Bans on Same-Sex Adoption

USA Today has just published a piece on same-sex adoption, noting that 16 states have now taken action to pass laws or create November ballot initiatives to ban it. One member of a conservative “pro-family” (gag!) group sees this as an extension of same-sex marriage bans: by preventing same-sex marriage, and then defining marriage as the best place to raise a child, it follows that same-sex couples shouldn’t adopt.

This is a hideous argument, as I’m sure most of my readers would agree. If you need convincing, or simply want to gather some well-put arguments, Shannon over at Peter’s Cross Station wrote an impassioned post this week on the negative effects–legal, financial, and emotional–of not permitting same-sex adoption. Worth reading the post and all its comments.

The truly frightening thing, though, is how this percolates down into other social issues, even beyond the LGBT community. As USA Today notes, Utah has also banned adoption by any unmarried couple, gay or straight. (Though strangely, they will allow single LGBT people to adopt.) While I think the legal and financial protections of marriage can make it easier to raise a child (one of the many reasons I want to marry my partner), it’s not my place to say why a couple might choose not to get married. We as an LGBT community have to do more to help people realize that bans on human relationships and families are more than just “gay issues.” They start us down the path of basing any permitted relationship on a narrow, conservative view of what should be.