BS: 'Gay' parents?

Subject: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 06:32 AM

Just in on BBC news.
A homosexual couple who were allowed to foster two boys have been jailed for their abuse.

Some time ago there was a long thread on the suitability of homosexual men to be given the care or adoption of children.
The general response then, was cries of bigot , homophobe, ect ect.

Is anyone troubled by this case? Or does "political correctness" take precedence over the welfare of our children....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: skipy
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 06:40 AM

Here it is:-
Homosexual Men Allowed to Foster Young Boys Despite Abuse Evidence Convicted of Sexual Abuse

by Hilary White

PONTEFRACT, UK, May 23, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Two homosexual men who volunteered to be foster parents to troubled children were convicted of multiple counts of sexual molestation of their charges. Ian Wathey, 40, and Craig Faunch, 32 were convicted of molesting and filming eight-year-old twins and two 14 year-old boys placed in their care by the Wakefield council.

The council is being criticized for having failed to act after accusations of abuse were made against the two men. The twin boys mother, identified only as "Mrs X," complained when she found suggestive photographs of her sons. An inquiry by social workers, however, cleared the now-convicted paedophiles and police were not called in.

The Telegraph quotes Kitty Ferris, speaking for the council, who said the men's applications had been approved "in accordance with statutory requirements and council policy."

The mother of one of the boys is suing the Wakefield Council and Hemsworth MP Jon Trickett has joined calls for an investigation. A total of 19 boys were placed with Wathey and Faunch since they were approved in 2003.

Mrs. X said she was shocked that social services failed to respond to the warning signs. "You just don't do that," she said. "You just don't take pictures of kids with no clothes on. Why would they want a picture of my son like that unless it's for something mucky."

Police found homosexual pornography featuring young adolescents in the men's house that they shared with the foster boys. One film featured a group of older men performing sex acts with young males. One of the couple's teenage victims claims he was made to watch one of these films while Wathey sexually abused him.

Describing the abuse, one of the victims said, "It hurt. Afterwards, I said 'Pack it in now,' and then I went to bed. I was gutted. I didn't want anything to do with anyone else. All I could do was sit there and cry."

On the application to become foster "carers" the two men specified that they wanted boys aged five to twelve but only two of the boys they cared for were in that age group, the rest were teenagers.

Social services in Wakefield were identified in a recent report as being among the worst in the country in a scathing report published in 2001. The Joint Review by the Audit Commission and the Social Services Inspectorate said the department was failing the city's most vulnerable people.

David Holmes, Chief Executive of The British Association for Adoption and Fostering, said it was important not to confuse the sexuality of the carers with committing sex crimes against children.

In Britain, as in Canada, anti-discrimination laws prevent social workers or parents from objecting to potential foster parents on the basis of their sexual 'orientation.'
STAYING OUT OF THIS ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 06:45 AM

Are you kidding me? Have you seen how many STRAIGHT parents beat the hell out of their children? Do you have any idea of how many STRAIGHT fathers molest their daughters?

Being gay has nothing to do with the propensity to abuse children and if you feel it does perhaps you should get over your prejudice and meet some people who are gay. You will find that they are like any other human beings on the face of this earth, some lovely people, some assholes. Geez.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 06:49 AM

I'm not surprised by this at all.Common sense went out the window years ago.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 07:06 AM

Lily Festre....You are quite wrong to state unequivocably that there is no link between MALE homosexuality and the abuse of boys.

In my lifetime ,I have seen many cases which would sggest the opposite.

Sexual abuse of children is almost always committed by men.

To tackle this problem we must look at male and female psychology.
When dealing with sexual matters, the veneer of "civilisation" is very thin indeed.....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 07:11 AM

Any quick check will find that a percentage children in foster care, in schools, in residential care, are all at risk of various forms of abuse from women and men, most of whom are married.

read on..

In an international study of allegations of abuse in foster care, 59 social services and social work departments returned questionnaires and identified 305 abuse investigations during the year under study; representing 4% of foster homes. Just over one-fifth of the cases (67) were substantiated and in a further fifth of cases investigating staff were not able to determine whether or not abuse had occurred (Nixon and Verity, 1996, p. 11; see also Verity and Nixon, 1995).

Finally, more general research on residential and foster care has identified abuse. In their study of special residential schools, Grimshaw and Berridge found that 4% of children and young people had definitely suffered physical abuse and 6% sexual abuse. One fifth (21%) were reported to have "experienced some form of suspected or confirmed abuse; 13% had experienced suspected or confirmed physical abuse and 13% similarly sexual abuse..." (Grimshaw and Berridge, 1994, pp. 103-104), although the research did not identify the perpetrator of the abuse. Triseliotis et al studied social work services to a sample of 116 teenagers over a 12 month period. Fifty-five young people experienced 78 residential care placements and, in interviews, "two young people spoke of incidents when they had been assaulted by staff and both had formally complained about it" (Triseliotis et al, 1995, p. 181). Twenty-seven young people experienced 37 foster care placements and two girls were sexually abused, one by the male foster carer, and one by "a family friend who had taken her in on a private fostering basis" (Triseliotis et al, 1995, p. 190). In a general survey of residential child care services in Scotland, Lindsay asked about allegations of sexual abuse by staff in the previous year. Thirteen services (6%) indicated that there had been a total of 16 allegations of abuse (Lindsay, 1997, p. 32). Macaskill studied 66 foster families caring for sexually abused children. The placements of 80 children were studied in depth and the research found 8 cases of abuse in previous foster or adoptive placements. The abuser was the foster or adoptive father in 5 cases and in the other cases, the foster mother, the foster mother's boyfriend or a foster brother (Macaskill, 1991). A study of 204 referrals to the child sexual abuse unit of a London hospital between 1981 and 1984 found that 4% of the perpetrators abusing girls and 3% of those abusing boys were classified as a foster father or foster brother. In addition to this, three adoptive fathers perpetrated the sexual abuse. This compares to only one case where the perpetrator was a worker in a children's home (La Fontaine, 1990, p. 121)

from http://www.sircc.strath.ac.uk/research/kendrick.html

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 07:50 AM

Figures as to the sexual propensities of child abusers don't change anything. It especially doesn't help to compare the habits of one sexual orientation with that of another as to the frequency of this perversion.
It is equally wrong whichever one does it, it is not anti homomsexual to publish an article that mentions them any more than it is anti hetereosexual to publish stories of abuse by that community.
What so many people seem to miss in their pursuit of political correctness is the fact thet this involves REAL children and not abstract statistics,
The thing that is wrong in this instance is that the council didn't act quuickly enough, and as a consequence more children were harmed, and not the fact of who actually carried out the abuse.
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:40 AM

I don't think it has anything to do with sexual preference and my view certainly has NOTHING to do with political correctness. I've been a social worker for over 10 years working specifically with children who have been abused in many, MANY ways....so...my point of view comes from my experience.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:53 AM

I hope those figures showed that no generalisations can be made about people who abuse children. And the nature of child abuse is so widespread, unfortunately, that I don't think there is any of us who would not know someone who has been abused.


freda

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: alanabit
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:58 AM

The issue is one of child care, not of sexual orientation. There are gay people, whom I would quite happily leave my children with. There are straight people with whom I would not.
I do not completely go along with the thinking, "Gay people have a right to have children too." I think that is an emotive statement, which clouds the real issue of putting the childrens' needs first. Nobody has a "right" to have children. I certainly do not. I have just been lucky. However, there are cases when placing children in the hands of gay people is the best option. The issue addressed in the initial post here is one of child abuse. Sexual orientation should be left out of it.
I forget the exact words that lawyers use to express the idea, but it is along the lines of, "Exceptional cases make bad law".
Writing the headline, "Gay parents molest children", is as crass as writing, "Black gunman shoots bank clerk". In both cases, the use of the first word as a near perjorative is biased and unnecessary.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 09:02 AM

perfect, alan.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Wesley S
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 09:07 AM

Ake - Correct me if I'm wrong. But I suspect that reguardless of the facts of this one particular case that you would prefer that homosexuals not be allowed to be foster parents. Or adopt for that mater. Am I correct ? If not please let me know.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 09:32 AM

Well said Alan.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 10:01 AM

There is one particulary disturbing fact in this case, which unfortunatly is being repeated across the country at this minute.

A complaint was made, but they were cleared to carry on as foster carers, and now it is shown the original complaint was well founded.
The fact the original complaint may well have been based on bigotry is irrelevant.

The couples sexuality is, in my opinion, irrelevant. It has been shown time and time again that some people of every Gender, Race and Sexuality have abused children

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Sorcha
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 10:07 AM

Thank you Alan.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 10:28 AM

Has anyone done any studies on hair color in adults who abuse children? Perhaps every article about child abuse should list the hair color of the perpetrator, so we could say that people with red hair, or whatever, shouldn't be allowed to be caregivers for children. How about geography? Are people in warm climates more inclined to hit thier kids? I really don't think we should let folks in warm climates be foster parents! What about race? Are there more child abusers among mixed-race couples? Perhaps the news article should say "Confirmed child abuse by mixed-race couple who were allowed to be foster parents"

Akenaton, if you can't see the illogic of your statements, you need to buy a ticket on the clue bus. Well, maybe it's more ignorance than illogic, I'm not sure. To automatically equate homosexuality with pedophilia bespeaks a vast lack of normal information as well as an astonishing ability to believe something for which there is no evidence, and which has been disproved many, many times.

I am not particularly politically correct, unless political correctness means treating people with respect, and treating them as individuals instead of as a member of some group. To say that gay folks being allowed to foster children is political correctness run amok is a smokescreen. You want to have your bigotry accepted as something other than your bigotry, so you try to ally it with some popular catch phrase so you can deflect our attention from your sad perversity.

Yes, you are a bigot and you are a sexual pervert. The bigotry should be obvious -- look it up, and then substitute "black" everywhere you use "gay". See how it sounds. Your sexual perversion is demonstrated by your public interest in what other people are doing in bed. Kind of sick, isn't it? Try subsituting the phrase "people who do things in bed that I don't" everywhere you use the word "gay" and it becomes pretty obvious that any discussion about what gays should be allowed to do is really about what they do in bed. Yeah, kinda sick.

Get your mind out of the gutter, take a logic class, read a book, and go meet some people. Please.

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 10:57 AM

I agree that the issue is this case is the incompetence of the agency. Obviously, their investigation and followup were incomplete. The article says that only one of the children was not in his or her teens- and thus they were well able to articulate the situation- if the ball had not been dropped. That is where the scandal is.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 11:49 AM

Akenaton says

"Sexual abuse of children is almost always committed by men"

Logic dictates then that men should not be allowed to care for children.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 12:04 PM

I agree that the ball was dropped by social services. Part of the problem with social services is that case workers have far too many cases to take care of each of them well. I believe that most social workers do the very best that they can but sometimes the caseload is so heavy that mistakes are going to happen, things are going to be inadvertantly overlooked. Children are being hurt, inappropriate homes/people are being approved for foster care (that's a whole other ball of wax...not enough foster homes), families are falling through the cracks and the list goes on. We need more social workers to handle the incredible amount of caseloads that exist. The burnout rate is high and the pay sucks...there simply is no incentive for people to join this profession or to stay with it. It's a system with many weaknesses.   This has been an ongoing problem in the US for YEARS. I don't know what the caseload of a UK worker looks like...anyone know?

LQF

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Rasener
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 05:14 PM

Its all about checking all people that foster children very carefully. The people that should have done that cocked up big time.

Unfortunately those foster parents did a big diservice to the gay society.
That is the trouble today, the minority are creating big issues for the vast majority of decent people in this world.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 05:22 PM

Lilyfestre has just about said everything I would have. This is about bad people not about whether they were gay or straight. As we live in Pontefract which is only a small town we will no doubt here much about this case in the weeks to come and I am saddened that it may mean that good foster parents are victimised because of their sexuality.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: NH Dave
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 05:38 PM

One of the problems we face is that the definition of abuse generally varies by the age of both the abuser and the abused. Thus people classed as abuse may only fall into this category because of the age of the child, and the fact that the older person committing the acts should have known better. Similar conducts between consenting adults bears no criminal liability.

Additionally, many recent headlines about teachers "abusing" their students have been about a woman carrying on a sexual relationship with one of her pupils, contrary to the notion that women aren't abusers.

Lastly, our newspapers have been filled with cases where otherwise well meaning social workers and foster parents lose complete track of each other. This is frequently due to case overload of the social worker, so that behavior that could have been caught early, had the two enjoyed a working relationship, ends up with children abused or killed, and everyone asking what went wrong.

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 05:39 PM

Trouble is that these two give homosexuals a bad name, as homosexuals and paedophiles are two totally different types of people.
I suspect that these two may have been masquerading as homosexuals in order to gain access to children.
A very difficult situation for the Social Services to deal with.
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 06:49 PM

Lilyfestre ...I can't believe what you have posted. Do you know nothing of this case , or will you say anything to protect the political correctness which rules the social services?
"I believe that most social workers do the very best that they can but sometimes the caseload is so heavy that mistakes are going to happen, things are going to be inadvertantly overlooked"

The mother of one of the boys discovered a photograph taken by one of the "foster parents" showing her son urinating.
She took the photo to the social work dept, who took no action against the couple allowing abuse to continue.
This photograph should have been taken straight to the police, and in my opinion the reason it was not is the climate of PC endemic to the social services.

Peekstock...you are a devious person who cares more about imagined wrongs to self-made minority, than the very real danger posed to vulnerable children.
"Your sexual perversion is demonstrated by your public interest in what other people are doing in bed."

I have no interest whatsoever in what you or your friends do in bed, but I have very great concern as to what they do to our children.

Alan dont let us mince our words, the real issue is whether or not male homosexuals can be trusted with the personal care of young children.

We are talking percentages here, there is no point in doing as Lilyfestre has done and comparing numbers of "straight" abusers and Homosexual abusers
"there are cases when placing children in the hands of gay people is the best option." Would you mind explaining that comment, I would have thought that placing children in a secure conventional family situation would always be the best option

I stand by what I have already said, that the link between male homosexuality and child abuse is a fact borne out by the daily abuse of boys by homosexual clergy, youth workers and others in positions of authority over children.
Lilyfestre talks of ten years experience in social work, well I have over sixty years experience of life and bringing up a family of four boys.
My family are all grown now but we talked on this subject lately and they told me that as children they had to ward of the attentions of adult homosexuals on several occasions.
I also remember as a child myself being subjected to an attempted sexual assault by a man who although "married" was known by the local chidren as a "fiddler"
Unbelievably this man fostered over a dozen boys during his time in our area. I spoke to some of these boys in later life and all said that they had been sexually abused by the man during their stay in his home. I have no reason to believe that this pattern is not duplicated nationwide....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: catspaw49
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 07:21 PM

No problem here. While we're at it, let's be checking those biological parents as well!!! Are they fit to parent children? Let's put them to rigorous pre-fucking screening and have no copulation without authorization. This would solve all of these pesky problems with Foster Care and those other unsavory types....you know, the Adoptive parents!

Now we need someone to play God on all of this and I nominate Akenaton there!!! Just remember that if you or your staff screws the pooch on any of these decisions you will be shot and then replaced by another God-like broke-dick mamalucca.

