David Friedman has read the study trumpeted yesterday in the press as proving that children of lesbians are better adjusted than children of heterosexual couples:
Questionnaires went, at various points in the study, to both mothers and children. But the conclusion about how well adjusted the children were was based entirely on the reports of their mothers. A more accurate, if less punchy, headline would have read: "Lesbian Mothers Think Better of Their Kids than Heterosexual Mothers Do."
A reader writes:
Do you sense a double standard here? You have a study funded by gay activist groups and conducted by a lesbian activist who is married to another lesbian activist. It fails to control for some rather obvious important variables -- an omission that would be expected to skew the results in the favored direction -- and its results are trumpeted by CNN and Time, among others. Studies finding racial differences in intelligence, no matter how well respected and disinterested the investigator and no matter how well-designed the study, are routinely ignored or treated as superstition. Moreover, the mere identification of a funding source (Pioneer Fund) is enough to completely discredit the studies.
Well, yes, but lesbian pressure groups are, by definition, Good, while the Pioneer Fund is, by definition, Bad. So that's all anybody needs to know: Who? Whom? What are you, some kind of troublemaker?
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38 comments:
To be honest, I don't think we really know yet.
Certainly, it's a different experience.
Having two moms is likely to play out in all kinds of ways that we don't expect. A child may be forty or fifty years old before it dawns on them that they might have missed something.
And having two moms might play out in ways that people never think about.
For instance, there is some early genetic evidence that women favor the grandchildren born to their sons, rather than their daughters. Fathers of daughters are often the mitigating influence on this tendancy.
Of course, there are also a lot of fathers who didn't really want to become fathers (more than women), and are not very engaged with their kids.
I find it probablematic and much too premature for any study to be putting the Goodhousekeeping stamp-of-approval on single sex parenting.
On the other hand, many gay couples, of either persuasion, are just dying to have kids.
There is this gorgeous Greek guy who runs a cafe not far from my house. He's gay and has two adopted children, a boy and a girl. He couldn't be more normal. He's very connected to his extended Greek family and I'm sure his kids won't lack for close female relations. Maybe that's the exception, but I'm glad this wonderful guy could raise children.
It's really hard to say how all this will play out.
-Puritan Descendant in SF
This is OT, but why are there so many law prof bloggers, like Friedman? Is being a law prof so untaxing? It's really a shame that somebody with a 150 IQ like Friedman is wasting his time writing vanity novels and teaching torts.
I'll say it again:
It's less damaging for a child to be raised by a Lesbian couple than obese parents.
Fat parents almost always instill the bad habbits that will consign their children to prolish obesity for life.
People used to create new breeds of dog. Now we create new breeds of family. Just build some fences, er, I mean public housing, and turn 'em loose.
Regarding the lesbian family study, most studies of lesbian children show that the kids do as well as the children of heterosexual couples. I looked at this study (it's available online), and my one problem with it is that the children (children of lesbians on one hand and those of straights on the other) weren't really matched in terms of parental education, race, etcetera, so it's hard to say whether the advantage of the former children was due to some other factor like education rather than the parents' sexual orientation.
Second, I have to take issue with some of your other statements. You say, "A lot of fathers didn't really want to be fathers." Any hard evidence other than anecdotal? Most studies show that men are as likely as women want a pregnancy and as likely not to want it. In fact, those showing a difference generally find that fathers are MORE likely to want a particular child than women are.
Third, your statement that women favour their grandchildren born to their sons than their daughters. Funny, I have heard the opposite, on the grounds that since paternity is never 100% grandmothers can be 100% sure that their daughter's children are really their grandchildren. Again, this is just a theory, so I'd like to see some hard evidence.
One thing that clouds how people think about this question is homophobia-phobia - the fear that someone will think they're anti-gay.
For example, instead of talking about a lesbian couple, say a widow with a young son has her spinster sister move in to share expenses and child-rearing duties. Freed from the fear of homophobia-phobia, most people (including the sisters) would probably think that getting the son around some male role models/authority figures would be entirely warranted.
But when child-rearing gets mixed into fashionable ideological crusades this kind of pragmatism is verboten.
First, it is completely wrong to bring kids into the world that do not know their biological parents. Kids want to know where they come from and such gay relationships are enormously damaging to children.
Second, and this is key, these are not "two mom" or "two dad" families. These are single parent families with their live-in lovers. Eventually, it's going to dawn on the kid that one of the people is not related to him. An impostor, essentially.
These acts are astonishingly selfish. These people thing they are raising pets.
