I have no problem with homosexuals adopting children, but I think there would be some pitfalls that might need to be watched for in the way children are socialised. If the adoptive parents are well engaged in the broad community that's not a problem - lots of role models, lots of diversity, but if they are principally mixing in the gay community, there could be some issues integrating with the wider community as they grow to school age, but I'm sure they could be readily managed.

As a father who can't claim to be any kind of exemplar, given the turmoil my children have had to cope with because of family breakdown and abiding animosity between their mother and me, I can only say that if the kids have a home they feel comfortable in and parents who cherish them, I reckon they'll be OK whatever the parents' gender(s).

The recent study showing that the children raised in same-sex households are doing well also found that the majority are raised in female households, so presumably they are being raised by their biological mother. This article is a homophobic beat-up.

RitaJ, Raycom and David van Gend:

WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

It is now bordering on the comical how blinded you are by your anachronistic bigotry and fear. So much so that you're reduced to engaging in unmitigated doublethink now.

Raycom states: "The relevant definition of parent in the above context is "one who has begotten or borne offspring, father or mother". Relevant to whom? Not to CEDAW, it's just not in the text.

And David van Gend congratulates RitaJ for pointing out "...that the plain meaning of 'parents' was explicitly confirmed in the UN explanatory documents as meaning mother and father, man and woman".

Really David? Where? Well, as RitaJ tells us "The formal human rights language of Article 16 of the Women's Convention links the term "parents" definitively to "men and women" and to "husband and wife".

Oh, does it? WHERE?? You do know guys that the full text of CEDAW is on the web.

Here's the handy link to Article 16: http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/text/econvention.htm#article16

Oops! Your convenient "definition" is nowhere to be found. As in, it's not there: YOU'RE MAKING IT UP. The blind leading the blind. Sad.

Phillip B, here are rebuttals to the Fitzgibbons article: http://fightthemyths.blogspot.com.au/2011/11/same-sex-adoption-is-not-game-or-how-to.html

And to fundamentalist Christian Muehlenberg's book: http://blogs.crikey.com.au/purepoison/2010/07/21/bill-muehlenbergs-evidence-free-guide-to-gay-marriage/

And thank you Progressive Avenger for pointing out the debunking of the Regnerus article. Here is a summary of that ASA's submission to the Supreme Court:

http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2013/03/01/1657891/sociologists-scotus-parenting/

Here's the full text: http://www.asanet.org/documents/ASA/pdfs/12-144_307_Amicus_%20%28C_%20Gottlieb%29_ASA_Same-Sex_Marriage.pdf

Van Gend and his blind followers, why don't you all grow a pair and just admit what is at the base of all this: homophobia plain and simple, a profound discomfort with gay people and a disgust of homosexual love.

I'm done with this thread, because ultimately it is a waste of time. See, your risible views really don't matter: the law is changing, the majority of Australians are for it, it's happening right now elsewhere and will happen here too. Welcome to social progress, to the 21st Century: you will lose, so like it or lump it, because you can't stop it.

From: Mark Regnerus and the Storm over the New Family Structures Study at http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2012/10/6784/

In the less responsible precincts of the blogosphere, Regnerus was the target of vicious calumnies along the lines described above, one of which led to the opening of an official “inquiry” by the University of Texas at Austin, where he teaches, to determine whether he had committed “scientific misconduct.”

At UT, the policy in such matters is that the merest squeak from any party alleging misconduct is enough to trigger a preliminary inquiry, which in 60 days must determine whether a full-blown investigation is warranted. The university swung into action, doing everything by the book, at no little inconvenience to Regnerus, but at the end of August the UT “research integrity officer” concluded that no plausible charge of misconduct could be substantiated. The university’s provost accepted that conclusion, and closed the matter without prejudice to Regnerus’s standing as a scholar and teacher.

Interesting link JP.

It seems the study in question compared outcomes of children from families with either a gay mother, or a gay father to married heterosexual couples raising their own biological offspring and staying together throughout the subjects’ lives. I would predict the second scenario to be ideal, outcomes wise. This is due to the fact that if a parent were to "come out of the closet" after having children, it would most likely result in a diverse orr separation of the biological parents. Similarly, the experience of an orphan being abandoned and adopted by even the most perfect parents would still have negative effects. As a scientist, I'm not looking to discredit the study, or attack the researcher, but it important to identify the questions to fully understand the answers.

However the point is, are we going to deny parenthood to anyone who is not the ideal, perfect, lifelong parent, or continue to put up with ordinary flawed people who actually raised people like you and I? I bet fat people also have children with lower outcomes using this measurement. Also the thought of fat people having sex disgusts me. Also being fat isn't healthy. Is there anything I the bible about being fat? Gluttony? That pretty much covers all the arguments for the hypocrites! What say ye?

Some of the above comments confirm that it is the derelict state of natural marriage and the need for heterosexual couples to normalise their own chaos that accounts for much of the public support for same-sex marriage. Because our marriages have broken down, let's downgrade the institution itself to an irrational free-for-all. Because we have had bad parents / are bad parents, let's accept any type of parenting provided it is less abusive than ours. How depressing. As with past civilisations, it is only as our own cultural structure crumbles that the barbarians overrun us.

We have to repair and defend the city walls. In response to those who raise the scenario of an abusive mother and father and argue that it is better for a child to have two loving same-sex carers than a dysfunctional pair of biological parents I would say: neither option gives a child what she needs. We must reject both, restraining parents who would inflict abuse while also restraining governments who would inflict laws that normalise the motherless or fatherless child.