Listen up .......When you've been in the trenches of children's services and have seen a collection of multiple sides to the same story as well as fighting uphill battles with too few qualified people, damn near no money, and being hounded by watchdog groups of "do-gooder know-nothings" like yourself (many of whom have been clients of the system!), then feel free to condemn at your leisure. Til that time, have a Coke and a smile and shut the fuck up!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: katlaughing
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 07:27 PM

Thanks, Spaw, JohnP and Alan.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 07:30 PM

Well thats put me in my place....But said fuck all about the matter under discussion.

Who do you think you are to tell anyone to "shut the fuck up"

Maybe if your heros in social service had not "shut the fuck up" these children would not have had to suffer continued abuse.

You may be some kind of "folk hero" to the simple minded, but to me you're nothing but an ignorant arsehole.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: alanabit
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:14 PM

"Alan dont let us mince our words, the real issue is whether or not male homosexuals can be trusted with the personal care of young children.
..."there are cases when placing children in the hands of gay people is the best option." Would you mind explaining that comment, I would have thought that placing children in a secure conventional family situation would always be the best option."
The answer I would give to the first sentence is simply "Yes". That is not the same as saying they should always be trusted. There are bakers, electricians and clergymen, who I would not want to be left alone with my children, because they are a potential threat. If we put the adjective "perverted" in front of any of those groups, there can be no question of it. So I am also quite happy to concede that perverted homosexuals would not be allowed to care for my children. I believe that most homosexuals are not perverted though.
In certain cases, where the child feels happiest being cared for by two people, who happen to be homosexual, I think that can be the best solution for the child.
In the love and physical affection I offer and receive from my children, sexuality plays no part at all. Otherwise I would - and should be - disbarred from caring for children. Why should that be any different in the case of homosexuals?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:44 PM

"In certain cases, where the child feels happiest being cared for by two people, who happen to be homosexual, I think that can be the best solution for the child"
How often do you think that situation might arise Alan
Given the numbers of children being fostered the percentage must be minimal. And what about the children who are too young or too disturbed to make any rational decision on happiness security or anything else.

Can you honestly say with hand on heart that as a child you or any of your friends have never recieved unwelcome attention from homosexuals.
I and most of my friends had these experiences. We would talk between ourselves of those men who should be avoided or make sure never to be in their company alone.
The whole idea of placing children in what could turn out to be a hazardous situation, seems far too much of a risk.

In a conventoinal family, if the father turns out have abusive tendencies, the presence of the mother must act as a safeguard for the child, as few mothers would condone this behaviour...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:52 PM

Lilyfestre said "case workers have far too many cases to take care of each of them well. I believe that most social workers do the very best that they can but sometimes the caseload is so heavy that mistakes are going to happen"

In Australia the situation is exactly the same - it's also about the will of the government to fund social services and in NSW our DOCs (Dept of community services) child protection workers have a very high burnout rate, as they are overworked and understaffed. The other problem we have is that there aren't enough foster carers - so some children get notified as being at risk and there's nowhere to send them.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: catspaw49
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 08:54 PM

In a conventoinal family, if the father turns out have abusive tendencies, the presence of the mother must act as a safeguard for the child, as few mothers would condone this behaviour...Ake

That statement alone shows how little you know. So when the Mom does NOT act as a safeguard, what happens? More to the point, abusive Dads are more often as not abusive husbands as well. And even more to the point, lots of Moms side with the Dad.

Why not just admit you're a homophobe of the first order and let it go?

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 09:13 PM

Hey Ake,

   Since you have 60 years of experience raising your own 4 boys, you are likely old enough to be retired. Instead of running your ignorant mouth about a system which you have no hands on experience in, why not spend YOUR time helping out? HMMM? Get a look at the real world up close and in person instead of from your rocker.

And Spaw....right on, man...RIGHT ON!!!

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 09:14 PM

Congratulations... 31 posts and the first use of "homophobe"

The very word is a cop out...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 09:35 PM

Lilyfestre...Retire!! you must be joking.
I'll die with my boots on...I spend my days on high roofs Scottish castles and such like, in all weathers, while you softies are toasting your arses and getting stressful about when the next holiday or "training course" is coming up :0)...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 23 Jun 06 - 11:36 PM

Ake - The best way to change a system is from the inside. What are you doing to fix the "problem" ? Or do you just like to complain ?

And let me repeat my earlier questions -"Correct me if I'm wrong. But I suspect that reguardless of the facts of this one particular case that you would prefer that homosexuals not be allowed to be foster parents. Or adopt for that matter. Am I correct ? If not please let me know."

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 05:38 AM

Many of you are still using the word homosexual when you mean paedophile.
I say again they are different, by calling a homosexual a paedophile you denigrate them.
Sorry to be pedantic but in this case it is very important, I blame the newspapers for a lot of the confusion on this one.

Homosexual
Paedophile

Giok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 06:59 AM

I know LOTS of working people who volunteer time....so what's your excuse now?

Yeah...that's what I thought....all talk and no action.

LQF

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 01:15 PM

I always considered myself a "gay" parent. A very happy period of my life.

How an adjective was allowed to also become a noun is somewhat of a mystery to me. Homosexual and Lesbian seem appropiate, don't you think?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 01:29 PM

hear hear

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 01:36 PM

Wesley I'm not obliged to take part in an inquisition conducted by you,

Read my posts and my viewpoint is perfectly obvious.
I am quite happy to conduct a discussion with folk like Alan, who takes a different stance on this matter, but always conducts his arguments on a basis of reason and without the padding of abuse used by many on this thread.

The main point in this case is the abuse of the children, regardless of the sexual orientation of the abusers.
But just as shocking is the rank cowardice of the Social services, who just like the politicians are prepared to abdicate responsibility
tosave their useless jobs.

When presented with photographic evidense of abuse they were too craven to involve the police or have a proper investigation.
The reason being, that in the all pervasive climate of political correctness regarding homosexuals, they were afraid the whole mess would bounce back on them.

They thought the whole affair could be "contained"
The whole pack of them should be sacked forthwith. To say "they dropped the ball" is the understatement of the year, they never wanted the ball to begin with.....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 01:41 PM

Happily retired from my Child Care career but with many memories of abused children put into my care. Abusers..male and female....who use and abuse physically/emotionally and sexually come is many guises. Admittedly male abusers were in the majority but not a large majority over the women who also abuse in all three ways. Women and sexual abuse rarely come to light inasmuch as boys who are abused by women tend to keep it quiet...and I have seen more than one case where women have been exposed as sexual abusers but their 'situations' have been hushed up...hidden from the public eye. Can I also suggest that there are a larger number of abusers out in the big wide world than we give credit for.
Whilst working with teenage girls who were pregnant or had babies (as young as eleven yrs old) Almost a third of them were pregnant by their own fathers and most of them pregnant by men much..much older than them. Many of the mothers had some idea it was happening but said nothing for fear of bringing problems on themselves and their families by speaking up.
I have thought for many years that learning about human relationships should be part of formal education from a young age, not just left to family and friendships. If children particularly are taught what is right and what is wrong in physical/sexual and emotional lives....and how/who to approach when they are abused....it would make such scenarios less likely.
Some of those abused grow to be abusers..that cycle needs breaking NOW.
Best wishes. Mike.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 02:56 PM

The mother of one of the boys discovered a photograph taken by one of the "foster parents" showing her son urinating.

(This is proof positive of sexual abuse? I don't find it necessarily erotic or even having "sexual content" without some additional information. Obviously it gets Ake excited, but is it sexual excitement? It sounds like it must be, but I'd hate to see Ake convicted on such scant evidence.)

She took the photo to the social work dept, who took no action against the couple allowing abuse to continue.

(Obviously castration, hanging from a tree, and removal of the children was the only thing that would constitute "taking action" for Ake. But maybe the foster parents claimed they were just trying to show the kid he wasn't hitting the pot? Only subsequent evidence indicates that the first picture might have been an indication of reason for suspicion for which the social work dept may not have found cause at the time to take action. It's also possible, that there was an inadequate investigation. While the photo may or may not be incriminating, without additional evidence it's hardly basis for a conviction.)

This photograph should have been taken straight to the police, and in my opinion the reason it was not is the climate of PC endemic to the social services.

(Urinating is a crime in Ake's town? Or maybe it's just communicating with one's children about body functions that's illegal? Or perhaps nobody should take pictures of their children without a chaperone? And does Ake think any picture of a naked child is erotic? That seems certainly enough for social sevices and the police to take action, according to the "solutions" recommended.)

"Political Correctness" is NOT THE SAME THING as "Due Process." Sometimes criminals are clever enough, or inconspicuous enough, to evade detection; and sometimes they lie believably to avert suspicion; but punishing people on the basis of what some other pervert thinks might be happening is not an acceptable answer in most of our cultures.

The social survice responsible may not have had sufficient credible evidence to place an investigation high enough on their priorities to devote resources to one. They may also have not recognized the need for more than casual investigation, on the basis of the evidence they had. They may have made an investigation and not found sufficient evidence for action - whether or not crimes were being committed. For the cited evidence, it's virtually certain that the police could have taken NO ACTION for the "incriminating photo" other than to refer the report back to social services to make the decision whether to investigate.

The social services people will certainly get "dobetter" letters from the boss, and may even be punished or discharged. It's probably a given the service won't get better funding, better equipment, more agents, or a better pool from which to select foster guardians for the children they try to care for. So what else is new?

John

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 03:08 PM

I take no sides in this one John, but do remember there was such a climate of fear here in the UK at one time, that an assistant in a photo laboratory reported naked pictures of children in the bath that had been taken by the parents. The police investigated them too, took the whole thing seriously, and now parents are afraid to take pictures of their children in any state of undress.
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Scoville
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 03:10 PM

I think I read somewhere that, statistically, the most dangerous parent-child combination is a stepfather with a young stepdaughter.

Homosexuality and pedophilia are two utterly different things. One has no connection to the other (which is not to say they are mutually exclusive, but then neither, obviously, are heterosexuality and pedophilia). Holy crap, am I tired of trying to explain that to people . . .

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 08:07 PM

Thanks John in Kansas for showing your true colours!!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 08:31 PM

I agree with Giok and Scoville.

Most Paedophiles are not homosexual in the accepted meaning of the word. Leaving aside the father/daughter, or mother/son proportion which are definitely not a gay issue, the man/boy or woman/girl perpetrators are rarely actively homosexual with adults. They are paedophiles because their sexual orientation is child based.

Most homosexuals are not paedophiles, as their orientation is based on adult members of the same sex.

If you see homosexuals as more likely to indulge in child molestation, it seems to me that this says more about your innate fear of "the different" than about your grasp of the situation.

I once commented to a friend, who happens to be gay, that before I came to know him well, I had dreaded the possibility that he might one day make a pass, and I feared that I might handle the situation badly.

He laughed and said, "Would you make a pass at a gay man?..Of course you wouldn't. So what makes you think I would have any interest in a straight man?...You just ain't my type mate.

IMHO, for the vast majority of gay men, kids just ain't their type. That's the province of paedophiles.

The cockup in this case was in the failure of social services to investigate allegations of abuse. The sexual orientation of the abuser is outwith the parameters of that, and rightly so.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 24 Jun 06 - 08:32 PM

I just realized the blatant evidence of bias- Ake, if you had titled this thread Gay "Parent", I would take seriously your viewpoint. The point is that these were people in the guise of parent and who betrayed the role. The fact that they were homosexual had nothing whatever to do with it. Paedophiles come (no pun intended) in both sexes.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 03:54 AM

Don...Alot of sense there.

BUT..."The cockup in this case was in the failure of social services to investigate allegations of abuse. The sexual orientation of the abuser is outwith the parameters of that, and rightly so."

Must take issue with you there.
In my opinion The "cockup" and failure of Social services was BECAUSE of the sexual orientation of the abusers.
This is exactly the point which I have been trying to bring out since the start of this thread.

If these people had been a conventional couple, Social services would have been quite rightly swarming all over them...(there had been other complaints about these men before the photographic evidense appeared)...But political correctness dictated that because of their sexual orientation, they were "handled with kid gloves"

Ebbie ...I'm sorry but I don'tunderstand the point you are making in your last post. I agree that appointed "parents" are not the same as natural parent, AND that child abusers can come from any sexual grouping
Maybe you could spare a minute to explain? either on the thread or by PM....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 05:30 AM

The problem is making a widespread generalisation against a whole "social group" based on the actions of two people. The law should respond specifically with any persons who break the law, and not impose generic punishments, witchhunts, on others who may seem to share similar characteristics.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 06:11 AM

Much thought and wisdom has gone into this thread. Freda, you have brought it to a good conclusion, Don't you agree Ake?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 07:05 AM

Yes Les I respect Freda's opinions very much, she is another who bases all her arguments on reason.

However, I still think this is a very serious matter and chilren are being placed in a very dangerous position through our adherence to PC.
Children brought up by a "same sex couple" also face a young life of taunting and bullying by their peers.
Something which never seems to have been taken into account by the authorities, but which can blight a child's life forever.

By the way Les, thank you for that kind and understanding post..Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 07:47 AM

Ake, thanks for your kind words but i can be as unreasonable as anyone. re the bullying, when I went to school, there was not one child who was not teased at some time, about something. I was teased about my name (not freda) because it sounded a bit different. Other kids were teased about anything - kids would try you out, pick on you for anything. I was lucky, it didnt bother me. I have a friend at work who is northern european and very tall and glamorous. Her son has been teased because she "looks like a prostitute". Other kids have been teased because their mother is too frumpy. Something people have to learn in the schoolyard is to stick up for themselves, learn how to handle things.

