Public Discourse Continues to Disappoint

Like their peers at the National Organization for [Heterosexual] Marriage (NOM), writers at The Public Discourse* blog (oh, I'm sorry "online journal") continue to wail about the evils of same-sex marriage.

There, Melissa Moschella writes:

"A crucial aspect of liberty is respect for subsidiarity—in particular, recognition that the family, based on marriage, is a pre-political community with natural and original authority over its internal affairs, especially the education and upbringing of children. Redefining marriage in law to include same-sex couples undermines the principled basis for the primacy of parental childrearing authority by obliterating the link between marriage and procreation as well as the norm of conjoined biological parenthood that conjugal marriage laws help to foster."

First things first, I'll address that argument regarding "the link between marriage and procreation" being severed by same-sex marriage.  Sorry-not-sorry but, allowing infertile couples to marry "obliterated" that connection long before same-sex marriage was a twinkle in anyone's eye.

Secondly, this is your semi-regular reminder that, in many conservative circles, anti-feminism and anti-LGBT advocacy go hand in hand.

Did that phrasing, that particular longing for the days of ye 'olde when families (i.e., fathers) had dominion over the "internal affairs" (i.e., women and children), send a shiver down anyone else's spine?

Yep, me too.

The thrust of her argument is that "conjoined biological parents" (adjectives in all my years of writing about this stuff I've never seen combined before and which are now inducing interesting mental pictures) should have dominion over their children and that the state should not be able to interfere with that. The state, let me repeat, should not be able to interfere with the internal affairs of child-rearing.

Incidentally, I'm guessing she would be, however, in favor of allowing the state to force someone to give birth.

Moschella goes on to reference a litany of, well, nothing that hasn't already been said by her allies about a gazillion times already, including comparing the public education system in the US to Nazi Germany and claiming that pro-LGBT folks are practically kidnapping children of Real Families, soooooooo I'm going to slowly. back. away. from. the computer and see if I can get the latest American Horror Story on Netflix instead.


*The Public Discourse is run by the conservative Witherspoon Institute. For background see, here.

Related: Same-Sex Marriage, Feminism, and Women

Blankenhorn Concerned About Donor Influence

"It’s also worth remembering that there’s no such thing as a donation without expectations. As long as we have think tanks, we’re going to have donors with motives."  

- David Blankenhorn, in a blog post at the Institute for American Values (IAV) website, entitled, "Think Tanks, Fundraising, and What Money Shouldn't Buy"

Blankenhorn made this statement in the context of discussing what he recognized as an inherent conflict of interest when foreign nations seeking to influence US policy give money to US think tanks.  

Although IAV no longer seems super involved, at least explicitly, in the same-sex marriage debate in the US, I have kept their Family Scholars Blog in my blog reader even though they now call it a "magazine" and no longer allow comments.  I've been curious about what would be next for such an agency, beyond same-sex marriage, and have to admit I'm a bit perplexed by its current focus on "thrift."  

However, overall I do agree with Blankenhorn's overall message in his latest post. More than anything, I was surprised to see him articulate a position acknowledging that money donated often comes with implicit or explicit strings attached to produce certain outcomes or opinions.

The relevant conversations have since been deleted from their site, but when I was a guest blogger at Family Scholars Blog, I remember Blankenhorn defending Mark Regnerus, who was being widely critiqued for (a) his substantively bad study, and (b) not disclosing his funders' possible influence on his infamous study that anti-gay organizations now use as "proof" that same-sex parents are bad (even though the study doesn't actually prove that).

Specifically, back in 2012, Blankenhorn wrote a post hyperbolically entitled, "Corrective Labor Camps, Perhaps?" (post and comments preserved here) taking issue with a journalist filing an open records request to investigate the ties between Regnerus and the conservative-leaning Witherspoon Institute, the funder that many suspected influenced the study to impact public opinion and court cases about same-sex marriage and parenting.

The American Independent eventually provided evidence that the Regnerus study was influenced in part by its funder, and that W. Bradford Wilcox was both a paid consultant on the study and a director at Witherspoon.  Wilcox was also previously a blogger at IAV's Family Scholars Blog.

Allen Study on Children of Same-Sex Couples

Let's start with the under-stated question that Allen asks near the end of his recently-published study, "High school graduation rates among children of same-sex couples" --  "the question is: why?"

I begin my discussion of economics professor and Ruth Institute board member Doug Allen's study with this question because, despite explicitly asking this question and thereby acknowledging that gaps exist in this area of inquiry, many of those promoting this study act, through their promotion of discriminatory policies, as though this knowledge is, in fact, certain.

As you may remember, the National Organization and Mark Regnerus, writing at The Witherspoon Institute's Public Forum, have promoted this study uttering variations of the platitude that moms and dads matter!  That's why!

True, the soundbite itself is so broad as to be largely uninformative.

Although it suggests that pro-gay forces might actually be claiming that parents are unimportant to the lives of their children, an absurd argument that has never actually been on the table, it is premised upon the more specific notion that mothers as women, and fathers as men, each provide unique, separate, and vital traits to parenting that same-sex couples, by their very nature of excluding one gender, cannot and do not provide to children. Indeed, Allen notes this theory in a footnote by citing an episode of Modern Family in which a gay male couple take their daughter to her aunt to discuss "girl issues" because they, being men, ostensibly are physically incapable of talking about "girl issues."

That premise is going to be important for same-sex marriage advocates to understand as they read and critique this study, as it's an argument about the inferiority of same-sex parents that is gender-based, rather than sexual-orientation-based. Women, it is argued, are inferior at the act of being a father - whatever that tangibly consists of -  than men are.  And likewise, men are inferior at the act of being a mother - whatever that tangibly consists of - than women are.  (What each role tangibly consists of is rarely clearly articulated. I guess proponents of this argument "know it when they see it.")

