Dispatches from the Creation Wars

The children arrived at the home of Petitioner and Tom Roe, Sr., domestic partners, and Tom Roe, Sr.'s then eight-year old biological son, Tom Roe, Jr., on the evening of December 11, 2004. John, the elder sibling, arrived with his four-month old brother wearing a dirty adult sized t-shirt and sneakers four sizes too small that seemed more like flip-flops than shoes. Both children were suffering from scalp ringworm. Although John was clearly suffering from a severe case of ringworm, the medication brought from John's home to treat his scalp was unopened and expired. James, too, suffered from an untreated ear infection, as evidenced by the one-month old, nearly unused, medication. John did not speak and had no affect. He had one concern: changing, feeding, and caring for his baby brother. It was clear from the children's first evening at the Petitioner-Roe home that the baby's main caretaker was John, his four year old brother.

On that December evening, John and James left a world of chronic neglect, emotional impoverishment and deprivation to enter a new world, foreign to them, that was nurturing, safe, structured and stimulating. Although Petitioner and Roe had fostered other children, caring for John was the most challenging of their foster care experiences. For the first few months, John seemed depressed and presented a void, unresponsive demeanor and appearance. Upon arriving at the Petitioner home, John did not speak a word for about one week. After two weeks, he began to mumble imperceptible utterances. After about one month, John finally began speaking. Petitioner quickly learned that John had never seen a book, could not distinguish letters from numbers, could not identify colors and could not count. He could not hold a pencil. He had never been in an early childhood program or day care. Nevertheless, John's potential for educational development was apparent. Although he had not had any formal education, John could sing and pick up lyrics very quickly. Early on, Petitioner and Roe noticed that John hoarded food by requesting additional servings at the start of dinnertime and later hiding the extra food in his room. John eventually grew out of this behavior, due in part to a tactic employed by Petitioner and Roe of showing John, in advance of mealtime, the more than sufficient amount of food on the stove prepared and available for the family.

The plaintiffs in this case have been together for nearly 10 years. They have been foster parents to 9 children over those years, including the two they are now formally adopting. How could any person not absolutely crazed with anti-gay bigotry claim that those boys are not infinitely better off with them than with the straight parents who had neglected them so shamefully? When John Stemberger says, "Children do better with a mother and a father," he can't possibly be talking about these children.

Here's what expert witnesses said would happen if these children were taken from the plaintiffs after four years:

Based on his assessment, Dr. Brodzinsky concluded that John and James would be emotionally devastated if removed from the Petitioner-Roe home. As Petitioner, Roe and Tom Roe, Jr., are the only family James knows and as John has not yet developed stability, a second separation would cause academic regression, separation anxiety, sleep problems, and trust issues. The witness also opined that it is in children's best interest to be adopted by Petitioner, as opposed to maintaining lesser forms of permanency through continued foster care, permanent guardianship or the like. According to Dr. Brodzinsky, children, at age appropriate levels, understand that foster parents and guardians are not a legal family. The doctor does not consider Petitioner and Roe's sexual orientation a factor in their parental abilities or the children's wellbeing. He concludes that: (1) Petitioner and Roe's quality of parenting is high and healthy; (2) the parent-child relationships are strong and healthy; (3) the resources and educational opportunities available to the children in the Petitioner-Roe home are beneficial; and (4) separation would cause emotional trauma to John, James and Tom Roe, Jr.

The Court also heard testimony from Ronald Gilbert, the children's Guardian Ad Litem since June 2005. Mr. Gilbert, who has served as Guardian Ad Litem to over 100 children, visits the Petitioner-Roe household monthly to observe the children and the family. Based on Mr. Gilbert's observations, the children are in excellent health, well behaved, performing well in school and bonded to Petitioner, Roe and Tom Roe, Jr. During his visits, the Guardian regularly sees the three children playing and hugging one another like brothers. Based on his interactions and observations of other foster parents, Mr. Gilbert believes Petitioner and Roe are model parents. In fact, he testified that in all of his 100 cases as a Guardian Ad Litem, the Petitioner home is one of the most caring and nurturing placements he has encountered. He further opines that adoption is the preferred form of permanency over permanent guardianship because John and James deserve parents. According to the Guardian, the children would suffer mentally and physically if separated from Petitioner, Roe and Tom Roe, Jr. The Guardian Ad Litem's official recommendation is to allow the Petitioner to adopt the children and states it is in the manifest best interest of the children.