This morning I had coffee with a friend from work, a woman, and her female partner. They showed me their beautiful baby boy, we had a long talk about life the universe and everything. This child will not be disadvantaged in any way, he will have two beautiful, intelligent mothers to help him on his way. These kids, with parents who care, are the lucky ones.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 08:33 AM

Ake says: "In my opinion The "cockup" and failure of Social services was BECAUSE of the sexual orientation of the abusers"

Ake, you must live in a cave. Get real. Because there is such a stereotype, the exact opposite of what you have posted is true. People like you can be counted on to call in allegations of abuse when a homosexual father is standing in the driveway giving his foster son a hug, or a lesbian foster mother is holding her 8 year old daughter's hand. Get a grip. The homosexual community is under a very fine microscope by those who don't understand or won't accept that they are PEOPLE and every little thing is reported. A child in a straight foster home with an adult male is much more likely to be abused.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 08:35 AM

Akenaton asks
"Can you honestly say with hand on heart that as a child you or any of your friends have never recieved unwelcome attention from homosexuals"

I would ask all women a very similar question
"Can you honestly say with hand on heart that as a child you or any of your friends have never recieved unwelcome attention from men"

Men tend to be much more sexually predatory than women. Gay or straight makes no difference.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: alanabit
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 08:42 AM

Akenaton: I have been away for a day - busking, karate training and the World Cup! So I am only now able to respond to a couple of your points.
Where I think you are on stronger ground, is that it is possible that a climate of political correctness may have given increased protection to perverts (who also happened to be homosexual). I have not lived in the UK for over twenty years, so I am open to the suggestion that may have been the case. As for the suitability of homosexuals in general to have care of children, I am unable to improve on Don T's remarks.
There are a couple of questions, which you asked earlier, which deserve an answer. The most important was about in what cases it would be the best solution to place a child in the care of two male homosexuals. I would say in rare cases, but that there are cases. I saw a TV documentary in Germany, where just that had happened to a couple of lads in the Eifel, to the south west of Cologne. They seemed happy, content and well cared for. They certainly preferred it to living in a children's home or returning to a disfunctional family. I could also imagine that in a household, in which a gay teenager's sexuality was emerging and was neither accepted nor accommodated by the family, it would be better to place the child with understanding carers.
The less important question was about whether I experienced unwanted attention from potential abusers in my childhood. If I did, I am unable to recall it now. I do not want to repeat the story again, as it is elsewhere on Mudcat, but I certainly was one recipient of brutal treatment, when I was eight. That was from the headmaster, who was in charge of a small, private school. To the parents, he came over as the most urbane and charming man. He was not homosexual. If anyone dares to handle my children as he handled the kids in his care, they had better hope that the police catch them before I do.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 08:55 AM

alan, I met with some old school friends a couple of weeks ago. there were five of us, all comparing notes about our time in high school. we hadn't seen each other for a couple of decades and talked mostly of good memories and funny things that had happened. Other things camne up. The women present had both been touched sexually, one by a teacher and the other by a senior male student when she was 12. The men had all been caned mercilessly by various male teachers. School in those days was a pretty rough experience - the strange thing was that none of us spoke to each other at the time about what had happened, we all grew up feeling that there was something wrong with us. it was incredible to talk about it all 35 years later.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 11:20 AM

Ake, I took your emphasis from Gay and put it on to Parents. In other words, these paedophiles (not at all necessarily homosexual) failed in their role as a parent, not because they were gay.

You are welcome to PM me if you wish.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 01:42 PM

I understand now Ebbie ..Thank you

Actually the inverted commas were not to give emphasis, but because I, like many others feel the use of gay in place of homosexual is ambiguous.

Gay in its old form was a wonderful word describing a wonderful feeling, common to all humanity.
It has now been lost to us, and its meaning twisted into something completely different...Ake

Thanks also to Alan, Don and any others who responded to this difficult subject with reason and depth ...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 01:53 PM

When you check it out, it appears that 'gay' has shared usage in its history. And there is nothing other than one's own qualms stopping anyone from using it in any way one wishes even today. For instance, I would not hesitate to use the word in a song, used appropriately such as a bird's trill or a happy party. (Frankly, given the article below, I'm not so sure that gay people would approve of all of its usages)

Old as (Some) Hills


"The word gay has changed meanings many times over the centuries, both as a standard English word and as a slang term, but it has nearly always had a shady side.
"Two of the less offensive definitions in Eric Partridge's Dictionary of Historical Slang are as abbreviations of gay and hearty, rhyming slang for "party" and gay and frisky for "whisky". That's appropriate, because one 19th century meaning of gay was "slightly drunk".
"The Oxford dictionary gives as one of the 17th century meanings of gay: "Addicted to social pleasures and dissipations; often euphemistic: Of immoral life."
Partridge says gaying instrument was used in the 19th century to mean the male member but this meaning goes back further than that. For instance Capt Francis Grose's Dictionary of Buckish Slang, University Wit and Pickpocket Elequence, which had its second edition in 1811, defines gaying instrument as "penis". Grose supposedly died in Dublin in 1791 so that meaning probably goes back to the mid-1700s."

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 02:19 PM

"People like you can be counted on to call in allegations of abuse when a homosexual father is standing in the driveway giving his foster son a hug, or a lesbian foster mother is holding her 8 year old daughter's hand"


Now Now Lily, surely someone as PC as you would NEVER stoop to stereotyping........Shame on you!! :0)...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 02:28 PM

I don't know about the foster son- hug but the lesbian mother holding her 8-year-old's hand story is true. It was an incredible story that involved the law and it took the mother a long time and many hurtful hours to clear her name, not to mention the harm done the child.

Fear - of all kinds and in innumerable occasions - makes bedfellows of stupidity and power. On the one hand, we all want children to be safe but on the other we often make unsafe the very child we are trying to protect.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 02:41 PM

"Wesley I'm not obliged to take part in an inquisition conducted by you"

Gosh Ake - I'm sorry you consider a few questions an "inquisition". If the questions are too tough or make you feel uncomfortable I'll back off.

But I still feel the best way to change a system is from within. You're either part of the problem or part of the solution. { That's not a question/inquisition - it's an opinion }

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 02:56 PM

Ake, on that matter, again, experience speaks volumes. If that makes me stereotyping the behavior of a bigot, then so be it.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 03:16 PM

Please accept my apologies Wesley...but as you may have noticed, I've been a bit under siege in this thread.

The vast majority of members seem to be keeping their heads WELL down.

When I was young, homosexuality was still a criminal act, and the treatment of homosexuals was barbaric. Believe it or not, I am quite a libertarian at heart and agree that what consenting adults do in private is entirely up to them.

However I feel we as a society are wrong to put young children into a situation which could be harmful to them....for all of the reasons I have given above.

I hope I am wrong, but I think we may see many more cases of the kind we are discussing. we need much more investigation into homosexuality and its results before placing our children in possible jeopardy
Childrens welfare should come before the hurt feelings of any minority....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 03:19 PM

But Lily, I would have to say that YOU were therefor a bigot?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 03:30 PM

In Fact if I were a moronic arsehole, I would have to accuse you of being bigoted against children, by wishing to see them placed in a dangerous situation......and so the merry-go-round goes on no discussion, no other opinions given credence, just personal abuse and ambivolence...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 03:41 PM

"...but as you may have noticed, I've been a bit under siege in this thread."

I'm not suprised.

Could it be that perhaps you're voicing an unpopular opinion in this place? You MUST know that a lot of folks here are qoing to disagree with your stand. Can you see how a lot of what you have to say would come off sounding bigoted ? And you've sounded rather dimissive of opinions that don't agree with yours.

Everyone agrees that the childs intersts should come first - but many of the things you've said end up sounding antigay. Correct me if I'm wrong.

And I'm sorry if it sounds like I'm trying to extend the inquisition. But your ideas sound so different from mine that I have trouble understanding them.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 04:16 PM

Yes Wesley I will correct you, I am not anti- homosexual and have no trouble understanding what a weasel sounds like...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 04:23 PM

How do weasels enter into this conversation?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 04:32 PM

Must be that time of year.
When weasels, having tired of mesmerising rabbits, turn their attentions to innocent Mudcatters...:0)

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 04:56 PM

I'm sorry but I've missed your train of thought. Who are the weasels and who are the rabbits? And who are the innocent Mudcatters?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Straight
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 05:26 PM

By definition, two men who commit sexual acts upom each other are deviants and therefor not suitable to foster young boys, young girls maybe, as I would guesse girls are ouside of their remit.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 05:36 PM

I fully agree with you, Ake, when you say: "However I feel we as a society are wrong to put young children into a situation which could be harmful to them....for all of the reasons I have given above.

"...Childrens welfare should come before the hurt feelings of any minority....Ake "

My mother and I 'took' foster children for years, more than 30 of them, all told, some of them arriving in the middle of the night. It's probably a good thing that I was not aware that some foster homes are not loving ones. We were not trying consciously to be 'loving', what we *were* trying to do was help the child feel wanted and accepted and safe. Foster care is a necessity in this world but it is full of the potential for harm. But so is any home.. Children arrive every day into heterosexual homes and some of those homes and parents should not be trusted with even a puppy.

We have no laws affecting the heterosexual home's suitability until the unsuitability is shown clearly. And that is how it should be.

Placing a foster child in the home of homosexuals is done only after the home and the prospective parents are examined, interrogated and okayed under much stricter guidelines than the three-day-old baby that goes home from the hospital with its heterosexual parent(s) enjoys.

The point is if crimes are committed against children then is when the law should step in.

It seems to me that you are ruling on the basis of the visible- if the foster parent(s) were black - or 'other' colored - or disabled in some way or in some other way 'visually unsuitable', it appears that you'd like to be able to decide on that basis as to the couple's suitability, because that's what would make you feel safer. So when you hear that the prospective foster parent is homosexual it helps you decide on that basis that it is not a suitable environment.

But life isn't like that. A blind or lame person may be a loving, wise parent, a black person may be a perfect match for a foster child - of any color - and a homosexual couple may prize a child as a dream they could not ever have any other way.

I have some friends who would love to adopt an older child, but they know that they would have to jump through all kinds of hoops and have their lives turned inside out for examination (How many heterosexuals are stainfree? It's just that heterosexuals' stains fit more closely the rules of the mainly heterosexual person behind the desk) and they decided that it was not worth it. They would have been wonderful parents.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 06:22 PM

Thanks for that post Ebbie. Your mother and yourself are obviously kind and loving people, embodying the best female gifts, the ability to give love and nurture children.

In a way your post reinforces my point in that a male couple could never bring to any child the nurturing qualities of a female.
It is clear that you feel very strongly about this issue as you write with such emotion and the last thing I want to do is upset a genuinly good person

I dont want to repeat myself, but I dont think your comparisons are quite right. I have no reason to believe that Black people lame people or blind people would not make fine parents, although the extent of their disability would obviously have to be taken into account if they were to be foster parents.

There are of course some groups who would not in my opinion be suitable foster parents. Those groups would include people addicted to drugs or those suffering from psychiatric disorders...so not everyone should be given custody of a child just because their lives feel incomplete without one.

I was very touched by your post Ebbie and I hope you understand my real concerns over this issue,although you may not agree with them....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 08:32 PM

Ebbie,

   This guy just doen't get it. I appreciate your post. :)

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Barry Finn
Date: 25 Jun 06 - 10:33 PM

Like a wolf & other predators they can smell out their prey. A pedophile or child predator will seek or smell out its victim. Like a bully searches for some one to victimize & over the years hones it's tracking abilities & techniques a pedophile does the same. A pedophile first places themselves in a position the gives them the greatest access to their type of pray. Hence the high number of pedophiles enrolled in the churches, boy scouts, etc. they also know they will be trusted, respected & won't be questioned. Foster care, what a heavenly position for a pedophile, almost a cushy as a priest's. They know the case workers are overloaded, that the agency is in dire straights, that they'll be seen as heroes making great sacrifices & once screened they're trusted & respected, maybe not as much as priests but still they won't be suspect unless someone make a very serious complaint (which a picture of some one pissing is certainly not or will be convinced that it's not). Blame it on the agency, the times, the money, the government, even blame it on George W Bush, but don't blame it on homosexuals, heterosexuals, lesbians, trans-sexuals, bi-sexuals, cross-dressers, asexuals, roofers, steeple-jacks or tin-knockers ( yes Ake, I too work in all weather conditions for 35+ years, in the high altitudes & with the same low attitudes. BLAME it on PAEDOPHILES they are the ones that are child predators not the others, though a pedophile can & do belong too any of these groups of humans, but none are more likely to be found in one than in another. Just like a murderer can be found to belong to any of these groups of people but you would not bare any of these groups from working with, say children, just because a heterosexual or a cross-dresser murdered a kid. If this logic doesn't seem sound then YOU ARE PREJUDCICE & you should be checking out your own shit.
A pedophile like any other type of predator starts learning it's preferred MO, it's victim & it's "means & method" from a young age. (Who knows why?). They learn what actions they take to complete their objective works & what doesn't work. They learn the boundaries of what they can & can't get away with, what & who make up the easier type victims. How to set up & manipulate their pry. How to take advantage of their victims & those close to their victims. How to work the system in their favor & how they themselves should behave in all situations. They are continuously researching their style & they've been refining it since their start, which may be from childhood. They have worked at this for years, starting slow & small & graduating all the time, bit by bit.
So is it any wonder that they know how to take advantage of a young naive social worker, after all the turnover & low pay would not keep the more experienced hanging on. It's not surprising that they know full well how to get around the system, & it's shocking when they've been found out to be something that they're not what everyone thought them to be.
Barry

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 08:03 AM

Akenaton,
You dismissed my last post in this thread by saying:

"Peekstock...you are a devious person who cares more about imagined wrongs to self-made minority, than the very real danger posed to vulnerable children.
"Your sexual perversion is demonstrated by your public interest in what other people are doing in bed."

I have no interest whatsoever in what you or your friends do in bed, but I have very great concern as to what they do to our children."

I notice that you don't actually respond to any of the points I made. You just attack me as a person, call me devious (huh?), spell my name wrong, and apparently assume I'm gay. Well, I know it's pointless to debate with someone whose debating style consists of ignoring arguments and attacking people, but I can't help making one more try. If nothing else, it will be an opportunity to prove once again that you're not interested in logic or in facts. So far your posts are heavy in emotional content and not much else.

Here are some specific questions:

1) In what way is any discussion of homosexuality not a discussion of what other people are doing in bed?

2) In what way is this any of your business?

3) What clear evidence do you have that homosexuals are more likely than any other group to be pedophiles?

4) How does what other people do in bed have any effect on your life?

5) Given that you are eager to have conversations about what other people are doing in bed, why should we not view you as some sort of bizarre voyeur?

6) Fair is fair . . . can we talk about what you do in bed?

7) You seem to be describing the gay rights movement as "imagined wrongs to self-made minority". Do you really beleive that gay folks passed all the anti-gay laws on the books? Who made the minority? Before we had civil rights laws that helped remove the institutional subjugation of black people, were they a "self-made minority", or were they a group being held down by laws made by people who despised them for what they were?

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 08:32 AM

If I'd been brought by two gay men instead of my parents I would be one confused puppy, but my dress collection would show better taste!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 08:46 AM

Akenaton wrote "I have no reason to believe that Black people lame people or blind people would not make fine parents, although the extent of their disability would obviously have to be taken into account if they were to be foster parents."

Since when has being black been a disability?

As for the rest of it, you are simply parading your ignorance.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 08:55 AM

Ever wonder why we concentrate so much on rehabilitation rather than methods of prevention?

We need more Social Service workers - probably - but why not attempt to become proactive rather than reactive?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 08:59 AM

"but why not attempt to become proactive rather than reactive?"

How would you decide who to be "proactive" against? Are you suggesting we punish innocent people?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 09:07 AM

Does anyone remember when they were twelve or thirteen, or whenever it was that you discovered the opposite sex? Do you really believe there is any power on earth that would have caused you to have a different sexual orientation? What makes you think it's any different for gay folks?

flamenco ted, everyone is on a continuum somewhere between very gay and very straight. Having gay parents isn't going to change or confuse your sexual orientation. It might, however, improve your fund of knowledge, like being able to tell the difference between homosexuals and cross-dressers. And knowing when "jokes" are thinly veiled bigotry. Would you have made your last post - with substituted stereotypes - in a discussion about black people?

Here's another radical concept: Lots of gay folks have terrible taste in clothes, and lots of straight folks always look great. Go figure.