Now that we have anti-equality advocates' "why" articulated as a context for this study, we can progress to the overarching conclusion Allen puts forth, which is that "the odds of a child with gay or lesbian parents completing high school are lower, by a considerable margin, compared to children of married opposite sex parents."

To reach this conclusion, Allen used a limited data file from the Canada Census, from which Allen selected data for a percentage of children aged 17-22 living with their parents. Sociologist Phillip Cohen estimates that the sample probably contains 85 kids of gay fathers and 194 kids of lesbian mothers. Allen himself says that Canadian law doesn't permit him to release the sample size.

In his analysis, with our "why?" in mind, we can further note Allen's terminology. Throughout, he uses the phrase "opposite sex" couples to refer to couples comprised of a woman and a man, suggesting an assumption about the purportedly "opposite" and/or "complementary" nature of women and men.

For instance, following his Table 4, which estimates population averages of certain variables, he includes this explanation in a footnote:

"For gay and lesbian households the 'father' is the survey respondent who self-identified as the household head"

Telling. But on the bright side, we do have one tangible characteristic of "being a father" clearly articulated.

In his general discussion of Table 4, Allen highlights some of the results he finds particularly "fascinating." For instance, he finds it "striking" how few same-sex couples with children within the 17-22 age range are living in Canada, estimating that such couples make up 1% of all couples with children within that particular age range.

That factoid prompts me to ask a different why: Why then are such massive amounts of resources, time, and effort to deny such a fascinatingly-small percentage of the population equal rights?

I suspect that this why is substantially related to the first why.  Namely, that same-sex marriage poses a threat to the notion that men and women are complementary, "opposite" beings who, by their very inherent nature, fulfill separate roles in marriage and parenting - with fathers, as men- being the head of it all. Secondly, it's also politically safer for researchers to espouse sexist "Men are From Mars, Women are From Venus" stereotypes than for them to reference explicitly anti-gay "homosexual predators are a danger to children" stereotypes in today's political climate.

Moving along, Allen goes on to discuss his data in Table 4:

"There are a higher number of visible minority children for gay households (28 % compared to 13 % for common law couples), and a higher number of disabled children (13 % compared to 6 % for opposite sex married parents)."

Oddly, he somewhat hand-waives away the possibility that this discrepancy might be explained by gay couples choosing to adopt children who might experience more challenges, saying, "This may imply a high number of adopted children in gay households, but interestingly there are no cases of inter-racial same-sex families within the 20 % sample."

Well, sure, okay - but he still doesn't know adoption rates because that information wasn't included in his data set. So, if we ignore the whiff of racial wedge-creating in his statement, it's still true that gay couples likely adopt more frequently than male-female couples, you know, since most gay couples can't generally procreate together.  It's actually quite odd to see a researcher of Allen's ilk minimize that reality given that it's often a Top 3 Talking Point that purportedly-civil "marriage defenders" use to oppose marriage equality for same-sex couples.

What I find interesting is that Allen doesn't highlight how other large discrepancies might also be "interesting" or "fascinating" in this section- like how children living with lesbian couples and children living with single mothers are far more likely, at 91% and 88% respectively, to live in urban settings than children living with hetero married couples (78%), common law male female couples (74%), gay couples (72%), and single fathers (79%). In addition, both lesbian mothers and single parents have quite lower average incomes than other family types, ranging from $49,874 for single mothers, $88,600 for lesbian couples, and a whopping $119,172 for heterosexual married couples.

As another interesting point, he also skims over the part where, once all controls are used, children of cohabiting (ie- unmarried) male-female couples seem to do the best of all when it comes to high school graduation - even better than the much-touted "married opposite sex" so-called Gold Standard Family.

He buries that lead by acknowledging that point in a footnote diss of same-sex couples: "Compared to children of opposite sex cohabitating parents, the children of same-sex parents do even worse." Well, yes, because compared to children of "opposite sex cohabitating parents," children of all other parent types do worse. But saying that would be highly damning to prominent "marriage defense" narratives.

From an analytical/discussion standpoint, I don't see a ton to this study, and it's disappointing that Allen only raises mostly one uninspired direction for future research, writing:

"This study suggests further work is necessary to narrow down the source of this difference. This will require an exceptional data set that not only identifies sexual orientation of parents, but also has a retrospective or panel design to completely control for marital history."

Well, yes, further work is indeed necessary, as this paper seems to raise more questions than it answers, although opponents of marriage equality certainly won't treat it as such. Indeed, if I were approaching the question "why" might we be seeing any disparities between children of same-sex couples, I would be asking many questions and positing many more directions for future work.

Like:

• Allen's sample is only of children between the age of 17-22 and who are living with their parents.  Yet, what is the average age of high school graduation in Canada? I really don't know much about the Canadian education system (so chime in here if you do!), but trusty Wikipedia notes that ages at graduation can vary by province and can range from between 17-21. Given that his data set notes an average younger age of children of lesbian couples, might it be that some children have not yet, due to their age, had the opportunity to graduate?  
• Relatedly, let's think for a second about the population of 17-22 who are living with their parents? Would such people be more or less likely to have graduated from high school than 17-22 year olds who are not living with their parents? What would happen to the graduation rates if we included the population of 17-22 year-olds who are not living with their parents, a population that would presumably be more independent and likely to have graduated high school?  By only including 17-22 year-olds who are living with their parents, Allen's sample seems as though it would disproportionately include non-high-school graduates.
• What are the differences among the children, when accounting for the circumstances of their birth and possible adoption? Might same-sex couples adopt children, and adopt older children, who have more challenges or disabilities than those raised by their biological parents? Might that contingency account for differences? What about children of same-sex couples who were created through alternative reproductive technologies, or who are the product of failed heterosexual unions? How do these variances impact child outcomes? 
• How might living in a society that privileges heterosexuality and marginalizes homosexuality contribute to any differences among children of same-sex couples? It's true that Canada legalized same-sex marriage in 2005, but given that the children in this study ranged in age from 17-22, they also lived in a country in which their parents were second-class citizens during most of the children's early, formative years. Social justice doesn't work in a way such that once same-sex couples have marriage equality 100% of discrimination, bigotry, and prejudice is entirely erased from society. I question the informativeness of comparing same-sex couples to heterosexual couples in a way that erases a social context in which these families are not, in reality, given the same social, moral, and familial supports to thrive.
• Since this study only looks at children of same-sex couples who are married, what proportion of same-sex couples in Canada, especially those with children, are legally married? Could the numbers be different if children of cohabitating same-sex couples were included? For most same-sex couples in Canada of the legal age to marry, same-sex marriage wasn't even a cultural norm, let alone allowed, until very recently. It still seems early to start drawing conclusions about same-sex couples and their children. 
• If these differences in high school graduation rates are legitimate, what can be done to better support same-sex families, given that lesbian, gay, and bisexual people exist in the real world, establish same-sex relationships, and raise children?  What is the impact on child outcomes when organizations like National Organization for Marriage and The Witherspoon Institute publicly favor policies that promote the marginalization of same-sex families and families other than married hetero so-called Gold Standard?
• If we take these findings as legit, what's up with children of cohabiting heterosexual parents doing better than children of the so-called married hetero gold standard?  Maybe Team Opposite Sex Is The Best should get on that finding STAT!