I know a guy whose mother decided she was a lesbian, when he happened to be 12 years old. She left his father, who married again, and permanently ingrained both left wing pathology and and intense self hatred in her son, which ha led to an incredible amount of suffering. The Taliban seem more and more appealing every day. Inshallah P-Os, inshallah.
Regarding grandmothers preferring the grandchildren born to their sons rather than daughters, this study shows the exact opposite result: http://www.epjournal.net/filestore/EP076677.pdf
"The fallacy of misplaced empiricism"
-- pretending you can measure something that cannot be measured. E.g. emotional well-being
It's less damaging for a child to be raised by a Lesbian couple than obese parents. -- an Onymous
Uh, most obese aren't lesbian, but aren't most lesbians obese? Let's correct this: "It's less damaging for a child to be raised by a Lesbian couple or obese parents than to be sat upon by either."
Remember the National Lampoon cartoon showing a little Dutch boy holding his finger in Gloria Steinem?
They were not matched racially—14% of the heterosexual couples were black, 3% of the lesbian couples were.
That's a pretty huge confounding factor.
I'vve been wondering whether butch lesbian mothers may fill much of the paternal role that is missing in a single-mother family? We know that lesbian brains are different from straight women's brains, more like male brains. We know that a father figure is vital for both girls and boys. Do lesbians provide some of that? If so, how does that compare with gay male parents - are they better or worse at providing a father-figure role?
Of course it may just be that this study is junk, since as Steve pointed out it recruited upper middle class couples in book stores. If you don't control for social class you're not going to get meaningful results. Never mind the self-reporting!
In John Waters' 1972 movie 'Pink Flamingos' contenders for the title "The Filthiest People Alive", Raymond and Connie Marble, had their gay butler Channing impregnate teenage runaways who were kept captive in their basement. Then they sold the girl babies who were born to lesbian couples.
That was such an outrageous plot line 40 years ago that people guffawed.
Actually sapphic love & Obesity are not mutually exclusive.
Most lesbians that I have met seem to be pushing the bad end of the BMI scale.....
I grew up with a friend who had two mothers and he was always withdrawn,very shy, and and very unsure of himself.
Lesbian Eugenics sounds like the name of a garage band.
Another aspect not controlled for is the use of sperm donors to father the children. I would expect sperm donors to have better than average genetics (at least for whatever definition of 'better than average' lesbian parents use).
There can't be much doubt that male homosexuality is a disease or affliction. Smoking costs you about ten years of life. Male gay sex costs about twenty years.
Cochran, Harpending and Ewald argue persuasively that male homosexuality is probably the result of some as yet undetected infectious agent. I have speculated that that agent is likely to be an ancanthocephala parasite. These intestinal worms invade their host's nervous systems and alter the host's behavior to benefit themselves. Gay men have high rates of intestinal worm infestation.
This is a conjecture - an arm chair conjecture. It has a rough fit to the known facts and might be close to the truth - or not. I want somebody to look into it. I'm not looking for adherents or followers. I'm looking for scientists.
The University of Oregon is looking for what it is that makes some of the state's rams gay. Gay rams are an economic problem for sheep breeders.
It seems likely that within just a few years male homosexuality will be better understood, but female homosexuality is still comparatively mysterious. Lesbians don't suffer the horrific illnesses that male homosexuals do. It may very well be that whatever it is that causes lesbianism is an entirely different mechanism than that which operates on gay males. It may very well be that just as Type I diabetes and Type II diabetes are caused by completely different processes, so too are male and female homosexuality.
It may also be that homosexuality is a symptom of a range of maladies. In the eighteenth century the best medical minds called all sorts of things "fevers" without respect to whether they were caused by a virus, bacterium, parasite, or chemical. They classified by the symptom not the cause because they didn't know the cause.
We don't know much about lesbianism. We need to know more so we can wipe it out.
speaking of lesbian eugenics, jodie foster apparently roughed up a 17 year old boy:
http://www.radaronline.com/exclusives/2010/06/exclusive-teenager-claims-jodie-foster-attacked-him-see-police-report
speaking of lesbian eugenics, jodie foster apparently roughed up a 17 year old boy
Details on the brutal assault from your link:
According to a police report, the incident occurred on May 29 between 1:50pm and 2:00pm with a report of battery and bodily force. The description reads:
"Vict while at The Grove saw susp and began to take pics of susp with his camera then walked to the valet area of The Grove. Susp followed vict, poked him on his chest, grabbed vict by his left arm causing visible injury."
The father of the alleged victim told RadarOnline.com exclusively: "My son was at The Grove with his girlfriend and they were going to see a movie. He saw Jodie Foster and is a big fan so went over and took a picture of her.
"She came after him, poked him in the chest and said, 'Do you even have a mother you slime ball?'"
