Mike Huckabee Thinks Our Kids Are Guinea Pigs: He Should Read This Book

BuzzFeed recently reminded us that Republican presidential candidate and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee once called the children of same-sex parents “little guinea pigs.” Gay guinea pigs are a thing, though—and he should learn from them.

Huckabee wrote:

I believe that we’re in denial about potential problems as we see more and more homosexual couples raising families. Essentially, these are experiments to see how well children will fare in such same-sex households. It will be years before we know whether or not our little guinea pigs turn out to be good at marriage and parenthood.

In 2008, author and illustrator Sarah Brannen gave us Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, the story of young guinea pig Chloe, who worries that her favorite uncle won’t have time to have fun with her after he marries his boyfriend. Uncle Bobby assures her that is not the case, and in fact, she’ll be able to do things with both him and her new uncle. The book focuses on a young child’s concerns about family relationships and change, and is not “about” the marriage of a same-sex couple per se. It just happens to include one.

The book has seen its share of criticism from opponents of marriage equality, even making the American Library Association’s list of the Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2008. It is, however, one of the more delightful and charming LGBTQ-inclusive children’s books I’ve seen, and avoids the pedantic, issue-driven approach of many others in the genre.

Perhaps Mike Huckabee should read it. He should also be informed that the history of LGBTQ parents goes back much further than many think—at least to the 1950s by modern definitions of LGBTQ, and even further if one looks more broadly. Many of the “guinea pigs” he’s worried about do indeed have children of their own. They seem to have turned out just fine, or someone would have noticed by now.

Alas, Amazon indicates that Uncle Bobby is out of print. With the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision on marriage equality, I hope its publisher, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, considers re-releasing it as a celebratory wedding tale. (Note, however, that although G.P. Putnam’s is an imprint of the Penguin Group, it is not the publisher of the gay penguin book And Tango Makes Three, which is from Simon & Schuster.)

For more on Uncle Bobby, including what made Brannen choose guinea pigs in the first place, see my full 2008 interview with her.