Gay dads want their son to grow up straight

The Sun-Herald, Sydney, Australia ^ | September 14, 2003 | By Candace Sutton and Larry Schwartz

[Byron_the_Aussie]

Two men and a baby... Tony Wood and Lee Matthews playing with baby Alexander.

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An extraordinary documentary about how two gay men flew to America and hired a surrogate mother to have a son is set to rekindle the debate about what constitutes an Australian family.

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In the US they call it the "gayby boom".

In Australia, where laws vary, it is still the centre of emotional and ethical controversy.

Tony Wood, 40, and Lee Matthews, 34, are an upper-middle-class professional couple who decided five years ago they wanted to be parents.

The men each donated their sperm to fertilise eggs donated by a young American woman they chose after studying a catalogue in a process "very cut and dried, like retail shopping".

The resulting embryos were then impregnated into another American woman, who gave birth to a 2.8 kilogram boy, Alexander, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, last December.

In a process which is banned in most countries around the world, the men used a California-based surrogacy and egg donation firm, Growing Generations, which is dedicated to the gay and lesbian community. The firm's website says it has assisted with the birth of at least 196 babies in cases from around the world.

There is no law prohibiting surrogacy in NSW (New South Wales, Australia’s most populous State.) But no contract between parties to undergo surrogacy would be recognised in the courts and the legal status and the nationality of a child born overseas would be under question.

The Melbourne couple brought Alexander back to Australia and now plan to raise the boy, who Mr Matthews said he hoped would grow up "straight" rather than gay, in a two-father family.

Despite the fact that the woman who carried Alexander, Junoa, is flying to Australia in December for his first birthday, Mr Wood and Mr Matthews do not consider her the boy's mother.

"She is not actually the mother . . . at the end of the day you have two dads, you don't have a mum," Mr Matthews said.

The men, who have been a couple for 14 years, initially encountered some "vehement" opposition from within the gay community to their plans to parent.

But they said increasing numbers of gay couples, particularly lesbians, were opting for parenthood.

"We believe our family is entitled to the same recognition as other families," Mr Wood said.

The men's story is expected to stir up a controversy when it airs as an SBS (government-funded, left-leaning TV network) documentary, Man-Made: The Story Of Two Men And A Baby, on September 30.

Community division on the subject of gay unions was highlighted by Prime Minister John Howard's recent comment that "if the same status is given in our society to gay unions as is given to traditional marriage, we will weaken that bedrock institution".

A spokesman for the Catholic Church said yesterday gay male parents were denying a child its natural right "to the love and nurture of a mother".

"With stolen children (children allegedly taken by Australian government authorities from their aboriginal parents, earlier this century), adoptions and all those things of the past 40 years, we have seen the problems that come with family situations than couldn't be avoided.

"What are we creating with these children? This is a case of adults fulfilling their own desires, but it is the children who suffer."

Bill Muehlenberg, vice-president of the Australian Family Association, said one of several concerns was "the commodification of children, the idea of baby-buying and all that goes with it". He said surrogacy, "with or without homosexual couples", was problematic.

"We may be placating the whims and fancies of adults but too often the very real interests of children are being overlooked in the debate," he said.

But Dr Justin Oakley, director of Monash University's Centre for Human Bioethics, said: "I don't see there's any particular problem with it and I think it's a shame [Mr Matthews and Mr Wood] have had to resort to such means in order to become parents or to become fathers."

Mr Matthews said he believed he and his partner had become parents "for all the right reasons . . . because we thought we could offer . . . a nurturing, protective and supportive environment.

"Parenthood isn't right for everyone. There's a huge lobby that sees surrogacy, and surrogacy in particular for same sex couples, as devil worship."

Mr Wood said they went through with it "because we love kids and thought we'd get a lot out of it ourselves and . . . hasn't it turned out better than you could have imagined".

"We have the perfect child. Every parent probably says that.

"He's an absolute delight, just amazing and he's got the most wonderful nature."

The couple said yesterday they were not necessarily advocating surrogacy and costs would be prohibitive to many gay couples.

Mr Matthews said he knew of "a handful of gay men" in Australia with their own babies. It had become far more common in the US.

