Ten
Persuasive Answers to the Question, "Why Not
Gay Marriage?" — Conclusion
By Glenn T. Stanton
Editor’s
note: This is the second of a two-part essay that
answers ten Important questions about the dangers
of same-sex marriage. Read part one here.
Question
6: “Is it healthy to subject children to experimental
families?”
Not
all married couples have children, but most do.
And not all same-sex married couples will want children,
but many of them will. So the argument for same-sex
marriage is the argument for the same-sex
family.
No
society at any time — primitive or developed, ancient
or modern — has ever raised a generation of children
in same-sex homes. Same-sex marriage will subject
a generation of children to the status of lab rats
in a vast, untested, social experiment.
In
The Lesbian Parenting Book, the authors admit
that in founding lesbian homes, “our children are
not the only ones who may find themselves in uncharted
territory.”13
Notice
the words “uncharted territory.” That sounds like
another word for “experiment.”
They
continue: “Many of our visions are still new, even
for us. It can be exhilarating — and sometimes scary
— to be painting a new and different lesbian family
tree.”14
Again,
note their adjectives: “scary” and “exhilarating.”
These words seem appropriate for bungee jumping
or a roller-coaster ride, but not childrearing.
And
here’s what they say about what it would mean to
raise boys in lesbian homes:
It
will be interesting to see over time whether lesbians’
sons have an easier or harder time developing their
gender identity than do boys with live-in fathers.15
The
key phrase: “it will be interesting to see.”
We
live in a warning label society — warning labels
everywhere tell us no animals were harmed in the
testing of this or that particular product. But
the warning label on the same-sex family is “it
will be interesting to see.”
Do
you think it will be “interesting” to subject millions
of children to these experimental families?
Question
7: “But haven’t medical and psychological groups
said same-sex parenting is fine?”
We
often hear it said that the American Academy of
Pediatrics supports same-sex parenting. And so do
the American Psychological Association, the American
Psychiatric Association and the American Medical
Association.
“Who
are you to say they are wrong?” we’re asked.
Well,
the AAP and APA and AMA are wrong. Let’s
examine why.
Here’s
the American Academy of Pediatrics’ statement:
[T]here
is a considerable body of professional literature
that suggests that children with parents who are
homosexual have the same advantages and the same
expectations for health, adjustment and development
as children whose parents are heterosexual.”16
Now
how did the AAP — all the pediatricians — come to
this decision? Did they gather all the best pediatricians
together and carefully study the literature, or
did they do it another way?
They
did it another way.
They
made this decision with a select committee of nine
people. And once they made this statement, the reaction
of the larger membership of the Academy was phenomenal!
Consider
this e-mail, written by the lead author of the AAP’s
study, and what it says about the larger membership’s
response:
The
AAP has received more messages — almost all of them
CRITICAL — from members about the recent Policy
Statement on [same-sex adoption] than it has EVER
received on any other topic. This is a serious problem,
as it means that it will become harder to continue
the work that we have been doing to use the AAP
as a vehicle for positive change.17 (emphasis
in original)
Consider
that last statement: “use the AAP as a vehicle for
positive change.” Is this careful science or
blatant activism?
The
AAP and these other professional medical organizations
cannot make statements about how same-sex families
serve child-well being.
Why?
Because
we have not performed the experiment yet!
The
AAP admits there are no large populations of children
raised in same-sex homes to study:
The small and
non-representational samples studied and the relatively
young age of most of the children suggest some reserve...
Research exploring the diversity of parental relationships
among gay and lesbian parents is just beginning.18
Yet
within sentences of these recognized cautions, the
Academy claims:
[T]he
weight of evidence gathered during several decades
using diverse samples and methodologies is persuasive
in demonstrating that there is no systematic difference
between gay and nongay parents in emotional health,
parenting skills, and attitudes toward parenting.19
It’s
also worth noting that while the AAP states the
kids who grow up in same-sex homes look pretty much
like children who grow up in hetereosexual homes,
they are both right and wrong. The fine print of
the Academy’s study tells the full story. They report
that children who grew up in same-sex homes had
outcomes similar to children who grew up in heterosexual
divorced and step-family
homes.20
That
is another way of saying kids who grew up in same-sex
homes didn’t look like kids who grow up with
their own mother and father!
How
did a small group of pediatricians with too little
data and conflicting analyses come to such a definitive
conclusion about the benefits of same-sex marriage?
Isn’t this the definition of prejudice, to draw
a conclusion before all the facts are gathered?
