Controversial Parenting Study Reaches the Courts

[William769]

Just one day after the results of a controversial parenting study were released to the public, the research was used — and misrepresented — in a federal court brief defending the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act.

The brief was filed by a conservative medical group at the urging of the Alliance Defending Freedom, an influential religious right legal organization. It illustrates the right’s strategy of using the new research — which was funded by two conservative organizations — in legal battles to preserve bans on gay marriage.

On June 10, the journal Social Science Research published the findings of University of Texas sociologist Mark Regnerus’ “New Family Structures Study,” which compared people raised in biologically intact two-parent families to people raised in families in which one of the parents had a same-sex romantic relationship at some point. Regnerus found that the children of parents who had a same-sex relationship fared poorly by comparison. Almost immediately, the study was criticized for using a “loaded classification system” to engage in an apples-to-oranges comparison.

The day after Regnerus’ study first appeared online, a conservative group called the American College of Pediatricians cited it in a “friend of the court” brief in Golinski v. United States Office of Personnel Management, one of the ongoing federal lawsuits challenging DOMA. The ACP’s use of the study was first reported on The New Civil Rights Movement website.

http://www.advocate.com/politics/marriage-equality/2012/07/11/controversial-parenting-study-reaches-courts

[Moonwalk]

1. Beyond it being bias and bogus study--which absolutely should be shot down!--

--it makes no-nevermind how well kids do with whatever parents. The right of a citizen of the U.S. to get married isn't based on how well they'll raise their kids. If that's not a criteria for heterosexuals--meaning any heterosexual pair can marry no matter what this study or that says about how their kids will turn out--it can't be a criteria for homosexuals. And it's doubly bogus as gays can have and raise kids without getting married, so what difference does this make to the marriage argument?

[beyurslf]

2. I just want to scream when I read these studies.

Of course being raised by your married, biological parents is great if they are safe and appropriate and loving and caring and meet your needs. When we live in a perfect world, that may be how it is all the time. These whack-jobs need to come live in the real world though. It would be best if kids live in neighborhoods free of crime and homes free form violence and never went hungry and had schools that were palaces and teachers equipped with everything and excellent health care and the list goes on.... but again, we don't live in that world do we?

Kids get beat. Kids go hungry. Horrible things happen to little kids. Kids grow up inn foster care. Kids become orphans. The world is mean and uncaring and unforgiving. My kids spent half their lives in foster living dozens of places before they came to my home. so fuck the hate filled assholes who want to say me being gay means i shouldn't be a parent. where they when my kids needed someone? Too busy hating gay people to care about throw-away kids is my guess. fuck them.