18
NSFW
You are viewing a single comment thread. Show all comments.
SpringMaidenDecember 2, 2023
No.
We know from statistics that unrelated men are dangerous to children. There is no reason why a child should be living with unrelated men. We need to stop ignoring what statistics tell us and stop pretending not to see the reality of men.
Like OPās edit, kinship adoptions are not really what people refer to when they mean adoption. If an uncle wants to take in an orphaned niece or nephew, thatās fine, but itās not really the same thing as a stranger adoption.
No one is entitled to children. If you canāt have children the normal way, thatās unfortunate. But adoption should be for the child, not for childless people (whether straight or gay) to acquire children for their families.
My gut says no.
Edited to add: my gut refuses to elaborate.
NastasyaFillipovnaDecember 2, 2023
If its not biologically related to you, then no ( and no surrogacy please). So that means a single father could keep their own child if the mother isn't in the picture anymore, for whatever reasons.
Having a child is not a Human Right, or even a natural right. If it had been, nature would've provided a way for them to have one.
WrennDecember 2, 2023
If it had been, nature would've provided a way for them to have one.
I (hope) think I get the sentiment here - but please be careful with this kind of language. Itās often used by people like religious zealots and anti-abortion campaigns.
Itās also used very often against disabled people (like myself). Especially when arguing that healthcare should not be a human right, especially if ānatureā didnāt provide you āvalueā (meaning a the ability to hold a traditional full time job in capitalism). You wouldnāt believe the things people say about wheelchair users, for example - āif nature didnāt provide you a way to get around, thatās just your bad luck. Iām not sure why the government should use my taxes to provide you one, and change all the buildings just to suit you getting insideā.
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 2, 2023
I see what you're saying but I don't really see men's inability to give birth to their own children as comparable to a disability, do you?
WrennDecember 2, 2023
No of course not, I just wanted you (and everyone reading) to be aware that itās an established phrase/sentiment thatās used for some really awful ideas, and you may be misinterpreted by others if you use it.
What is comparable are women who have a disability that makes them unable to give birth - who the groups I mentioned earlier will argue, should have nothing to do with a child or be able to adopt, because clearly God/the universe/biology didnāt want her to have any.
Or a woman with female health problems that require some medical treatment to enable pregnancy.
Thereās a huge world of difference between the ethics of donor eggs and sperm in a surrogate and minimal medical treatment or fertility stimulation for women with very common female health problems, yet both come under the heading of if nature wanted you to have a child, you would.
Not to mention the 50/50 chance of us all dying in childbirth if we follow the logic of if nature wanted you to live through childbirth, then you would.
Rial_ItyDecember 2, 2023
So lesbians shouldn't have children then? Since nature hasn't given them anyway to have children naturally?
littleowl12December 2, 2023
It's not that they shouldn't have children. It's that the adult offspring of anonymous sperm donation (or even known donation) have expressed that this setup was harmful to them. I think that should be taken into account.
SecondSkinDecember 2, 2023
There are a never ending number of children from teen mums who say their mothers age was of significant detriment to them, children of much older mothers who say their mothers age was harmful to them, children of severely obese mothers who say they were harmed by the awful example and never having a mother to run round the park, children of working mothers whose children feel they were let down by never having anyone their at pick up, or to see the school play or protect them from the paedo child minder, and so on and so on.
We donāt take autonomy away from a womanās reproductive choices because of as of yet unborn children. Thatās the antithesis of radical feminism.
Lesbians can easily get pregnant with no harm or cost to the men who donate sperm. Thereās no health risks to it, like there is with egg donation, zero negative consequences for men choosing to donate (officially or for a friend). Any resulting child deserves to know the truth about parentage, but in the U.K. itās already a legal requirement that happens with sperm donation. Thereās no right to have a child, but women do have a right to reproductive autonomy.
littleowl12December 3, 2023
This is all the same logic people apply to adoption and surrogacy, that there's no harm to the child and no kid's life is perfect anyway.
Adoptees had to work very hard to gain the right to meet their birth families. Having a connection to your biological family is important to most people. They just don't know it because most of them already have it.
With all due respect, I'll take the word of millions of adoptees and others ripped from their birth families over yours.