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 09:13 AM

Freda, how about education early on? I know that is a broad brush term but it would appear to be a better approach than attempting rehab after certain behavioral patterns have been established.
(and innocents suffering)

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 09:22 AM

I wonder how you PC brigade would react if two heterosexual men who lived together fostered teenage girls?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 09:33 AM

Guest, the thought that people can be educated to have a different sexuality is based on the false idea that everything is learned, that there is no genetic inclination. Maybe you didnt mean that.

People who work in the areas of child protection like Lilyfestre and Ebbie, who has fostered, would have a better idea of social preventative measures. Like all social programs they require funding - government commitment. This is not popular in governments (like mine) that are not committed to funding many social programs. In countries like Sweden, Denmark etc, they have a greater commitment to looking after their populations, and so have fewer social problems.

In Australia we have had scandals involving pedophilia amongst closed communities such as churches. Our Ombudsman's office has taken on these churches and has imposed mandatory responses where there are allegations of child sexual abuse. The Ombudsman's office has consequently forced accountability and brought about significant change to churches and has made them a safer place for children of church goers. Where child abuse continues can be in organisations or communities that have their own internal power structures and standards. Groups like these can create & perpetuate their own cultures. Members of such communities need support so that they are aware that their rights are the same as all members of the country that they live in, and they need access to information they need to ensure that their human rights and legal entitlements are protected.

All children and young people need access to information about how to report sexual abuse.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Scoville
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 10:22 AM

I'm hoping that GUEST meant "proactive" in connection to increasing social service workers (and vastly improving their working conditions--I have a friend who is on mental health leave after being forced into working 7 days a week with Katrina evacuees) so that they have the time to actually investigate their cases, catch early-warning signs, and preventing future abuse, applicable to ALL households.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 11:06 AM

" wonder how you PC brigade would react if two heterosexual men who lived together fostered teenage girls? " Flamenco Ted

There's many a man out there who is rearing his children- including girls- alone. As far as another man sharing the household goes, there's nothing much fiercer than what the normal parent feels when it comes to protecting their young.

A brother of mine once said in wonderment, 'Men have awful thoughts.' So do women. That is where the civilisation of the normal person- including compassion, insight and foresight and just plain love - kicks in. Acting on thoughts is something totally different.

(I say that even though I know that an act begins with the thought; that isn't what I'm talking about. I'm referring to the random flittings through the mind.)

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: MMario
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 11:14 AM

Off the main topic of this thread, but related:

"a male couple could never bring to any child the nurturing qualities of a female"


to which my response is BoLLOCKS! There are any number of hetero couples in which the primary caregiver and nurturer is the male.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 11:16 AM

flamenco ted,
Anti-PC is the new PC. Didn't you get the memo?

How 'bout a real answer? Earlier I said, I am not particularly politically correct, unless political correctness means treating people with respect, and treating them as individuals instead of as a member of some group.

Your response? Please provide specific information about how asking for civil rights for a group of people who do not have the same societal legal benefits as you do should be dismissed as "policital correctness". Please also provide a definition for PC, with examples from my posts showing how I fit that definition. Please be prepared to defend your definition of PC with facts and logic, and be willing to change your definition if it doesn't stand up to examination.

Please do this, or admit that you aren't really interested in the discussion we're having, but only want to throw in snide comments from time to time. If that's the case, please shut up and go away. I'm not interested in your crap.

JP

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 11:23 AM

Answer my question then.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 11:29 AM

Scoville, "proactive in this case means doing more in Society to educate our citizens - the end result (in a perfect world) would mean no requirement for Social Workers except for those with major disabilities whether mental or physical.

I know some will say "pie in the sky" but why not eliminate a problem as opposed to continual treatment while watching it grow?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 12:09 PM

Economic rationalism refers to a mindset that the market should provide the foundation for all economic, political and social decisions. It has resulted in a "downsizing" of government's role in the provision of human services, the expansion of the private sector, the positioning of individuals as consumers and services as commodities and the valuing of profits and private interests over social benefits.

In order to achieve pre-emptive solutions to social problems, there has to be a change of government in those countries whose governments are pouring their money into war and other businesses.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 12:29 PM

Study: Older Brothers Increase Chances Men Will Be Gay
Monday, June 26, 2006; FoxNews.com
        
WASHINGTON — Having several older brothers increases the likelihood of a man being gay, a finding researchers say adds weight to the idea that there is a biological basis for sexual orientation. "It's likely to be a prenatal effect," said Anthony F. Bogaert of Brock University in St. Catharines, Canada. "This and other studies suggest that there is probably a biological basis for" homosexuality. S. Marc Breedlove of Michigan State University said the finding "absolutely" confirms a physical basis.

"Anybody's first guess would have been that the older brothers were having an effect socially, but this data doesn't support that," Breedlove said in a telephone interview. The only link between the brothers is the mother and so the effect has to be through the mother, especially since stepbrothers didn't have the effect, said Breedlove, who was not part of the research. Bogaert studied four groups of Canadian men, a total of 944 people, analyzing the number of brothers and sisters each had, whether or not they lived with those siblings and whether the siblings were related by blood or adopted. He reports in a paper appearing in Tuesday's issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that having several biological older brothers increased the chance of a man being gay. It's an effect that can be detected with one older brother and becomes stronger with three or four or more, Bogaert said in a telephone interview.

But, he added, this needs to be looked at in context of the overall rate of homosexuality in men, which he suggested is about 3 percent.
With several older brothers the rate may increase from 3 percent to 5 percent, he said, but that still means 95 percent of men with several older brothers are heterosexual. The effect of birth order on male homosexuality has been reported previously but Bogaert's work is the first designed to rule out social or environmental effects.

Bogaert said he concluded the effect was biological by comparing men with biological brothers to those with brothers to whom they were not biologically related. The increase in the likelihood of being gay was seen only in those whose brothers had the same mothers, whether they were raised together or not, he said. Men raised with several older step- or adopted brothers do not have an increased chance of being gay. "So what that means is that the environment a person is raised in really makes not much difference," he said. What makes a difference, he said, is having older brothers who shared the same womb and gestational experience, suggesting the difference is because of "some sort of prenatal factor."

One possibility, he suggests, is a maternal immune response to succeeding male fetuses. The mother may react to a male fetus as foreign but not to a female fetus because the mother is also female.
It might be like the maternal immune response that can occur when a mother has Rh-negative blood but her fetus has Rh-positive blood. Without treatment, the mother can develop antibodies that may attack the fetus during future pregnancies. Whether that's what is happening remains to be seen, but it is a provocative hypothesis, said a commentary by Breedlove, David A. Puts and Cynthia L. Jordan, all of Michigan State.

The research was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 12:46 PM

Thanks for that, freda. I read that article online a few minutes ago. Someday, those people who are convinced that homosexuality is a choice will be joining the ranks of those people who blamed demonic possession for epilepsy, sin for hurricanes, solar eclipses as warnings and vehemently maintained that the earth is flat.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 01:05 PM

Interesting analogies, Ebbie. Like gays, people with epilepsy have been persecuted, - their condition has been demonised, mysticised, and mythologised. Its worth noting that epileptics were another group targeted by the Nazis. Although June 30, 1934, marks the beginning of the Nazi slaughter of gays, active persecution had begun a year earlier, in 1933, when Hitler had become supreme legal authority of the Third Reich. In that year a law was passed requiring the sterilization of all homosexuals, schizophrenics, epileptics, drug addicts, hysterics, and those born blind or malformed. By 1935, 56,000 people were thus "treated." In actual practice, the homosexuals were literally castrated rather than sterilized. More info here

It's strange that in their pursuit of physical perfection, racial purists themselves became psychotic by acting on a twisted and paranoid set of beliefs.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 01:16 PM

This whole thread troubles me. I think most of us are aware that the majority of pedophiles are heterosexual males, yet no one seems to object to heterosexual couples adopting. Hmmmm?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 01:34 PM

Exactly, Jim.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 05:31 PM

Well well, I see the lyvch mob has been working itself up into a right little frenzy while I've been out at work.
Some of the comments have been so ridiculous that they dont deserve a response, especially Peekstock who is total obsessed by homosexual sex.
Or is his post just a sly attempt to muddy the waters so that any real attempt to debate this issue is drowned out by the usual cries of bigot homophobe ect

Interesting how so many Mudcatters have been unwilling to give their opinions here. Well done you ragbag of Social workers and apologists for child molesters, the lynch mob mentality must be having the desired effect

I dont believe that there is anyone in their right mind (that lets out quite a number of the above) who want to see young children handed over to male homosexual couples, but the powerful homosexual lobby has been so successful in seducing the public that political correctness now rules common sense.
Like the majority here on mudcat, people are becomming afraid to raise objection to anything which offends them and their lives are set by the most powerful pressure groups

As I've said before, I hope I am wrong, but I think before too long most of you will have cause to eat your words.

As an example, one of the most ridiculous statements
"This whole thread troubles me. I think most of us are aware that the majority of pedophiles are heterosexual males, yet no one seems to object to heterosexual couples adopting. Hmmmm?"

I'll leave the "intellectually challenged" to work it out for yourselves....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Wesley S
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 05:59 PM

Ake - I can only deduce that you don't really want to discuss the issue. That you only want folks to agree with you. If so - why start the thread in the first place ?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: frogprince
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 06:08 PM

Or could it be, Akenaton, that quite a few of us have already found our opinions well expressed by other members, and haven't bothered to line up to be told that we are "out of our minds".

"the majority of pedophiles are heterosexual males"

Do you, in fact, believe that pedophilia is discernibly more common among homosexual males? If so, can you support that belief?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST, Ebbie
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 07:47 PM

It appears that Ake is not interested in facts, only in airing his fears. Ake, please don't get all self righteous here. We - every single one of us - wants to keep children safe as much as you do - yours is not the only view in how to do that.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 08:58 PM

Exactly Ebbie. Well said.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 26 Jun 06 - 11:52 PM

flamenco ted,
When you talk about two heterosexual men being foster parents to a young girl, are you talking about a real-world situation or are you making up a hypothetical question? If the later, why bother? We'll deal with it when it happens. If the former, are you supposing that these two guys are forming a single economic and social unit? Being a family, in other words? Or are they roommates? Are they both signing the adoption papers, or what? Really, your question has too many possible variables to be talked about coherently.

Akenaton,
Sorry, dude, it's you that's obsessed with the homosexual act. I don't think about it at all unless someone like you starts spreading your uninformed opinions around and I get sucked into a conversation about it before I figure out they're too set in their ways to even bother defending their posts. If you think you're not obsessed with the homosexual act, why did you start a thread about people who are only different than you in that they sleep with members of the same sex? How about another substitution game: everywhere you said "homosexual" in your first post, just say "people who sleep with members of the same sex".

I ask you yet again, how is this whole thread not about the homosexual act?

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 03:11 AM

John P,
       Nice smokescreen sir! You deflected my question rather well there.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 04:40 AM

Apologies to all..

"As I've said before, I hope I am wrong, but I think before too long most of you will have cause to eat your words"

Should have read

As I've said before, I hope I am wrong, but I think before too long most of you will have FURTHER cause to eat your words...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 04:56 AM

Ebbie...It appears by what has been written here, that those employed in the "Social services" are more concerned in keeping their JOBS safe than CHILDREN.

Its a case of "dont rock the boat we may fall in the water"

Here in the UK we see daily examples of Social services abdicating responsibility. Children abused murdered tortured while under "care" and when the truth finally surfaces no one is ever to blame, just sent away for another spot of re-training.

Money does not seem to be a problem here as New Labour have opened the purse strings for political reasons, but has seemed to compound the problem in that no one wants to lose a lucrative job by rocking the PC boat....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 05:12 AM

What this whole thread comes down to is the simple question:

Are homosexuals more likely to be actively paedophile than heterosexuals?

That's answerable only by study of the evidence- proper study, not swapping of anecdotes or linking to fundamentalist hate sites. Until someone comes up with at least a search of the respectable academic literature, the thread is worthless.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 06:47 AM

I agree with the bit about study of evidence, Paul, but I am not sure that it is the whole point of the thread. Ake may have started it with that in mind but it does open up other issues.

We all know that there are no rules to becoming natural parents apart from the usual biological ones so we do get all sorts of unfit people becoming natural parents. What we can do is make very tight and stringent rules about who gets to adopt or foster children.

It has been said over and over again that what we should be doing is making sure that the fostering or adoption is in the childs best interest. I am pretty sure that the social services do their best to make sure that anyone wanting to be involved in childcare undergoes a stringent screening before beeing allowed to. What does strike me as odd about this though, and it is here that I realise I may be opening myself up to accusations of homophobia, is that by the most basic premise a same sex couple simply cannot be best suited.

I don't think that anyone will dispute the statement that the best environment to bring up a child in a stable family environment with input from both a mother and a father. Equaly, to ensure that the child does not encounter problems when at school or in later life, as much as possible should be done to protect them from discrimination and bullying. Putting them in an envornment where they are missing one of the major forces in their life and where they may become the subject of scorn or ridicule is not a good idea. And if you want to see examples of how they will become examples of scorn or ridicule you only need to look at some of the posts in this thread.

OK - So the child with same sex parents will not grow up homophobic. There are better ways to teach him that. The child may get as much love as from a hetrosexual couple. But will she ever have the pleasure of sharing a biology with Mum?

We must always have the best interests of the child at heart. We cannot do much about the thousands of children who are born into loveless or disfunctional families. We can make sure that those who are put up for adoption or fostering go into the best pssible environment. That means putting them into an environemnt that is considered right by the majority of people. Not one that is only considered right by a handful. Please don't use children in experiments!

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 07:12 AM

Ake,

   I take it you are in the UK. Are the workers overloaded with cases? Do you know anything about that? I think that your thoughts about social services are unrealistic at best but I am in the US and can only speak for how the services are here. I don't know one social worker here who would knowingly put a child in harm's way, EVER. I do know that the red tape the courts have is PHENOMINAL and sometimes there is nothing a social worker can do except to present information to the judge and she is then bound by law to see it carried through. I once had a case of a little boy who was not yet school age who had been placed in foster care and was thriving. His mother was given a list of parenting courses she must attend and certain goals to meet before her son would be returned to her. As the case worker, I had to transport and supervise all visits this woman had with the young child. She was mean, neglectful and had very little interest in actually taking care of the child. She wanted him at home because she received child support for him and didn't receive it while the child was a ward of the state. I also had the chance to observe his foster home environment on MANY, MANY occassions (think almost daily). The woman completed the list of things the judge mandated that she do and a placement hearing was held. I presented my findings. The judge overlooked the fact that she let the child sleep in a pee soaked bed, that her attentions were elsewhere and a bunch of other things that I can't go into and he returned the child to her care.

Let me tell you, that tore me up. I was sick with worry about this boy and eventually quit my job because I couldn't live with knowingly having placed a child somewhere where I felt he wasn't safe.

Don't talk about social workers not caring or shutting up to not rock the boat...that's not how it is. And making big bucks? Not in the US pal. I could have made more money working at a factory job without the responsibility of someone's life in my hands. As a social worker, I've worked in beyond disgusting conditions, have been given thanks from my clients with offers of homemade tatoos and tickets to an all male review, have had iron grates from a gas stove thrown at me, been kicked, bitten, hit, spit on, snotted on, hair ripped out of my head and had a gun drawn. All but the gun were done by children...don't talk to me about social workers not caring. Just how long would YOU stick it out? What would YOU do to help the children?

