Refuting fundamentalists

[Mystical]

I'd like to post some claims and sources put forth to me by Christian apologists and see just how much they hold up to scrutiny.

It's a shame we actually need a study to say what should be basic biology, but since we do, this is probably a good place to start.
http://www.familystructurestudies.com/
The 'outcomes' section shows how children raised in a variety of environments fare based on a variety of life outcomes and behavior. It's peer-reviewed and has random sampling, whereas most of the studies cited in favor of homosexuality use non-random sampling.

[Captain Colostomy]

What's this linked website's agenda? I barely scanned the summary before seeing something about children faring best with their married biological parents. I smell a rat.

[GodsRevolt]

What's this linked website's agenda? I barely scanned the summary before seeing something about children faring best with their married biological parents. I smell a rat.

Why is it surprising to you that children do better with their biological parents?

[pineapplebunnybounce]

One of the articles, the first one, so it's very late here and I'm too lazy to access this through my school's library, and after reading the abstract I feel like it's not going to be that big a deal of a paper. I'll clarify.

Highlights
► A 26 of 59 APA studies on same-sex parenting had no heterosexual comparison groups. ► In comparison studies, single mothers were often used as the hetero comparison group. ► No comparison study had the statistical power required to detect a small effect size. ► Definitive claims were not substantiated by the 59 published studies.

Supposedly the highlight of this paper.

First concern is legitimate.

Second concern is ... I'll need to look into it in detail. Is it single but living with boyfriends? Because that would be quite similar to the situation a lot of gays and lesbians may find themselves in, living with their boyfriends/girlfriends, since at this time gays cannot yet get legally married in the US. So really, have to check out the papers one by one.

Third concern is kinda bullshit. If you've done these sort of population type (not the technical term, can't remember that term) studies, which I have, you'll know how difficult it is to recruit enough people to detect small changes in data. And it requires A LOT of people to the extent that sometimes it's just unreasonable to expect that to happen in reality. Because it is very difficult to call people, ask them to answer a whole bunch of questions about themselves which is going to take them about 15-20 mins and these people have kids and often don't get anything out of participating.

Fourth one is a blanket statement and I feel like they're saying that because of the statistical thing. But it could be true, often one study cannot fully substantiate such a huge claim (especially when you're studying actual human populations instead of doing experiments in a lab) it just adds to the pool of evidence. So. Yea.

In this case though, the website states their bias when they started the entire thing. And if you notice their wording, they do not say same sex parents, they say "mothers had lesbian relationships" and "fathers had gay relationships", now having a fling/flings is very different from having a stable partner helping you raise your kid. Then they compare it to "intact families". Which is like, wth? Are we excluding the heteros who got divorced now? Pretending that doesn't happen? But divorced families would be included in the homo groups because to qualify you just have to have had a homo relationship.

Anyway, it's late, won't look into more of it tonight. But I want to say that I think this is very bullshit. There are a lot of factors affecting parenthood. What works and what doesn't work. This is kind of like those types of studies that try to determine if any race is smarter than the rest. The question is, what the hell is the point? There is no point! Because the data you get is overly averaged there is such a huge overlap that it basically provides no real world relevance. Which is what people tend to miss when they're using numbers to push a point.

[Captain Colostomy]

What's this linked website's agenda? I barely scanned the summary before seeing something about children faring best with their married biological parents. I smell a rat.

Why is it surprising to you that children do better with their biological parents?

Read that again...and turn off the projector.

[GodsRevolt]

Why is it surprising to you that children do better with their biological parents?

Read that again...and turn off the projector.

OK, you said that you were reading over the article and noticed that it claims children do better with their biological parents. And this for some reason means that the article has an agenda and that there is a "rat" involved, as you put it.

So, I think my question is a fair one.

[Lion IRC]

Read that again...and turn off the projector.

OK, you said that you were reading over the article and noticed that it claims children do better with their biological parents. And this for some reason means that the article has an agenda and that there is a "rat" involved, as you put it.

So, I think my question is a fair one.

Yep. Its a perfectly legitimate question.

Look at domestic violence stats for post-divorce, 'blended' families where there is a step-dad raising someone elses kids. Much higher rates of violence than for biological fathers.

I cant believe people think that non-biological adoptive/defacto parents is just as optimal as biologically-related (heterosexual) parenting.

Two gay men dont have lactating breasts. How on earth can they provide the scientifically proven benefits of maternal breast milk?

[pineapplebunnybounce]

Yea, cos that's what's parenting is about, the quality of breast milk.

ETA: You are also completely missing the point. So what if one person is a better parent than another? That's probably something that can be demonstrably proven whether it's hetero or homo parents. Does that give you the right to say, ok you're not the best possible model, so we'll take your child away, OR from now on, no more kids for you. You're violating people's right to have children. So I don't understand what is the point of this exercise. Does being biological parents make you immuned to cancer, car accidents, affairs, genetic diseases? Are you just so much more superior than adoptive parents? Really? Because adoptive parents are adoptive parents because the biological parents GAVE UP their children or died. What kind of advantage does being biological parents can possibly give you that will even be significant? Would you ever tell someone who has a family history of cancer that they shouldn't have children? Or people with family history of heart disease and obesity? Or soldiers and policemen/women who risk their lives at work? So why do you feel entitled to tell homosexuals they shouldn't have children?

[kılıç_mehmet]

Really, they're using the wrong arguments. You don't need articles to know that homosexual parenting is a retarded concept.

[pineapplebunnybounce]

Being a homophobe doesn't give you special knowledge or powers. You still have to state your argument like a reasonable human being.