should be issued with restraining orders from their kids?

lol indeed. proves your point well.

I pretty much agree with Anna ..

I guess it would be difficult for the child to explain to their 2nd Grade friends why they have 2 mummy's though. However, if gay couples are allowed to adopt / IVF now, then within 15 years, any stigma would dissapear and having gay parents would be as common as having divorced parents.

 

[muzby]

i think it acutally comes down to having strong role models for each gender.

yes, as anna said, what about parents who realise later that they are gay... well, so long as the child has an important role model in their life, to take the part of the gender that is missing, that should help them identify with themselves.

how is a boy supposed to feel when he starts getting feelings for a girl, but then looks at his role models (mother + mother) and sees that maybe there is no place for a guy in a loving relationship.


i for one never had a strong male role model in my life. i have had to help identify myself through living a full on life, getting involved in as much as i can, maturing at a later age than everyone else in a lot of aspects (my friends say i'm 25 going on 16) and have always found it difficult to accept a loving relationship, because of the experiences i had growing up.

i've learned from this, and will quite often be an older brother type figure to a lot of my younger friends, as i don't want people going through what i have had to go through.

yes, of course my parents aren't gay, but the point i am trying to make is a child learns from their surroundings. up until the age of about 9 or 10, their world is all that counts. how they see things is how they interact with society. if they can't see a strong role for either a male or a female in their development, they will grow up a little confused.

 

[doofqueen]

Being gay has nothing to do with good parenting or not. I'm all against un natural forms of reproduction for any couple actually but i'm fine with adoption. There are so many kids in the world that need homes and are unloved right now.

 

[beech]

If the lack of a role model of a particular gender in the parent group is an issue or reason for gay couples not to have kids, then similar to Anna's reasoning then when a child's parents get a divorce or separate then the child should be removed and put in an environment where they have equal access to both a mal and female role model (traditionally mother and father). Or if the mother or father of a kid dies and is therefore left to a single parent to bring up, the child should be taken away too??? Now ofcourse this is not the case. A kid can turn out just fine if coming from a standard nuclear family or from a broken home, single parent family or 2 same sex parents. The key is that there is plenty of parental support and love.
I honestly don't think the child of a gay couple is going to have issues understanding what is going on and why they have 2 mums or 2 dads. Obviously they are going to be bought up in a way that such issues of sexuality are pretty clearly explained and well balanced.
We advocate here on Bluelight for people to be open minded and understanding. Thats all that is required here. Imagine if there were more children bought up by same sex parents, do u think this kids would be narrow close minded people or you think they would be open, understanding people willing to accept new things. I dare say they would/do turn out to be pretty cool people.
I'm glad i haven't heard the arguement YET that the kids will turn out gay if both parents are. This would be the most rediculous statement ever. If sexuality was determined by that of the parents then there would only be 1 sexuality and homosexuality would never have came about. Also what would be wrong if the kids of a homosexual couple did turn out to be gay? What would be the issue here? The issue here is that people who make such a statement are those who clearly have some issue with homosexuality (however they are often the one's who profess to have no issue with it).
Anyway just my thoughts.
By the way I have a close friend who was bought up by his gay uncle and partner since age of 2 when his parents both died. My friend isn't gay and is possibly the most balanced person I know.

Beech out

 

[-Thoth]

I'm all against un natural forms of reproduction for any couple actually but i'm fine with adoption.

Why? What makes artifical insemination any more 'artificial' than the artificial computer you are reading this on, and any other number of 'artificial' things you do every day? If your are sick, don't you take medicine? Is that unnatural too? I seriously don't understand this objection at all... Perhaps you could explain it?

 

[up all night]

^ Yeah I agree. I think systems like IVF and having surrogate mothers etc is fantastic and I only hope the technology improves even more.

I watched a TV show the other week which was basically a video diary of a gay couple. They had decided to have a child together, chose an egg, chose a surrogate mother and went to America as the child was being born. I wish I could remember the name of it because after seeing it I implore anyone to stand up and say that gay people wouldn't provide a happy, healthy and stable household. They had taken parenting classes, one of the men left his job to stay at home and look after the child and they could offer everything the baby could ever want. That's more then a lot of 'normal' families could deliver.

