HawthorneWingo wrote:ewingxmanstarks wrote:I agree with almost everything you said, and for all I know you may be 100% correct......The one thing that I think you did say, but i'm not sure....is that even in extended family models, mother and father did provide a crucial and unique structure....Women and men are naturally different , and I believe with that they provide natural different functions in child rearing....It only makes sense to conclude when a child lack one or the other...then that takes away from his or her development..
Perhaps, if a homosexual couple can bring a child into an extended family environment, where the child is being raised by different genders....then I would feel better about it..
I cannot join you in saying with certitude that a child is getting a better up-bringing with a gay family, because they have gone through an extended screening process....It is true that children that are adopted often excel at greater levels...None the less, there is a huge level of uncertainty that would come with gay parents entering the equation...
Isn't there a reality show called "I Married a Monkey"?
"Marriage" is a hoax, unless you hit the lottery and found your SMF (soul mate forever). And since, believe or not, I'm a romantic I still hold out hope that it CAN happen ... it's just very unlikely. Today the divorce rate is 50%. But I have to believe that there is at least half of the remaining 50% (that equals 25% to mugzi and EXS - I figured since your party has long since given up on science, math wasn't far behind ... lol) are MBM (Miserable But Married). That leaves 25% who are not miserable and still married. But, of course, there are those married men who like to be hen-pecked and yelled at and told they're stupid. So let's shave off another 5% for those guys. Then there are all the mentally deficient who are too stupid to know that they're miserable. Another 5%. That leaves us 15%.
I'd say that half of them must be cheating on each other in one form or another ... from full-blown (no pun intended) affairs to strip clubs to cyber sex (it's all cheating, right?). That leaves about 7.5% of all married couple being "happily married."
Not a pretty picture.
But like I said, I'm a romantic at heart.
HW - I disagree strongly with that sentiment. I think the idea of a SMF is what is a hoax. It's a mythical unicorn and trying to catch it will only lead to delusion or disappointment. Especially in the first few years if you're looking for the perfect one you're going to be looking at other women and seeing that this one is better for me at one aspect and another is better at another aspect. The way that love based marriages work, imo, is you find somebody that is pretty close and recognize you're at one level and that it will take work to get to antoher level. My wife and I have way more in common now than we did when we met and can mutually admire the things that make us different at this point.
Did we start with her being the best woman for me in the world? I don't know... we had a good time... but almost definitely not. But at this point there is no substitute! I hope you find one for you.
To X-man: This is one article that sums up the research I've seen about kids raised by two gay parents:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07161/793042-51.stmBut most studies have found that outcomes for children of gay and lesbian parents are no better -- and no worse -- than for other children, whether the measures involve peer group relationships, self-esteem, behavioral difficulties, academic achievement, or warmth and quality of family relationships.
and
Some liberals chimed in too, notably Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Leonard Pitts, who cited "a growing body of research that tells us the child raised without his or her biological father is significantly more likely to live in poverty, do poorly in school, drop out altogether, become a teen parent, exhibit behavioral problems, smoke, drink, use drugs or wind up in jail."
The problem with the research cited by both Dr. Dobson and Mr. Pitts is that it compares children of heterosexual couples only with those of single parents and not with children of same-sex parent families, said Gary Gates, a senior research fellow at the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law and an expert on census data involving gay and lesbian households.
This is pretty consistent with what I've experienced in my own life with kids raised by gay parents. Now, I know some gay couples (and couples in general) that I wouldn't want anywhere near children... but the kids of the ones that are stable, file, and pass seem no worse for the wear.
