I'm Curious

[tpdncr4christ]

After reading, and rereading Dr Dobson's Article, Two Mommies is One Too Many, I have a question. Has there ever been a truly nonpartisant study designed to discover the effectiveness of GLBT's raising children?

Why can't someone take 100 straight couples, 100 gay couples, and 100 lesbian couples and look at there kids. If they can't tell the difference between the straight kids and the gay kids and the lesbian kids, then would Dobson be quiet about our so called sinful families. Do we have a study like this? Or do our studies just reflect what the good Ol' Doctor believe?

We need to do a study on studies.

[u-dog]

Austin,

The studies that the doctor misquotes ("thousands of studies") actually compare two parent straight families with single parent families and find that kids do better with two parents (he always says "Kids do better with a mother and a father" do you see the duplicity there? Its true that kids do better with a mother AND a father than they do with a Mother OR a father so he isn't lying, but he KNOWS that his followers are going to assume that the studies show that kids do better than they would with Two moms or two Dads.

There are not nearly as many studies looking at same gender parents but the ones that there are show that Two mom's and two Dad's do as well (or better than) a mom and a dad. the "or better" part is due to the fact that gay couples only have kids because the REALLY want them and never by accident whereas some straight couples will end up having children by accident that they don't want.

No doubt Andy (that other "old guy" with the scarey sense of humor) will be able to cite the studies whereas I cannot.

As to why Doc Dobson doesn't sit down and shut up... I haven't a clue!

grampa dave

[tpdncr4christ]

Gran'pa Dave! it means a lot. I'd really like to see a horribly public study though, one that doesn't discriminate between whoever they ask or not... one study, that everyone agrees to and then we can just move on with our lives.

[andrewlittle]

The APA has a summary of the major studies in this area on its website. It is available as a PDF file.

http://www.apa.org/pi/lgbc/publications/lgparenting.pdf

It is an interesting read, if you like study comparisons. I would not suggest it for old folks like Dave, because of limited visual capacities once people reach that age. No sense aggravating the fatique that people of that era already experience, is there?

I thought it would be kinder to post the conclusion of the report in larger type for the old and feeble. You can thank me in PM, Dave.

Conclusion
In summary, there is no evidence to suggest that lesbian women or gay men are unfit to be parents or that psychosocial development among children of lesbian women or gay men is compromised relative to that among offspring of heterosexual parents. Not a single study has found children of lesbian or gay parents to be disadvantaged in any significant respect relative to children of heterosexual parents. Indeed, the evidence to date suggests that home environments provided by lesbian and gay parents are as likely as those provided by heterosexual parents to support and enable children's psychosocial growth.

Uncle Andy