While there are no physical negative consequences to sperm donation, there are emotional and psychological ones. It also opens the door for gametes to be commodities. If sperm can be commodities, then so can eggs. Saying "yes but there are health risks" is an insufficient rebuttal. What people will go with is "informed consent, just so long as she's aware of the risks, we're all about freedom of choice, here!" Furthermore, even if we could retrieve eggs with zero risk to women, we shouldn't do it.
We shouldn't treat our natural, genetic connections like interchangeable coins that all equal the same amount.
Surrogacy is harmful to the women whose bodies are purchased for it. So itās nothing like this.
Adoption should be a very last resort, and is where I am. We donāt purchase babies in my country (not currently at leastā¦)
Itās not the same argument at all and youāve missed the point.
There are no harms to the man donating sperm.
Feminism concerns itself with the women and girls already living, not the unborn nor yet conceived potential children. Feminism most definitely does not argue in favour of these potential embryos having rights. That would remove womenās right to autonomy over her reproductive choices.
This is the womenās liberation circle, this isnāt the place for the potential feelings of not yet conceived children and their rights. With all due respect, Iāll take feminism over your views.
Rial_ItyDecember 2, 2023
I just find it a bit rich that so many here claim to care about the future fertility of gay children being affected by puberty blockers yet are also so homophobic as to declare gay men and lesbians shouldn't have children.
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
Why should any man have children?
Children need their mothers. Birthing children to give them to men is child abuse.
Lesbians can get pregnant. Gay men canāt. So letās not pretend like this is the same thing.
CaeruleaDecember 2, 2023
Lesbians were not mentioned in the poll. It was specifically about letting men having unrelated children living with them.
I commented earlier about lesbians, and I was the first and only (at least at the time) comment that mentioned lesbians. My conclusion was that lesbians would likely statistically make much safer parents than gay men, simply because there are two women vs. two men.
In this thread, they are specifically talking about that two gay men can not grow a child. They need a woman to do it for them. A lesbian couple would be perfectly capable of growing their own child, because they are women. I don't have the impression that this post is about lesbians at all, but about men being a threat to children's safety. Which it is very easy to find statistics about.
SecondSkinDecember 2, 2023
There are a couple of posters who have mentioned lesbians. One I replied to who said itās not ethical and another who said children say itās harmful. And saying if nature doesnāt give you children then you shouldnāt have them can easily be read as an absolute. These threads tend to bring out absolute views and rigid thinking, so maybe sheās seen how they often go and is jumping the gun somewhat.
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 2, 2023
And saying if nature doesnāt give you children then you shouldnāt have them can easily be read as an absolute.
This wasn't my comment but this isn't quite what she said. And I believe she was talking about men. The post is about men. Most of the discussion about lesbians happened in response to this comment, unfairly imo. I already responded upthread.
littleowl12December 3, 2023
A few things: some of these children who are perceived to be gay will grow up to be bi or straight. Perhaps not many, but some.
Furthermore, the reproductive system does more for the body than actual reproduction. Most of the time, your uterus is working for YOU. Very little of its life will be devoted to gestating a fetus.
Likewise, men's genitals do more than just produce sperm.
Even if these people never have children, their bodies should be intact for their own health and well-being.
No one said they shouldn't have children.
But it is more complicated when the children in question will be cut off- by design- from one genetic parent. That is a big deal to most people, and I'm not crazy about situations where adults are made happy today by borrowing from the child's future psychological experience.
Most people want connection to their genetic family. It's not selfish. It's also not bigoted to know most people want it.
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 2, 2023
Hey now, you are the one who suggested that lesbians shouldn't have children. And I don't think that's a fair characterization of the comment you were referring to.
She said that having children is not a natural right. That is an actual concept in philosophy. Some philosophers claim that human rights are derived from natural rights. An example of a natural right would be your right to have your own belief or opinion on a topic. By their very nature, your beliefs are your own and there is nothing I can do or say to force you to change them. They simply exist and you have a "right" to them being what they are because they just are. I'm not a philosophy expert but I think this is where the idea of "inalienable rights" comes from.
Having children is not a natural right because it isn't innate to you, like your thoughts are. It's not something that simply exists; regardless of fertility, you actually can't do it without the consent and cooperation of someone else. And it's not a human right because we don't believe you should be able to force another human to do it with you.
