Yesterday my Twitter home page briefly filled with a link to an article claiming to have “Answers to arguments against gay marriage.” Of course I was interested, since I can imagine that over the course of our trip we will have some dissent to address. Though I feel pretty confident that I can defend my marriage, getting some new talking points is never a bad idea.

The article was from a blog called Burning or building bridges in the community?, and seems to be geared toward people working within their faith organizations to gain support for marriage equality. [The post credits another blog with the talking points, www.loveisanorientation.com, but I was unable to find the post on that blog.] I’m not the intended audience for the points, so if they didn’t enthrall me, that’s not to say they’re not good points.

But one of the points really disturbed me:

5.) Courts will not be able to favor a traditional family involving one man and one woman over a homosexual couple in matters of adoption.

To be realistic, gays will never know the joy of bringing their own children up together, yet looking at the way we just throw away children or abuse them, it would seem we don’t value them so much. To me, one baby in the hands of a gay couple is better than one baby in a dumpster. No it’s not ideal, but we must work with what we have to get the best situation we can. Having a kid in a single sex household is no more damaging than having a child raised in a single parent household, which is legal. With two parents at least, you have more of a chance for stability. Yet, it is the better option that we are trying to outlaw. [Emphasis mine]

As a child of a single-parent home, I was pretty offended by that. I will agree that it’s not as easy to be a single parent. Discussing this article with a single mom friend this morning, she said, “Yeah, when I was sick last week, I couldn’t sing to my daughter. There was nobody else to sing to her, so she went without singing for a few days.”

Do we have to throw single parents under the bus in order to make the point that we are capable of creating good families? Is it really “not ideal” to have gay couples as parents?

According to the American Psychological Association website, some studies show lesbian and gay parents may, in fact, have superior parenting skills to straight couples. But I’m not here to argue that we should stop letting the hets become parents, even if it is less than ideal.

I don’t mean to criticize the post’s intentions–it’s obvious that the author (whoever s/he is) means well. And it’s not the first time I’ve been offended by the “two parents–any two parents–are better than one” argument. Here’s another example:

Two Dads Are Better Than None T-Shirt

Two dads are better than none. Really? Are they? Immediately I thought of our family, no dads to be found. So it’s my daughter hanging her head in that picture? Oh, wait, no, because there’s also a two moms t-shirt. But don’t they contradict each other?

Again we see this argument: even having gay or lesbian parents is better than having a single mom or dad.

I propose that we not use this defense. Single parents have enough on their plate without us adding to the burden. Their jobs are difficult: balancing family and work; having enough money to raise children with only a single income; the age-old argument they have to contend with daily, spoken and not, that not having two parents is bad for kids. And an oppressed group boosting itself up on the backs of another oppressed group is just ugly.

Instead, let’s say this: Consciously parented children who are loved and cared for have everything they need to become well-adjusted adults, whatever the makeup of their family. Let’s make our point that gay and lesbian parents are worthy on the basis of its merits, not by comparing to other non-traditional families.

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