I'm sure others could include many more questions, as well.

As a final note, I want to draw attention to Allen's footnote 24, where he discusses how small sample sizes in previous studies result from low response rates to surveys of gay parents:

"Often the problem of small sample size comes from low response rates. Many of the fifty-two studies are silent on the question of response rates to their surveys, but when information is provided it often shows that response rates are very low. For example, in Bos (2010) the gay males were recruited from an Internet mail list for gay parents. Although the list had 1,000 names, only 36 replied and participated in the study. This amounts to a 3.6 % response rate. Other studies (e.g., Chan et al. and Fulcher et al.) have reductions in their samples similar in relative size to Rosenfeld. Response rates lower than 60 % are usually taken to mean the presence of a strong selection bias—even when the initial list is random."

Why?

I purport that when some researchers seem hell-bent on determining that same-sex couples are inferior to heterosexual couples, results that will eventually be promoted as reasons to deny same-sex couples rights and further marginalize and malign us in society, I can imagine that many same-sex couples would be reluctant to respond to surveys, thereby impacting the quality of many studies about same-sex families.


Related:
Sociologist Philip Cohen's Critique of Allen's Study
Same-Sex Marriage, Feminism, and Women
Regnerus: Same-Sex Marriage Will Change Hetero Marriage

Regnerus Promoting New Family Study

Mark Regnerus has taken to Internet to promote another study that purportedly proves the popular anti-equality platitude that "a married mom and dad really do matter," a platitude that's supposed to imply that therefore same-sex couples should not raise children or have equal marriage rights.

Regnerus' promotion of this study is posted at  the Witherspoon Institute's Public Discourse blog, where Regnerus has posted his anti-equality opinions previously.

The Witherspoon Institute is the organization that recruited and funded Regnerus to run his widely-critiqued New Family Structures Study and that, contrary to claims otherwise, was later revealed to have played a role in the study's design and timing.

This past summer, Mark Regnerus spoke at The Ruth Institute's "It Takes a Family" conference.

The study Regnerus is promoting is by Douglas Allen, who sits on the board of the Ruth Institute (tagline: "One Man One Woman For Life").

Douglas Allen has also spoken at the anti-equality National Organization for Marriage's (NOM) conference in 2012, where he opined that women's menstrual cycles make lesbian relationships particularly unstable.

This week, the National Organization for Marriage has been promoting Allen's study, as well as Regnerus' promotion of the study.

And just so you know, it's the homosexualists who are alleged to have the coordinated agenda. Heh.

I will be posting my full review of the study shortly to see the extent to which these folks have or have not fairly represented it thus far.


Related
Journal Audit Finds Severe Flaws in Regnerus Study
Scholars Critique Regnerus Study
Bryan Fischer: Regnerus Shows that "Underground Railroad" Needed to Rescue Kids in Gay Families
American College of Pediatricians Misuses Regnerus Study in Amicus Brief

Public Discourse Promotes Anti-Equality "Primer"

Back in June, I took note of a creepy "primer" purporting to give marriage equality opponents tips on how to better frame the marriage debate.

As I noted back then, key takeaways from this propaganda manual, er, "primer" include "elevat[ing] as spokesmen" gay people who oppose same-sex marriage, "telling bigger stories" that reverse who the victims and victimizers are, and subverting the "marriage equality" meme with "stickier" anti-equality memes.

So, basically more of the same "winning" strategies the anti-gay movement has been using for years all jotted down in one handy-dandy document which I hope will be in the appendix of a future history book as actual proof of there being an actual anti-equality agenda.  Because really, I'm starting to wonder if many anti-equality folks are so insular and insulated from opposing views that they maybe don't get that it's the reliance on these very strategies, strategies that gaslight LGBT people's lived experiences and aim to divide and drive wedges between marginalized populations, that many people find hateful.

Brian Brown (who doesn't seem to be the same guy from the National Organization for Marriage), has written a piece at the Public Discourse, promoting this new "primer" and discussing its key concepts. Funnily enough, his article's title is a sarcastic admission of sorts, "Now That We're All Haters..."

The ellipses are in the original title, for dramatic effect I suppose?, but *spoiler alert* his punchline isn't a conciliatory and apologetic "Sorry for the harm we've caused gay people, let's see how can come to a better understanding and try to temper this culture war a little."

Nope.

Now that opponents of marriage equality think that everyone else thinks they're haters (but do we, really?)... the new goal seems to be to try to not look like haters whilst still opposing equality for same-sex couples while parroting superficial platitudes and sound-bites that don't embiggen the discourse.  

