Study says lesbians make better parents - I can hear the heads exploding now...

[WillParkinson]

Study says lesbians make better parents

Lesbians make better parents than a man and a woman, according to Stephen Scott, Director of Research, at the National Academy for Parenting Practitioners.

In a meeting hosted by the think tank Demos, Scott said that the latest research showed that children of such couples did better in life, reported UK Daily Express.

Unsurprisingly, there has been a backlash from the conservative right, with critics saying that children need fathers and that children do best when raised by their married biological parents.

The Fathers4Justice campaign attacked the study for failing to promote the role of fathers. A spokeswoman told the Daily Express:

“This Government has introduced a new gender apartheid where fathers are marginalized and excluded from their children’s lives whereas other types of parent are celebrated and promoted. ‘Father’ has become the new ‘F’ word.”

http://www.365gay.com/news/study-says-lesbians-make-better-parents/

[Cirque du So-What]

1. Look for an uptick in fundie church sermons

warning about 'teh homo-SECK-shoo-ul agenda.' :eyes:

[paulsby]

9. they should read their bible

the bible says nothing negative about lesbians.

[WillParkinson]

22. If anything it encourages lesbians!

Thou shalt not lie with man as with woman....

[tekisui]

2. I don't doubt that for a second.

knr!~

[still_one]

3. Maybe for some, but I am Jewish, and if I had two Jewish mothers I would go nuts

[Lerkfish]

4. makes absolutely perfect sense to me

but I think it has as much to do with social acceptance of emotionally remote fathers.

Fathers have been given a pass for generations on responsible parenting.

But, having two mothers could be a cool thing in that dept.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

5. not surprised

[LeftHander]

6. Well makes biological scense....that females would make good parents...

Human and natural history time and time reflects the nature of the "male" role in parenting. They, woo, impregnate the female, then goes off to protect and fight, leaving the females behind to care for offspring. In this scenario the females are fierce defenders of the offspring and territory. They do the hunting and providing while the males provide ultimate territorial protection from other marauding males.

Granted exceptions in the animal kingdom abound but in general mammals are kinda funny like that.

But I know...fundies don't see it that way. They have dominion over the earth and it's creatures. Thus they can justify the crazy shit they believe.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

17. i think its more nurture than nature. i think adoptive parents generally put more thought

into parenting. i think women are taught to be more empathetic etc

[pnwmom]

7. The flip side of that is that two male parents would make poorer parents --

if you believed the research.

[LoveIsNow]

8. I remember somewhere

hearing Harvey Fierstein on TV discussing a study that said two dads make better parents than a mom and a dad. I also remember reading about a Canadian study involving both gay and lesbian same-sex couples which contended they make better parents than straight couples. My wager would be that they would be more at ease discussing difficult subjects with their children, and possibly tend to a more rational, less authoritarian parenting style.

[pnwmom]

13. I think all this is bunk, and I say that as the daughter

of a gay man.

I think it all depends on the individual parent. Nothing about being gay or straight automatically makes a person a better parent.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

16. your personal experience doesnt trump empirical evidence though

as far as i remember wasnt your dad closeted and wasnt this 30 years ago?

not sure how much i trust this research because it has yet to be replicated etc but i certainly trust it more than anecdotal evidence

i wonder if the truth is really that all adoptive parents in general make better parents

[pnwmom]

19. We have no idea what the quality of the "empirical evidence" is -- for example,

much of this research of this type uses self-selected subjects. I read the original article at the Mail, and there wasn't any link to the actual research.

My father also had a second family, non-closeted, and those kids are about the same age as my younger ones. He didn't magically become a better (or worse) parent just because he had a same-sex partner the second time around.

And my experience isn't limited to my father. Their other gay friends aren't perfect parents either, and neither are the other parents I've heard about through my connections at COLAGE (at least, in the opinion of their children).

And neither am I nor any of my straight or gay friends.

I think it does a disservice to gay people to hold up this idea that they are "good enough" because they are BETTER than other people. They AREN'T better than other people, they're EQUAL to other people, flaws and all, and just as diverse, and that's how it should be.

Believing anything else is a form of prejudice, IMO.

[joeybee12]

18. Not at all...it didn't compare that...just two women as opposed to a man and a woman...

...you can't make that assumption, it has no basis whatsoever...using your reasoning then three women are better than two, or 2 women and a man are even better...the study didn't research that, just the comparison I noted.

[pnwmom]

21. We don't know what the study researched because neither the article in the OP

nor the article it linked to actually explained how the study was set up and whether or not it included male couples.

[Bitwit1234]

10. Did they ever stop to think

that being discriminated upon, and all the flak they take, these women are more considerate and protective than a lot of conventional parents. I am not knocking man and woman parents, I am just stating that they might be more considerate of the child.

[LeftHandPath]

11. I would even go a step further...

They make better people in general. They are more educated, more rational, more open to new ideas, and they typically have better communication skills.

I always find it a little twisted that the most 'Christ' like people I know are despised by most Christians.

[pnwmom]

14. Gay people are just as diverse as straight people.

No need to sanctify them. They're just people -- period.

[juno jones]

12. Totally ancedotal

but there are a few lesbian couples raising children around here. I see them on the bus all the time. They are by far among the most attentive parents I've seen.

This doesn't really surprise me.

[gaspee]

15. Men, IMO

tend to be more violent than women (see that word TEND, MRAs?) and there is no worse environment for a child than violence. Yes, I know women can also be violent. But IMO, it's not women who lose their tempers and lash out at the people around them as if it's their right to do so, throw shit around, use body language to threaten and intimidate and go a little overboard with autoritarianism.

I would have loved to have had two mothers instead of a mother, an ex-father and a stepfather.

[ShadowLiberal]

20. Other studies have shown this about gay parents before, it's because adoptive parents are better

A big part of the reason gays make better parents in these studies is because they almost always adopt their kids, and adoptive parents tend to be better off financially, and in other areas that help them raise kids better. You can't unexpectedly get a kid by adopting them, but you can unexpectedly get a kid if you get pregnant by accident and then decide to have the kid even though you weren't planning on one before then.

If you control for wealth of the the gay parents compared to straight parents then the advantage of gay parents over straight parents goes down some, but gay parents still come out ahead a bit.