It has nothing to do with whether or not there is a "natural" way for someone to conceive and bear children with the exact person they want. So it's a huge leap, imo, to go from that to claiming that gay men and lesbians shouldn't have children. No one said that as far as I can tell.
Rial_ItyDecember 2, 2023
I'm not suggesting that at all. I clearly oppose that belief. But to say that gay men can't have children at all because they can't have them 'naturally' then you condemn us all.
Have we all forgotten how difficult it was to get adoption rights for LG people?
You were suggesting that that's what she said, weren't you? Edit: I see how my comment was worded confusingly. What I meant was that you are the one who suggested that the comment you were referring to was taking about lesbians. She didn't say it.
I think she said - and again, we're arguing about what someone else said and I am going to grossly simplify/paraphrase here - that if men were meant to have children without women involved, they would be capable of doing it. How does that condemn lesbians? As others have pointed out, they are perfectly capable of having children without involving men in their families.
And to answer your question... I mean, the whole point of this post was to discuss whether or not we believe men should be allowed to adopt. So... at the time of my writing this comment, at least 44% of us definitely don't care how difficult it was for men to obtain adoption rights. I think whether or not the feminist movement should rely on attaching ourselves to gay rights (for men) is beyond the scope of this post.
NastasyaFillipovnaDecember 2, 2023
A very good example of natural laws is that of regarding gay sex, or anal sex between men and women. It used to be categorized as "unnatural" by law, and was punishable. But if it really is against nature to have anal sex, nature would've provided some way to prevent it, like some thorns or something, that would only allow PIV sex, and make anal sex impossible. But that's not the case, and we don't define anal sex as unnatural anymore.
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 2, 2023
Right. In that sense, you could say that anal sex is against natural law but it is in a way, a natural right. Because your right to do what you want with your own body stems naturally from the fact that you are your body.
And there's the problem - you made a comment about a natural right and it was interpreted to mean you believe in natural law. "Natural law" is a series of [largely religiously motivated] rules and judgements based on what is deemed "natural". It's the naturalistic fallacy with motivated reasoning. In contrast, natural rights are rights that stem naturally. Nature just happens, and so does your ability to have your own opinions, put things in your body, etc etc.
You can correct me if I'm wrong but I didn't get the sense that you were saying that lesbians shouldn't have children because they don't have a "natural" way to do it.
Not sure about the ethics of having a child with a man who won't invest in the raising of them, for lesbians or single women. Is it really a good idea to do that? It would make more sense if we were like other mammals who have sex with males just for children and raise them mostly amongst females but we aren't like that.
kahkahtesstessDecember 2, 2023
Lesbians can if they choose to. Gay men are not entitled to exploit the reproductive labor of a woman for something they're not biologically capable of doing.
SecondSkinDecember 2, 2023
Itās rare there are men who will invest in raising children. When there are, they often pose a serious risk to the child. Most children raised by (truly) single mothers, who stay away from step dads, will be safer and happier than many children raised by their fathers. Children raised by lesbians, if told the truth about their father, who are otherwise raised lovingly, will likely fair better than most children.
Which is very sad, because a rare decent engaged father is an amazing force in childrenās lives and for the mothers well being and fulfilment (Iād know, my Nigel is an incredible partner of 25 years and father of our teens). But 99% of men are not like this. Ethics based on magical thinking are useless to women. Safeguarding is based on reality and the reality is men pose risks to women and children.
tabbycatcircusDecember 2, 2023
I mean, at least there's possible child support. But to my knowledge sperm donors don't pay for that.
So should we yearn for a society where families are structured based off of a community of women and mothers where fathers aren't in the picture? If not then why want a child so badly that you'd guarantee an uninvolved father? Oh no, my antinatalist thoughts are leaking, questioning if a society where this is inevitable is really worth continuing. That's probably because the idea really messes with me due to all the societal messaging I've received, but oh well. I guess that's how many other mammals operate and they do so just fine.
DoomedSibylDecember 2, 2023
This is a bone of contention in feminism, but as littleowl says below, the children of donor sperm express the damage thatās been done to them. As much as this isnāt āfairā in the late capitalist ideal that everyone should be able to have everything they want as long as they can pay, this isnāt true. Itās like we tell the TRAs; weāre a sexually dimorphic species. Weāre sexually dimorphic for the reproductive benefits of gene mixing. Humans are still made by a female gamete and a male gamete. This is a natural limit and not anyoneās fault per se. We arenāt consistent if we decry the problems of human trafficking via infant adoption, surrogacy or parceling people out for their reproductive parts and systems but then make an exception for lesbians.