None of that matters....I didn't leave my job because of the things in the last paragraph but rather of heartbreak and frustration about having to see a child go somewhere that wasn't safe. Maybe you raise a different breed of social worker in the UK.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 07:18 AM

DtG,

You wrote:

"OK - So the child with same sex parents will not grow up homophobic. There are better ways to teach him that. The child may get as much love as from a hetrosexual couple."

If it's a loving, safe environment, what's the issue? If indeed there are so many folks out there who have issues with same sex couples fostering a child, why aren't they volunteering to be foster parents? The child may have been placed with a same sex couple (which is sure to get a lot of whining from some) because they were an approved foster home...simple as that. This particular placement was a bad one, I'll give you that BUT it's bad due to the behaviors on individuals, not due to the behaviors of the labelled group.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 07:52 AM

If it's a loving, safe environment, what's the issue?

None at all from me, Michelle. But a lot of people do have issues with it. Why place a child in any controversial environment if you don't have to? In 30 or 40 or 50 years maybe attitudes will have changed enough for everyone to accept gay partnerships. Maybe technology will give us a way for the child to have a real mum and dad. Until then, as I said before, why experiment with children?

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 07:59 AM

Like I said, perhaps there are not enough "straight" foster homes. Would you rather a child be in a dangerous situation with biologial parents or in a same sex home where the child is safe? It's a no brainer. I don't think it's experimental at all.

I know a family of 2 lesbians and a child. I asked one day, rather boldly, now that Jessie was in daycare and was more active with children who had a mommy and a daddy, how did they explain their living situation to her? What they said made perfect sense to me. They told Jessie that some families have a mommy and a daddy, some families only have a mommy, some only have a daddy, some have 2 mommies and some have 2 daddies...and all of them love their children just the same. What else needs to be said?

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: MMario
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 08:15 AM

you know - this would have been far less of an issue a couple generations ago when extended families were far more common. It wasn't unusual to find several generations or several couples of one generation sharing a household and responsibility for the young. so the "nuclear family" was less defined.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 08:30 AM

Like I said, perhaps there are not enough "straight" foster homes.

If you could convince me that was true then I may agree. But I would need a lot of convincing. I know for certain that childcare, in the UK anyway, is under the control of governmental authorities who are obliged to possitively discriminate towards minority groups. The reasons behind possitive discrimination are all very laudable but the reverse of the coin is negative discrimination against the majority. Maybe the reason that there are not enough 'straight' foster homes is that they feel discouraged from participating by that discrimination? I know whenever I get a job application form asking for my race, colour, creed or sexual disposition I always write straight across it "WHAT DOES IT MATTER". Funny thing is I have never had an interview for any of those jobs.

Back to the subject in hand though. I cannot agree strongly enough that same sex couples can be every bit as loving and caring as anyone else. I agree completely with the sentiments of your friends in your last post. Until the majority of people accept and agree that standpoint though we cannot afford to risk moving our children from an environment with one set of problems just to put them in an environment with another. It will come. Only 50 years ago the black people in both our countries did not have the same rights as the white population. In another 50 years, hopefuly less, people will stop being predudicial towards people with a different sexual orientation.

Until that time though I say, once again, that children should not be placed in a situation that can be deemed, by a lot of people, to be anything other than perfectly normal.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 08:31 AM

good point, MMario.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 08:44 AM

DtG

".. perhaps there are not enough "straight" foster homes. ..If you could convince me that was true then I may agree."

The Dept of Community Services website in Sydney says: Currently, there is a national shortage of foster carers.

FosterClub USA comments: Between 1984 and 1993, the number of children in foster care has increased by 61 percent, while the number of non-relative foster parents available to care for children steadily declined. The result has been a shortage of foster parents to care for these youth.

This recent article from the Independent says:
Shortage of foster parents leaves children unsettled
By Maxine Frith, Social Affairs Correspondent; 08 May 2006

A chronic shortage of foster parents means that some children in care are being forced to move up to three times a year, research has shown.
An extra 10,000 foster carers are needed to plug gaps in the service, campaigners say.

Are you convinced, DtG?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 08:47 AM

Not convinced at all, Freda. Did you read what I said about possitive discrimination?

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:08 AM

Sorry - didn't mean to be as dismissive as that last remark came across on a re-read!

I should realy explain how possitive discrimination works. Lets put some figures to it. If, for instance, a representative area of 1 million people has 50% hetrosexual white couples, 30% hetrosexual black couples, 15% homosexual white couples and 5% homosexial black couples then governmental guidlines say that this proporton MUST be reflected in the number of foster parents being 'taken on'. There are very strict rules on this and heaven help the departmental head who breaks them!

So, say we need 100 foster homes. It means that 50 of them must be hetrosexual white. 30 of them must be hetrosexual black. 15 0f them must be homosexual white and 5 must be homosexual black. So far so good?

OK - we have now had the full allocation of 50 hetro white couples. But only 12 hetro white, only 3 homo white and only 1 homo black have applied. Where do we get the rest from? The rules say that, even if there are another 50 hetro white couples waiting they cannot be taken on.

All governments are full of these ridiculous policies. They impose these restrictions for the best of reasons but they seldom work. Before saying that there are not enough people fostering we need a realy hard look at these ludicrous rules.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:10 AM

Sorry again - the 12 hetro white should read 12 hetro black.

Mea culpa.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:12 AM

you can take a horse to water..

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:34 AM

No probs, DtG, but here is some more info on the shortage of carers:

(".. perhaps there are not enough "straight" foster homes. ..If you could convince me that was true then I may agree.")


The Borough of Telford & Wrekin held two information days in the town centre to raise awareness of the desperate shortage of foster carers both locally and nationally as part of the celebrations to mark Foster Care Fortnight 2005 (9th May to 22nd May). There is a national shortage of almost 10,000 foster carers, which means that the lives of looked after children are unnecessarily disrupted by moving from home to home. A wider pool of carers would increase the chance of finding the right foster family for the 50,000 children who need fostering on any one day. (from the Telford council website)

Foster Care Fortnight is taking place this year from 8-21 May 2006. It is organised by the National charity, the Fostering Network. The aim is to highlight the shortage of foster carers in the UK. The charity estimates that almost 50,000 children live with foster families on any given day in the UK and that a further 10,000 foster carers are needed. (from the Bristol City Council website)

A chronic shortage of foster parents means that some children in care are being forced to move up to three times a year, research has shown.
An extra 10,000 foster carers are needed to plug gaps in the service, campaigners say. The Fostering Network is calling on the Government to invest an extra £750m in the service to recruit, train and retain more carers. (from the Child Rights Information Network)

The Fostering Network in Scotland is launching Foster Care Fortnight today with news of a shortfall of almost 1,700 foster families across Scotland. ..The survey of 32 local authorities shows that almost one in three (30%) of children and young people in foster care in Scotland are moved more than three times in their first year in foster care. In England the figure is almost one in eight (13%). The survey also shows that one in every four children going into foster care in Scotland will be in a foster family which already cares for four or more children. Six per cent of children will be going into a foster family caring for six or more. This extraordinary situation occurs in Scotland because legislation is not in place to regulate the number of foster placements.

Bryan Ritchie, Director of the Fostering Network in Scotland said:
'These are our most needy children and whilst the foster care service is working miracles everyday we desperately need more people to come forward.'

..Emma Davies, FCA placement officer for the Cymru region, comments; "There is a national shortage of 10,000 foster carers across the UK, with around 750 of these being needed throughout Wales. ..

THE FOSTERING NETWORK IS CALLING ON THE GOVERNMENT TO INVEST AN EXTRA £750M IN THE SERVICE TO RECRUIT, TRAIN AND RETAIN MORE CARERS.

DtG, I think this info demonstrates there is a huge shortage of foster carers in the UK. Looking after kids is a difficult task even with your own children, let alone anyone else's. Social workers dealing with placements are the meat in the sandwich between the needs of the children and the lack of government funding for carers. It's a hard burden to bear.

freda

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:37 AM

There aren't enough foster homes in the US at all. There are children being placed in residential centers for lack of foster homes or worse yet, being left at home.

What I find ironic is that children are being placed in foster homes in many situations when the best thing in the world would be to remove the offending adult. Why move the child away from his/her family, home, friends and everything they know and love (when they have done nothing)so abusive daddy can sit at home in his recliner having a beer and watching football? Why not ship the abuser elsewhere, let his/her world be upheaved. It's almost like the kids are being punished twice.

Of course, in some situations, it is a one adult home or maybe both the adults (or more...as I have seen) are the offenders and the child would be left at home alone...that won't work. Still, the offending parties should be moved out too.

Kudos to the UK if there is not a shortage of foster homes....it's not that way here.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:43 AM

Dave,

   I think you are mistaken. Here is a link to the Child Rights Information Network from the UK and an article that states quite the opposite of what you have posted, foster homes are not abundant.

Child Rights Information Network


Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:47 AM

Michelle

my post of 09:34 AM had a quote from that site, and several others, all confirming the huge shortage of foster carers in the UK.

freda

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:53 AM

Another thing we're contending with here is that 'Good news is no News'

The Children with foster carers of any ilk who grow up normal won't make the headlines. We wiill only hear about those when either they or their carers do something vile.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,RB
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 09:54 AM

Having read this whole discussion, I agree that it doesn't seem like there's much actual consideration of other views (on either side of the discussion) going on, but I feel I should put in my two cents anyway...
1)I was raised by two heterosexuals, but had quite a few gay friends in school (I'm female, and they were lesbians). They never made a pass at me once. They knew I wasn't interested, and frankly, they weren't interested in me that way either. Just as a heterosexual person is not required to make a pass at every person of the opposite gender they see, neither is a homosexual person required to make a pass at every person of the same gender they see. That's just common sense, and I've seen plenty of proof to uphold it.

2)My husband and I were accused by some very bigoted firefighters of harming our child because they happened to see some swords hanging on the walls and candles in the basement. They assumed that we were satanists, and that this naturally meant we were bad parents. Luckily, not only did the social worker follow up on these claims, as absurd as they were, but she had the common sense not to follow the same faulty logic. At least in the US, I think social workers for the most part do as they are supposed to by law, and that is follow up every claim of child molestation or abuse, and investigate it thoroughly, and make a decision based on those observations.
Apparently in this case, those observations were wrong, but as has been mentioned above, pedophiles, like other repeat criminals, are good at covering their tracks.

3)I know a pair of homosexuals who are currently raising a foster child. They are very good and very loving parents with no thought in their heads of ever abusing the child in question (who is the same gender as they are), and in fact ARE a better choice than the biological parents (who are very much unable to raise the child, and uninterested in doing so properly). However, because the court is more interested in the child being with biological relatives than being in a good home, the child will probably end up with the biological parents after all, and will probably be abused and neglected, given their current track record.

4) In response to a much earlier post, Yes, there is a difference between biological parents and foster parents, but I suspect that what you meant was that biological is better. It entirely depends on the situation. Sometimes foster parents are better, no matter what their sexual orientation is. Sometimes they aren't. But I wouldn't make any kind of generalization regarding foster/biological, gay/straight, color of skin, religion, or gender, because it simply isn't something you can generalize about. Every family is different, and every family has its own problems.

5)sure, it's hard to explain to the child or for the child to explain to other children how they come to have two mothers or two fathers instead of the "normal" one of each, but these days it's just as hard to explain how one comes to have two of each or two of one and one of another, or no parents at all but a grandparent. Any of these situations is becoming more and more prevalent, so someday it may be harder for the kid with one of each to explain why that's the case.

Just for clarification, when I say "you", I'm referring to those who don't agree with my viewpoint, of which there seem to be a few.

And I do agree that it's a little silly to complain that people aren't agreeing with you, when you post something this bigoted to a list that is predominantly made up of relatively liberal people. Libertarian is not, in fact, synonymous with Liberal, as I think most of us know.
It's even sillier to say something like that when most of the people here seem to be doing their best to be open-minded and to have a good discussion, rather than a bitch session, despite you occasionally responding in an argumentative rather than discussionary way.
My two cents (or more like 20).
-RB

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 10:05 AM

I agree - there is a shortage of foster homes. What I am saying is that it is a self imposed shortage. Let the authorities remove the ridiculous quotas they impose and let us see if there is a shortage then. Do you have any figures for how many 'majority' couples are being turned down because the quotas for 'minorities' are not being filled? I doubt that the authorities in question would admit to any but when asked if their quota of minorities is filled they will gleefuly tell you they are!

Let us not move too far from the point though - and it is me that is most guilty of that at the moment! What we need to concentrate on is putting these unfortunate children in consistant, good-quality care. I simply want to point out that while allowing gay couples to adopt and foster can be an option it is, at the moment, far from ideal. You have seen yourselves on this very page peoples attitudes to gay couples.

Imagine that attitude being passed on to the foster children. "Oh, the poor little mites. Fancy them being under the care of those perverts..." Can't you just see it? Sorry, by all means let us try and change this attitude, but don't see gay adoption as the only solution. I believe the system as it stands is very flawed and can easily be mended to find many more carers.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 10:51 AM

Dave,
You seem to be saying that we should make social policy that will protect the closed world view of negatively judgmental people. Should we also prevent black folks from being foster parents to non-black kids? I can easily imagine as much negative feedback from many communities. What about allowing pagans to be foster parents? Don't you think there are many places where most of the community would find that reprehensible?

Did you notice that discrimination against black folks went way down and mostly underground when we finally got some laws passed that made it illegal, and were able to integrate the military? We were suddenly able to raise a generation of kids who didn't find it acceptable to be openly racially bigoted. What would happen if gays were allowed in the military (so potential dads were able to get to know them), were given the full rights of citizenship, and there were laws enforcing equal treatment?

My personal belief is that they should test potential foster and adoptive parents for bigotry. Lets stop raising new ones.

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 10:54 AM

Dave,

Cast your mind back 25 years or so, to the time when the only people allowed to adopt or foster were hetero couples in stable relationships.

Indeed, the time when there were no officially recognised same sex couples, as it was illegal.

There were massive shortages of foster parents, with thousands of children in institutional care all over the country.

Do you really believe that the relaxation of strictures to allow fostering by previously banned individuals brought, in its wake, a sudden huge increase in the number of hetero couples wanting to foster.

I think your (perhaps understandable) misgivings about same sex couples fostering is blinding you to the truth that there have never been enough foster parents available, and what you see as positive discrimination is, in fact, nothing of the sort.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 11:17 AM

John and Don. Nowhere in any of my posts have I suggested

- we should make social policy that will protect the closed world view of negatively judgmental people

- that the relaxation of strictures to allow fostering by previously banned individuals

All I said was that I am not convinced by Michelles comment Like I said, perhaps there are not enough "straight" foster homes.

I accept fully that there are not enough foster homes available. What I am saying is that the shortage of "straight foster homes" is down to possitive discrimination and quota restrictions by authorities. If these policies were lifted there may, and I only go as far as may, be more carers available. To use a self imposed shortage as an excuse to explore other avenues is not, in my book, playing fair.