I am definitely in favour of gay couples being able to adopt or have a child of the own through whatever means is necessary.

 

[Urbanhog]

I dunno why.....I think this way.....

I don't mind Lesbin couple having kids.....

but for some strange reason I find weird for male gay couple to have kids......

I just don't think or feel its right for male gay couple to rasie kids....

I am not anti-gay.... I know plenty... but just in my eyes I don't understand ....

Thats just me.

 

[beech]

^^^ thats the exact attitude i touched on in a previous post. The "I have no problem with gay people at all, but......". As soon as a BUT comes into the sentence it is a dead giveaway that deap down the person has on some level a problem with homosexuality or some aspect of it. If you truely believe that gay dudes and straight dudes are there is nothing wrong with being either gay or straight then it wouldn't make a difference the sexuality of a parent.
Dont mean to sound aggressive or anything like that and i'm not trying to flame anyone, its just my best friend is gay and i have seen him go through a lot in terms of becoming accepted. Most people were cool about it and his family was great but there is always a percentage of narrow fucks that like to make life difficult for people. So i guess i have strong views on the issue cos i hate to see anyone experience what my best friend did.



Beech out

 

[beech]

i guess i do kinda see where ya coming from urbanhog. Unfortunately gay men can be seen as predators when it comes to children. Like how many parents would trust a young male to babysit thier kids? Not many i think, and how many would trust a young gay male or older gay male to babysit their kids? Even loss i reckon. Which is very interesting considering the vast majority of sex offenders are middle aged white straight males. So why is it that men are trusted less than women in raising kids or caring for kids? why wouldn't 2 gay men do as good a job as 2 lesbians?

Soz for multiple posts



Beech out

 

[doofqueen]

I'm all against un natural forms of reproduction for any couple actually but i'm fine with adoption.

Why? What makes artifical insemination any more 'artificial' than the artificial computer you are reading this on, and any other number of 'artificial' things you do every day? If your are sick, don't you take medicine? Is that unnatural too? I seriously don't understand this objection at all... Perhaps you could explain it?

I've aired my thoughts about this in another thread already but long story short i think if you can't have a child naturally then maybe your not supposed to and also that there are alot of children in the world that need homes now so how about taking them in?

 

[Raz]

I dunno why.....I think this way.....

I don't mind Lesbin couple having kids.....

but for some strange reason I find weird for male gay couple to have kids......

I just don't think or feel its right for male gay couple to rasie kids....

I am not anti-gay.... I know plenty... but just in my eyes I don't understand ....

Thats just me.

Before I left for work the other day I happened to catch a bit of Dr Phil on the telly....and while he's not generally one of my favourite people in the world, he said something which made a lot of sense. When you're explaining something to someone and you use the word "but" you're basically saying "forget everything I just said, now this is what I really mean." Simplistic, but you get where I'm coming from.

Not that I'm saying you're rampantly homophobic or whatever, but seriously if you have no justification for male couples not being allowed to raise children when you're fine with female couples doing it; well, I don't think "I don't understand it" is a good enough reason. I don't understand why people like anchovies, doesn't mean I think it's wrong or immoral.

Going back to what muzby said...in an ideal world, I do think that kids should have both male and female role models. Nearly every adult male I knew when I was growing up was an abusive redneck alcoholic asshole, and it wasn't until I was in my 20's that I felt comfortable in my own skin as a man and stopped feeling like men are inherently bad.

We don't live in an ideal world though, and I think it would be a massive step forward for society to recognise that your sexual identity has absolutely fuck-all to do with your ability to raise a child. If a gay guy or a lesbian or a transgender person or anybody for that matter has the compassion and the sense of responsibility and ability to nurture a child, I think it's the height of arrogance and hypocrisy to say they can't do it when there are many straight couples out there who probably shouldn't have kids and nobody stops them from popping them out...

