Kids of gay parents fare worse, study fds, but rearch draws fire om experts - CBS News

Contents:

• COMG OUT AS GAY IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
• FOR GAY MEN, HAVG A BLOGIL CHILD N BE PLITED
• WHEN DO GAY KIDS START “ACTG GAY”?
• PARENTG A GAY CHILD
• PARENTS OF GAY CHILDREN AND THE ISSU THEY FACE
• KIDS OF GAY PARENTS FARE WORSE, STUDY FDS, BUT REARCH DRAWS FIRE OM EXPERTS
• IS YOUR CHILD GAY?
• GAY KIDS COMG OUT YOUNGER, BUT PARENTS ASK "HOW DO YOU KNOW?"
• MANY PARENTS STGGLE TO ADJT AFTER LEARNG CHILD IS GAY, STUDY FDS
• GAY PARENTS RAISG KIDS: HOW WILL THEY FARE?
• ARE WE BORN GAY?

COMG OUT AS GAY IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Team up wh a pediatrician, a unselor at school, close fay members and even muny anizatns — for example, Parents, Fai and Friends of Lbians and Gays (PFLAG) — if you’re havg trouble gog alone.

FOR GAY MEN, HAVG A BLOGIL CHILD N BE PLITED

”Dannielle Owens-Reid and Krist Rso, -founrs of Everyone Is Gay and -thors of This Is a Book for Parents of Gay Kids, attribute lower g-out ag to the power of reprentatn.

WHEN DO GAY KIDS START “ACTG GAY”?

The next generatn is growg up wh gay characters on their televisns, pansexual rappers on their playlists, and queer micro-muni on their Tumblr the change also means that there is a new generatn of fai scramblg to raise LGBT kids who have specific needs and challeng — kids who are growg up a society that, while creasgly LGBT-tolerant, is still plagued by hate crim, job discrimatn, and the more banal, everyday sort of homophobia borne by sual ignorance.

Amelia, a Midwtern mother of a 10-year-old boy who first began intifyg as gay when he was 7, said that her son’s unabashed outns tends to startle many adults who would rather not thk about children havg sexual sir. “Consirg how much more fluid the younger generatn is about sexualy, ” she said, “[Informatn about and accs to queer culture] shouldn’t only be ma available to gay intified children — should be [available] to all children. ” Kate’s mother, Ey, driv her to a LGBT youth group town, sce there’s no straight or gay alliance at her is proud of Kate for beg vol about her inty and passnate about LGBT issu.

”In Febary, Amelia blogged about the first time her son was met wh anti-gay sentiment: A boy his class told him that beg gay was illegal (somethg that boy picked up om his parents). ” In nversatn wh the Uned Stat Interagency Council on Homelsns, Krehely said that “ some ways, this is a good thg — means they are gettg societal cu that is OK to be gay — but they are not old enough to be able to live penntly yet, and they face rejectn by parents and fai, and emotnal and/or physil abe at school.

PARENTG A GAY CHILD

Ey, who wrote about beg the straight spoe of a recently out gay man, creds the experience wh her abily to be a better mother to Kate now than she otherwise might have been. Wh the World Wi Web at their disposal, many LGBT kids go beyond googlg gay search terms — some are also g technology to nnect wh, and support, queer youth om around the don’t have many queer iends at home Reno, Nevada, but she has plenty on the ter. The procs tak about two years and sts around $200, 000 per child - and prospective gay fathers don't meet eligibily creria for most health surance plans' fertily benefs, although this is begng to change.

Brent Monsr, MD, recently helped lead a study to document tails of how gay men e assisted reproductive technology to build their fai, cludg qutns such as how many children they wish to have and how often their efforts succeed. Cisgenr gay men are almost never clud this rearch, so as physicians we don't know anythg about their characteristics as reproductive health patients, even basic rmatn such as their mographics, clil cisn-makg patterns or out.

PARENTS OF GAY CHILDREN AND THE ISSU THEY FACE

It's important to keep md that our data reflect the experienc of dividuals who n afford reproductive medil re bee their employer-sponsored fertily benefs ver , and that is still an unual suatn for gay men.

This data served as the foundatn for a grant applitn we've jt had approved to nduct a much larger populatn study that will give accs to rmatn on about 2, 000 embryo transfers annually gay men. A lot of people see a fertily doctor bee they have an unrlyg medil issue, whereas gay male upl ually have two possible sperm sourc, a young egg donor and a gtatnal rrier who has already had succsful pregnanci.