Rial_ItyDecember 2, 2023
Then people need to stop using us as arguing points. If your ideal world means gays and lesbians don't have biological kids, what the fuck do you care what happens to young Gs and Ls who fuck their fertility with PBs?
children of donor sperm express the damage thatās been done to them
As do children of career women, as do children of single mothers, as do children kept by their very young teen mothers, as do children of very old mothers, as do children who were the 12th child and had no parenting because of that, as do children who were conceived by rape but mum chose to have them, as do children of disabled mothers, as do children who have disabilities, as do higher order multiples and Iād bet all gen z kids will say how harmful it is their mothers had them in a world we are destroying.
So so many children will reflect on the (at best) less than ideal circumstances their mother chose to have them in. Many will say they were harmed by their motherās selfish choice to bring them into existence. They may well be right. But feminism doesnāt base reproductive autonomy on the consequences for a child who isnāt yet alive. Itās an absolute right to chose whether or when to try to become pregnant. The rights feminism would be concerned about are the women living. Feminism doesnāt look at the life of an unborn child as having rights and it most definitely doesnāt ascribe rights to not yet conceived children. Doing so is just another way to remove womenās reproductive choices.
If men want to donate sperm, given thereās no health risks involved for them, then if lesbians or other women want to flex their reproductive choices with it, thatās their choice. If we draw a line on where to limit womenās reproductive autonomy, then men will move that line further and further back and use that line to control all women. Our right to reproductive autonomy is an absolute, or it isnāt for all women.
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
I donāt think single or gay men should be allowed to adopt children unless thereās some sort of familial or close friend relationship and like the parents suddenly die and the kid had a connection to the man adopting.
Way too many men are sketchy.
littleowl12December 2, 2023
I would have gone with "depends."
I think if a child has been surrendered by their birth mother, kinship adoption is the next best option. If a gay uncle and his husband want to help out (which is rare for men) that would be fine.
I don't find it theoretically wrong, however, to use statistics to avoid disaster. No matter how well you vet someone, ultimately it's a leap of faith that it will work out.
I don't know that gay men are indeed more likely to abuse kids, either directly or through trafficking. There have been some terrible lesbian adoptions that ended badly, even in murder. Look up the Hart family. My main concern is, social workers and adoption agencies relax rules and common sense to avoid accusations of discrimination.
The Harts weren't stable enough to adopt a cat from the pound, let alone six black children, some of whom shouldn't have been moved from their families in the first place.
I've come to accept that certain toxic sex pozzy traits really have saturated LGBTQ culture as a whole, and many people in the community don't value safeguarding. There are some dissident members that point this out, but they get canceled more than applauded.
Adoption is a trauma for the child. The welfare of the child should be centered, not the welfare of the adopters.
yes. in so many cases the kids may have been taken away because the mother was poor and couldnāt afford to keep up the house or feed them etc. of course thereās a ton of real abusive situations (her poverty might even be because she had to leave her shithead husband) but if there were stronger supports for single mothers many adoptions wouldnāt be needed.
notsofreshfeelingDecember 2, 2023
Wow, I'd never read about the Hart family until now. Your comment made me look them up.
littleowl12December 2, 2023
Had they been straight, they would never have been allowed to adopt all those kids. If they managed to anyway, the kids would have been removed from their care. They had been investigated numerous times for child abuse. The social workers rushed through the paperwork to "clear it all up" because no one wanted to be accused of being a bigot.
The point of adoption should never be to make the adults happy. It should be avoided in the first place, and if it must happen, birth parents should retain the right to decide where they go. Kinship adoption should be prioritized.
SecondSkinDecember 2, 2023
Kinship adoption can go really badly also. Children knowing their mother as a āfun auntā and growing up watching her parent āher real childrenā etc.
Adoption in the U.K. is almost always older children, not babies like it is in the US. So itās children who already have a connection to a relative, and will already have the family dynamic in place they need to learn to come to terms with as they grow up. Choosing to recreate that from birth has lots of its own pitfalls and difficulties. It must be especially painful and confusing for the mother, who is normally very young in these situations, seeing a relative mother your child who you either longed to keep yourself or desperately wanted to give up to someone away from your life, to be able to come to terms with that trauma and move forward. Itās such a strange limbo for the mother and the child to opt for kinship adoption from birth, just as traumatic in different ways.