And the last thing I wanted to say...in principle I agree with doofqueen on the adoption thing. I think it's great that we have the technology to assist women who have difficulties conceiving naturally, but I can't help thinking it'd be a much happier option to adopt kids who are already with us and don't have anyone to help them. Not that I'm saying it should be the law or anything (people can do what they want with their own bodies), it's just my preferred option.

 

[anna!]

Firstly, I think it's a whole lot easier to say "if people can't have kids, maybe they weren't supposed to" when you're able to have kids yourself. In the same way that advances in technology have made it possible for infertile couples to have babies, some would argue that advances in technology have also caused higher rates of infertility. So maybe that's just the way the world is headed. I know a wonderful woman who had the most beautiful daughter by IVF, and for me, "she could have adopted a homeless kid in China" just isn't a good enough reason for me to think that she doesn't deserve the opportunity to have her biological daughter, and to experience pregnancy. I didn't agree with doofqueen's principles the last time she mentioned them, and I don't agree with them now.

Secondly, I think UrbanHog's underlying problem might be with the fact that women can biologically have children and men can't, maternal instincts and all that. I mean, in almost every species of mammal, the females are responsible for raising the children, so I guess it becomes ingrained as being "normal". And I think you can have a problem with deviating from the norm without being a homophobe.

 

[Raz]

Firstly, I think it's a whole lot easier to say "if people can't have kids, maybe they weren't supposed to" when you're able to have kids yourself. In the same way that advances in technology have made it possible for infertile couples to have babies, some would argue that advances in technology have also caused higher rates of infertility. So maybe that's just the way the world is headed. I know a wonderful woman who had the most beautiful daughter by IVF, and for me, "she could have adopted a homeless kid in China" just isn't a good enough reason for me to think that she doesn't deserve the opportunity to have her biological daughter, and to experience pregnancy. I didn't agree with doofqueen's principles the last time she mentioned them, and I don't agree with them now.

Just to clarify a bit because I don't think I made it clear enough in my other post...I don't think there's anything wrong with IVF, it's just not my preferred option. Not that I'm a woman who wants to get pregnant anyway though, so it doesn't bother me that women use IVF...like I said it's their choice, who am I to judge?

Secondly, I think UrbanHog's underlying problem might be with the fact that women can biologically have children and men can't, maternal instincts and all that. I mean, in almost every species of mammal, the females are responsible for raising the children, so I guess it becomes ingrained as being "normal". And I think you can have a problem with deviating from the norm without being a homophobe.

There's a difference between "being a homophobe" and having an irrational prejudice too. Like I said, I don't think Urbanhog IS being a homophobe--but until he can present a proper argument beyond "I don't think it's right for two men to raise a child because I don't understand it", I don't think it's a rational viewpoint.

"Deviating from the norm" does not equal "wrong".

 

[doofqueen]

Just because i am one of the ones that can have children naturally does not mean that my opinion on the matter does not matter. No one is asking you to agree with me. It's just MY opinion.

 

[beech]

not saying urbanhog is a total homaphobe but the point is that i doubt there would be any issue with a single father raising a child for whatever reasons (dead mother, mother not appropriate, etc) so what is the dif if it is 2 men? If u had a prob with a single father raising a child then it would be consistent with anna's theory but i doubt that is the case.


beech out

 

[ravebuddha]

I was talking with my mum the other night, she is a fairly open minded woman so I was suprised when she said she was against gay parenting. I asked why and she said "a couple who engage in a relationship that excludes reproduction should take that as part of life." I don't agree but it was a point I hadn't considered.

I think that in the end parenting is not about two people being able to concieve a baby, it is about being able to raise that child. And most of all parenting is about the love shared between the parent/s and the child. I know plenty of long-tem gay couples' who would love a child and every single one of them would be better parents than the people i see staggering down the street with a bottle in one hand and a pram in the other.

ravebuddha

 

[anna!]

Originally posted by Raz
"Deviating from the norm" does not equal "wrong".

No, I didn't say it did. UrbanHog said he thought it was "weird", not "wrong". I never said anything about it being wrong. (?)

Originally posted by doofqueen
Just because i am one of the ones that can have children naturally does not mean that my opinion on the matter does not matter. No one is asking you to agree with me. It's just MY opinion.

(?)