But
consider what another major study on same-sex marriage
says.
The
Stacey/Biblarz study is used widely by same-sex
marriage proponents to show that such families are
not harmful to children. And this is indeed the
conclusion the authors offer. But regarding research
done on children raised in same-sex homes, they
admit,
“Thus
far, no work has compared children’s long-term
achievements in education, occupation, income, and
other domains of life”21 (emphasis added).
How
can we draw a conclusion on the long-term impact
of same-sex parenting if no long-term research has
been done?
Question
8: “How do we know what kind of families children
need?”
All
of the family experimentation over the past 30 years
— no-fault divorce, the sexual revolution, cohabitation
and widespread fatherlessness — have been documented
failures, harming adults and children in far deeper
ways, for longer periods of time, than even the
most conservative among us ever imagined.
Why
do we think this radical new experiment will somehow
bring good things?
No
pediatrician or child development theorist would
look at a child, see the problems that child has
and say, “I know exactly what that child needs,
I’m going to write a prescription for a same-sex
home.”
Every
child-development theory tells us kids do best when
they are raised by their own mothers and fathers.
And it’s interesting that even more liberal organizations
are starting to understand this.
Child
Trends, in a recent research brief, explains:
An
extensive body of research tells us that children
do best when they grow up with both biological parents…
Thus, it is not simply the presence of two parents,
as some have assumed, but the presence of two
biological parents that seems to support children’s
development.22
The
Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), also finds:
Most
researchers now agree that together these studies
support the notion that, on average, children do
best when raised by their two married, biological
parents.23
By
definition, no child living in a two-parent same-sex
home is living with both biological parents. As
a result, every child living in such a home is living
in a home that is less than best.
Question
9: “Is the same-sex family about the needs
of children or the wants of adults?”
We
can learn a lot from the world’s most famous lesbian
mom: Rosie O’Donnell.
In
an interview on ABC’s “Primetime Live” a few years
ago, Diane Sawyer asked, “Would it break your heart
if he [Rosie’s 6-year-old son Parker] said, ‘I want
a mommy and a daddy’?”
Rosie
said, “No. And he has said that.”
Diane
said, “He has?”
Rosie
answered, “Of course he has. But as I said to my
son, Parker, ‘If you were to have a daddy, you wouldn’t
have me as a mommy because I’m the kind of mommy
who wants another mommy.’”24
Can
anyone say that is a good parenting ethic? The child
needs a daddy, but he is told “no” because
the parent has wants, and those wants come
before the child’s needs.
Many
people say marriage is about legal benefits and
privileges — Social Security benefits and hospital
visitation rights, and children should be given
these benefits and protections. But little Parker
has never asked, “Mama, why can’t we have all the
rights and benefits and protections of
marriage?”
Parker asks, “Mama, why can’t I have a daddy?”
And
again, the answer is you can’t have what you need
because I want what I want.
Why
does Parker want a daddy?
Not
because Rosie enrolled him in a fundamentalist day
school where they indoctrinated him with that idea.
He’s
reminded of the lack of his father all over the
place. He sees it in the fact that he’s different
from all the rest of the adults in his house. When
he looks in the mirror, he wonders if he looks like
his dad. When he bathes, physically and psychologically
he’s reminded that he’s not like the women in his
house.
Where
is this adult male who is like me, whom I can emulate,
whom I can follow after?
Today’s
experiment in same-sex marriage is similar to our
nation’s experiment with divorce 40 years ago.
Dr. Judith Wallerstein, one of the world’s leading
researchers on how divorce impacts children,
observes:
We
made radical changes in the family without realizing
how it would change the experience of growing up.
We embarked on a gigantic social experiment without
any idea about how the next generation would be
affected. If the truth be told, and if we are able
to face it, the history of divorce in our society
is replete with unwarranted assumptions that adults
have made about children simply because such assumptions
are congenial to adult needs and wishes.25
Today,
we are making unwarranted assumptions about children
simply because such assumptions arise from adult
wishes. We must realize how this new gigantic social
experiment will change the experience of growing
up.
Question
10: “Does gender really matter?”
This
is the question this whole issue comes down to.
If same-sex families and male-female families are
interchangeable — like vanilla or chocolate ice
cream, mere preference — and that
is
exactly what our opponents want us to believe, then...
•
male or female,
•
mother and father,
•
husband and wife,
...
do not really matter for the family or society.
We are told, “you can have a man and women in your
family if you want, but neither is necessary.”
