Focus on the Family Gives Facts on Gay Adoption

U.S. Newswires ^ | 3/19/02 | Focus on the Family

[anniegetyourgun]

To: National Desk
Contact: Julie Neils of Focus on the Family, 719-548-4634

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo., March 19 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Following was released today by Focus on the Family:

Last month an eight-member executive committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) endorsed same-sex parenting, claiming that children raised by homosexuals fare just as well as children whose parents are heterosexual. Talk show host Rosie O'Donnell recently added her voice to what appears now to be a coordinated effort to achieve yet another cherished objective by homosexual activists. Significantly, O'Donnell announced her opposition to the Florida law banning adoption by homosexual couples on ABC's "Primetime Thursday." In sharp disagreement, Dr. James Dobson, heard by 7.5 million listeners each week, emphasized the important role mothers and fathers play in parenting on his national daily broadcast this week and discussed the facts surrounding this critical matter.

-- The AAP's endorsement of homosexual parenting is NOT supported by the research. Drs. Robert Lerner and Althea Nagai, professionals in the field of quantitative analysis, examined 49 empirical studies on same-sex parenting. They found no basis for the conclusion that children raised by homosexual parents fare just as well as those raised by homosexual parents. They found serious methodological flaws in each of the studies examined, including inadequate sample size, biased sample selection, lack of proper control groups and the failure to account for confounding variables indeed, the AAP's own report began with this statement, "Accurate statistics regarding the number of parents who are gay or lesbian are impossible to obtain."

-- The AAP's committee's recommendations have ignited a firestorm of protest among America's rank and file pediatricians. Many physicians have condemned the report, challenging its assumptions and criticizing the research cited by the committee as "seriously flawed." Some pediatricians have pulled out of the organization and many others are threatening to as well. The AAP reportedly conducted a poll regarding the issue on their "members only" Web site, and 75 percent of those responding strongly disagreed with the committee's report.

-- Children raised by homosexual parents are more likely to experience gender and sexual confusion, more likely to become promiscuous and more likely to experiment with homosexual behavior. They are also at greater risk of losing a parent to AIDS, substance abuse or suicide.

-- Children raised in a stable, married, heterosexual home do better than children raised in any other type of household. They are healthier physically and emotionally, do better academically, experience less poverty and commit fewer crimes.

-- Children need both a mother and a father. Why? Sociologist David Popenoe of Rutgers University has done extensive research on the different functions that mothers and fathers play in their children's lives. His studies show that while fathers tend to stress competition, challenge, initiative and risk-taking, mothers stress emotional security and personal safety. When disciplining, mothers provide important flexibility and sympathy, while fathers provide predictability and consistency. By nature, same-sex couples are unable to provide one-half of this equation.

[concerned about politics]

isn't "a one parent family", if a loving and warm home, at least better than the awful limbo of foster homes and institutions?

Maybe not.

[Intolerant in NJ]

...at least better than the awful limbo of foster homes and institutions?...not the issue - the push by the gay lobby is to insist that adoption by gay couples is as beneficial, in the sense of providing experience with adult role-models etc etc etc, as is adoption by hetero couples - the study cited, among others, suggests that gay couples may be no better than single parents in this regard...Mary may not have two mothers - she may have a mother and another sister...and we haven't even mentioned the antipathy many gays feel for the opposite sex (but never want to talk about) - a double dose of this in the family no matter how well hidden is probably not going to contribute to particularly healthy interpersonal relationships for those kids who are exposed to it...we have to look at the individuals involved - both gay and hetero - to determine if adoption would be better than the "limbo of foster homes and institutions"...I just think it's more likely to be better with heteros....

[SouthCarolinaKit]

It'll be interesting to see how much press this report gets compared to the 'outing' of Rosie! Admitting that Gays are less than better than straights is SO politically incorrect!

[Buffalo Bob]

[LadyDoc]

There is also two facts rarely discussed in this matter.

First, most girls giving up babies would not give their kids to gay couples. Once the fact that their kids might be adopted by gays gets around, I suspect fewer babies will be offered up for adoption, unless "open" adoption is done.

second, there is a bias to give kids to such couples. Remember when black social workers opposed black kids being given to white couples? The reason was that after the show "Different strokes" became popular, many rich upper middle class white couples decided to show how good they were by adopting "black" kids. So black kids were taken from their moms (usually for neglect by a druggie mom) and instead of giving the kid to HER mother or aunt, who were poor and black and might have been single or maybe not having enough bedrooms, the middle class white social workers would decide it was "better" for the kid to be given to a richer white family.

Now it is an open secret that many social workers are lesbian. Given the choice between a richer, white collar, upper middle class gay "couple" and a heterosexual, Christian "fundamentalist" blue collar worker, guess who gets the kid?

[EdReform]

BUMP!!

[anniegetyourgun]

Whoa, Lady - these are incredible insights into this matter. (And I thought the fact that many social workers are lesbians was a well kept secret. It is certainly true about our "child proective" services in this state. And guess who is placing children in foster homes?)

[anniegetyourgun]

I know what you mean - lost a cousin to the lifestyle.

[anniegetyourgun]

See the source documents discussed in paragraph 2 above. I'm sure you can find that at AAP. Not that the truth will matter to those who refuse to hear it.

[BibChr]

found no basis for the conclusion that children raised by homosexual parents fare just as well as those raised by homosexual parents

Um... I'm betting they fare exactly as well.

Now, as compared with heterosexual parents — well, that's entirely another matter!

Dan (suspecting textual corruption)

[pray4liberty]

-- Children raised by homosexual parents are more likely to experience gender and sexual confusion, more likely to become promiscuous and more likely to experiment with homosexual behavior. They are also at greater risk of losing a parent to AIDS, substance abuse or suicide.

Some of them are really emotionally abused. I witnessed this with a lesbian couple. The 11-year old son of one of them (the 'Dad') wanted to play with my kids and we asked, nicely, if he could join the birthday party and have some cake. We were refused, and I got the distinct impression she didn't want her son playing with straight people's kids. After that she harangued him, carrying on, all sorts of verbal abuse. The kid's crime? He just wanted to play and have some cake, for heaven's sake--and as it was my daughter who invited him, that must have really ticked her off!

It got so bad, I really did cast sympathetic glances at both the kid and the by-now shamefaced 'wife'. It wouldn't surprise me one day if I read in the paper that this kid has shot his biological lesbian mother dead. I can never forget their faces. Heaven knows what sort of hellish life she makes for him that is not in public view. I'd sure seen enough. She treated him like she hated his guts. And we're supposed to be tolerant of this?

Hopefully, there is a saving grace. I pray that he remembers he was treated with kindness at least once in his life, and by (gasp) straight and Christian people!

[Salvation]

Thanks for sharing your personal story in witnessing these messed up family relationships. How disheartening! But it proves to point of the article!