Comments on: Mark Regnerus’s Sound Social Science

By: John Howard

John Howard — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 05:53:11 +0000

Currently they still need a sperm (which currently must come from a man) and an egg (which currently must come from a woman). But they could soon use stem cells to create or some other method to enable same-sex couples to conceive genetic offspring together. It’s not a question of whether it is feasible or how far away it might be, that doesn’t matter.

By: Sally Rogers

Sally Rogers — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 02:29:47 +0000

John Howard – are you being ironic when you press the question of whether two people of the same sex have the “right” to conceive a child together? Because, you know… they can’t. Last I checked you still need a sperm and an egg to conceive a child, so what in the world are you talking about?

By: John Howard

John Howard — Sun, 04 Nov 2012 02:11:27 +0000

What’s going on? David, do you still believe what you wrote in 2005? Maggie, was I wrong that you think same-sex conception should be allowed? Matthew, do you think this is off topic? I think “parenting” is off topic, unless we are talking about adoption laws or child protection services or something. But everyone knows we are talking about marriage, and “parenting” is off-topic to marriage, there are no tests of parenting to get married, you don’t have to be married to parent, being married doesn’t protect a right to parent, etc. So I’m hoping to hear from everyone, it’s past time to resolve this.

By: John Howard

John Howard — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 15:03:25 +0000

As we all know, Maggie Gallagher and David Blankenhorn disagree about allowing people to marry someone of the same sex. But what’s worse, they also disagree about allowing people to reproduce offspring with someone of the same-sex, in the opposite way: Blankenhorn (unless he has changed his mind along with his change on marriage) said children have a right to be born from a man and a woman, which if he is serious about means he doesn’t think people have a right to conceive with someone of the same sex. Gallagher, while opposing same-sex marriage, has been quoted as saying “if it is possible, then it is possible” regarding changing sex and reproducing as the other sex, letting her Libertarianism and sci-fi background form her views, perhaps.

What’s remarkable though is that their views on same-sex marriage are inconsistent with their views on allowing same-sex couples to conceive offspring together. They have somehow managed to agree that marriage has nothing to do with being allowed to conceive offspring together, which is a terrible eugenic belief. In the past, marriage has always meant that the couple is allowed to reproduce offspring together, combining their genes (“miscegenation” means “mixing genes” and creating mixed race children). There has never before been a marriage that was not allowed to conceive offspring together, nor have there been any couples that were allowed to conceive offspring but not allowed to marry. But now apparently Blankenhorn and Gallagher think it is OK to change that, and separate conception rights from marriage rights, for everyone’s marriage.

We should not do that, we should preserve marriage’s conception rights. If we don’t allow same-sex couples to make offspring together, we should not let them marry, and if we don’t let them marry, we shouldn’t let them make offspring together.

By: sally rogers

sally rogers — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 22:18:33 +0000

I know it’s old fashioned and simply morally wrong to say so, but I am very grateful that I was raised by my mom and dad. I would not want to be raised by two dads or two moms.

Can anyone honestly say that if they had to choose another couple to raise their kids that they would choose to give their own kids to two moms or two dads as opposed to a mom and dad – all other things being equal?

I feel very sorry for any child that is deprived of a mom and dad in order to fulfill someone else’s needs. What a world!

By: John Howard

John Howard — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 16:37:17 +0000

The “gay equivalent” to intact biological families is not yet available: lab-created gametes perhaps derived from stem cells that have been imprinted with the opposite sex methylation patterns to become “female sperm” and “male eggs.”

But even that won’t be the equivalent, because it’s unethical and artificial and expensive, and isn’t a right, unlike a married man and a woman creating offspring, which is ethical, natural, free, and a human right. Being created unethically would effect “parenting outcomes” more than “parenting skill” would, and “parenting” has nothing to do with marriage rights anyhow, only conception of offspring is a right of marriage, not parenting.

You might be not realize it, but being allowed to create biological offspring with another person of the same sex is the actual demand of Culhane, Corvino, Rauch, etc. They have admitted this to me, you can ask them yourself if you don’t believe me.