The
same-sex marriage proponents take what I call a
“Mr. Potato Head” theory of humanity: There is no
real difference between Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head.
They have the same central core, but merely external
interchangeable parts. There’s no real difference.
That’s
exactly what many believe. But no.
But
humanity is demonstrated in our complementary beings
as male and female.
And
male and female really mean something.
Our
maleness and femaleness go right to the very core
of our being. Every person matters as a male or
female. Each has what the other needs but lacks.
Love
will not be enough to help two dads guide a scared,
young girl through her first period or help her
pick out her first bra. These men will have very
little to say because they’ve never experienced
these things. Likewise, what kind of message would
two lesbian moms teach a little girl about loving
a man or a little boy about growing into a man?
The
same-sex family celebrates sameness.
Any
family that intentionally rejects either male or
female — saying either is not necessary — cannot
be viewed as good and virtuous in a society that
esteems the unique value of both male and female.
The
idea that male and female are replaceable is really
an anti-human message.
Recap
These
ten questions and answers are summarized in the
following points:
•
Marriage serves a necessary public purpose and it
does so as a heterosexual institution, serving both
religious and civic needs.
• If we redefine marriage for this experiment, where
do we stop?
• Same-sex marriage is nothing like interracial
marriage.
• It is cruel to subject children to experimental
families.
• The professional medical organizations that have
supported same-sex parenting don’t have enough research
data to do so.
• Thousands
of studies show that children do best with married
mothers and fathers.
• Any family that says male and female are optional
is not a good human family, no matter how loving
it might be.
• Society needs natural marriage. It has no need
for experimental families. This is because both
male and female are essential for the family and
society.
Finally,
here’s a quote that captures this issue:
Let
times change, let the weather change, but do not
invent an adulterated family and drink from it as
if it were the real nourishing thing.26
From the Focus on the Family
booklet “Why Not Gay Marriage” written by Glenn
T. Stanton. Copyright © 2005, Focus on the Family.
All rights reserved. International copyright secured.
Used by permission.
Notes
13
D. Merilee Clunis and G. Dorsey Green, The Lesbian
Parenting Book: A Guide to
Creating
Families and Raising Kids, 2nd ed. (New York:
Seal Press, 2003), p. 60.
14
Clunis and Green, The Lesbian Parenting Book:
A Guide to Creating Families and
Raising
Kids, 2nd ed., p. 60.
15
Clunis and Green, The Lesbian Parenting Book:
A Guide to Creating Families and
Raising
Kids, p. 243.
16
“News Release: AAP says children of same-sex couples
deserve two legally recognized
parents,”
February 4, 2002, http://www.aap.org/advocacy/archives/febsamesex.htm,
accessed
4/7/05.
17
E-mail to select AAP members, from Ellen Perrin,
February 15, 2002.
18
Ellen Perrin, “Technical Report: Coparent and Second-Parent
Adoption by Same-Sex
Parents,”
Pediatrics, 109 (2002), pp. 341-343.
19
Perrin, “Technical Report: Coparent and Second-Parent
Adoption by Same-Sex
Parents,”
pp. 341-343.
20
Perrin, “Technical Report: Coparent and Second-Parent
Adoption by Same-Sex
Parents,”
pp. 341, 342.
21
Judith Stacey and Timothy Biblarz, “(How) Does the
Sexual Orientation of Parents
Matter?”
American Sociological Review,” 66 (2001),
pp. 159-183
22
Kristin Anderson Moore et al., “Marriage
From a Child’s Perspective: How Does
Family
Structure Affect Children, and What Can We Do About
It?” Child Trends
Research
Brief, June 2002, p. 1.
23
Mary Parke, “Are Married Parents Really Better for
Children?” Center for Law and
Social
Policy, May 2003, p. 1.
24
Diane Sawyer (Anchor), “Rosie’s Story: For the Sake
of the Children: Rosie O’Donnell’s
Crusade
on Behalf of Gay Parents Seeking to Adopt Children,”
ABC News:
“Primetime,”
(March 14, 2004).
25
Judith Wallerstein, et al., The Unexpected
Legacy of Divorce: A 25 Year Landmark
Study,
(Hyperion, 2000), p. xxii.
26
Alvaro de Silva, ed. Brave New Family: G.K. Chesterton
on Men, Women, Children,
Sex,
Divorce, Marriage and the Family, (San Francisco:
CA: Ignatius Press), 1990, p.19.