DoomedSibylDecember 2, 2023
In Australia, where women can still surrender an infant to the state for adoption if she really wants to, but where money and trafficking and duress, coercion and forced adoption have been completely removed from the picture, very few women āchooseā to place their infants for stranger adoption. They want their babies. The babies that are adopted are generally intraday-family adoptions in tragic circumstances.
The number of necessary adoptions of newborns doesnāt come anywhere close to meeting the demand of covetous would be baby buyers. The propaganda surrounding infant adoption and womenās āchoiceā to give up unwanted babies is exactly that. Propaganda and mind control of the same caliber as convincing people that humans can choose and change their sex. Given a real choice, women donāt choose to surrender their children. Something everyone knows deep down, the same way we know what sex people are.
ShadowChildDecember 2, 2023
Not always - but often - when I see photos of gay men posting photos of their adopted or (via surrogacy) purchased children, I get the vibe of somebody showing off their new car or designer pet or expensive purse.
TheKnittaDecember 2, 2023
I donāt think a hard and fast rule is fair, and these things probably need to be judged on a case by case basisā¦but no, the idea of men adopting children (especially female children) freaks me out.
HEReticDecember 2, 2023
Men are rarely trustworthy or competent caregivers. Children deserve- no, require dedicated, involved, interested, safe, loving adults. "Mothering"
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 2, 2023
Agree. What had me thinking about this, actually, was contemplating how shite pretty much every male parent I know is, even the most loving and caring, loving, well meaning and non-abusive "Nigels." They just suck. I think children have a right to a mother. Preferably their mother. But when that can't happen, a mother is still best.
SecondSkinDecember 2, 2023
My Nigel is an incredible dad.
But, without me in the picture, he would never have had any interest in children or any instinct to care for them.
There is something off about men seeking to adopt children they donāt know and have no familial or care giver connection with.
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 2, 2023
I'm sure he is. Mine is too. But you will have a very difficult time convincing me that you are not a far more motivated and responsive caregiver than he can ever be.
DisappearanceoftheychromosomerDecember 2, 2023
I wish that for adopting they would conduct a medical experiment were images of children would be shown, and if the areas of the brain responsible for sexual attraction flare up, be denied adoption and worse.
BlankandPitilessDecember 2, 2023
Totally. It donāt get why we donāt do that. For fostering as well. Seems like itās an easy way to prevent problems. And if people donāt want to subject themselves to it then they donāt get a kid.
ItzpapalotlDecember 2, 2023
This is such an interesting question. Iām really unsure tbh, my natural (not thinking too deeply) response would be yes gay couple, no single men...but then a comment has mentioned maybe an older male adopting younger siblings, maybe a male relative - given all the right vetting and checks it seems wrong to have a hard rule against it.
Saying that, something like 99% of pedophiles are men...sex is the biggest indicator of criminality, especially sex crimes. I donāt really think 2 men would know anything about raising a girl tbf, but surely 2 loving parents or even one loving parent is better than the foster system..? I honestly donāt know but would say the only way is case by case š¤·š»āāļø
Thousands of kids need homes. Each state has their own heartbreaking adoption page, like petfinder. Gay couples are no better or worse than heterosexual couples when it comes to adopting and fostering. Surrogacy should be illegal, and having a child is not a human right, but I canāt think of any argument against a stable male couple adopting children that isnāt homophobic. If the objection is that men are more dangerous towards children than women, thatās obviously true, but every straight couple poses that danger too. There are so many instances of abuse with straight couples adopting or fostering children, especially evangelicals. I donāt think single men should be allowed to adopt unless they are related to the child.
CaeruleaDecember 2, 2023
If the objection is that men are more dangerous towards children than women, thatās obviously true, but every straight couple poses that danger too
You double the risk if you put the child with two men instead of one. Actually, you might more than double the risk, since there won't be a woman in the household trying to protect the child with her own body.
I don't know, it's a difficult question. But men are risky, and seem to be getting worse with the porn pandemic. The more men in the household, the higher the risk.
