Argument: Children do not need distinct male and female parental role-models
From Debatepedia
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]Supporting evidence
- Brad Sears Director of the UCLA School of Law's Williams Project on Sexual Orientation Law, and Alan Hirsch "Gay Marriage: Pro and Con" Village Voice 12/2/03 - "Wholesome though it sounds, the idea that children need a parent of each gender is curiously outdated. What is the male supposed to model? Aggression? Sports? Trucks? What should the female model? Nurturing? Femininity? Pink clothing? Insisting on gender-based role modeling makes sense only if there are viable models of gender to begin with. Yet psychologists and thinking laypeople increasingly conclude the opposite, that the idea of a model of maleness or femaleness is misleading and constraining...We want all parents to model compassion, responsibility, independence, and good citizenship. These virtues are androgynous."
- NYTimes Op-ed Kenji Yoshino 7/14/06 - "Like most arguments against gay marriage, this 'role model' argument assumes straight couples are better guides to life than gay couples. And like other blatantly anti-gay arguments, it falls apart under examination. In a decision last month in a case concerning gay foster parents, the Arkansas Supreme Court found no evidence that children raised by gay couples were disadvantaged compared with children raised by straight couples."