I must say I realy do like the idea of testing for bigotry:-) Perhaps we could expand it as well. As I said earier a child needs a mother and a father. I would not exclude female fathers or male mothers from this! Perhaps we can test for maternal and paternal instincts as well. As long as the child gets a balanced view on life does it realy matter what parent does what? I'm sure there are many mothers out there who are better footballers than their husbands. And plenty of fathers who would love to play with dolls. No, not that sort!

I am still convinced that while homophobia is as rife as it seems to be it is unfair on the child to place them in that situation though:-( Would you be happy to send a child to live on a white farm in Zimbabwe? Or to an Arab settlement in Israel? A bit extreme I know but if you would not subject them to one type of attack why subject them to any?

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 11:56 AM

I still think you are missing the point Dave.

Do you agree that children are no more likely to be abused by homosexual carers than by heterosexual, as homosexuals are no more likely to be active paedophiles than straights?

I will certainly agree that children should be given the best possible environment; indeed, I blame my own parents for the inadequate family situatuion, as it didn't leave me sufficient financial independence. I have to work. But there are too few potential carers for all to be perfect. Therefore all we should ask is that they are about as good as the population at large. All the evidence suggests that they are, on the whole, considerably better.

Yes, placing children in care puts them at risk of abuse. That's the way our society is. Leaving other children in their "natural" home also puts them at risk of abuse. Not to mention cases in which physical or sexual abuse is swapped for emotional abuse- remember that there are other ways of damaging a child, just as destructive.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 12:04 PM

Do you agree that children are no more likely to be abused by homosexual carers than by heterosexual

No, not at all, Paul. In fact I said in my opening post that I wasn't sure if this was why the thread was started but it did, to me, open up other questions - Like the ones I have raised. I do however think it is more likely that children brought up by gay parents will be subject to more abuse from other people than those brought up in 'straight' families. Simply because of the fact that their parents are gay. I don't think it fair to place that burden on a child un-necessarily.

And I blame my parents as well. If they had only let me be born rich I am sure I would be doing something better with my time;-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 12:10 PM

Sorry - I'm having a bad day aren't I! I missed the 'no' in your question. Which means, yes I do agree. I think. :-~ I'm confused now! What I mean is I believe that there are child abusers on both buses! No more on one than on the other, percentage wise, I would guess.

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: MMario
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 12:11 PM

As far as abuse from peers - kids who want to abuse other kids find something to pick on others about regardless of the situation - I've seen kids picked on for:

both following and not following fashion trends;
being a single child,
for NOT being a single child,
for being the youngest in the family,
for being the oldest in the family,
for being the single girl in a family of boys,
for being the child of a single mom,
for being the child of parents who have NEVER been divorced or seperated
for having moved too many times
for having NEVER moved
colour of hair
colour of eyes
colour of their PET!
having a pet
not having a pet

face it - many kids are cruel, vicious beasts. I think they get it from their parents.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 01:04 PM

How about there aren't enough foster homes for the amount of children who need placement? I'm not happy with my "there aren't enough straight homes" comment...because what my point is, is that perhaps a safe placement is a safe placement is a safe placement...I don't agree with your comment about there being a shortage on purpose or the like...homes are sought for children and when they are found, it's a big sigh of relief for everyone involved...foster homes are hard to come by (for many reasons), period. I don't believe and have never run across a situation where a child is being beaten by his biological parents and social services says, Hmmm...sure would be nice to place that kid in a home...too bad we'll have to wait for one of the homosexual placements to open up...it's not a quota kind of thing. If a family has passed all clearances, they are approved to be a foster parent...single, married, living together, gay, straight...whatever...a safe placement of the child is the most important thing.

Michelle

PS. I absolutely agree with Mmario.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 01:26 PM

I thoughtI had made it clear that I don't subscribe to your idea that positive discrimination is the reason for allowing fostering by same sex couples, Dave.

I repeat, the shortage existed before single sex fostering was legal, and I see no evidence to suggest that the removal of single sex households would suddenly bring forth more hetero foster parents. It would IMHO put many children back into institutional care, which has its own history of systematic abuse, as a visit to any newspaper archive will easily confirm.

Children have suffered abuse at times in every conceivable environment, and it is wrong to seize on one case and extrapolate from that the kind of general conclusion you are asking us to accept.

Sorry mate, it just doesn't wash for me.

DonT.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 01:49 PM

Aye Dave...You and I have had a few battles in the past, but you've got my point exactly....Just put it over much better than I could.

The Phrase you used was "why experiment with children" and thats what same sex parenting is ...an experiment.
Well I wouldn't have wanted my boys to be part of such an experiment,
and I bet none of the lynch mob would either.

Regarding whether male homosexuals are more likely to abuse children than hetro sexual males, there must be statistics somewhere which takes percentages into account.
Further up the thread some dumbo said that "as there are more "straight" abusers than "gay", straight people should by banned from fostering. As i would guess the ratio of "straight" foster parents to "gay" ones will be in the hundreds to one, this piece of "wisdom" is quite worthless

The fact that homosexual couple, in a very small pool of homosexual foster parents abused children so vilely must say something statistically....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Jim
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 02:01 PM

As DtG said,"I do however think it is more likely that children brought up by gay parents will be subject to more abuse from other people than those brought up in 'straight' families. Simply because of the fact that their parents are gay. I don't think it fair to place that burden on a child un-necessarily."

We could use the same argument for not allowing those with cleft pallets or other disabilities to foster. Do you feel that little people or obese peopleshould be allowed to foster? I feel that because something about foster parents is more likely to subject the child to abuse from bigots is no reason to prevent them from fostering or adopting.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 02:03 PM

Aaaaarrrgggg! Must be me coz everyone else seems to be reading things into my posts that aren't there! I apologise and assume I am indeed having a bad English day!

Michelle I neither said nor implied that anyone waits for a gay household to become available. The quota thing isn't about placements its about having the same proportions represented as there are sections in the community. Because they do not have enough of one part they cannot recruit any more carers. From any quarter of the community.

Don. My idea isn't that possitive discrimination is the reason for allowing fostering by same sex couples. What I am trying, obviously badly, to get across is that possitive discrimination could be the reason for the shortage in the first place. Like you said yourself, 25 years ago these barriers stopped whole sections of the community becoming carers altogether. When they dropped them what they should have done was encouraged recruitment of carers from the entire gammut of society. What did they do instead? Decide to recruit from specific sections to redress the balance. It just doesn't work does it? Surely this is proven by the shortage. In this day and age of mass marketing and multi media surely they can get the message across that fostering is for everyone. Yet have you ever seen the forms required for fostering?

Yep, you have guessed it. Whole swathes of questions about race, colour, religion and sexual orientation. You know, the type I write "WHAT DOES IT MATTER?" across. It was enough to put me off. I am sure I am not the only one either.

I hope I have made clear what I am saying - If not I think i will have a rest and start again with a new head tomorrow!

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 02:20 PM

Being gay has nothing to do with the propensity to abuse children
A child in a straight foster home with an adult male is much more likely to be abused.
"Sexual abuse of children is almost always committed by men"
Logic dictates then that men should not be allowed to care for children.
the majority of pedophiles are heterosexual males.....

Such a display of statistical illiteracy in one thread (though in TIA's case the error may have been made tongue in cheek to expose it).

(1) You should make clear if you speak about absolute numbers or percentages. Absolute numbers are often very misleading. Of course, trivially the majority of pedophiles are heterosexual males because there are so much more of them than homosexual males. Trivially true but completely irrelevant (no wonder, Ake didn't feel like pointing out the obvious reasoning error implicit in that statement).

(2) You should not mix up relative risk increase and absolute risk increase. Relative risk increase can be extremely high on a very low absolute level. That error is made (pointed out?) by TIA ("logic dictates then..."). The probability that a child is abused by a male (foster) parent is much higher than it being abuse by a female (foster) parent. That's a relative risk increase by a factor of ten or more. But this alone is not a good basis for a policy if the absolute risk increase is extremely low. In other words, the probability given that a child was abused that the perpetrator was male, is very high. The probability that given a person was male that he'll abuse children is very low.

I see some disputing numbers because they fear if they don't dispute them that a policy they would not wish for would be adopted. These are two extremely different things. One is an argument on the basis of facts and the other is an argument about what should we do knowing facts. Let's assume for the sake of the argument that male homosexual couples are relatively more likely to abuse children (assumed fact). Should follow from that assumed fact that we should generally disallow male homosexual foster parents. Not at all, if the absolute risk increase is still very low.

For instance we still allow males as teachers though we know that the relative risk increase is very high compared to female teachers for the absolute risk increase is still low. By far, most teacher perpetrators (sexual abuse) are males but also by far most male teachers are not perpetrators.

So even a higher relative risk alone is usually not used as a basis for discrimination (in this example, of male teachers). I have seen no good argument from Ake why it should be used in this particular case (male foster couples). But some of the counter argumenters have assumed without good (or any) reason that there is no relative risk increase (Being gay has nothing to do with the propensity to abuse children) at all. The motivation I see for such statements is the fear that if that was wrong a wrong policy would necessarily follow.

There is no good basis for LilyFestre's claim. I link to a fairly recent abstract here. There are several similar data of that kind. But keep in mind that this is on a very low level of absolute risk increase.

There is one counter argument to such data which may or may not convince you: Being homosexual is defined as being attracted to same sex adults. A male abuser of a male child is quite often not interested in adult males. Therefore he is not a homosexual (in the above definition). People using this definition of homosexuality of course can make the statistical claims repeated by Lilyfestre. But such statements are not very helpful in this context. If one would define heterosexuality in a similar way (attracted to other sex adults), some of the statements in this thread also would have to be considered as completely wrong for male heterosexual (in the broader sense) child abusers are often not interested in sex with mature women.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 02:28 PM

The experimenting with children bit...if you think about it, if you have children, your first child was an experiment...putting a child in a safe home with a man and a woman, a man and a man, a woman and a woman...whatever, it might not be conventional BUT it doesn't mean it's wrong or those in a same sex relationship can't be good parents. It's not an experiment, it's an alternative to a rotten home...someplace where they can be safe.

So let's try and balance this out....DTG...would you rather see a child who is being beaten, sexually abused or severely neglected stay in such a situation or take the "risk" of putting them in a same sex partnership home? You people are talking in circles and making no sense whatsoever.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 02:56 PM

would you rather see a child who is being beaten, sexually abused or severely neglected stay in such a situation or take the "risk" of putting them in a same sex partnership home?

That's a complete no brainer - neither. I want to put them into a completely safe environment with no un-nesessary risks at all. Why should the only choices be risky ones? Surely it's that that makes no sense isn't it? It's a bit like saying do you like your children fried or boiled! Give me a real choice and I will be happy to make it.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: catspaw49
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 03:07 PM

Karen and I have fostered about 40 kids and were at it for about 12 years. We, like many active foster parents eventually suffered from burn-out. We would be back at it again now were it not for health issues, but as those resolve we may start again. We are also adoptive parents and in '96 our family was named as one of the six Outstanding Adoptive/Foster Families in Ohio.....That was nice, but it didn't matter but it was pleasant to be noticed for a good job.   Like social workers, there are far too few foster parents and the best work hard at it and many of them, like Karen and I, burnout.

The foster parents that rarely do well are the ones who believe that love and/or a better home environment with more $$$ will conquer all. Most kids in the system want to go home, even when the home is abusive/filthy/etc.,etc. We loved our kids and some we were sorry to see move on.....others, well, it was party time. I was a foster parent trainer doing training in FDAS and Attachment Disorders, a subject we were all too familiar with. I say all this to offer up that I do know of what I speak and I have put my money where my mouth is.

Foster parents undergo background screening and checks that include things most of us would not normally agree to. We have days and days of initial training and are required 12-36 hours a year to retain a license. All of this can vary from state to state and from agency to agency so some people slip through the cracks....a sad and many times tragic thing. But I never knew people in charge of foster care programs who didn't try to do all within their means to insure good homes/parents.

In my first post I sarcastically suggested that we license biological parents, but were it in my power I would do so. While no amount of testing, screening, and training, would make everyone a competent parent of any sort, the real problems start at the level of the biologic family. Yet our laws still include (even after great changes/advances made in recent years regarding the best interest of the child) lines like, "Parents are entitled to their children as they are their other property." Other property.......Kids and dishware are equals in every state! Isn't that nice now? Christalmighty............

Sadly, it does seem to take an entire village to raise a child but it wouldn't if so many in the village weren't assholes. Ask any social worker though....A great foster placement will not harm a child will it? They will tell you that even if they remove a child for the best of reasons including physical safety, damage is done as soon as the child goes into care. They are now different and we are a herd species. One of our kids was told they could not date a classmate because the clasmate's parent said no....they were a "foster kid." Ain't that some crappola?

But knowing that we try to do our best for the children in care and that means trying to find the best possible home the first time. Kids who move between homes do worse....statistical fact. The real questions are can the home provide the structure and understanding (and discipline and love) for that particular child. And now you come to that point where you do the best with what you have. Sometimes that means a home that is not perfect. But no one that I have ever known places kids in situations where they think the odds for failure are high (forget about abuse)......The best interest of the child is first. For awhile we operated an emergency home to have kids for a few days until the best possible placemment was made.

Sorry.....I'm off topic here.................But this entire topic is ridiculous.   We don't have enough foster families. We don't have enough minority foster families of any sort We don't have enough adoptive families of any sort. What we do have are kids in trouble and in danger and laws that still remain archaic at best. We have a social service system that is overloaded and underfunded and a jackass in Washington who knows zip about it. At the state and municipal level we have some good people but still too many local judges and other politicos interpreting what they think is in the best interest. Most of them have never seen the trenches from the trench level and are of no real help.........four juvenile judges in my county, only one worth a damn.

Gay/Striaght/African/Asian/Indian/Blue Eyed/Brown Eyed........I don't care. Can they do the job?

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: MMario
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 03:16 PM

bravo! Bravo! bravissimo!

Molto bravissimo!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 03:24 PM

Nice to know the poltico's of all nations have one thing in common, spaw. They are all idiots!

And I cannot fault a word you say. The cause of the shortage is political - Perhaps not exactly in the way I suggest, though I still say that is part of it, but political all the same.

Thanks for injecting a modicum of common sense. Now will you bugger of and do some farting like usual:-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: freda underhill
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 08:01 PM

Onya 'Spaw.
The cause of the shortage is political, it's also because its a demanding, burnout job, and it has nothing to do with positive discrimination.

There is no evidence that a policy of positive discrimination has anything to do with the shortage of foster parents.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,TIA
Date: 27 Jun 06 - 10:52 PM

On the nosey Wolfgang!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Barry Finn
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 01:08 AM

Bush's pet "Head Start" is slowly in decline bacause it hasn't received any budget increases, I believe for a couple years running now. So as the cost go up so don't the cuts. So much for underfunding "No Child Left Behind". It's not just about child education, it's not just about child welfare & it's not just about child protection, it's about not putting the freeze on children now & thawing them out later.
Barry

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 03:48 AM

Dave : "The cause of the shortage is political ".

Disagree. The shortage is because most parents know that foster care is a very difficult task in many cases. I never even considered it, as I lack the necessary skills, and would have feared the possible harm to my own children. Children needing fostering are often badly damaged, and their behaviour can be almost intolerable.