By the same logic, I would guess that putting a child with a lesbian couple would statistically be safer than putting the child with a male household of any sort.
TheKnittaDecember 2, 2023
You double the risk if you put the child with two men instead of one.
Absolutely my line of thinking too. I donāt care about their sexuality, men canāt be trusted around children.
magicianly7December 2, 2023
yes. when reading about the subject of incestuous CSA most of the time when the father abused a girl it was strongly correlated with the mother being incapacitated via disability / dead / not in the picture. even when women cannot fully protect their daughters from the man their mere presence shielded them from worse escalations sometimes.
EdithPeevishDecember 2, 2023
I think thatās my main objection, that if weāre saying men are so dangerous (and of course they often are) then why are we ok with heterosexual couples adopting? Iād like to think that two adults means more of a chance that at least one would be an advocate for the child, but itās entirely possible Iām being naive.
Men, related or unrelated, pose a risk to children. The safest option is to not have children. I see that's too much for "straight" identifying people? They deny gay people the opportunity to adopt a child jointly from a public adoption service, but feel entitled to children themselves
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
[Comment deleted]
FlauschballDecember 2, 2023
That study is more than a little flawed... I'm one of those icky gays who is raising her child in a same-sex marriage. I guess in 20 years time I can write a case report on the outcome. š
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
Unfortunately false, there have been many studies on the effects on children raised by same sex parents. Itās not great.
I think this is a bit misleading, unless Iām misunderstanding you. This makes it sound like the majority of studies on the subject have found negative effects, yet the āAllen 2013ā study you quote is (or was at the time) in the minority and even states in the first two sentences:
Almost all studies of same-sex parenting have concluded there is āno differenceā in a range of outcome measures for children who live in a household with same-sex parents compared to children living with married opposite-sex parents. Recently, some work based on the US census has suggested otherwise, but those studies have considerable drawbacks.
That article by Richard P. Fitzgibbons is pretty flawed.
There is a lengthy criticism of the 65 percent statistic here.
A number of other things in the article are misleading. He cites Sirota's study comparing women with gay or bisexual fathers to women with heterosexual fathers, but leaves out that all of these men, including the gay and bisexual ones, were married to the mothers.
He also cites the Regnerus study, which put participants in the "gay parents" group if they answered "yes" to the question of whether a parent had ever been in a relationship with someone of the same sex while they were under 18. So, this would include plenty of people who weren't raised by same-sex parents for all or most of their childhood.
The Sullins study used data from 1997 to 2013. Especially in 1997, there would have been many kids living with same-sex couples as a result of their biological parents separating. You have to factor in the emotional impact of divorce before you can pin the blame on gay parenting.
Lastly, Fitzgibbons was a member of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality, and has written about "healing" homosexuality. This doesn't invalidate his claims by itself, but it does give you reason to be skeptical when you know he has an incentive to misrepresent the facts. (And you know he isn't going to cite any studies that don't show negative effects from gay parenting.)
Not saying gay men should or shouldn't adopt, but I don't like the way Fitzgibbons takes advantage of questionable studies to present his desired narrative.
CaeruleaDecember 2, 2023
If they are going to study this seriously, at least divide gay male couples and lesbian couples into two separate groups.
istaraDecember 2, 2023
When there are thousands of kids stuck in the foster system and children's homes, if anyone (responsible/well-vetted) is able to offer them a permanent home, then great.
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
What exactly would a man want a child for so badly
IdentifyAsTiredDecember 2, 2023
To be a parent? I'm sure that plenty of men want to be fathers, regardless of sexuality.
I think it really depends on the situation. If the man is related to the child and there are no other family members, than yes. I do wish there was more protections for adopted children. They need better screening for adoptive parents, and regular follow ups with social workers. That viral video of the trans-id man who was also a nudist and decided to sit named in front of his adopted children comes to mind.
Single men. No.
A gay male couple. Only male children and they should be under more than the usual scrutiny.
magicianly7December 2, 2023
iām pretty sure iāve read at least that theyāre very leery about single men wanting to adopt and may refuse. i hope so.
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
Uh, a male child would be exactly who they would sexually abuse not a girl.
syntaxerrorDecember 2, 2023
Why would the sex of the children in question be pertinent? Is it for molestation concerns or are you saying that men shouldnāt raise girls?
mathloverDecember 2, 2023
Both.
