adversary of gaymarriageandadoptionoften entrap their criticism in terms of what ’s best for nipper . allow lesbian , gay , bisexual and transgender ( LGBT ) couples to raise boys and girls , they may attest , endangers healthy tike maturation in countless mode . In 1998 , for instance , the Alabama Supreme Court transferred tike custody from a sapphic mother to the child ’s heterosexual father , on the curtilage that her sexual orientation morally jeopardized her power to parent [ source : Doe v. Pryor ] . In that way , negatively charged thought on same - sex parenting tend to liken a couple ’s intimate orientation to a bacterial contagion that ’s passed along from adults to fry , thus change the younger generation ’s ego - perception of gender and set them up for social and psychological problem along the agency .
Certainly , since that 1998 decisiveness , homosexuality has become progressively accept , and courts are less likely to rule against complainant solely on the foundation of their intimate orientations [ source : Stacey and Biblarz ] . Nonetheless , social resistance to gay parenting still simmer , often hinging on bygone stereotype . In August 2010 , for instance , Tony Perkins , president of the Family Research Council that encourage heterosexual marriage , told CBS ' " confront the Nation " that " no grounds " existed that child raised by gay parent make out as well as those recruit by square ones [ root : Media Matters ] . But when it come to the watch over five myths about same - sex parent and their family , scientific grounds actually has told a dissimilar story . To give up things off , permit ’s go ahead and fact - check mark Perkins ' televised claims .
5: No Scientific Evidence
Family Research Council President Tony Perkins is n’t the first or only person to submit that scientific grounds does n’t fend for same - sex activity parenting . Many a leery middle has been couch on published academic enquiry that ’s found no adverse risk associated with gay parenting , under the laying claim it ’s tainted with liberal diagonal [ rootage : Kix ] . But the torso of enquiry guide on LGBT parents and their children has been irresistibly electropositive enough for a host of respected professional organization to issue public statement sacrifice homophile rear their impression of approving . They include the American Medical Association , American Psychological Association , American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy , American Academy of Pediatrics , and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry [ germ : Gottleib ] .
Take a 2002 insurance policy instruction liberate by the American Academy of Pediatrics that was reaffirm in 2010 . It reiterated that , based on scientific literature , " small fry who grow up with one or two jocund and/or lesbian parents fare as well in emotional , cognitive , social and intimate functioning as do children whose parent are heterosexual " [ seed : Perrin ] . None of the organizations have since reverse their place on same - gender parenting , either , return the sheath of light scientific grounds null and null .
4: Kids Need Parents of Both Genders
The first wave of legal challenges to same - sexual activity parents derive during the so - called " sapphic sister boom " in the eighties [ source : Gottleib].Womenwho hail out after being in heterosexualmarriagesand experience nestling with heterosexual pardner frequently encounter roadblocks in the courtroom during subsequent detention battles . Today , though effectual obstruction are still an issuance , gay woman are more likely to have small fry than homosexual males , because the hurdling to gay Isle of Man becoming fathers –adoption , foster careand surrogacy – stay on high by moral excellence of their biological sexual practice . Out of legal and social lesbian mothering argumentation have come the contention that , in rules of order to fly high , a fry need both a mother and a don .
In heterosexual household setting , studies have linked the absence of dads to higher rates of willful neglect , drug abuse and crushed educational acquirement [ source : National Center for Fathering ] . But as New York University sociologist Judith Stacey pointed out in her 2010 study on gender and parenting , meld single motherhood with lesbian motherhood is inaccurate . As the American Psychological Association has likewise express , Stacey ’s meta analysis of 33 studies found that paternal gender had little bearing on kids ' well - being . The most influential variables were resources and child care committal , and those retain even dandy tilt than the number of parents in a home [ beginning : papa ] . In other words , two clothe parents are the best fount scenario , but even one necessitate parent is practiced than a detached duo – no matter their sexual orientation .