It's not surprising that there is a shortage, and that only strongly- motivated people will apply to do it. It's the job of the agencies to decide whether that motivation is truly parental love, or whether other motivations like financial gain or sexual predation are involved.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 04:47 AM

I am still convinced that the politics of the situation, both lack of support and possitive discrimination, are adding to the shortage but I will also accept Paul's point. One thing we can all agree on though. There is a shortage. Remember that I started on this road originaly saying that I would need some convincing that there is not enough 'straight' foster homes? Well, I am duly convinced that there are not enough foster homes. I am still not convinced however that the word 'straight' has anything to do with it. I still also know that positive discrimination plays a big part in deciding who is employed by government agencies. I have been there, done that and bought the T-shirt. It is one of the reasons I left local governmnet in 1976. I have seen no evidence that anything has got any better since.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 05:28 AM

Excellent post Wolfgang, though I'm not too sure how many of the "lynch mob" would understand what you say, or even wish to think in a reasoning fashion.

Reason often brings up many unpalatable truths.

To those who are pro homosexual fostering ....Just keep repeating ...Percentages...Percentages ...Percentages It will come ...I promise it will...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 06:57 AM

The word straight really doesn't have anything to do with it, it's about safe homes and the lack of them for children. Period.

And sure, Wolfgang's post is an excellent academic post...too bad it's not grounded in reality. Work in the real world of social work and foster care for half the time I have and then let's talk.

Michelle

PS. Spaw...three cheers for you....there aren't many people out there like you and the world needs many more!

PSS. Paul...EXACTLY!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 10:41 AM

"To those who are pro homosexual fostering ....Just keep repeating ...Percentages...Percentages ...Percentages It will come ...I promise it will...Ake "

When extrapolating from a single known case.... What bloody percentages?

If one astronaut abuses a child(a more exclusive group than gays, certainly), would you consider astronauts a risk?

No, you would not!

Sorry Dave and Ake,but you are demonstrating a high degree of bias against gays, no matter how you wrap it up in a cloak of concern.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 11:09 AM

Sorry Dave and Ake,but you are demonstrating a high degree of bias against gays

How so for me, Don? I cannot speak for Ake becasue I know neither him or his motives. Genuinely interested for myself though because I have repeated over and over that being gay does not mean you are likely to abuse children. I have stated on any number of occasions that gay parents can and likely will be very good parents. I have gone further and stated quite categoricaly that while a child needs both a mother and father role model it does not matter what sex that mother and father are.

The only thing I have ever shown concern for is that predjudiced people are more likely to 'pick on' the children of gay couples and the fact that authorities using positive discrimination are causing more harm than good.

Please tell me in what way does that show any degree of bias against gays.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 11:51 AM

Paul has raised a point how can we be critical of the social services system? they have such a difficult task. The applicants are so few, and the potential for harm to the children if wrong foster parent selection made so great. Regardless of gender, racial, lifestyle and other ethical questions, how can we protect the child without checks and balances?

Trying to put myself in the position of selecting a suitable foster parent and making a final selection would be very hard. I could not imagine the horror of dealing with the knowledge I put an already damaged child in the care of abusers, or into a family that is dysfunctional in any way. The very thought that I made an error in judgment would haunt me for the rest of my life. You absolutely would not want me as the judge serving sentence on you if you were the predator who used the social services to procure a victim. Mercy would not be in my vocabulary that day.

Yours, Aye. Dave

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 12:25 PM

Come on Don, you are being quite unfair to Dave who has never shown any bias in any of his posts.

You are correct to say that I am against male homosexuals being allowed to foster children and if that is bias well I plead guilty.

However I am not anti-Homosexual, I believe they should be allowed to behave in which ever they choose with other consenting adults.

I mentioned in another post that any and every group of people should not be allowed to foster just because they want to.
I would be against drug users fostering, is that bias against people who use drugs? I dont think so, it is concern for the safety of the children.
I would even be in favour of removing "natural" children from people who are addicted to drugs....Is that bias?

The welfare of the children should come before anything.

There are various other groups which I feel are unsuitable to foster children, but I am not biased against any of them.
Many are struggling hard to come to terms with life....But I echo Dave's words why should we put our children at unnecessary risk .

When mentioning percentages,I was not only alluding to the recent case concerning the foster parents, but sexual abuse of young boys in general by homosexuals.
There was not long ago a huge scandal in the RC church over this.
Surely you read of it and every week we read in the papers of abuse of boys by staff in "care homes" Youth organisations ect.

Also personal memories of the attempted abuse of myself and my young friends by homosexuals, leads me to the conclusion that this form of abuse is much more common than most people care to believe....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 01:30 PM

Oh, don't worry about me, Ake, this happens a lot here. If you disagree with the policies of Israels government you are anti-semetic. If you speak out against the IRA you are anti-Irish. Heaven help you if you say you don't like Rap, Soul or Blues music...

It is far easier to brand people '...ist' or '...phobic' than it is to formulate an answer to some genuine questions or concerns. In real life shit happens. On the Mudcat it is a currency.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 02:00 PM

Yes I agree Dave and I notice since your intervention in this thread most of their posts have been more reasonable.
Even Lilyfesters screeching has become less strident.

I'm disappointed by Don T's view. Don usually talks a lot of sense, but I cant really understand why he thinks we have some alterior motive. Anyway thanks for taking a bit of the "heat" away from me...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 02:29 PM

And if you make blanket, ill-informed statements you're going to get called on it. Life on the Mudcat is tough. Tough, I tell you.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 02:37 PM

Away ye go Ebbie!!   These folk are no' tough.   Screamin' nasty words is the easy way.

Trying to reason with morons is TOUGH....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 02:52 PM

I do try to apply reason to all my opinions, with varying degrees of success, and I hate using ----ist, or ----ophobe to describe people who hold opinions that differ from mine.

However, I consider it unreasonable to generalise about groups of people on insufficient evidence, and I maintain my belief that it is unsafe to conflate the term paedophile with the term homosexual.

It's the old circular argument. "Some dogs are black,and some black dogs bite, therefore black dogs are dangerous".

As to bias, Dave, I refer you to the following, posted by you.

"That's a complete no brainer - neither. I want to put them into a completely safe environment with no un-nesessary risks at all. Why should the only choices be risky ones? Surely it's that that makes no sense isn't it? It's a bit like saying do you like your children fried or boiled! Give me a real choice and I will be happy to make it.

Cheers

DtG"

Can you tell me how this comment can be read so as not to conclude that you consider all same sex foster parents a risk to children?

Ake, those priests were paedophiles, whether the church is prepared to admit it, or not. They WERE homosexual too in the context of a situation where only boys were available. Who knows what the situation might have been, had there been any girls serving at the altar, or singing in the choir?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 03:02 PM

Wolfgang...I've only one tiny pick to make on your great post.

"For instance we still allow males as teachers though we know that the relative risk increase is very high compared to female teachers for the absolute risk increase is still low. By far, most teacher perpetrators (sexual abuse) are males but also by far most male teachers are not perpetrators.

So even a higher relative risk alone is usually not used as a basis for discrimination (in this example, of male teachers). I have seen no good argument from Ake why it should be used in this particular case (male foster couples)."

The difference Wolfgang is in the environment.
I accept that some teachers may abuse their pupils, but the risk is drastically reduced by the classroom environment and the oppertunity of the child to discuss any attempted abuse with his/her peers without the coersion of the abuser.

When a child is introduced into a very private environment under the complete control of two male abusers the risk soars dramatically.

This may seem a simplistic point to you, but I feel its an important difference ...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Barry Finn
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 03:06 PM

Those church scandles were not commited be homosexuals they were commited by PAEDOPHILES. Homosexuals are not commiting crimes against children or against nature, being in love with their own sex that is their sexual orientation. Paedophiles are commiting crimes against children & nature & are sick criminals. They are child predators. Get it straight & get it right, please, for once. Open up & admit that you are predjuice when it come to homosexuals. You are continuing the "WITCH HUNT".

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 03:25 PM

Can you tell me how this comment can be read so as not to conclude that you consider all same sex foster parents a risk to children?

No need to, Don. I do believe it to be a risk and I have made my reasons more than obvious. I think the children of single sex parents are at a higher risk of abuse from OTHER people. I do not see how from this you can infer I am anti-gay. Anti-bigot, certainly. Anti-gay, how so?

Now, perhaps you can explain to me how, out of this single statement, you chose to publicly label me biased against gay people?

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 06:06 PM

I have made my response. Whether you believe my reasons or not is of little consequence but I would be grateful if you would do me the courtesy of a reply.

Many thanks in advance.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 07:37 PM

DtG,

   I know that post wasn't addressed to me but I'd like to tell you how your response comes across to me.

    As a white child (we're talking about as fair as a body can be), I had an aunt who married a black man. They had a child together. He turned out to be lighter than his father, but definately dark skinned. They lived 4 hours away in the big city and I rarely saw them except during the summers when my cousin would come stay for a week or so (ok...big holidays too). My grandmother on my Dad's side of the family would pitch a polite fit. "What will the neighbors say? Oh that poor child, what a predicament they have put him into....it just isn't fair to the child...blah, blah, blah." My cousin had a fine childhood and is now a high ranking officer in the Navy. He tells me that he wasn't picked on anymore than any other child. Sure...he got the name calling...mostly Oreo (black/white) but he maintains that other kids were singled out for other reasons as well...being fat, having pimples, being a jerk, teacher's pet and the list goes on and on as Mmario has pointed out previously. Your post has the same ring of "polite concern." Yeah, I can see your point but I don't think it's a big enough issue to not have same sex families be accepted as foster parents.

I have a friend who has 2 children with different fathers. Both men, after getting married to my friend and being Daddy for a few months, decided that they really couldn't live life as a straight man and both now actively live the life of a homosexual man. The children are 10 and 15 and all their friends know about their dads. They've been picked on some, but not like you would have it portrayed. I would also like to point out that teachers, bus drivers and other people who work with children are very quick to squash that kind of teasing...just as they are with the racist remarks. Yes, I know, kids aren't supervised 100% of the time and some hurtful things will be said...but honestly, if it weren't that, kids would find something else to tease about.

So, yeah...the "polite concern" comes off as covered up bigotry from someone who is trying to save face.

Sorry dude...not trying to be rude...but you asked and I'm doing my best to explain.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 08:35 PM

Sorry for the delay in replying, Dave, but I do occasionally have to devote some time to real life.

I've spent some time going over this thread again,and I DO have to apologise to you. Your objections have all related to the possibilities of ridicule from outside, and not to the orientation of the foster parents.

However, this does seem somewhat naive, given the vast number of reasons why children are teased by their peers.

Why would you single out this one as more serious than any of the others?

During the last fifteen years, working in a primary school, the most common cause of ridicule has been about fashion, more specifically designer trainers. Children whose parents cannot afford £80+ for a pair of Nike or Reebok trainers, which will be outgrown in two to three months, are ridiculed for being poor and ostracised when they turn up in shoes bought in the market.

Is that acceptable risk or should only the very rich be allowed to foster?

Depending on where you draw the line, the number of children in institutional care will be affected, since there is already a shortage of suitable parents, and, as I have said before many children have been abused in municipal carehomes.

In addition, by debarring same sex couples from fostering, you prevent a tiny minority from offending (maybe, but they'll find other ways) at the price of demonising the vast majority, and please don't try to tell me that you don't believe THAT will happen.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: TIA
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 08:39 PM

To Akenaton's absolutely accurate quote:

"When a child is introduced into a very private environment under the complete control of two male abusers the risk soars dramatically...",

I would add:

"When a child is introduced into a very private environment under the complete control of two female abusers the risk soars dramatically...",

and:

"When a child is introduced into a very private environment under the complete control of one femal and one male abuser the risk soars dramatically..."

Surely we are not using "abusers" as an synonym for homosexuals. Are we...?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: frogprince
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 09:27 PM

I submit that it wouldn't be unfair to paraphrase Akenaton like this:

When a child is introduced into a very private environment under the complete control of two potential abusers the risk soars dramatically, in comparison to a situation in which a child is with a potential abuser in plain view of a substantial number of other people.

The real question is still whether homosexual males are, to a significantly greater degree, potential abusers. I think it is fair to say that Akenaton believes that. Now, in all honesty, the study that Wolfgang cited suggests that there is some substance to that allegation. If it is an "academic" study, that doesn't mean it isn't based on occurrences in the "real world". But it's a long, outrageous jump from the numbers in that study to the exclusion of all gay males from foster parenthood.

Is it possible, in the "real world", to be absolutely honest and up-front with gay male foster parents as to looking into their background extra carefully, because those "percentages" are there?
It can never be done without causing some resentment, and casting some shadow of discrimination on many who don't deserve it. But even Akenaton is coming at this with a bias based in some part in unfortunate experience, not in a red-eyed homophobic rage. What is really the "real world" answer that, first and foremost, meets the needs of these poor displaced kids.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: TIA
Date: 28 Jun 06 - 10:11 PM

I agree -- "looking into their background extra carefully" should be done to all persons who will have power over or be alone with children. I get looked at very carefully every year before being allowed to volunteer at school.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Jun 06 - 03:13 AM

Don, thanks for taking the time anyway. I must say I always find it odd that people seem to find plenty of time for posting scurrilous accusations but when asked to justify them they suddenly seem to get a 'real life':-) I guess that is just the way of the 'un'real world...

Anyhow. I accept what you say. Plenty of kids do get picked on for plenty of reasons. I was picked on because I had a Polish name in a 1950s suburban school. My parents changed our name to stop it. I know full well what I am saying is unfair as well but so is the world. I am as sure as I can be of anything that in some years time the situation will be better but until it is all I request is that consideration is given to the point I make. Why make things harder for kids than they already are? I think we will just have to agree to differ on this one. OK?

As to you Ms Lilyfester. You start of by saying you know that the post is not addressed to you. But you go ahead and answer it anyway. You then repeat your accusation of my being a bigot and compound that by suggesting I am now trying to 'save face'. You finish of by saying you don't want to be rude. Well, if that is you not being rude I would not like to hear you when you are. Or does 'rude' have a different meaning in the USA?

I will repeat once more. I am not biggoted. I am not anti-gay. I am anti-nothing but ignorance. You say I am trying to save face. May I ask for whom I am trying to look good? You possibly? Why would I do that? I do not know you. I do not know anyone who has posted on this thread personaly at all. Why on earth do you think I would try to save face with people that I do not know? Perhaps in the world of Social Services these things are important. Please let me assure you that to me they are not.

If you keep up these unfounded personal attacks on me I am afraid the thread may be closed and all the good arguments, both for and against, will be lost.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 29 Jun 06 - 07:39 AM

Tia dont be facitious.

Yo know very well I was discussing the difference in risk between teacher abuse and foster parent abuse...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 29 Jun 06 - 08:12 AM

DtG,

   It was not a personal attack. You asked how someone might see you as other than what you had posted and I answered. I'm sorry you don't like the answer.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Jun 06 - 08:30 AM

Calling someone a bigot because they disagree with your views is not a personal attack? As in the "polite concern" comes off as covered up bigotry from someone who is trying to save face. Accusing someone of of trying to save face - an acronym for twisting what was said previously - is not a personal attack? I can see I need to get a whole new dictionary.

