Those who oppose adoption by gays — it is difficult to imagine Jesus doing anything but spitting at their feet and sneering.

SlimyBill on December 1, 2008 at 11:41 PM

Those who can imagine Jesus sneering and spitting — it is difficult to imagine that they’ve ever come within a light year of knowing Jesus or anybody like him.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 9:51 AM

A child who is available for adoption is usually an example of a failed straight relationship.

…there are qualities to people that make them successful parents. If sexual orientation is on the list it comes below dedication and sacrifice. Some gay couples will make better parents than straight couples–usually better than the couple that gave the child up in the first place.

dedalus on December 2, 2008 at 9:22 AM

I’ve come across dedalus before, and he’s uniformly incapable of correct logic. This bizarre distortion before us is no exception.

Characteristics like “dedication” and “sacrifice” are not easily measurable, and state agencies can’t use them. They have to rely on more readily-available measures, like the tenure of the marriage, the stability apparent in family history, the stability apparent in work history. They need to look for “red flag” issues, like separations, complaints of domestic violence, medical issues that might indicate mental health disorders (attempted suicide, medical disorders common to alcoholics or drug abusers, etc.)

If a couple appears before the state, and they’re gay, the state agency has a huge, red flag staring them in the face. Simply by the fact that they’re gay, the state knows:

1) The likelihood that the two will still be together five years from today is near zero. The average tenure of a gay “couple,” even in nations where gay marriage is permitted, is 18 months.

2) The probability that one or both of the individuals is chronically sexually promiscuous is roughly 80%.

3) The probability that one or the other of the individuals will attempt suicide is 3 to 4 times greater than the general population.

4) The likelihood that one or the other of the individuals exhibits antisocial personality disorders is 10 times that of the general population.

5) The probability that one or both of the individuals is an illegal drug user is around 50%.

6) The probability that one or both is an alcoholic is about 33%.

Given that the state is required to use statistical markers to determine fitness to parent, the simple fact that the couple is gay should immediately and permanently remove the possibility that either of these individuals should EVER be permitted to adopt a child.

It’s not the state’s job to search through gay couples like they’re searching for a needle in a haystack, and find the one, exemplary gay couple that will nurture a child better than all “straight” couples (as though “straight” were a subgroup). They have to use statistical markers to guess at parental fitness, and the marker called “homosexuality” is one of the best predictors of behaviors that rule out the likelihood of parental fitness.

Allowing gays to adopt children is simply and utterly insane.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 10:23 AM

Peer-reviewed? I call BS… There is enough peer-reviewed mental health statistics and anecdotal evidence exactly to the contrary.

The only kind of evidence bigots like you are able to produce are their self-evidence prejudices and narrow minded worldviews.

Brazilian Neocon on December 2, 2008 at 10:00 AM

Didn’t I predict name-calling? And here it is.

But let’s meet the challenge, and then offer one.

Here’s some peer-reviewed research for you. I’m summarizing data from R.T. Michael et al, Sex in America: A Definitive
Survey (Boston, Little, Brown & Co, 1994.) The survey is regarded as one of the most scientifically rigorous studies of American sexual behavior to date, although the number of gays in the survey was smaller than they would have liked. Michael et al report that homosexuals are likely to have 12 times more sexual partners than heterosexuals in their lifetime, are 41 times less likely to be monogamous, and are 13 times more likely to have engaged in anal intercourse within the last 12 months. While none of these mean much in themselves, each of them — number of lifetime partners, monogamy, and anal intercourse — are strong predictors of related health problems. And of course, a large number of sexual partners can, in itself, be an indication of self-destructive tendencies.

Your turn, Brazilian Neocon. Let’s see some of your peer-reviewed research showing no mental health effects of homosexuality. And if you dare to mention Evelyn Hooker, that paragon of how NOT to perform credible research, be prepared to have your head handed to you on a platter. (I’m betting that what you’re calling “peer-reviewed” research is the biased horse manure pro-gay advocates have been trying to sell for the last 40 years. None of it stands up to scrutiny.)

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 10:47 AM

I wouldn’t be surprised if those statistics hold for homosexual males, but I have a feeling that they exclude homosexual females. The phenomena are probably so different that we really shouldn’t lump them together.

Count to 10 on December 2, 2008 at 10:38 AM

If I recall correctly, the statistics on public health issues — diseases — are wildly different between male and female gays, but the statistics on mental health phenomena — depressive disorders, suicide attempts, and drug and alcohol addiction — are not so very different. I’ll go check if you’re interested.

