Gay Adoption

I do hope Metiria Turei’s bill to allow gay adoption passes first reading because it will be great to have a select committee consider the issue and allow submissions on it. The HOS has an article on it.

Opposition to gay adoption, tends to take one of two forms. The first is from those who think most gay men are pedophiles and they want to adopt so they can molest their own children, and bring them up gay. Not too many out there like this, but there are a few.

The second is from those who think that the best likely outcome for a child is being brought up by a man and a woman married or at least in a permanent relationship with each other. And I actually fall into the camp of believing that – how-ever I don’t support gay adoption being banned either.

First of all one should acknowledge there are already many gay parents out there, and many kids who are already brought up by gay couples after relationships have split up or more recently through IVF, or donors etc. And I’m not aware of any research that have shown gay parents to be any less loving than normal parents. So regardless of the fate of the adoption bill, there are and will continue to be many gay parents.

How-ever I do instinctively believe that, putting aside for now all other factors, that a child is best to have a male and female parent, and that having the parents married, or civilly united, living together is ideal.

So why do I still support gay adoption? Because the above is only one factor of a good environment to raise children. I’d take a non-alcoholic gay couple as parents over a straight alcoholic couple any day.

I presume that when couples are considered for adopting, there is a “points” system of some sort like immigration where various criteria are judged – length of relationship, sufficient income, commitment to education, lack of criminal record etc etc. So I would have couples of opposite gender scoring somewhat more highly than the same gender (because I do think male and female role models and parents are important and do fulfil different needs) but this would be only one factor, and would more affect your place in the queue, than your overall eligibility.

This debate might also be more theoretical than practical also. I think the number of babies made available for adoption is now very very low. At some stage I’ll research this in more detail.