Also - sex trafficking occurs with girls and boys but is significantly more common with girls.
I mean thatās true, but donāt you think that number would change if the potential predators were gay men? There was that famous case from last year
Note that Iām not saying gay men shouldn't be allowed to adopt, I donāt think these monsters represent most gay men but still
mathloverDecember 2, 2023
I don't know. But I categorically don't trust men - even gay men - with girls.
My gay uncle was regularly physically abusive toward me. He'd slam my head into furniture or pin me down and smash phone books onto my face.
Edit: In the context of this discussion, I realized that this comment wasn't particularly helpful, just anecdotal. I think kids have a higher chance of being abused by men, but I wouldn't say no to gay male couples adopting.
Straight men rape men in prison because thatās whatās available, I donāt see why the same canāt be true of gay men and girls.
And thereās so much abuse thatās not sexual abuse. Or is non contact sexually abusive (like paedo Tachell tweets with the 15 year old girls about how to learn about sex from porn and how porn is empowering etc)
A pair of pedophiles who pose as a gay couple to adopt might not necessarily be gay. Pedophiles lie all the time.
LOriginedumondeDecember 2, 2023
Holy shit! I never heard about this. Is this why weāve been hearing more and more people on the far left insisting that male pedophiles who only rape and molest boys are not gay?
MaryDyerDecember 2, 2023
I was going to say the opposite - No to single men but yes to gay male couples but only if the child is a girl.
FemmeEtalDecember 2, 2023
So forcing a young girl to be raised in a household of men with no mother? That doesnāt sound ideal either.
tabbycatcircusDecember 2, 2023
I'd be careful with that because you can easily say "forcing a young boy to be raised in a household of women with no father"
IdentifyAsTiredDecember 2, 2023
I have absolutely no problem with it as long as the usual checks are in place, even for single men. There are far too many children needing adopted and plenty of children thrive with a single father.
niffinDecember 2, 2023
I don't think anyone has a "right" to adoption (women included). Rather I think that we have a responsibility to protect each other (including kids), so my rationale is based primarily on safety and the good we can do (for kids) through adoption.
I went for "single men? no. Gay couple? yes." basically from a priority queue kind of perspective. We need more adoptive parents (especially in my country) to take care of kids, so how can we get there most safely. I basically have 2 reasons to allow gay couples:
-
The increased risk of abuse, just from being male, is my rationale for saying no single men. But, I figure that at least if there's two people involved, the chances of them both conspiring to abuse (or cover up / enable the other's abuse) is relatively low; a similar (though albeit smaller -- just because one side is female) risk is still there in heterosexual couples, and we tolerate that (partially because we don't really have a choice, but it's still a practical baseline).
-
Raising kids is hard, and while I have the utmost respect for all the single parents that figured out a way to pull it off, I would not assume that it's generally a preferred idea. Having two adoptive parents in the picture adds more support, so we should prefer that first.
Basically, if I had my way to arbitrarily place kids with families seeking to adopt (i.e. the non-intra-family case), I'd preferentially choose from "lesbian couples > heterosexual couples > single women | gay couples > single men". I'm most on fence about where to rank gay couples vs single women, and would like to see some data on the empirical outcomes from each. My intuition is that the risks of "something traumatic" happening are maybe on approximately the same, but "how traumatic" is probably different, so default to putting single women before gay couples.
SecondSkinDecember 2, 2023
Paedophilies very commonly seek out other paedophiles to team up with and build their lives with (as friends or partners). Paedophiles organise better than any other type of criminal, they cooperate and play the long game and do anything to get access-especially on going unlimited access- to children.
niffinDecember 3, 2023
Yeah, that's something that I was thinking about while writing, but didn't want to go down the rabbit hole of how exactly those risks correlate. The risk of both partners are pedo predators given that one is is certainly increased. I admit that I don't have a good guess of how common this is (as I said, I'd want to see data). When I was sexually abused as a kid, my abuser was a socially inept single family relative who I can't believe could hold together the kind of long-term relationship you're talking about even if it were just to be co-conspirators, so my perspective is perhaps based too much on my own anecdotal experience.
