Let The Little Children Come Unto The Lesbians
Roughly half of America doesn’t want them to have the right to even get married and yet, according to at least one study, lesbians are as good as, if not kicking our hetero asses, when it comes to parenting.
Yup, that’s right. The children of lesbians tend to be smarter and more well-rounded than kids raised by straight couples and this isn’t the first study to say so. Back in 2010 a similar study came to the same conclusions.
According to Jezebel, The Williams Institute at UCLA conducted the 26-year study called “Adolescents with Lesbian Mothers Describe Their Own Lives.” Researchers followed 78 children with lesbian moms for more than two decades.
The verdict? Those kids have better grades than other kids, strong family bonds, and consider their moms to be good role models.
“At the end of high school, the teens tell us that they have excellent grades, feel connected to their families and friends, and admire their parents,” researcher Nanette Gartrell says. In fact, Gartrell goes so far as to say the children of lesbians she studied are model kids. “As a psychiatrist, I can say that these are the types of child-rearing outcomes that every parent hopes for.”
I’m not surprised. Remember Zach Wahls? He’s a 19-year-old University of Iowa student who spoke about the strength of his family during a public forum on House Joint Resolution 6 in the Iowa House of Representatives. Wahls has two mothers, and came to oppose House Joint Resolution 6, which would end civil unions in Iowa. He’s a prime example of the child of a lesbian couple like the ones Gartrell describes from her study. Watch Wahls’s AMAZING speech here. I tear up every time I watch it.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that the well being of a child is based on the quality of family relationships and not the sexual orientation of the parents, and yet a lot of folks still can’t wrap their brains around a concept as simple as love. I don’t get it. Do you?
The study appears in the Journal of Homosexuality. You can read it by clicking here.
Photo Credit: goodenoughmother.com
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Thanks so much for writing on this topic. I am a lesbian mama and I don’t know that I feel our parenting is any better than a straight couple, but I -know- our parenting is definitely the same! I always love to see the equality in Babble articles.
Thanks Rachael!
One very obvious reason for this: lesbians don’t get pregnant accidentally; every child that comes into their family is planned for, and wanted. Which leads to better outcomes. Which also makes it clear that allowing every woman to plan their family the same way by giving us complete control over reproduction is good for children!