Tom Roe Jr refers to the biological son of one of the plaintiffs, who lives with them and has bonded with the boys as an older brother.

The state's arguments revolved around statistical claims, many of them false, about homosexual relationships. Gay couples are more likely to split up than straight couples, they said, and more likely to have violence in the relationship. And as I've argued many times, even if those claims were true they would not justify preventing them from adopting. As the ruling notes, the same thing is true of any number of other demographic factors and no one would ever suggest that this is a justification for preventing adoption by them:

In analyzing the divorce rates of various demographic characteristics such as ethnicity, race, education, income, and religion, Dr. Peplau finds that sexual orientation is no more a predictor of divorce than other demographic characteristics. According to the research, an individual with a low level of education tends to earn less, thus increasing the chance of divorce. If the individual is also African-American, the chances of divorce again increase. Thus, Dr. Peplau concludes that the success of a marriage is affected by multiple characteristics, as opposed to one single factor. Therefore, according to the witness, the research taken as a whole, shows that any one demographic characteristic, such as sexual orientation taken alone, is not a strong predictor of break-up rates. In fact, as homosexually behaving individuals tend to be more highly educated and high income earners, sexual orientation is less correlated to break-up rates than race or income, for example.

In a footnote, the judge cites the various rates among different demographic groups:

According to studies by Bramlett and Mosier (2002) and R. Kelly Raley & Larry Bumpass, based on the following demographical characteristics, the 10-year divorce rates are: Blacks (47%), Hispanics (34%), Whites (32%), Asian (20%); when same race (31%), when different race (41%); when married as teenagers (43%); when married over 30 (20%); less than HS education (39%-42%), HS graduate (35%-36%), more than HS (29%-30%), college graduates (20%); family income less than $25k (53%), up to $50k (31%), more than $50k (23%); some religion affiliation (32%), w/o religious affiliation(46%); from intact family (29%), divorced parents (43%); military service members having served in combat (62%).

Would anyone who uses this argument against gay marriage and gay adoption even consider using it against veterans who had been in combat? Would anyone other than outright racists claim that blacks and Hispanics should not be allowed to adopt children because their rate of divorce was so much higher than whites? The same thing is true of other similar issues, such as psychiatric problems:

Among other aspects, Dr. Cochran testified as to the effects of sexual orientation on mental health and the prevalence of psychiatric disorders. As a general premise, elevated occurrences of psychiatric disorders and rates of depression and suicidality are associated with demographic characteristics, such as race, gender, age, socioeconomic status and sexual orientation. In terms of the specific demographic characteristic of sexual orientation, the witness cited to several population-based studies comparing the mental health of gay and heterosexual individuals including the 1996 National Survey on Drug Abuse, the National Co-morbidity Survey (1990-1992), the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1971-1975, 1976-1980, 1988-1994, 1999-2002, 2003-2004, 2005-2006), the National Examination Survey, the Midlife Survey of Adult Development (1995- 1996), the Add Health Cohort study (1994-95, 1996, 2001-2002, 2007-2008) the California Quality of Life Survey (2001) and the National Latino and Asian-American Survey (May 2002 and November 2003). According to the witness, taken as a whole, the research shows that sexual orientation alone is not a proxy for psychiatric disorders, mental health conditions, substance abuse or smoking; members of every demographic group suffer from these conditions at rates not significantly higher than for homosexuals. Therefore, based on the research, while the average rates of psychiatric conditions, substance abuse and smoking are generally slightly higher for homosexuals than heterosexuals, the rates of psychiatric conditions, substance abuse and smoking are also higher for American-Indians as compared to other races, the unemployed as compared to the employed and non-high school graduates as compared to high school graduates, for example. Poignantly, Dr. Cochran pointed out that if every demographic group with elevated rates of psychiatric disorders, substance abuse and smoking were excluded from adopting, the only group eligible to adopt under this rationale would be Asian American men.