You’re correct, male and female homosexuality are different enough that they should not be lumped together automatically. For that matter, a fairly comprehensive study of homosexuality performed by Laumann, et al in 1994 concluded that homosexuality is so varied and changeable over time that it can’t even really be considered to exist as a single, measurable quantity.

Allow me to quote a summary of Laumann from Dr. Jeffrey Satinover’s “The Trojan Couch:”

One of the major points of the Laumann study, which the authors themselves did not expect, is that “homosexuality” as a fixed trait scarcely even seems to exist.

“[E]stimating a single number for the prevalence of homosexuality is a futile exercise,” Laumann declares in the first paragraph of an entire chapter devoted to the subject. It is futile not because of bias, underreporting, methodological difficulties, or complexities of behavior, but “because it presupposes assumptions that are patently false: that homosexuality is a uniform attribute across individuals, that it is st able over time, and that it can be easily measured.” All the evidence points to the fact that homosexuality is not a “stable trait.” Furthermore, the
authors found to their surprise that its instability over the course of life was one -directional: declining, and very significantly so. Homosexuality tended spontaneously to “convert” into heterosexuality as a cohort of individuals aged, and this was true for both men and women —the pull of the normative, as it were.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 10:57 AM

Your contention of uniformly is unsupported by any point in your argument. Additionally, my post identified characteristics of successful parents not standards for government agency metrics. You are refuting an argument that I didn’t advance.

dedalus on December 2, 2008 at 10:33 AM

Yep, continuing the tradition of irrational responses.

My single post could not possibly offer support of my experience of your irrationality without quoting a bunch of prior conversations, could it, hmmmm???? I was citing my experience as a summary. You could refute me by responding sensibly, but you fail to do that.

Your post suggested the state should look for characteristics of successful parents, but offered no means to measure those “quantities.” What I pointed out is that the state has to rely on measurable quantities, and by those, gayness is a red flag too large to ignore. It’s a very specific refutation of your approach, and your failure to recognize that is characteristic of your general inability to think straight.

I don’t know what your problem is, dedalus — too many drugs, too much TV, not enough education, or what — but honestly, son, you try really hard to sound like you’re forming sound arguments, but nothing you write ever displays even basic ability to reason. I’d be worried if I were you.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 11:04 AM

You hatred for someone not like yourself is astounding.

BTW, Peer Reviews are also used on/for Global Warming idiots.

Need I say more?

upinak on December 2, 2008 at 11:04 A

Yet another in the expected “hate mail” category.

Please cite for me here the evidence on which you’re basing your claim that I’m exhibiting “hatred for someone not like me.” I’m simply citing medical statistics from accepted (but largely unreported outside of the medical community) research, and drawing conclusions based on that research.

The Global Warming idiots never use “peer review” successfully because there’s plenty of peer-reviewed science pointing away from human causes of global warming. Peer review is not a bad thing, when the system is working properly. The system breaks down when the criteria for publication in peer-reviewed journals is controlled by bigots of a particular viewpoint, as has occurred in evolutionary biology.

The place where you need to look for similarities is not in the reference to peer review, but in press coverage. Global warming idiots control the press, so evidence of non-human causes never gets exposure. The same is true of sound information about homosexuality. That’s why you still believe that homosexuality is a genetically-determined, permanent condition that the individual cannot change, even though there isn’t a single shred of credible, scientific evidence that this is so: the press doesn’t report information that doesn’t fit their homosexuality narrative, same as they do with global climate issues. Are you surprised? You shouldn’t be.

I’m not a bigot, and I don’t hate gays. I just haven’t let the press settle the issue for me, but I’ve gotten my information from medical journals instead. Apparently you’re still believing the press. Need I say more?

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 11:18 AM

phil I am a tad younger then you and have had a few friends raised by “Gay” parents and adopted “gay” parents. My Friends turned out fine… oh and straight. None of them were pressured into anything and these “Parents” did not talk openly about their sexual preferance.

upinak on December 2, 2008 at 11:22 AM

upinak, first of all, you and I generally agree on political issues, so let’s agree to dispute politely here, ok? I suspect our difference on this issue has something to do with our difference in age.

What you’re offering me here is anecdotal evidence, which is fine but doesn’t go far. I could dispute the importance of your assessment that they “turned out fine” — how much do we really know about our friends? — but I won’t. Rather, I’ll simply refer you to my arguments that I wrote at 9:48 AM and 10:23 AM, which explain the problem. The problem is this:

The state is not clairvoyant; they don’t know which applicants for adoptive parents are going to be great and which are going to be horrible. Naturally, they want to avoid “horrible,” but how do they do that? The only means at hand are general predictors. The problem is that “gay” almost invariably means that some of the general predictors are strongly negative. This does not mean that any particular gay person is a bad person, but that as a group, gays are much more likely to provide an unstable home.