Because yes yes, we know. Whether or not people think marriage defenders are hateful bigots is the single most pressing concern in this entire culture war, a concern that must be centered in all conversations, especially mixed-company ones. Because god forbid we just not magically accept as benign the notion that "true marriage is more diverse" unlike "mono-gendered" marriage, and pretend that a catchphrase like that is not rooted in some serious sexist, supremacist, and shallow bullshit thinking about gender and sexuality.

Fun fact: The Public Discourse is hosted by The Witherspoon Institute, the "think tank" that recruited Mark Regnerus to run "his" widely-critiqued study on parenting that was timed to be available before the US Supreme Court issued its marriage equality opinions.

Schadenfreude Moment of the Week

As I've continued to mull over the recent gay-related Supreme Court victories regarding DOMA and (sorta) Prop 8, I've gotten a bit of satisfaction about how the Regnerus study did not successfully sway the Court's majority even though public records show that the study's release was timed to influence major Supreme Court decisions.

According to The American Independent, the conservative Witherspoon Institute paid about $700,000 for the study.

Gosh, that must be really sad for the study's biggest fans.


Related:
The Regnerus New Family Structure Study 
American College of Pediatricians Misuses Regnerus Study in Amicus Brief 
Journal Audit Finds Severe Flaws in Regnerus Study 
Regnerus Speaks at Ruth Institute Conference

Scholars Critique Regnerus Study
Regnerus: Same-Sex Marriage Will Change Heterosexual Marriage
Fischer: "Underground Railroad" Needed to Rescue Children in Gay Families

Same-Sex Marriage, Feminism, and Women

Over at The Feminist Librarian, Anna ran a live-blog series on David Blankenhorn's book The Future of Marriage, in which he laid out his case against same-sex marriage (before he changed his mind, obvs).

Her whole series is a great analysis of the book, and I wanted to especially highlight Anna's postscript in which she examines Blankenhorn's treatment of male versus female scholars he disagrees with on the same-sex marriage issue. She provides a side-by-side comparison of the words and phrases Blankenhorn used to describe his male opponents compared to his female opponents.

As a few examples, he describes Evan Wolfson as "my friend," says that Jonathan Rauch "argues convincingly," calls history professor Stephanie Coontz "a prominent activist" with "Marxist" views who "rarely bothers with detail," and kinda mocks Judith Stacey:

 "...[Stacey is] formerly the Barbra Streisand Professor of Contemporary Gender Studies at the University of Southern California -- I'm not making that up -- Stacey is an activist as well as an intellectual. Her main project is to combine socialism with women's liberation."

It's perhaps difficult to tease out whether Blankenhorn was chiefly uncomfortable with his female opponents' gender, their leanings toward feminism, or their purported Marxist and socialist ways. Possibly it's all of these. Possibly it's none.

Nonetheless, regardless of Blankenhorn's intent, when I read his book I too noticed the dismissive, disparate way he treated the two female scholars compared to his relatively tame treatment of the male scholars, as he expressed near pain at having to disagree with the men at all, claiming of Rauch, "How I wish he were right!"

I find that many same-sex marriage opponents, especially men, don't deal especially well with progressive feminists, especially female ones. There seems to be a taking for granted of the "fact" that feminists, and feminist arguments, are irrational and thus not worth fairly addressing. Earlier this week, I noted Mark Regnerus' treatment of progressive (especially) female scholars in his same-sex-couple-smearing opinion piece over at The Witherspoon Institute's Public Discourse forum.

The approach to "dealing with" progressive feminist-leaning scholars, among some same-sex marriage opponents, seems to be to emphasize their real or imagined "socialist" leanings so as to passive-aggressively red-bait and discredit the entirety of their work, respond to caricatures of their arguments, mock their scholarship and titles of their works and seminars, and suggest that they are activists and therefore that their scholarship is suspect.  Unlike, I suppose, the work of Evan Wolfson. You know, the attorney and founder of Freedom to Marry, that organization that campaigns for the legal right to same-sex marriage. 

As same-sex marriage becomes more of a winning cause in US politics, and as more conservatives ally themselves with the cause, I think it's going to be important for feminists to remain vigilant about the potential non-feminism and anti-feminism of these new allies - allies who are often themselves threatened by feminist critiques of marriage's history of inequality and female subordination. Being a new supporter of same-sex marriage, indeed being gay, doesn't mean that one will also be a supporter of, or even receptive to, feminism.

The most prominent national conversations about same-sex marriage are, with the exception of Maggie Gallagher, largely also same-sex conversations among (white) men often talking to other (white) men, but sometimes also to the American public, about the topic.  Jonathan Rauch. David Blankenhorn. Brian Brown. Evan Wolfson. Dale Carpenter. John Corvino. Robert George. Andrew Sullivan. Dan Savage. Peter LaBarbera.

I know that many people are doing important advocacy work in less prominent ways that don't get them attention, recognition, and credit. Yet, it's problematic to me that I can think of no feminist progressive women of the prominence and platforms of any of these men, even though what, like 96% of feminist progressive women likely support same-sex marriage?

I'm also personally appreciative of Elizabeth Marquardt, of Blankenhorn's Institute for American Values (IAV), invitation to me to blog at the IAV's Family Scholars Blog (FSB) about a year ago.  The issues I raise in this post are also largely why the IAV's decision to abruptly close the blog with little explanation or engagement with its invited guest bloggers has, quite honestly, stung.

Not I only do I feel I'm missing some backstory there, it's a rare thing for progressive feminists, especially queer ones who support LGBT rights, to have the opportunity to engage with a somewhat conservative, largely non-feminist audience whose exposure to feminism is largely filtered through non-feminist, often-conservative interpretations, such as Regnerus' and Blankenhorn's treatments of feminist scholarship. Indeed, I often felt that some of the most contentious conversations I was involved in at FSB were feminist ones, rather than pro-gay ones, as I found myself even arguing against  other gay people and those who were otherwise supportive of same-sex marriage.