Any parenting scheme has some risks, and I'd still like to minimize those risks. The magnitude of harm from the nightmare scenario you're describing does give me pause though. If I were responsible for placing a kid into such a "home", I honestly don't know if I could live with myself if I found out how wrong it went... but I also have to recognize that such "long-term access through deception" cases do happen in heterosexual couples too (sometimes with a female accomplice too), so some calculation of the relative risk should come in somewhere... If we could find adoptive homes for all kids just with lesbian couples, without resorting to either gay couples or single parents I'd take it in a heartbeat l, but unfortunately we have too many kids in desperate need of a safe adoptive family...
Your example has swayed me though. If forced to pick, I'd prefer single women over gay couples... Sigh... This really is the worst timeline isn't it?
SecondSkinDecember 3, 2023
If itās anecdotalā¦. My single (child protection social worker) mother had me for the purpose of baiting her many peado affairs (most who were also social workers, or similar fields).
Itās all impossible in theory because there are way too many predators and way too many risks. We need much more robust safeguards and more involved, long term supervision (although from social workers who also have much greater safeguardsā¦)
Thereās no perfect answer. And thatās what everyone wants with children because any risk feels too much with children the target. The deserve absolute safety and protection, which doesnāt exist. So there needs to be much better safeguards, which requires much more funding.
assigned_terf_at_birthDecember 3, 2023
Interesting! This is totally conjecture but I would bet that single women hoping to adopt are likely just as good (if not better) than a straight couple. Children do better in two parent households because they have a second income, not because there's a dad. Just a guess but I expect any single woman going out of her way to adopt already had a high enough income to remove the financial element.
SecondSkinDecember 3, 2023
Until thereās a step dad in the picture.
Paedos often seek out single mothers. Step dads bring something like a 20 times increased risk of csa. Even those who donāt pose the risk come with their sons or brothers who do.
If a single woman was adopting and was remaining single forever, then thatās likely better. But most single mothers end up with a partner at some point (statistically) and no adoption agency can force women to remain single for the childās life.
[Deleted]December 2, 2023
[Comment deleted]
- direct link
44
magicianly7December 2, 2023
yeah. the highest rate of CSA is committed by men like stepdads. i donāt remember if adoptive/foster male parents are recorded to have a higher rate but it seems common knowledge that foster kids arenāt treated well at a baseline so sadly i think that would follow :/
I understand concerns about single men (not so much a gay couple) but I wouldnāt want a hard and fast rule. Iād hate to see, say, a loving brother prevented from adopting the orphaned nephew with whom heās been close since the kidās birth becauseā¦ unmarried.
Awwww, you're right. I read the survey as blind adoption. If it's a child someone has a relationship with already, the rules should be different
You were right to see it that way, it is what I had in mind. I shouldn't make posts when I'm lying in bed with a sick baby who won't let me sleep.
I hope your baby feels better soon. And I wish you lots of rest.
Intra family adoption when a child has been orphaned is a different thing entirely. Children who need help should get it. That said, I donāt think anyone should be able to adopt when weāre talking about people who want to take the baby or children of living parents who havenāt done anything wrong other than be young or poor. This is what most adoption is; itās the buying and selling of human beings like commodities. Children who genuinely need help? The state generally pays you to foster. But people donāt want those children because they often have issues physically and/or emotionally.
Baby buyers want a top notch genetic specimen ripped fresh from their motherās womb either via infant adoption or surrogacy. This is now especially true of gay men. Then there are the statistics that ALL men are more prone to sexual abuse and child abuse and that ānon-related parentageā has a rate of child abuse that is 500 times that of natural parents. Listen to the sheer numbers of adult adoptees who tell you that they were abused by their adopters either physically, sexually or emotionally/psychologically. Thereās been a lot of propaganda and marketing done in the last eighty years to whitewash these forms of human trafficking but they arenāt what is marketed.
Iām for family preservation and the basic family unit is a mother and child. I donāt care if people who āwantā babies and canāt have them are able to purchase the lifelong services of a mother and child. What do we call it when human beings are bought and sold?
Exactly. And there are so many older teens still in the foster system, no real hope of ever being adopted. If someone would like to give them a permanent home, then assuming suitable vetting, background checks, ongoing checks, that's great.
I would be very nervous with teens in particular, actually. Teens are easy prey for trafficking.
Aw damn that's a really good point. Case by case would be best.
Good point.
I said yes for this reason.