In the documentary film, William Halms, of Growing Generations, says costs are so high he calls his own three children who were born in the program, "$75,000 babies". A first- time surrogate mother is paid $US20,000 ($30,130), a second-time one is paid $US25,000 and so on.

Egg donors, mostly college students, received an average $US5000, he said.

Mr Matthews and Mr Wood declined to reveal how much they had spent. The St Kilda men have maintained frequent email, mail and telephone communication with the surrogate mother.

Junoa, herself a mother of two, says in the documentary that she had long wanted to be a surrogate mother.

"I wanted to give someone who really wanted children the chance to parent," she says.

"To imagine not being able to have children destroys me."

After the birth, she says the process has left her with "a little fear, a little heartbreak, but a lot of pride".

"I thought, 'him leaving is going to break my heart', but then I am so proud his daddies will get to take care of him and raise him," she says.

But nevertheless she looks wistful and depressed before parting with the child.

Mr Matthews and Mr Wood have not ruled out having more children.

[merry10]

I watched Queer Eye last week and what they did with the hetero male was pretty decent.

[merry10]

Your comments are pretty rude. You are denigrating me because I am/was a single mother of three? Pretty tolerant aren't you? You don't know ANYTHING about me or why I WAS a single mother of three. How nasty and intolerant can you get? By the way, how many disabled kids have you been taking care of?

[merry10]

Ping see above

[John O]

...perhaps because CC has a family member or friend who is gay, and is thereby (creditably) protective of that person?

First of all CC doesn't have a family member or friend who is 'gay' What he would have would be a family member or friend who chooses to practice homosexual behavior.

Remember this is a disease we are talking about, not a state of being.

Secondly, I have a family member who chooses to remain afflicted in that lifestyle and the best thing I can do for that person is to make life here difficult for them. I will not push them into hell by accepting or normalizing their sin.

(Yes, homosexual behavior is both a disease and a sin. You can be cured of/delivered of it and life a perfectly happy normal life)

[John O]

It seem that gay people come from.....straight people.....straight men and straight women....straight religious and not so religious people, straight Liberal, Conservative, Libertarian, etc people....

People are recruited into the 'gay' disease by being molested or severely abused when children, by having an absent or insufficient relationship with their father or by being ruthlessly teased by their peers during their formative years (self-fulfilling prophecy).

Each person who chooses to practice homosexual behavior is a mentally diseased straight person. They desperately need therapy and a cure. Fortunately a cure exists and thousands have already found it.

[PBRSTREETGANG]

. . . at the end of the day you have two dads, you don't have a mum

At the end of every day you have one mum and one dad. Forcing this idiotic fiction on the child to make the "adults" feel warm and fuzzy does him a disservice.

[John O]

Peter Libra->Sadly, the odds of one or both of these men eventually molesting this child are quite high. Higher numbers of molesters are homosexuals.

Article->"We have the perfect child. Every parent probably says that.

"He's an absolute delight, just amazing and he's got the most wonderful nature." (implied completion to the quote: He sucks anything placed against his lips")

This poor child will be molested before he's two years old. The laws of homosexuality demand it:

The first law: 'Homosexuals' don't reproduce, they recruit.

The second law: To the mentally healthy person (heterosexual), sex is something they do
To the mentally diseased person ('homosexual'), sex is everything they are

The third law: Any exposure of children to homosexual behavior is child abuse

Mr Wood said they went through with it "because we love kids and thought we'd get a lot out of it ourselves and . . . hasn't it turned out better than you could have imagined".

I bet they 'love' kids alright

Many men will come and go out of his and his "dads" lives so you can see the huge potential for molestation there.

It's a certainty.

Also remember that Jesse Dirkhising was raped, tortured and murdered by a monogamous 'homosexual' couple

[John O]

Two professional gay nurses live in my neighnborhood; they are wonderful parents. One of them is always with the children. And guess what...one of the girls loves to wear dresses.

Of course the second girl dresses like a bull dyke and hangs around at female biker bars (but that's apparently healthy behavior for budding young lesbians). And the third girl is out sleeping with every guy she can find trying to find the love of a father that's been denied to her. (They don't mention any boys, must keep them locked in closets and eating scraps like that other lesbian household that was posted here a while back)

By definition two 'gay' parents are an abusive household

I also know two gay women who are raising about 8 deaf or hard of hearing children. Many people say very many mean things, but a lot of people say a lot of mean things, but nobody else is willing to raise these kids.