The voices of progressive feminist women remain marginalized, appropriated, and often mocked in the national discourse, even within conversations about a purportedly liberal/progressive issue like same-sex marriage.

At the same time, my support of same-sex marriage is deeply tied to my feminism. Even as I critique the history of marriage for what it often meant to women, my position is certainly more nuanced and thoughtful than to be hand-waived away as irrational or dismissed as "socialist" or "radical" without its merits being addressed. I think that's true for many feminists.

And, I further think the same-sex marriage movement is indebted to many other movements, including feminist scholarship, the civil rights movement, and queer/gender studies.  Many in the movement do not seem aware of that as they assume a non-intersectional, gay-centric approach to the issue. Many do not understand complementarist arguments against same-sex marriage. They don't always understand why some people believe all children need a male and female parent. The movement, on the outspoken pro-gay non-feminist side, often seems bizarrely, simultaneously all about gender while also being nothing at all about gender.

So, when I think about how progressive feminist women are implicitly and, oftentimes, explicitly treated as less authoritative and credible than male advocates on the issue, I have to admit that these new shifting alliances, these new friendships between former opponents of same-sex marriage and prominent gay men, give me pause.

For, "if your revolution doesn't implicitly and explicitly include a rejection of misogyny and other intersectional marginalizations, then you're not staging a revolution: You're staging a change in management."

Regnerus: Same-Sex Marriage Will Change Hetero Marriage

Fresh off his speaking gig at the anti-equality Ruth Institute, Mark Regnerus has written a bizarre opinion piece over at The Witherspoon Institute's online Public Discourse forum.

Just as a reminder, The Witherspoon Institute is the conservative think tank that opposes same-sex marriage and recruited and funded Regnerus to run the notorious New Family Structures Study, which purports to study "gay and lesbian families." (Spoiler alert: sketchiness ensued).

In his recent Public Discourse piece, Regnerus begins:

"Will same-sex marriage cause harm to opposite-sex marriage? It’s one of the most enduring questions surrounding state and national legal decisions about marriage."

Now here it's good to remember that Regnerus is a relative New Guy when it comes to writing publicly about same-sex marriage, having only become somewhat of a household name after publishing his widely-critiqued study a little over a year ago.

So, first note the phrase "opposite-sex marriage." The phrases "different-sex marriage" or "other-sex marriage" seem to be more accurate and therefore apt than "opposite-sex marriage," as men and women as a whole aren't actually categorical, essential opposites.

That topic is beyond the scope of what I want to talk about today, so my point here is that throwing around the phrase "opposite-sex marriage" often suggests to me that maybe a person hasn't thought super critically about gender issues, that they're unthinkingly parroting a common phrase, and/or that they believe in often- religiously-based "gender complementarism" and that "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" sort of mythology.

Secondly, he goes on to immediately claim, of his question:

"But the question itself is empirically unanswerable any time soon."

Of course, he then goes on to immediately "hypothesize" an answer to this purported unanswerable question.

Indeed, the very title of his piece (which he may or may not have been responsible for), is "Yes, Marriage Will Change - And Here's How."  Ker-pow! As though, wow, no one's ever predicted that, hey, you know what? That whole same-sex marriage thing? It will likely change "opposite-sex" marriage for the worse.

Third, he proceeds to, for some reason, support his conclusion by (a) citing statistics that he claims show that lesbian relationships break up more frequently than gay male and heterosexual ones (by citing a non-random sample, one lesbian's anecdote, and referencing a couple of reports he doesn't link to), (b) to reference purported "lesbian bed death" and then gay male non-monogamy, and (c) to claim that acceptance and popularization of same-sex marriage has put men in charge of the marriage and sex markets... um.... somehow? (Instead of "same-sex marriage" giving men power in sex and relationships, maybe Regnerus actually meant "rape culture, patriarchy, and sexism"? Damn you, autocorrect?)

Alas, he ends:

"This, I predict, will be same-sex marriage’s signature effect on the institution—the institutionalization of [gay male] monogamish as an acceptable marital trait. No, gay men can’t cause straight men to cheat. Instead, the legitimacy newly accorded their marital unions spells opportunity for men everywhere to bend the boundaries."

Um.... again.... somehow? He doesn't really spell out how the relationship agreements that a relatively small percentage of the overall population engage in will have more of an effect on the majority than vice versa.  He says some stuff about how men these days are pressuring women into anal sex, because gay men have made the practice popular. So, um. There's that, I guess?

The overall piece, and Regnerus' arguments within it, are disjointed and somewhat desperate-seeming. It's a "throw scary-looking opinions and numbers at people and see what sticks" approach to making the legalization of same-sex marriage look like a Really Bad Idea. But, well, I like to make predictions too, and I predict that it's going to be funny as hell to read pieces like this in about 20 years. Have fun staying on the anti-equality bandwagon, bro!

On the "disjointed" and "desperate" point, while Regnerus partially fixes his gaze on lesbian relationships, which is different than the usual anti-gay approach of fixating solely on gay men, it's not clear what his purpose even is in talking about lesbians at all, given gay men's supposed disproportionately powerful influence on sexual norms than lesbians'.

In fact, as an actual lesbian, and a civil union'ed one at that, it is extremely odd to me to be talked about in a context of the forum of a conservative, anti-equality "think tank" for kind of no reason at all other than to list Bad Things About Lesbians, rather than having our ideas and arguments engaged with in a more fair, representative manner.

For, when talking about lesbian relationships, Regnerus takes the approach of citing a handful of more radical queer scholars and thinkers, like Judith Stacey, making statements that might sound scary to a conservative, reactionary crowd. His citations, therefore, read to me mostly as cheap point-scoring "gotchas." For instance, he describes Stacey:

"The elevated breakup rate among lesbian couples has been an open secret for a long while. Even NYU sociologist Judith Stacey—no fan of marriage in general—noted it back in 2000 in small, nonrandom studies of upper-middle-class, educated white lesbian parents, demographic factors historically associated with stability rather than dissolution."

