Representing

New Parenting Memoir Shows Humor and Heart

To label Dan Bucatinsky’s Does This Baby Make Me Look Straight?: Confessions of a Gay Dad a “gay parenting” book is to do it a disservice. Not that there is anything wrong with gay parenting books (far from it)—but Bucatinsky’s work is about parenting, period. To limit the scope of this hysterically funny, often bawdy, and unexpectedly touching book to gay parenting alone is to miss that essential point—even if the book also contains some supremely sharp observations about being both gay and a parent.

TV

Jennifer Lopez Developing TV Series About Lesbian Moms

Jennifer Lopez is developing a TV series for ABC Family about two lesbian moms, Deadline reports. Will the hour-long drama give us an authentic (albeit fictionalized) portrayal of a lesbian-headed family? Will it stay away from tired clichés, like “the wacky search for sperm”? Will J.Lo sing and dance about baby strollers?

New Book Compiles Decades of LGBT Children’s Literature

Books matter. “Children feel unimportant and invisible when they do not see representations of their lives and families in books,” asserts librarian Jamie Campbell Naidoo. He knows this firsthand. Growing up in the Bible Belt in the early 1980s, he says, there were no books that “mirrored my life and the lives of other queer children.” If there had been, he says, he “I would not have felt so alienated and ashamed of being different.” His classmates, too, might have understood his queerness was not strange. Such books, however, were not to be found.

Fast forward to today and Dr. Naidoo, now an assistant professor of library and information studies at the University of Alabama, has written a book of his own to help guide librarians, parents, teachers, and others seeking LGBT-inclusive titles.

LGBT Parenting: 40 Years of a “Quieter Revolution”

President Obama has said that same-sex parents and their children influenced his decision to support marriage equality. And in the Washington Post recently, Janice D’Arcy asked, “Has gay parenting ‘normalized’ the perception of gay relationships?” The interaction between LGBT parenting rights and relationship rights is indeed a fascinating and important question—and one charted in part by law professor Carlos Ball, whose new book also gives us a compelling history of the expansion of LGBT parenting rights. Here’s my review of his work, originally published as my Mombian newspaper column.

Glee’s Dianna Agron in Lightsaber Duel with Children of Lesbian Mom

At the risk of overwhelming you with celebrity posts today, please enjoy this photo of Glee’s Dianna Agron at the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation’s 23rd Annual GLAAD Media Awards last night in San Francisco. Agron is battling the children of Jennifer Tyrrell, a mom from Ohio who was ousted from the Boy Scouts for being gay. Or maybe they’re training her in the ways of the Force. Dark side, watch out!

Oprah’s “A-ha” Moment About Gay Parents

It’s nice to know that even as accomplished a person as Oprah Winfrey is still open to learning a thing or two. In her interview with actor Neil Patrick Harris and his fiancé David Burtka, which airs tonight, June 3, at 9 p.m. ET/PT on “Oprah’s Next Chapter,” the three of them have this exchange

Will New NBC Sitcom About Gay Dads Be Good for Our Families?

This fall, NBC will premiere “The New Normal,” a sitcom about two gay men who decide to become parents with the help of a surrogate. There’s only a little information about the show available yet, but here are the pros, cons, and concerns, as I see them now. Add your own in the comments, and watch the trailer after the jump.

He Sailed Off, Through Night and Day: Goodbye, Maurice Sendak

Acclaimed children’s author Maurice Sendak died yesterday at the age of 83. I love his books, both the words and the pictures, and their exploration of “the darker side of childhood,” as NPR puts it. Darker, yes, but never bleak or hopeless.

Film Shows Lesbian Mom Losing Custody to Convicted Murderer

Sometimes it’s good to be reminded of how far we’ve come. In 1995, Floridian Mary Ward lost custody of their daughter to her ex-husband, even though he had been absent from the girl’s life for six years—and been convicted of murdering his first wife in a custody dispute. Why did the judge not award custody to Ward? She was a lesbian. Now, a new documentary tells the sobering story of the case.

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