Believe it or not, one of the state's two expert witnesses, George Rekers, did say that he would be in favor of preventing one group from adopting based on such social statistics, as Skemono observes:

He said he would also consider banning Native Americans from adopting because research shows that they are also at much higher risk of mental illness and substance abuse. "They would tend to hang around each other," Rekers testified. "So the children would be around a lot of other Native Americans who are . . . doing the same sorts of things."

Very nice. One of the things that the judge notes repeatedly in her ruling is that the expert witnesses for the state were clearly motivated by their religious beliefs and that this colored their scientific arguments. George Rekers, for example, is both a psychologist and a Baptist minister. That by itself is not a problem, but when you combine it with other things it quickly becomes clear what is going on inside the head of Mr. Rekers.

For instance, he repeatedly cited "research" by the vile and utterly discredited Paul Cameron. And this is how extreme Rekers is:

Dr. Rekers astounded the Court when he testified that he favors removal of any child from a homosexual household, even after placement in that household for ten years, in favor of a heterosexual household. To this Court's further astonishment, the witness hypothesized that such a child would recover from the removal from his family of 10 years after one year in a heterosexual household. The Court finds this testimony to be contrary to science and decades of research in child development.

Rekers has written repeatedly that he strives to make his professional conclusions match his belief in the inerrancy of the Bible. In one book, he wrote about the dangers of "non-Christian psychology" because it does not conform to the Biblical view of morality:

"Non-Christian psychologists often encourage their clients to do form their own values regarding sexual expression. In doing so, they mistakenly assume that they are providing the most appropriate and sensitive counsel. In reality they are tacitly creating an impression that the universe was constructed with no moral law inherent to the system, but God has spoken. God has given us explicit instruction as to what his moral laws are. The psychologist who recommends that a person simply define his own sexual values ends up not being an advocate of human freedom, instead he becomes a revolutionary, attempting to overthrow the moral laws of God. Instead of being helped, the client is therefore led down a fanciful path of alleged morality called, quote, liberation."

He also says in that book that researchers should begin and end their inquiries into homosexuality with the notion that God says it's wrong and that the actual research does not matter, only the religious assumption that homosexuality is bad:

"An honest scholarly search for the truth about homosexuality should not stop with psychological or medical information alone. Wise professionals should also consider evidence for moral truth as well. The bible teaches that people are foolish if they deny God's reality and live their lives as though he were not there.... What happens when psychologists and psychiatrists search for truth about homosexuality, but close the door to any possibility of information from the creator of the human race? What happens if scholars deliberately discard all moral evidence as irrelevant to their professional judgments? Roman's describes the consequences in suppressing truth revealed by the creator.... Those verses indicate that the existence of God is evident within each person, so psychologists and psychiatrists who proceed as though he does not exist are deliberately suppressing truth. To search for truth about homosexuality in psychology and psychiatry, while ignoring God, will result in futile and foolish speculations."

Rekers was not alone in this regard. The other expert offered by the state of Florida was Dr. Walter Schumm from Kansas State University. He seems to have the same problems distinguishing religion from science:

Dr. Schumm also integrates his religious and ideological beliefs into his research. In an article he published in the Journal of Psychology and Theology he wrote, "With respect to the integration of faith and research, I have been trying to use statistics to highlight the truth of the Scripture."

In another paper, he wrote:

Within the limitations imposed by context, errors in translation and errors of individual interpretation, we prefer to accept the authority of the Bible as the best guide for sexual decision making, as well as for many other areas of life. We consider Scripture to be important, not because of tradition or institutional affiliation, but because after reasoned study, we make the assumption that they contain the wisdom of the Creator regarding the human condition and effective ways of relating to others interpersonally. In particular, we turn to the life of Jesus as a guide for our own value system.

Unlike Rekers, however, Schumm did not think that homosexuals should be denied adoption rights as a group but only that the decision should be made on a case by case basis. Which is, of course, exactly what the plaintiffs want to happen. Such decisions should always be made on a case by case basis, as they always are. The state should always consider individual factors for prospective adoptive parents and weed out those whose past would indicate they would be bad parents.