Oooooh, an "open secret"! Wow, a link to the Heritage Foundation citing one-liners from a Judith Stacey talk! And ahhhhhhh, Stacey is "no fan of marriage in general" (which has to do with what now? Oh right, we are to presume she's a Very Bad Person now!)

Regnerus' approach does not seem especially targeted to a skeptical, progressive, pro-equality, or LGBT audience.  I'm to believe Mark Regnerus has his finger on the pulse of lesbian relationships better than, say, actual lesbians do? Sure.

Yet, with the phrase "open secret," Regnerus frames himself as an anthropologist of sorts, as though he's super "in the know" about what lesbian relationships are really like, as he assumes a mansplaining air of merely translating this information to a largely ignorant audience that, unlike him, doesn't yet know the "open secrets" of lesbian couples or indeed the entire set of real goals of the Queer Agenda.

Further, Regnerus' main point is that it's the alleged Great Power of gay male relationship- and not lesbian ones- that, in the end, are going to change heterosexual people's marriage and sex norms. So including lesbians in his article only to list the purported shortcomings of lesbian relationships seems to be a distracting sneer, and fodder for the anti-gay audience who already believes in the supremacy of heterosexual relationships.  It's like, hey, here's this bad thing about lesbians, and this thing too. And pssst, did you guys know this, as well? 

Besides, if Regnerus understood the relevant legal issues involved, he'd know that from a legal standpoint, the fact that some lesbians break up and don't have sex as much as some other couples is not a legitimate reason to deny all lesbian couples marriage rights.  

One final note. Within the article, Regnerus claims:

"Sex is a common 'love language' for men, pop psychologists are quick to assert. It should be noted, too, that egalitarian couples tend to report less frequent sex—and women report lower sexual satisfaction—than couples who exhibit 'more traditional household arrangements.' Perhaps sameness and fairness, however represented, have their unintended consequences."

The file he tries to link to which purports to be evidence for this claim, unfortunately, "cannot be found" (whoooops). Nonetheless, it's a telling Traditional Marriage admission.

Inequality is hot! Sexy! Especially for the ladies! (I guess we'll just take this dude's word for it. After all, it is a man speaking). Here I'll just end by noting that the traditional marriage crowd tends to skew toward opposing, and indeed greatly disapproving of, consensual sexual activities in which participants engage in roles that portray and suggest inequality.  In which case, some of them try to suddenly act all pseudo-feminist and What About the Wimmenz (See also when Sarah Palin or Michelle Bachmann is attacked, and anti-feminists are opportunistic feminists for like 3 seconds).

I'm thinking of the recent hubub in which a group of conservative men essentially had a convo amongst themselves about purported "uncivilized" and "degrading" S/M sexual activities that a woman chose to engage in.  Seems lots of guys can handle gender inequality in their religions, marriages, society, families, and politics because Men Are From Mars And Women Are From Venus, but when a woman explicitly chooses to portray it in her sex life, "inequality" suddenly gets very threatening to them.


Related: My Thoughts on the New Conversation

Regnerus Speaks at Ruth Institute Conference

Mark Regnerus, who authored a notorious study on what he referred to as "lesbian and gay families," recently spoke at The Ruth Institute's "It Takes a Family" conference this past weekend.

The Ruth Institute is a project of the anti-equality National Organization for Marriage. Its "About Ruth" web page for some reason is entitled, "Making Marriage Cool," even though, in my opinion, the Institute does precisely the opposite, for instance, by selling "one man one woman" "party kits" and "tote bags."

Also speaking at the conference was Ruth Institute founder and president Jennifer Roback Morse. In addition to being quite the proponent of inequality, Morse has also engaged in gaslighting against the LGBT community by suggesting that hatred of gay people does not actually exist in those who oppose marriage equality, has admitted that she opposes same-sex marriage because (her words) "anal sex is icky," and has invented absurd lingo to refer to her political opponents (eg- "the Life Style Left").

Others speaking were Robert Gagnon (whose opinions you can read all about here), the National Organization for Marriage's Thomas Peters, and Alana Newman (who wrote a controversial post calling "older or infertile women, and gay men," those who use surrogacy and egg donation, "the new sexual predators. And then wrote an awkward follow-up.)

So, what's the point of today's post?

Well, The American Independent has already obtained documents and emails from a public records request showing that the widely-critiqued Regnerus study was timed to influence "major decisions of the Supreme Court" and that, contrary to language in the study purporting otherwise, The Witherspoon Institute, which opposes same-sex marriage, may have played a larger role in the study than claimed.

Associating with the Ruth Institute and advocates who are notorious for uncivil-y opposing same-sex marriage is not a great way way to demonstrate that one is just a mere, impartial observer of the facts about "lesbian and gay families."

Neither does making statements like the following, which one conservative-leaning college news source cites Regnerus as saying at the conference:

“Sex doesn’t explain the world, religion does,” Regnerus said. “Sex will come up short.” 

Oh. Really. Sometimes I just have to laugh at the simple-minded way some conservative-leaning religious folks imagine that other people are like. I mean, are there even hoards of people out there claiming that sex is the big thing that explains the world? Is the battle for how people interpret reality really one of Religion v. Sex? Alrighty then.

American Independent: Regnerus Study Influenced by Funders

The American Independent has obtained documents and emails from a public records request showing that the widely-critiqued Regnerus study was timed to influence "major decisions of the Supreme Court" and that, contrary to language in the study purporting otherwise, The Witherspoon Institute may have played a larger role in the study than claimed.

Sofia Resnick reports:

"[The documents] show that the Witherspoon Institute recruited a professor from a major university to carry out a study that was designed to manipulate public policy. In communicating with donors about the research project, Witherspoon’s president clearly expected results unfavorable to the gay-marriage movement.