KIDS OF GAY PARENTS FARE WORSE, STUDY FDS, BUT REARCH DRAWS FIRE OM EXPERTS

We regnize that this may be bee a lot of gay men requt tws or may ultimately want two children, and fertily doctors may be transferrg two embryos to try to save their patients money so they only have to go through the fertily treatment procs once. The rrelatn is much weaker the other directn: A disproportnate number of boys who don’t nform to genr stereotyp turn out to be gay men, but lots of gay men played wh G. Gay 3-year-old boys n’t verbalize their sire to be wh a man when they grow up—although many such children exhib cshlike behavr toward adult men—but they may be tryg to learn the behavr that will later attract a male partner.

You may say that parentg is parentg, but the straight parent of a gay child has to al wh addnal issu such as bullyg, possible low self-teem of their child, discrimatn, to name a few. Parents of gay children may be shocked when their kids e out of the closet, but once the dt settl, most parents realize that their child is the same one they have loved and red for all their liv, they jt happen to be gay. So, for example, boys that play wh dolls and have primarily girliends or girls who are tomboys and prefer to play wh guns may have an creased likelihood of growg up to be gay.

IS YOUR CHILD GAY?

While knowg your child is gay may help you ease the transn to adulthood, 's cril to remember that a gay child is jt a child like any other and a parent of gay child is jt a parent, like any other. (CBS News) A new study that fds children of a gay or lbian parent may be more likely to have social and emotnal problems has sparked ntroversy on both sis of the same-sex marriage bate.

In a jot statement om the Fay Equaly Council, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), Freedom to Marry, and the Gay and Lbian Alliance agast Defamatn (GLAAD), advot lled the study a "flawed, misleadg, and scientifilly unsound paper that seeks to disparage lbian and gay parents.

GAY KIDS COMG OUT YOUNGER, BUT PARENTS ASK "HOW DO YOU KNOW?"

In a mentary Slate, William Saletan wr, "What the study shows, then, is that kids om broken hom head by gay people velop the same problems as kids om broken hom head by straight people. Has a history of repeatedly sharg unfound nspiraci that man-ma chemils the environment uld be makg children gay or transgenr and g the femizatn of boys and masculizatn of girls. The basels claim that chemils – particularly tap water – uld turn people gay has gaed populary wh nspiracy theorists over the years, most memorably wh nservative rad host Alex Jon, who said chemils the water were “turng the igg’ ogs gay.

Both lbians and gay men often have a history of cross-sex-typed behavrs: ltle boys beg fatuated wh their mother's makp k; ltle girls enamored of field hockey or profsnal wrtlg.

MANY PARENTS STGGLE TO ADJT AFTER LEARNG CHILD IS GAY, STUDY FDS

So on the basis of some earlier, shakier rearch, along wh a good dose of mon sense, Bailey and Zucker hypothized that homosexuals would show an verted pattern of sex-typed childhood behavrs—ltle boys preferrg girls as playmat and beg fatuated wh their mother's makp k; ltle girls strangely enamored of field hockey or profsnal wrtlg—that sort of thg.

GAY PARENTS RAISG KIDS: HOW WILL THEY FARE?

Although only 12 percent of the women grew up to be genr dysphoric (the unfortable sense that your blogil sex do not match your genr), the odds of the women reportg a bisexual or homosexual orientatn were up to 23 tim higher than would occur a general sample of young women. Bailey and Zucker, who nducted a retrospective study which adults answered qutns about their past, revealed that 89 percent of randomly sampled gay men relled cross-sex-typed childhood behavrs exceedg the heterosexual median.

ARE WE BORN GAY?

There is also evince of a “dosage effect”: the more genr-nonnformg characteristics there are childhood, the more likely is that a homosexual or bisexual orientatn will be prent adulthood. Cross-cultural data show that prehomosexual boys are more attracted to solary sports such as swimmg, cyclg and tennis than they are to rougher ntact sports such as football and soccer; they are also ls likely to be childhood bulli. Bee the data often reveal very early emergg tras prehomosexuals, children who show pronounced sex-atypil behavrs may have more of a geic loadg to their homosexualy, whereas gay adults who were sex-typil as children might trace their homosexualy more directly to particular childhood experienc.

Lang, Elton John and Rachel Maddow's close relativ, but I n only image that the straight k are far better off terms of their own reproductive opportuni than they would be whout a homosexual danglg so magnificently on their fay tre. So cultivate your ltle prehomosexual's native talents, and your ultimate geic payoff uld, strangely enough, be even larger wh one very special gay child than would be if 10 medcre straight offsprg leaped om your los. I n say as a once prehomosexual pipsqueak that some preparatn on the part of others would have ma easier on me, rather than nstantly fearg rejectn or worryg about some rels slipup leadg to my “exposure.