Free Republic

WASHINGTON — When the jubilant couple were wed in June, they exchanged personalized vows and titanium rings, cheered the heartfelt toasts and danced themselves breathless. Then, as the evening was winding down, unexpected questions started popping up. One after another, their guests began asking: Are you going to have kids? When are you going to have kids? Tom Lotito and Matt Hay, both 26, could not help but feel moved. They never imagined as teenagers that they would ever get married, much less that friends and family members would pester them about having children. “It’s another way that I feel...

Quite simply, growing up with gay parents was very difficult, and not because of prejudice from neighbors. People in our community didn’t really know what was going on in the house. To most outside observers, I was a well-raised, high-achieving child, finishing high school with straight A’s. Inside, however, I was confused. When your home life is so drastically different from everyone around you, in a fundamental way striking at basic physical relations, you grow up weird. I have no mental health disorders or biological conditions. I just grew up in a house so unusual that I was destined to...

A local Christian school that has refused to enroll a student in its pre-K program because his parents are gay is violating the New Mexico Human Rights Act, the family’s attorney contends. Attorney Shane Youtz, who represents the family, said the couple received a letter from Hope Christian school saying their three-year-old son would not be able to enroll because of his parents’ sexual orientation. An official from Hope Christian – which received $61,455 in public, federal funding for the current budget year – declined to comment. Youtz said the family hopes the school will change its mind, and that...

July 19, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Elton John said in an interview this week that it will be “heartbreaking” for his son to grow up without a mom. Elton and his homosexual partner David Furnish got ‘married’ in 2005, and, after trying unsuccessfully to adopt a child in Ukraine, arranged for a boy child, Zachary, to be born to a surrogate mother in 2010. John admitted to Matt Lauer on NBC Today, “It’s going to be heartbreaking for him to grow up and realise he hasn’t got a mummy.” John said he is also worried about when Zachary goes to...

A California woman is suing the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for "unconstitutional" sperm donor policies. The woman is in a same-sex relationship and wants to conceive a child with her female partner. The woman has a male friend who she wants to use as a sperm donor.

State Sen. Mark Leno is pushing legislation to allow a child to have multiple parents. "The bill brings California into the 21st century, recognizing that there are more than Ozzie and Harriet families today," the San Francisco Democrat said. Surrogate births, same-sex parenthood and assisted reproduction are changing society by creating new possibilities for nontraditional households and relationships.

The Washington Times reported on Sunday that two new studies indicate that children raised by gay parents might not benefit from the experience like kids raised by married mother-father parents. "The empirical claim that no notable differences exist must go," University of Texas sociology professor Mark Regnerus said in his study in Social Science Research. Regnerus's study involved 3,000 randomly selected young adults in the U.S. These young adults' lives were measured for "social, emotional, and relationship outcomes." The other new study challenges the widely accepted contention by the American Psychological Association that "[n]ot a single study has found children...

In his new Social Science Journal study...Mark Regnerus set out to answer the question of whether children who have parents in a same-sex relationship experience disadvantages when compared with children raised by their biological, married parents. The answer, contra the zeitgeist, appears to be a resounding yes. Children with a parent in a same-sex relationship “underperform” in almost every category. Some of these differences may be relatively benign — whether one voted in the last presidential election, for example — but most are decidedly not. One deficit is particularly worrying: Less than 2 percent of children from intact, biological families...

Study: Children Fare Better In Traditional Mom-Dad Families By Cheryl Wetzstein- June 10, 2012 Two studies released Sunday may act like brakes on popular social-science assertions that gay parents are the same as — or maybe better than — married, mother-father parents. “The empirical claim that no notable differences exist must go,” Mark Regnerus, a sociology professor at the University of Texas at Austin, said in his study in Social Science Research. Using a new, “gold standard” data set of nearly 3,000 randomly selected American young adults, Mr. Regnerus looked at their lives on 40 measures of social, emotional and...

In its June book, J.C. Penney Co Inc. ran an ad featuring another same-sex couple, but this time it features two dads in honor of Father’s Day.