Good for Foster. I am in no danger of ever becoming a celebrity, but if I did I'm sure I'd assault a photographer my first day of fame.
Foster was the only famous actor or actress I can remember willing to be quoted by name saying nice things about Mel Gibson after he got arrested. Jodie Foster is alright with me.
Eeeecch! More smoke and mirrors from our powerful MSM elite. Studies indicating gay men and lesbians are 'wired for homosexuality' by their genes are widely publicized, yet when a third-year law student writes after a private dinner conversation "I absolutely do not rule out the possibility that African-Americans are, on average, genetically predisposed to be less intelligent." it sparks a media furor. However, the incident did produce an interesting Orwellian condemnation from Harvard dean, Martha Minow, that gives us insight into liberal 21th century doublethink.
At the law school blog, ABOVE THE TRUTH, err, LAW , Dean Minow writes:
"We seek to encourage freedom of expression, but freedom of speech should be accompanied by responsibility. This is a community dedicated to intellectual pursuit and social justice. The circulation of one student’s comment does not reflect the views of the school or the overwhelming majority of the members of this community."
Oh really, Dean Minow? So when should *any* student's private email reflect the views of Harvard Law School? Why should the school subjugate faculty and students intellectual pursuits using your sanctified social justice litmus test? And what or whose 'social justice' are you referring?
Really creepy.
Oh BTW, kjmtchl at Gene Expression has opened a discussion on whether homosexuality is an genetic disposition or lifestyle choice.
And here's plain speaking, funny man, homosexual, and filmmaker John Waters interviewed at the America's Marxist magazine, The Nation.
Q. You reveal in your new book that Johnny Mathis is one of your heroes. But I was shocked to learn that, when you went to his house, you saw a picture of him with George Bush.
A. I have pictures in my house that are worse. On my coffee table I have a textbook “Surgery of the Anus.”
Q. That’s not worse than a photo of George Bush.
A. Okay, I have a cigarette lighter that’s a crucifix.
Q. The problem is that apparently Johnny Mathis is a Republican.
A. I guess so. I didn’t ask him. So what? Why do all liberals seem shocked when people disagree with them? My assistant’s a Republican. I’m a bleeding heart liberal. I’m a limousine liberal. I only voted for Obama because he was a friend of Bill Ayres. Republicans hate Obama as much as we hated Bush. Let’s hope that this November they aren’t as smart as we were last time.
Q. You report that Nancy Reagan would come over to Johnny Mathis’s house to sing Christmas carols.
A. I read that in a magazine. So what? Patty Hearst comes over to my house. What’s the difference?
Q. You made Patty Hearst a star.
A. She was a star anyway—a reluctant one. So Nancy Reagan comes over to Johnny Mathis’s house to sing Christmas carols -- that doesn’t mean they’re talking politics. To me, Johnny Mathis is a great man. He’s a gentleman, and he can still sing. There’s no oldies act there. He’s beyond fame.
Would John Waters make a better Supreme Court Justice than Harvard dean, Martha Minow?
most obese aren't lesbian, but aren't most lesbians obese?
No they're not. Unless "obese" means not an anorexic supermodel.
Johnny Mathis is the only gay male celebrity who is also a dedicated golfer (10 handicap at Riviera) that I've been able to identify. So, it makes sense that he's a gay black Republican.
I've never seen anyone on this site suggest a political deal with gays/lesbians: you can have everything you want, including marriage, if we can all start telling the truth about blacks. Deal? I wish someone here would broach the idea to a gay acquaintance and report back on its reception.
Grandparents are almost always closer to the children of their daughters than to the children of their sons.
Simple--the mother-in-law/daughter-in-law relationship is a touchy one with all kinds of choppy waters to be navigated even under the best of circumstances. In addition, most men defer to their wives when it comes to whom the kids spend the most time with, the maternal grandparents or the paternal grandparents.
It's only natural that in most cases, a woman trusts her own mother with her kids more than she trusts her mother-in-law, and this allows for easier and more frequent access to the kids when they are young for the maternal grandparents.
The old expression "A son is a son until he takes a wife, but a daughter is a daughter all her life" is right-on most of the time and this closeness between mother-daughter is reflected in the "sharing" of her children with her parents.
To the anonymous who referred a parasitic infection:
I recall reading something by Greg Cochran in which he said that this hypothetical pathogen was not likely a parasitic worm, for if it were, it likely would have been noticed by now. I believe he said a virus was the most likely culprit.
He also said that because gay men have a notorious high number of infections (IIRC, he was referring to intestinal infections) it would be hard to identify a particular agent as a possible cause.