You can't say nobody, you really don't know. If the child placement system wasn't rigged to place these poor kids in an abusive home I bet there would've been parents for them. I bet the child protective services employee in charge of adoptions is also a sexual pervert

[CyberCowboy777]

I am without sin.

I have been forgiven.

Will I sin again - yes. Will I be sin free again - yes.

All HAVE sinned - not - All are Sinners.

We are told to judge the fruits of others, to judge light and dark, to stand for G_ds law and proclaim G_ds love.

Jesus never told us NOT TO JUDGE people. G_d made the judgment of right and wrong and we MUST judge where we and others stand.

[John O]

I KNOW a gay man who married and raised a family, and has tried very hard to live as if he is straight. But he isn't straight and no amount of wishing will make him so.

However reparative therapy, or any other number of therapies have been proven to be effective at curing this disease. Thousands of people have been cured already. All he has to do is admit that he is sick and seek the cure. That first step is what keeps most 'homosexuals' sick. They refuse to admit it.

(BTW the bible supports this line of argument:
1 Cor 6:9 ¶ Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.

[The phrase "Abusers of themselves with mankind" can only be translated 'homosexual' as the term is used today.]

So we see that some Christians used to be 'homosexuals' but aren't any more.

(And yes I've read the bible, cover to cover, many times.)

I wish all gay people could set aside their impulses and desiresSIN to do what God has ruled is best for us. Barring that, I wish that all children could have a good, two-parent, Christian home.

Agreed as altered

These two gay men would make better neighbors than a married straight atheist/Demonrat couple running a meth lab would.

Possibly

They may even be better parents than some of the straights you personally know.

Absolutely not. By teaching the children entrusted to their care that sexual abomination is normal and healthy they are dragging these children into hell with them. The kids would be better off being beaten to death while they were still innocent.

[jimt]

And let them take turns adopting his daughters.

ChemistCat is a she.

While on some subjects she's very rational, sometimes emotion seems to take over.

[John O]

I raised three girls on my own. I am now married. I provided them with male role models like wonderful uncles....

This is so very critical to a girl's development. When I was in school, before I got saved and realized what life was all about, I always tried to date girls from fatherless homes. They were uniformly easy. A girl needs her father's love. She will seek that love from her father and if she can't find it there she'll seek it elsewhere. If you check the girls who are 'easy' I'd bet that all of them have insufficient relationships with their father. (Just as most males who practice homosexual behavior have an insufficient relationship with their fathers)

[CyberCowboy777]

And to add:

To say that all men are sinners is to deny the Blood. All men have sinned and without Forgiveness are condemn by their own actions. But a man can be sin free.

I am free of sin at the point of Forgiveness and all that entails.

Christ never told us not to judge, but to meet requirements before we judge. He pointed out the hypocrisy of the crowd, who lived in sin (what was written in the dust?) and proceeded to judge others.

Our judgments are nothing more than determining who is and who is not obeying the Law G_d has already laid down. G_d has already made the judgment.

[carlo3b]

"B.D. has moved out of their condo," says a source, "but apparently it's amicable. B.D. has taken another apartment nearby, to be close to their son."

Assuming Foo's parents (2 Daddys) find their next vic..a ..er.. Lifemates, will Foo write a book.. Foo has Four Fathers.. inquiring minds have lost them. I am in fact HOMOPHOBIC, and extremely happy about it!

[Bon mots]

I don't like the way that kid is being reared.

[mtbopfuyn]

The Melbourne couple brought Alexander back to Australia and now plan to raise the boy, who Mr Matthews said he hoped would grow up "straight" rather than gay, in a two-father family.

Gotcha! That's almost admitting the boy has a choice in his sexual preferences.

This is so beyond words...

[Siamese Princess]

Thanks, John, for your reply. I am afraid that you are right.

[GirlShortstop]

As long as you don't throw like a girl.

HEY!


:-)   teeheehee

[Dr. Eckleburg]

...what they did with the hetero male was pretty decent.

"Decency" has nothing to do with style.

[merry10]

well, he looked pretty good. He had a lot of STYLE when they were done with him.