Since David Blankenhorn is reading this: David, do you still believe what you said about children’s rights in 2005?:

“2. Every child has the right to a natural biological heritage, defined as the union of the father’s sperm and the mother’s egg. Society should typically refrain from actions that would efface or deny the child’s natural biological heritage, or what the French philosopher Sylvianne Agacinski calls the child’s double origin.”

If so, Culhane et al strongly disagree with you.

By: Tristian

Tristian — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 14:50:00 +0000

We can all agree I think that the proper comparison is between outcomes for children raised in intact biological families and what would count as the gay counterpart to that. The disagreements arise over what exactly that counterpart is. It’s very tempting to suppose it’s something like children raised by gay parents in a stable, long term relationship from infancy. If that’s the assumption, then Regnerus’ study fails pretty obviously. But for reasons that have been much discussed at Family Scholars, to leave it there is really much too simple. Regnerus made a choice to broaden the comparison classes so as to accommodate the actual diversity of the circumstances under which children are being raised and their complexities. (Somewhat lost in all this is the fact he did this on both sides of the gay/straight divide). On the gay side of it all this meant giving enormous weight to comparatively unstable relationships. But I think it’s fair to ask what else could and should he have done. Holding out for the ‘raised in a stable long term relationship from birth’ ideal on the gay side was apparently methodologically impossible—it’s just too rare, comparatively speaking. But given that very fact, it’s a fair question to ask why that should be the normative model of ‘gay parenting’ in the first place. If the reality is that most gay parenting comes in circumstances far removed from that ideal, it seems right to compare outcomes in those circumstances to outcomes in the varieties of circumstances in which straight parenting takes place. That I take it is Regnerus’ response to these kinds of criticisms, and it seems right, as far it goes.

Unfortunately—and here David Blankenhorn is surely right—all these subtleties are lost, frequently enough intentionally, when the results are put to political use.

By: David Blankenhorn

David Blankenhorn — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 13:48:41 +0000

Hi, Maggie. I agree that Mark does not say, it’s the gayness that is the problem. Nor does he ever say that his findings bear on the gay marriage debate. And yes it’s true that his core framing (or at least one of his core framings) is that the no-difference thesis has to go. And finally, I’m sure we both agree that no one can be held responsible for how others interpret or use one’s statements.

At the same time …

We both know that, on websites and in other venues all over the country, this study is being cited as we speak to justify the claim that gay parents are bad parents and that therefore gay marriage is no good. Plain as that. I’ve seen this too many times, and I’m sure you have too, for the matter to be of any doubt or ambiguity.

I bring this fact up, not sure exactly what to make of it myself … it’s just that, it seems like a relevant fact.

As for the framing around “no difference,” that has always struck me as a bit … odd … even though as factual matter, I agree with it fully. It just strikes me — I had this reaction instantly, upon first hearing and reading the material — that a study’s findings ought to stand mainly on their own; they ought to be judged mainly on the basis of what they positively are, as opposed to the notion that their value lies mainly or partly in providing a counter or off-set to (what the author alleges to be) wrong or misleading ideas that the public has previously held. Wouldn’t it be better, cleaner, easier to discuss, if the scholar simply said, here are my findings and here is how I interpret them, and leave it to others to decide whether this constitutes a valuable off-set to previously held flawed ideas?

By: Andrew Perrin

Andrew Perrin — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 12:57:03 +0000

@Maggie Gallagher: unfortunately, though, the Regnerus study simply doesn’t offer sufficient evidence to reject the “no differences” hypothesis as properly construed. That’s because the independent variable measures an entirely different construct and therefore doesn’t address the hypothesis. http://scatter.wordpress.com/2012/06/23/bad-science-not-about-same-sex-parenting/

By: Maggie Gallagher

Maggie Gallagher — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 04:43:50 +0000

Regnerus specifically does not blame anything on the gayness of the parent. He simply states the “no difference” conclusion–no study has ever found a difference between children a parent in a same-sex relationship and children in intact married biological families–has to go.

Social science is seldom ever proof, and has a much harder time with the whys than the whats.

This is the beginning of a serious debate not the end.