3: Maladjustment Await Adolescents
Even if LGBT couples make an enrich home environment , what happens to the kids when they venture from the roost ? By one 2010 estimate , 41 percent of 10 - year - onetime children with mirthful parents encountered bullying or closing off [ source : Park ] . That does n’t , however , imply that they ’re at greater risk of becoming depressed or form fewer friendships than other peers on the playground . The University of California at San Francisco researcher who collected that bullying data give-up the ghost back and checked in with the same adolescents seven years later and ground no durable psychological damage from any parent - relate persecution [ root : Park ] .
In increase , 25 year ' worth of studies consistently expose theories that psychological and societal pitfalls are in store for children of lesbian and braw parents . Outcomes of anxiety , depressive disorder , substance abuseand socialization are n’t markedly different for kids rear in gay- or sapphic - head households compare to those from heterosexual - headed menage . Repeated analyses have found that parents ' sexual orientation is n’t a component [ source : Patterson ] . In other words , kids can – and clearly do – grow up with near head on their shoulder joint no matter of their parents ' sexual orientation [ seed : Patterson ] .
2: Kids Will Be Gay
One of the most coarse anxiety regarding LGBT parenting is that the small fry will , ineluctably , occur out as homosexual . To that , University of Virginia psychologist Charlotte J. Patterson show out that such anxiety is unfounded , since non - heterosexual orientation was long ago eliminated as a disorder or sickness . Still , regardless of whether gayness is consider as a damaging result for a child , the statistics show that children do n’t of necessity inherit the monovular gender and intimate identicalness of their parents .
Research on Kyd raised by lesbian couples ( data on festal manlike parenting remain relatively thin ) has chance that they conform less topink - and - bluedividedgender rolesand stereotypes , but a majority ultimately identify as heterosexual in maturity [ beginning : Park , Patterson ] . For example , in one 1989 bailiwick of adolescents raise by lesbian and heterosexual parents , the only player to identify as homosexual belonged to a hetero - guide household [ source : Patterson ] .
A controversial 2010 subject from Kansas State University mob subject field prof Walter Schumm did suggest that sunny and sapphic parent may rock their children ’s orientations toward non - heterosexualism [ source : Schumm ] . In his examination of 262 fry of sunny fathers and lesbian mothers , the number of those who identify as LGBT spanned from 16 to 57 percent . Schumm ’s research did , however , come under fire from other faculty member who criticized the study ' small sample size of it of 262 , which may have inadvertently inflated the result [ source : Kix ] .
1: Gay Parents Raise Kids the Same as Straight Parents
The estimate that same - sex twain put up children and manage menage identically to straight parent might seem like something festive parenting advocates would need to preserve , but it simply is n’t exact . And that is n’t a negative matter .
Until the other 2000s , enquiry on festive parenting and child growth outcomes were largely focused on draw latitude between LGBT and heterosexual parents as a way to transfer intimate orientation as some sort of dangerous ingredient in the complicated stew of child rearing . But , as New York University sociologist Judith Stacey target out , differences do n’t equate deficiencies in this case [ reference : Stacey and Biblartz ] . Research has highlight some unique hallmark of lesbian parenting , admit more equal sectionalization of chore and childcare and greater parent - minor emotional nakedness [ rootage : Belkin ] .
Of course , just as not all heterosexual yoke make identical decisions and establish consistent household rules , neither do LGBT parents . But since data have clearly demonstrated that nipper raised by gay and lesbian parent grow into successful , well - adjusted new adults , parent of all stripe can take off an important lesson : There is more than one road to raising a glad , healthy child .
Lots More Information
Negative stereotypes about gay and lesbian parenting are beginning to decrease by the wayside as the social definition of " family " has diversify beyond the heterosexual atomic unit . While some moral objection remain , scientific research also has repeat that child raised by gay or sapphic parent release out just as healthy and happy as their peers . Maintaining objectivity on politically dicey topics like gay marriage and parenting can be a challenging tightrope to navigate , whereas myth - busting based on data and fact is a much more straightforward endeavor . And though scientific discipline ca n’t explain off lingering moral or religious anxiety about such non - normative households , it can declare oneself plenty of empirical evidence to debunk stuck - in - the - clay stereotype , like the premise Top 5 Gay Parenting Myths .