If your friends who were raised by gays came out fine, I’m glad. Good on ‘em. The problem I have is, we can’t extend their experience to all children in gay households. The likelihood is otherwise. That’s not my prejudice, it’s a conclusion drawn from unbiased statistical information, and the state should be basing its decision on such factors, which really do produce the most consistent good for all concerned.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 11:38 AM

Let’s talk about peer review.

The problem with scientific research is that it’s performed by human beings. Humans have prejudices, and they make mistakes. So, when research is performed, scientific practice demands that it be submitted to other scientists for criticism. If the community of scientists go over the research and don’t find significant errors, it’s a lot more likely to be good research, and the community accepts it. This does not guarantee perfection, but it does weed out a lot of biased samples and a lot of just, plain silly mathematical errors. Peer review is a good thing.

The reason “peer review” is getting a bad name these days is that some groups are using access to peer review as a weapon. If a particular group controls who gets published, they can exclude all the research performed by some other group they don’t like — and then, they can claim “None of the research for your position is peer-reviewed” as a reason to reject the position. It creates a Catch-22 for outsiders, and becomes a weapon for enforcing an unthinking orthodoxy in some scientific circles.

The worst case of this is occurring in evolutionary biology, where some very highly-regarded scientists are getting black-balled for associating with Intelligent Design. One fellow got fired for daring to publish an article by Steven Meyer in Smithsonian Magazine, can’t recall his name. Once that happens, nobody will accept articles from Meyer or anybody else working for the Discovery Institute. Then, they sneer at ID research because none of it is “peer-reviewed.” It could only be peer-reviewed if it was published in certain journals, and they won’t permit those papers in those journals, etc. Catch-22.

The AGW crowd tried the same thing, so upinak is partly correct. Their problem was, they didn’t have absolute control over all peer-reviewed publications, and there’s been plenty of research published showing interesting effects of Pacific Decadal Oscillations, cloud cover, sunspot activity, etc. I’ve never been bothered by AGW fanatics sneering “peer review,” because I’ve always been able to come up with plenty of peer-reviewed research that shows their sneering to be uninformed.

None of this says peer review is a bad thing, just that we need to be careful about attempts to REFUSE certain points of view because they LACK peer review. What I was attempting to do was the converse — offer a point of view that is validated by science that has been accepted as valid science, using peer review as a sort of “seal of approval.” It’s still good for that, despite the misuse by the AGW crowd and others.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 11:58 AM

phil… but my point is this. Even a “normal” family has “issues”.

Of course. Are you supposing that there’s anybody here who does not understand this? Why do you suppose that incredibly difficult adoption process exists in the first place? They want to weed out the worst issues. They know they’re not going to be perfect, but they have to perform due diligence.

The point is that we won’t know for YEARS. And honestly I am not going to belittle someone who has a different seuxal life style, since it comes down to belittleing everyone… from race to religon.

No. It is possible to draw inferences from consistent data. The data regarding homosexuals show consistent recurrence of certain patterns, and those patterns include promiscuity, depression, and relational instability. The state would be irresponsible to ignore the data.

My guess is that you’ve never studied statistics. It’s a tough course, but very, very worthwhile, since so much of the data we hear in the news is statistical data, and it pays to be able to interpret it correctly.

Here’s the important point: a statistic about a group in the population does not predict a specific instance within the group, or vice-versa. For example, let’s say that 70% of Swedish-American males have blue eyes. And let’s say my wife had a college buddy named Sven who calls on the phone. Can I predict that Sven has blue eyes? No. The statistic is about a large population, not about Sven particularly. He might have gray eyes. This does not refute the statistic, though. Of 100 guys named Sven who have Swedish ancestors, if the statistic is true, somewhere around 70 of them are going to have blue eyes. We just don’t know which ones. See how it works?

If the state knows that the likelihood of an anti-social personality disorder in the general population is 2%, and the likelihood of an anti-social personality disorder in the gay community is 35% (those are actual numbers, by the way), then it makes sense to refuse the gay couple in the adoption process. It’s not possible to test for the anti-social personality disorder itself within the process, and some of those folks are very, very good at masking their disorders. The only way the state can make the call is by applying the statistic. They can’t know that a member of THIS couple has such a disorder, but there’s a much higher chance of that than with the average hetero couple walking through the door.

That’s not prejudice. That’s due diligence.

philwynk on December 2, 2008 at 12:17 PM