When I read that, I wondered why samples from young teen boys who are same-sex attracted but who have not yet had sexual relations would not be a possible avenue to investigate. Such a sample could at least rule out certain pathogens as probable causes.
The words Feminist and Lesbian are not synonymous but it is sometimes hard to tell them apart. One thing about lesbians is that they have higher rates of domestic violence then the general population. It is sort of a dirty secret. Also, they are famous for the custody fights that occur when there is a split. There can only be one biological parent at most in a lesbian relationship. That means one parent is always at a legal disadvantage and it is rare when the bio-mom does not press the advantage.
"Such a sample could at least rule out certain pathogens as probable causes."
I wrote the above too hastily. What I meant to convey was that a comparison of semen and colon samples between same-sex attracted young males who've not yet had sexual relations and opposite-sex attracted young males who've not yet had sexual relations might reveal a difference in pathogen populations.
Examining samples from males who have been and are sexually active tells us little since the pathogen loads would be high because of sexual activity.
"Most lesbians that I have met seem to be pushing the bad end of the BMI scale....."
My experience is different. Of the four lesbian couples in my social orbit, only one is fat, and four are quite slim. On the other hand, I don't know any gay males.
"A recent and controversial finding indicates gender might also play a role in the relationship between parenthood and happiness. In a study of adult identical twins, Dr. Hans-Peter Kohler of the University of Pennsylvania found that fathers experience almost 75 percent more happiness upon the birth of a firstborn son than they do upon having a firstborn daughter, while a first child’s gender has little bearing on mothers’ happiness. However, also in contrast to the findings of Dr. Angeles, raising more than one child was found to have a negative impact on feelings of well-being for mothers (although they still report significantly greater happiness than their childless counterparts) but not for fathers, who reported no effect from adding second and third kids to their broods."
Reference:
http://www.bookofodds.com/Relationships-Society/Family/Articles/A0395-Does-Having-Kids-Equal-Happiness
"keypusher said...
Foster was the only famous actor or actress I can remember willing to be quoted by name saying nice things about Mel Gibson after he got arrested. Jodie Foster is alright with me."
And of course, she does have a reason to be particularly wary of stalkers.
Is it any wonder trust in science is declining?
The 19th century provided us scientific racism and the 20th century scientific socialism. In efforts to prove that human beings are a disease afflicting the Earth, that their pet ideas about sexuality are correct, and etc., scientists and their editors at scientific journals (also scientists) have abandoned the techniques of science for polemics.
Since science is just another con, why believe scientists? Don't like the conclusion: scientists will have to clean up their profession, lustrating fools who produce studies and papers like this one.
This reminds me of Millie Tant the femminist lesbian from the Viz comic.
http://s3.hubimg.com/u/2017998_f260.jpg
Lots of theories here for what led to the result that same-sex couples are better at being parents than opposite-sex couples. More affluent and educated parents? A lack of unwanted pregnancies? Racial demographics?
But even if these ARE the reasons that children of same-sex parents are more successful than children of opposite-sex parents, the fact remains that children of same-sex parents are more successful than children of opposite-sex parents, and that takes an awful lot of the wind out of the sails of the religious right. The precise reasons don't matter. The simple reality is that WHATEVER the reasons, same-sex couples are better parents.
Pender,
"But even if these ARE the reasons that children of same-sex parents are more successful than children of opposite-sex parents, the fact remains that children of same-sex parents are more successful than children of opposite-sex parents,"
You said the same erroneous thing over at Friedman's blog.
You don't seem to have read Friedman's post, which points out that the higher well-being is a self-report of the lesbian mothers, and not something derived objectively from data.
Please give me an objectively derived datum from this study that proves your point.
STD rates?
Depression rates?
Educational attainment?
Professional achievements?
C'mon give it up.
BTW, anyone who is interested can read the report in its entirety here:
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/reprint/peds.2009-3153v1
This is right on the first page:
"According to their mothers’ reports, the 17-year-old daughters
and sons of lesbian mothers were rated significantly higher in
social, school/academic, and total competence and significantly lower
in social problems, rule-breaking, aggressive, and externalizing problem behavior than their age-matched counterparts in Achenbach’s normative
sample of American youth."
Ahem. According to their mother's reports.
Yeah, right.
This is science?
>He's gay and [...] couldn't be more normal.<
Non sequitur.
>the fact remains that children of same-sex parents are more successful than children of opposite-sex parents<
All children are of opposite-sex parents.
Besides which, human history contains many instances of successful persons who were reared by a mother and/or a father instead of by two homosexuals. Something north of 90% of all successful people were reared in this way.
But what's human history and logic when one bears in hand a single self-reported survey sans controls, eh?
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