A day after Mitt Romney said he was “fine” with gay adoption, he took it back. Suddenly, it’s not “fine.” He said on Thursday: “And if two people of the same gender want to live together, want to have a loving relationship, or even to adopt a child — in my state, individuals of the same sex were able to adopt children. In my view, that’s something that people have a right to do. But to call that ‘marriage’ is something that, in my view, is a departure from the real meaning of that word.” On Friday,he was asked, in...

(CBS News) Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Friday backed away from his support of adoptions by same-sex couples, saying that he simply "acknowledges" the legality of such adoptions in many states. A day earlier, Romney, in an interview with Fox News' Neil Cavuto, had indicated that while he does not support same-sex marriage, he considers the adoption of children by same-sex couples a "right." He said on Thursday: "And if two people of the same gender want to live together, want to have a loving relationship, or even to adopt a child -- in my state individuals of...

May 12, 2012 JC Penney Features Same-Sex Couple in May Catalogue Fifteen years ago, when advertisers got wind that Ellen DeGeneres was going to “come out” on her popular sitcom show “Ellen,” some advertisers fled. One of them was JC Penney. Flash forward to one of their newest clothing ads in the May catalog. It features a real-life same-sex couple. The photograph is of two models identified as Wendi and Maggie holding their two daughters. Both women appear be wearing wedding bands. Quietly, gradually and largely without protest, advertising is starting to reflect new attitudes and new realities about who...

Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (R) said Thursday that he believes gay couples should be allowed to adopt children, even as he reiterated his view that marriage is defined as a relationship between a man and a woman. In an interview with Neil Cavuto of Fox Business Network, Romney was asked whether he believes the gay marriage debate is a new civil rights movement, as some Democrats have framed the issue. “I don’t see it in that light,” Romney responded. “I believe my record as a person who has supported civil rights is strong and powerful. At the same time,...

I know, I know — no politician is perfect. Heck, none of us is perfect, obviously. Far from it. That said, the main thing that bothers me about GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney — no, it's not his affiliation with Mormonism, although you should take a look at RenewAmerica.com president and editor Stephen Stone's new e-book A Mormon Story: Authoritarianism Knows No Bounds (click here) — is his seemingly cozy relationship with the homosexual lobby, as evidenced in the book Mitt Romney's Deception: His Stealth Promotion of 'Gay Rights' and 'Gay Marriage' in Massachusetts, authored by pro-family activist Amy Contrada....

Please take a minute today to support the more than 100 fellow Equality Virginia supporters at Lobby Day. We know many of you couldn't make it today due to busy schedules, work or the distance to Richmond but you can still make a difference at the General Assembly. Contact your delegate and senator by phone or email today and ask them to look out for members of Equality Virginia. Better yet, voice your support for and against bills concerning Virginia's GLBT community this week. Find out who your representatives are here. Ask your senator to: OPPOSE SB 349 (MCWATERS) This...

Gay marriage, and especially gay parenting, has been in the cross hairs in recent days. On Jan. 6, Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum told a New Hampshire audience that children are better off with a father in prison than being raised in a home with lesbian parents and no father at all.

Last night a lady went to a grocery store in Mountain Home, Arkansas, where she was privy to one of the more offensive things we’ve heard about in a long time. The people over at Harps Supermarket decided to put a “family shield” (you know, “to protect young Harps shoppers”) over the cover of Us Weekly. But Harps is not trying to protect kids from Snooki or Kim or any other standard tabloid trash. No, they’re trying to “protect” children from a photo of Elton John, his partner David Furnish and their adorable baby Zachary. This makes us angry. Really,...

MEXICO CITY – Mexico's Supreme Court voted Monday to uphold a Mexico City law allowing adoptions by same-sex couples, drawing jubilant cheers from gay advocacy groups and angry protests from Roman Catholic Church representatives.

BOSTON — When headlines announced last week that a Boston Catholic school had denied admission to a student because his parents were lesbians, the Boston Archdiocese scrambled to contain the damage. The superintendent of Catholic schools, Mary Grassa O’Neill, insisted there had been a mistake and vowed to locate another parochial school for the child. The executive director of the Catholic Schools Foundation warned that subsidies would be withheld from any school that discriminated against such students. The quick turnaround earned approval from homosexual-rights groups, media commentators and many local Catholics in Massachusetts, where same-sex couples can legally “marry.”...