I do not think that I have once tried to cast doubt onto your integrity, Michelle, if I did show me where and I will apologise unreservedly. You have repeatedly answered my comments and concerns by implying I am either homophobic or have some other axe to grind. I am innocent on both counts. If there is any saving of face to be done it is by the Social Services operatives that were fooled by these evil people. I will never say that you are trying to save face for these fellow social workers. I believe you are above that. Please give me the same consideration.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Barry Finn
Date: 29 Jun 06 - 02:30 PM

As for the suffering of children caused by others, because they are being raised by gay parents, that is the fault of others. Site them not the children or the gay parents. Like the victim of a bully or a rape victim blame the predator not the victim. It helps society to bring fairness to all when you support victims instead of blaming them. And to ask the victims to differ their actions is blaming them.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Jun 06 - 04:08 PM

I agreed with the bits I understood, Barry:-) I don't think anyone has blamed the victims so far. Give the good old cat box another few days and I am sure it will come though!

Michelle, Don and everyone else. I somehow managed to twist the argument so it was about me and my feelings. I was never hurt by being called names. Especialy when they are undeserved. But when I am pushed I do, all to often, push back. In this case the issue is far more important than that and I apologise to everyone working towards protecting our children for derailing the thread somewhat.

I do not think it is homophobic or bigoted to use the sensationalist headline that was used. I think it is just human nature which, like mine unfortunately, is far from perfect. Neither me nor my views are more important than anyone else or anyone elses views. Nor are they less important. What is more important that all our petty squabbles and politcal wranglings is the future of our children.

Please accept my apologies for any offence or upset I have caused anyone. I am not fishing for apologies myself either. I am neither hurt nor offended by the unjust accusations. They are as much your human nature as my defensiveness was mine.

Lets turn this about and make sure that the sensationalist headlines do eventualy stop. Not because they are forced to or because we shout them down. But because they no longer sell papers. Or get people to open threads?

Good luck ,best wishes and cheers to you all.

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 10:19 AM

Dave the Gnome,
You seem to be surprised and feeling misunderstood when people tell you that your ideas are part of the problem of discrimination against gay folks. Specifically, you seem to think you are not saying that we should take other peoples' bigotry into account when making social policy, and you seem to feel misunderstood when we tell you that's what you're doing. Here are some quotes from your posts that don't quite add up:

Nowhere in any of my posts have I suggested we should make social policy that will protect the closed world view of negatively judgmental people.

Putting them in an envornment where they are missing one of the major forces in their life and where they may become the subject of scorn or ridicule is not a good idea.

Until the majority of people accept and agree that standpoint though we cannot afford to risk moving our children from an environment with one set of problems just to put them in an environment with another.

Imagine that attitude being passed on to the foster children. "Oh, the poor little mites. Fancy them being under the care of those perverts..." Can't you just see it?

The only thing I have ever shown concern for is that predjudiced people are more likely to 'pick on' the children of gay couples . . .

Please tell me in what way does that show any degree of bias against gays.

Dave, it shows bias against gays because you are suggesting that gay homes are not good foster homes, while not suggesting that straight, single-parent, mixed-race, or religiously intolerant homes are equally not good foster homes. Why pick out the gay homes?

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 03 Jul 06 - 01:57 PM

John, I have apologised for hijacking the thread and going defensive when feeling threatened. If it makes you feel any happier then, yes, I do feel that {list supplied by John P} could be equaly unsuitable. It was a lot easier to talk about the subject in hand than it was to list every single possible combination. I apolgise once more for my laziness.

I was quite happy that the thread had fallen off the end of the page in the 4 days between my last post and yours. If you would care to do the same then the sensationalist 'headline' of the thread can die the death it rightly deserves.

Many thanks in advance.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 12:09 AM

A link posted quite a ways back, at 27 Jun 06 - 02:20 PM, was to an abstract of a report on abuse of children by homosexual parents.

Because the result reported was somewhat at variance with other information I've seen, and because the full report is not accessible to me, I took a quick look at the home page of the organization cited as the "home" for the authors. I found NOTHING but anti-homosexual literature at their home site, with some of it being obviously and blatently bigoted and abusive. (And much of it previously known.)

I must note that the cited/abstracted report indicated a study of 78 cases, including 79 homosexuals. This does imply that at least 77 of the cases studied were of marriages between male and female parents or for single parents. The abstract is unclear. AT MOST, only one case of a homosexual couple is included.

The "control:" For 78 nonhomosexual vs nonhomosexual control cases implies that all comparison cases involved male/female partnerships, with both partners involved.

Given the difficulty of single persons obtaining foster charge of children who are not biologically related, at least in my area, it is quite probable that all of the "studied" cases involved a biological parent of the child who was abused, with the assumption that the child was the product of a "normal" marriage. (A possible, plausible, but of course tentative interpretation.)

So does the report suggest more of how prevalent similar abuse is in "nominally heterosexual" couples who have not (yet?) entered a custody dispute, than it does about "single parents"? IMO - probably, but I'll reserve judgement pending additional information.

I have known, and do know of, several "homosexual partnerships" that have been stable for many years, and in which the persons involved are persons I respect, and whom I would trust to be good caretakers for children if they chose to assume that responsibility. I have known, and do know of, far more heterosexual parents who, in my opinion, are abusive (not necessarily sexually), incompetent, and should not have that responsibility.

While I have not had close association with many who have been foster parents, I do count a half-dozen friends who were raised in foster care, a couple of whom were in care long enough eventually have been adopted by their caregivers. I've seen enough of the "ritual" involved in the system to know that it is a failure-riddled and inadequate system, but also enough to offer my abject admiration for those who participate in it, either as administrators or as care-givers.

Neither the sex, nor the sexual preference of a caregiver is of significance. If "partners" are involved with the caregiver, then they are inevitably involved with the children and must also be suitably qualified, but the sex of the partner also is immaterial.

All that counts is the character and dedication of the individuals.

John

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 04 Jul 06 - 01:39 PM

My God...Dave brought this thread to a satisfactory conclusion, leaving the posts to speak for themselves. Some of you just won't let it lie and keep posting repeats of your opinions as if they were incontravertible proof.

Right up near the top, I mentioned a man who lived near me when I was a boy. All the boys who went to Primary school with me knew him as a pervert.It was not safe to be in his company alone.
This man lived in a "sham marriage" and did not even sleep in the same room as his "wife".
During the time he was in our area he fostered 12 children, 10 boys and 2 girls. On talking to some of the boys later in life, I was told that all the boys were abused in a sexual manner, but none of the girls were ever abused.
This was the only case of foster child abuse that ever came to light in our area.

Some say that the homosexuals who abused the children in UK were just one bad apple in a barrel. I might argee with this, but when you start to get bad apples in packs of four, you got to start looking very carefully at the apples.....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: John P
Date: 05 Jul 06 - 10:31 AM

Geez Ake, please go away and spew your bigoted bile on someone else. So you knew a homosexual pedophile. So what? I knew a brown haired pedophile. So what? You complain about people repeating their opinions over an over again while doing it yoursef. The difference is that you don't bother to respond to the factual information, personal experience, and logic offered by others here. You just keep saying the same ignorant, unethical, stupid, bigoted, un-Christian crap over and over. If you really want this thread to die, shut up and go away. Many of us are past the point of remaining silent when faced with the civil rights travesty of our culture's treatment of gay folks.

If you keep typing bigoted comments, I'll keep telling you what a bigoted asshole you are. I know, I know, calling you names is guaranteed to make you not hear what I'm saying. But we tried being nice and responding to you as if you were a reasonable adult and it just didn't work. So . . . you're an idiot. If you don't like being called a bigot and and idiot, stop being a bigot and an idiot.

JP

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 05 Jul 06 - 10:38 AM

WOW! Well said!!!!

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 06 Jul 06 - 06:15 PM

"You just keep saying the same ignorant, unethical, stupid, bigoted, un-Christian crap over and over."

Well, well, thats quite a mouthful Mr Peekstock (as some of your friends might say)
Easily seen where you sympathies lie!   Not a word on the children abused by the paedophile, some of whom have had their lives ruined by childhood abuse, but a full post dedicated to abuse of me and defending the civil rights of homosexuals.

I hate to shatter your illusions, but homosexuals are no longer a downtrodden minority, but a vociferous section of society with a powerful voice in the media.

A powerful pressure group who punch well above their weight, forever pushing back the boundaries of common sense and decency....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Paco Rabanne
Date: 07 Jul 06 - 07:49 AM

"A powerful pressure group that punch well above their weight" Torally agree with you on that one Ake...

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 07 Jul 06 - 10:25 AM

Ake,

   Pedophiles are an abomination, I don't see anyone here saying otherwise. Nice try at twisting things though.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Jeri
Date: 07 Jul 06 - 12:27 PM

So a pedophile is homosexual because he preys on little boys!? Does this mean that all male abusers of little girls are heterosexuals? If you believe so, does that give you enough evidence to hate heterosexuals? It takes a certain amount of ignorance to believe that any rape of a child is a sex act, whether it's heterosexual or homosexual.

I know we believe a lot of what we hear through our lives, but we really ought to question reasons to hate others, if not everything else. Loving an adult partner and raping a child aren't even in the same universe.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 22 May 07 - 04:45 PM

Gay flamingo parents

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Sorcha
Date: 22 May 07 - 05:41 PM

Neat, Wolfgang! I like it!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 May 07 - 05:44 PM

How kewl is that! Thanks, Wolfgang!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: frogprince
Date: 22 May 07 - 07:26 PM

Yeesh; two males, in fruity pink outfits...disgusting!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Scoville
Date: 22 May 07 - 08:06 PM

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,Scoville
Date: 22 May 07 - 08:07 PM

Oops--sorry about the empty post.



The chicks are SO CUTE! Look at that one standing on one leg already!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: JennyO
Date: 23 May 07 - 07:07 AM

Awww - that's really sweet!

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Big Phil
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:07 PM

My Bible says Adam and Eve, not Adam and Albert. A child requires a parent of each gender. End of story.......

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: MMario
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:16 PM

your bible also congratulates a man on handing his virgin daughters over to a crowd of rapists; tells of a man rewarded for being willing to kill his own son; has a man prefferring his illegitimate son by his wife's servant; condones men buying their wives from their fathers - and many many more stories.

Shall we live by *THOSE* rules? And if not, then why are *those* examples different?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Barry Finn
Date: 23 May 07 - 09:02 PM

My Bible says Adam and Eve, not Adam and Albert. A child requires a parent of each gender. End of story

I'm gld I don't live by your bible.

Over this past Xmas I got to see my niece & got to meet my neice's hubby to be, I'll be seeing them in San Francisco in a week or so. They just bought a house together. She's very much her own women & it's been a joy to watch her grow into an adult that any mom's would be proud, I hope my kids become as nice an adult as she has. I'd say that the credit is almost all hers but the rest goes to the 2 women that raised her. They did an excelent job & I just can't say how proud I am of them & the girl they raised. You don't need to be a bible thumper to be a good person, I've often thought that those who go through life without a bible & are decent have a much better way of living, they didn't need a life's guideline to direct them, they knew how to live by following their heart not a book & we all know which one is more reliable. The heart's not bias, doesn't condemn, won't threaten, won't start wars or kill babies & knows right & wrong when it's encountered. In the name of the bible,,,,,,,

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: JennyO
Date: 23 May 07 - 09:59 PM

How lucky for that flamingo couple, that they don't have the bible thrown at them! Sometimes I really wonder about human nature...

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: M.Ted
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:34 PM

Adam and Eve? That was a truly disfunctional family, Big Phil--not one that anyone would hold up as an ideal--

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: katlaughing
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:45 PM

♪ ♪ Everything is beautiful / In its own way ♪ ♪

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,ib48
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:08 AM

This world has gone absolutely nuts,GAY PARENTS,does anybody think just the sound of that is completely ridiculous? No wonder we have screwed up kids out there.Why the hell cant everybody just be normal,i have nothing against gays,but surely to god children should not be allowed to enter the equation.You reap what you sow.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: jacqui.c
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:19 AM

So, it would seem that homosexuality isn't an 'unnatural' act as such if it occurs in the 'natural' world of the so called lesser species. Interesting......

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,dianavan
Date: 25 May 07 - 01:09 PM

Well, Dick Cheney doesn't seem to mind. His daughter Mary just gave birth to a baby boy that she and her partner Heather will raise.

This is the first time I have ever seen Cheney smile.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=3205613&page=1

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: M.Ted
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:37 PM

ib48, why can't *you* be normal, instead of a hysterical, raving, drama queen?

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: akenaton
Date: 26 May 07 - 04:50 AM

Ib 48......Don't waste your time mate!

The arguments have all been made further up the page, and its more than obvious who the hysterical raving people are.

Wolfgang is taking the piss....so let the kiddies play in peace...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: jacqui.c
Date: 26 May 07 - 06:39 AM

Any abuse is unacceptable in my eyes. Problem is, a lot of abused men won't report the abuse they suffer so what can be done about it - and it's not just women who think it's funny, other men will mock as well.

To me it makes no difference the sex or orrientation of good parents. I would have preferred to have been raised in a loving and caring environment by same sex or a single parent than my natural parents who were not, IMO, fit to raise children.

We suffered what I call 'respectable abuse'. No physical abuse, but verbal and mental with care just the right side of the minimum needed, leaving me with problems it has taken me fifty years to sort out and a brother who has been involved with drink and drugs and is incapable of working at fifty. We were a disfunctional family who no longer keep in touch. Would we have been better with same sex parents, our own or adopted? I don't know, but maybe there would have been a chance that we might have felt wanted, rather than just an impediment.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: M.Ted
Date: 26 May 07 - 11:24 AM

Thank you for sharing that, Jacqui--it is important for everyone to hear about this stuff, and understand that it is a real, ongoing issue that confronts everyone, and not just fodder for internet ranting and raving.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: guitar
Date: 26 May 07 - 01:31 PM

there are men who get abused by women, and yet there is no place for the abused men to go and I call that abuse because these men are asking for help and they get none

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: guitar
Date: 26 May 07 - 01:34 PM

well I think that there is no place for abused men to go ie refuges or any other place for that matter I mean a woman was on the radio said that the reason for this was that 10 percent of all abuse is towards men, I find that 10 percent too much what about zero torlance towards these men who are victims of domistic vilolence

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: guitar
Date: 26 May 07 - 01:37 PM

I'm a gay man ie I'm usually happy and a stright man

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 May 07 - 03:56 PM

I suspect that a good many people think of a gay man as being perpetually in bed, rather than a person faced with all the day to day problems and joys as everyone else. One of my gay friends says that when he meets someone he doesn't immediately identify himself as being gay for a couple of reasons: He doesn't live the sterotypical big city gay 'lifestyle' and never has; His 'gayness' is only part of what makes him who he is.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Gay' parents?
From: GUEST,ib48
Date: 27 May 07 - 07:51 AM

Mted,i fell for it hook line and sinker,your all having a laugh arent you,twatty boy?