The think tank’s efforts paid off. The New Family Structures Study came out just in time for opponents of gay marriage to cite it in multiple federal cases involving marriage equality – including two cases soon to be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.....

Records show that an academic consultant hired by UT to conduct data analysis for the project was a longtime fellow of the Witherspoon Institute, which shelled out about $700,000 for the research. Documentation about University of Virginia associate sociology professor W. Bradford Wilcox’s dual roles contradict Regnerus’ assertions that the think tank wasn’t involved with how the study was designed or carried out.

Religious right groups such as the Witherspoon Institute have for years been challenging the legality of gay marriage on all fronts and trying to amass data that that can be used to sway the public, lawmakers, and the courts to their side of the debate. Groups seeking to block gay marriage have been eager to use Regnerus’ study – and even further twist his findings – as evidence that gay parents are inferior to straight parents.

So far, the New Family Structures Study has been cited in United States v. Windsor, a challenge to the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, and Hollingsworth v. Perry, which seeks to overturn California’s gay-marriage ban, Proposition 8."

I believe that the main issues with respect to the Regnerus study are substantive flaws. These do not need to be re-hashed, as I originally hashed them out here (and many others have done so as well). At the same time, the two above-cited issues of concern, seem to be more.... concerning since the release of the documents.

Barry Deutsch questioned Wilcox's dual roles back in October. And Wilcox responded in his own words, saying:

"I served as a fellow and as the director of the program on marriage, family, and democracy at the Witherspoon Institute from 2004 to 2011. These positions were honorific, and designed to highlight my writing and speaking on family-related issue."

Language in the study itself claimed that the Witherspoon Institute played "no role at all in the design or conduct of the study, the analyses, the interpretations of the data, or in the preparation of [the study.]"

Yet, Resnick cites an email suggesting otherwise:

"In the early stages of the New Family Structures Study – before data was collected and long before any results were known – the Witherspoon Institute’s president, Luis Tellez, made it clear to Regnerus that expediency was paramount.

'Naturally we would like to move along as expeditiously as possible but experience suggests we ought not to get hung up with deadlines, do what is right and best, move on it, don’t dilly dolly, etc.,' Tellez wrote in a Sept. 22, 2010 email. 'It would be great to have this before major decisions of the Supreme Court but that is secondary to the need to do this and do it well. I would like you to take ownership and think of how would you want it done, rather than someone like me dictating parameters but of course, here to help.'”

To me, this email doesn't suggest that the Witherspoon Institute engaged in anything extraordinarily damning from a methodological standpoint, but it is pretty explicit that having the study available for the Supreme Court to consider is at least one motivating factor for the study to happen. Technically, urging the study to take place quickly so it can be used in court cases, is involvement in the "conduct" and "preparation" of the study.

In addition, Renick claims that emails exist of "examples of Wilcox making decisions on behalf of Witherspoon and of Tellez insisting Wilcox be present at certain meetings alongside Regnerus," suggesting that his role was more than simply "honorific." In one email, Regnerus purportedly asks Wilcox for feedback on the funders' "'boundaries' around this project" and "their hopes for what emerges from this project."


I know in the past that some people, including David Blankenhorn, have expressed a distaste for the Public Information Act (or, perhaps, the distaste is just toward the application of the Act to this particular case?), which was implicated because of Regnerus' association with the University of Texas.

Yet, open and honest government is (purportedly) a cornerstone of American government. And, this study was purporting to tell certain truths, both substantively with respect to outcomes and procedurally with respect to the influence of its funders, with the weight, legitimacy, and authority of the University of Texas behind it. Yet, these records suggest more of an influence from Witherspoon than what the study's disclaimer purports, and what both Regnerus and Wilcox have claimed.

And, that troubles me.

In my original critique of the study I was very clear about not ascribing anyone involved "with having evil or malicious intent here."  I'm not sure if I would use the word evil, but this study does seem especially tainted now, in my opinion, by this influence and dishonesty. 

The Regnerus New Family Structure Study (NFSS)

I have a few comments about the recently-released Mark Regnerus New Family Structure Study (NFSS).

For some background, the study randomly sampled almost 3,000 individuals aged 18-39, with the goal of comparing "how the young-adult children of a parent who has had a same-sex romantic relationship fare on 40 different social, emotional, and relational outcome variables when compared with six other family-of-origin types." (Emphasis added- let's remember that specific wording).

The study is generating a lot of press right now because Regenerus asserts that his study demonstrates that "numerous, consistent differences [exist] among young adults who reported maternal lesbian behavior (and to a lesser extent, paternal gay behavior) prior to age 18." And that, therefore, "the empirical claim that no notable differences exist" in child development "in lesbian and gay families" compared to male-female-headed, intact families "must go."

1) On "Gay," "Lesbian," and "Same-Sex Households"

The first critique, which others on Internet have pointed out as well, is Regnerus' categorization of what constitutes a "gay"/"lesbian" person and a "same-sex household." The screening tool used to identify children of "gay and lesbian parents," for instance, asked respondents the following question:

“'From when you were born until age 18 (or until you left home to be on your own), did either of your parents ever have a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex?' Response choices were 'Yes, my mother had a romantic relationship with another woman,' 'Yes, my father had a romantic relationship with another man,' or 'no.' (Respondents were also able to select both of the first two choices.) If they selected either of the first two, they were asked about whether they had ever lived with that parent while they were in a same-sex romantic relationship."

Note that the question is not something along the lines of, "Were you raised by two people of the same sex?"

The question, instead, focused on whether or not a parent had ever dated, for any amount of time, a person of the same sex while the respondent was under the age of 18. If yes, the parent was categorized as "gay" or "lesbian"- never bisexual, never "experimenting," never "my mom had a brief same-sex relationship, but eventually got back together with my dad," never "gay until graduation," or never "sexually fluid." Parents are categorized as flat-out 100% gay or lesbian, with their family structure being labeled "same-sex households," based upon the parent having ever had even just one same-sex relationship no matter how brief in duration.

