First, I have to be careful here. A lesbian could always choose artificial insemination, and there are people who had kids who them later came to the conclusion that they were gay. Thus my comments are limited to adoption.
I was thinking more along the idea that concerns about the best welfare of the child should be considered. Not all children elegible for adoption are very young. What if the kid is old enough (say, 13) and already thinks being gay is a Bad Thing. Would a gay couple be the ideal adoptive parents in that case?
Note also I did choose “agree”. Thus while this isn’t “strongly agree”, in terms of getting consensus I’d be on the same as the gay rights side. It is just to me this isn’t the highest priority in terms of a political issue. Lots of left wing economic issues are more important to me. IOW I’d consider someone opposed to national health care a threat, and not gays wanting to adopt. Gays who are far right wing ecomomically scare; ecomically leftist gays who want to adopt don’t.
As Mr. Meat pointed out in his excellent OP, adoptive parents are not handed out children. Older children in particular are not placed “first come/first served.” An effort is made to find a family for a child — not a child for a family. So your scenario is already taken care of in the process.
I think there are two types of people who have an issue with this…the “family values - gays are icky” folk, and the ones who have images of adoption as being like something they saw on the history channel, where a farm family picks a boy off the train platform - or something out of Anne of Green Gables - ("Mrs. Spencer, when you go pick up that child, pick up a boy for us, too). It don’t work that way. The screening process is fairly intensive. Older children are allowed a voice in their placement. With open adoption of infants, birthmothers are allowed a voice in placement (more than a voice actually, they pick parents out from people who have already been judged to be parentworthy).
And since this topic has come up again, let me again recommend Dan Savage’s ** The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Get Pregnant ** He can be a little graphic, and the fat jokes are over the top, but its one of the best written and most accurate adoption stories I’ve ever read.
And also, in the end, one of the sweetest. As for the fat jokes, I buy his explanation that he’s just preparing himself for his own genetic destiny. Anyway, I second the recommendation.
Probably not, and a black couple wouldn’t be the ideal adoptive parents of a 15-year-old Nazi white power brat either. Doesn’t mean I want to exclude black people from adoption.
If I so decided and was in a committed relationship again with the man of my choice, what’s to stop me from finding a consenting woman and whipping out a turkey baster?
The parts WORK. I make sure of it.
Thus, it is far from a physical or natural impossibility.
Strongly agree. But I live in a country where singles and same-sex couples are allowed to adopt.
My daily Mass mother stopped grumping about the idea when I said “Mom, what about co-adoption? Let’s say two women are already having a baby, co-adoption makes the non-birth-mom able to take the kid to the doctor.” She isn’t keen on the idea of two women having babies, but since they do it, the baby ought to get the same rights as any other baby.
Imagine a sibling group whose parents die in a car crash and the only surviving relative is a gay uncle: who is more likely to be willing to take in three kids, that uncle or some family who’s never met them before? If the uncle had been demonized by his brother as far as the kids would remember, then social services wouldn’t place the kids with him because they eould hate him and/or be afraid of him, but if they knew and were ok with each other - why not? Isn’t it much better to be with a gay uncle who knows and accepts himself than with one who lied in order to get the custody of his nephews?
This whole thread is null and void. Its not about excluding anyone from adoption. Adoption is about the child. Thats it period.
The state should only be interested in the kids best interest regardless of who they may hurt from rejecting there adoption application.
As a single parent i know and have withnessed that my children require a father and a mother. So simply said hetrosexual couples should get preference for state adoptions till theres only homosexual couples left to chose from.
Think of the kids needs first, why deny them either a mother or father unless it cant be helped?
Why deny them the BEST home by giving them to a lesbian couple who are the best parents (equal or better than a straight couple). You might wanna check out Priceguy’s links.
I understand what you are saying but your reason does not make homosexuals less than ideal adoptive parents in general rather it is just that specific case. Just like the racist example or any form of prejudice you want to name does not make the object of those prejudices less than ideal for adoption.
You do realize the dangers of drawing conclusions from a single statistical sample, right? While I’m sure your experience is perfectly valid, generalizing it to the whole population of adoptive parents is fool hardy, at best.
So you think the state should come into your home and take your children and given them to a two parent male/female couple? Because, as you pointed out, they need both a father and a mother and would do best there.
This used to happen. It’s what the movie Evelyn is about (which takes place in Ireland, but Social Services used to do it here as well, though not consistantly).
Agree. Conditional on the assumption that we don’t eventually learn of some bad effects of not having any role models of one sex or the other in a home, or something like that. And the assumption as well that the methods used to determine that adoptive parents are stable work at least as well for gay couples as for straight ones.
I should mention in passing that this is a topic on which my mind has been changed based on discussions on the SDMB - one relating to Esprix’s Ask the Gay Guy threads, IIRC.
Regards,
Shodan
PS - Further disclaimer - both the junior Shodan-ettes are adopted. If the discussion becomes too heated or strikes too close to home, please excuse me if I drop out without comment.
PPS - Did you know my daughter just got straight A’s on her report card? And my son got his first job? Further insufferable bragging available on request.
No, I didn’t know that, and congrats, but given the nature of the thread I feel obliged to inform you that I read that first sentence as “Did you know my daughter just got straight?”.