Using this inapt categorization method, Regnerus makes claims throughout his paper, including a literature review and critiques of previous studies about "gay and lesbian parents." And, he suggests that not only is his study about "gay and lesbian parents" but that it's better than all of the previous studies about "gay and lesbian parents."

In reality, his paper is actually about parents who have ever had a same-sex relationship while their child was under the age of 18. While these categories will have some overlap, I hope it is obvious (but... apparently it's not) that the second category will include at least some people who are not, actually, "gay and lesbian parents" and who do not, actually, live in "same-sex households."

In explaining his chosen screening process, Regnerus notes the difficulty in obtaining an adequate sample size of "same-sex households." Indeed, it's a legitimate point. However, the screening question he chose to use to boost his numbers boosted his numbers by including people who weren't in "same-sex households" at all.

When people pore over methodology in a study that's making as bold a claim as this one is, the conflation between, say, (a) a dad who might have had an affair with a man and (b) two men who adopt a child together is not something people are going to overlook.

The nuance, unfortunately, is not likely to be picked up on by anti-LGBT advocacy groups.

See also, John Corvino's criticisms with respect to this point.

2) The Play on the Lesbian Predator Narrative

[TW: Discussion of child abuse and sexual abuse]

All respondents were asked if “a parent or other adult caregiver ever touched you in a sexual way, forced you to touch him or her in a sexual way, or forced you to have sexual relations?”  A statistically significant difference was found for respondents with a "lesbian mother." I use scare quotes here to indicate Regnerus' sketchy definition of a "lesbian mother"- because, per the analysis above and for the sake of accuracy, it would have been more apt for the study to state that a statistically significant difference was found for respondents reporting that their mother had ever had a romantic relationship with another woman.

I highlight this one because it's a finding that undoubtedly is going to be picked up by anti-LGBT groups to "prove" that "homosexuals" are sexual predators and unfit for parenthood. But, notice how the question doesn't ask which parent or "adult caregiver" engaged in the abuse- leaving readers to wonder who did it- A babysitter? A daycare worker? A previous boyfriend or husband of the parent? A "lesbian" partner? A Boy Scout master? A priest?)

Nor does the question ask in what context the abuse occurred. Did a lesbian couple adopt a child who had been abused by his or her biological parents? Did the biological father abuse the child, prior to the "lesbian mother" having her same-sex relationship?

To his credit, Regnerus acknowledges that point:

"It is entirely plausible, however, that sexual victimization could have been at the hands of the LM respondents’ biological father, prompting the mother to leave the union and—at some point in the future—commence a same-sex relationship. Ancillary (unweighted) analyses of the NFSS, which asked respondents how old they were when the first incident occurred (and can be compared to the household structure calendar, which documents who lived in their household each year up until age 18) reveal this possibility, up to a point: 33% of those LM respondents who said they had been sexually victimized by a parent or adult caregiver reported that they were also living with their biological father in the year that the first incident occurred. Another 29% of victimized LMs reported never having lived with their biological father at all. Just under 34% of LM respondents who said they had at some point lived with their mother’s same-sex partner reported a first-time incident at an age that was equal to or higher than when they first lived with their mother’s partner."

The study design and commentary sheds little clarity about what's really going on with this finding, and that's really unfortunate. Anti-LGBT groups are going to have a field day with that one in their zeal to demonize gays and lesbian, and a more careful analysis and questioning process by the researcher would have been appreciated. Yes, yes, I know Regnerus can claim that this study is just a "foundation for future research" in this area, but LGBT people have been on the receiving end of mis-used research for far too long to think such a disclaimer is going to stop virulent anti-LGBT groups from mis-using and misinterpreting research findings like these anyway.

In addition, the study reported a similar finding with respect to the question of whether the respondent had ever been forced to have sex against his or her will, and I would make the same points about that question as well.

3) You Say That Like It's a Bad Thing

Another significant finding was that children of "lesbian mothers" (there's that phrase again) were more likely to identify as not entirely heterosexual. Forgive me for not seeing that as a bad thing.

Unfortunately, and without elaboration as though the sub-par status of being not 100% heterosexual is some sort of self-evident truth, Regnerus includes this finding in his discussion of significant findings in which children of "lesbian mothers" have sub-optimal outcomes.

Related to that point, some may find Regenerus' discussion regarding his sexual orientation categorization interesting:

"The Kinsey scale of sexual behavior was employed, but modified to allow respondents to select the best description of their sexual orientation (rather than behavior). Respondents were asked to choose the description that best fits how they think about themselves: 100% heterosexual, mostly heterosexual but somewhat attracted to people of your own sex, bisexual (that is, attracted to men and women equally), mostly homosexual but somewhat attracted to people of the opposite sex, 100% homosexual, or not sexually attracted to either males or females. For simplicity of presentation, I create a dichotomous measure indicating 100% heterosexual (vs. anything else)."(emphasis added)

"Anything else."

Wow.

That really sums up the biggest flaw of this study for me, and note here, that I'm not ascribing Regnerus with having evil or malicious intent here. Rather, that his sketchy categorization of sexual orientation groups center one group of people as the Normal People. The so-called "microcosms of society"-- a man who has only ever had sex with women, a woman who has only ever had sex with men- and the children they are raising together while married.

And then, apparently, there's Everyone Else. The distinctions among these Everyone Else's don't matter within this study. So, despite all of the nuance in family structure and circumstances that exist in the real world, suddenly the narrative is that any parent who's ever had a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex is a "gay or lesbian parent" living in a "same-sex household."


(Note: Regenerus' study was funded by the Witherspoon Institute and the Bradley Foundation, two socially-conservative funders. I wanted to put that tidbit of information last, so as to not prejudice readers regarding my substantive criticisms.)

Cross-posted: Family Scholars Blog