Why we must make a stronger commitment to lesbian family health
“Equitable treatment” recommended by ACOG does not eliminate health-care disparities between families headed by heterosexual parents and those headed by same-sex parents
IN THIS ARTICLE
Like heterosexual women, many lesbians desire to create families secured by civil marriage laws. These families need and deserve the same protections established by law to support and protect families headed by heterosexual couples. The marriage license is a state-regulated contract between two individuals. Each couple must then separately have the license solemnized, either by a designated state official (civil marriage) or by a clergy member (religious marriage).
All of the states with laws that permit civil marriage for same-sex couples have explicitly endorsed a religious right for clergy to refuse to certify same-sex couples’ licenses according to their beliefs.
Married parents provide a greater sense of security
In comparison with mere cohabitation, marriage confers more health benefits to the couple and has been correlated with a lower rate of cardiac disease24 and cancer risk factors,25 and with greater longevity.26 Marriage also provides greater security to any children in the family unit.27 When federal and state laws treat homosexual families differently than heterosexuals, this discrimination conveys a lower societal respect to all members of the family, but especially to the children.28 When children eventually learn that their parents—unlike other children’s parents—are not allowed to marry, they may lose some faith in their parents and be subject to bullying.29
The AAP reported significant, reliable evidence that lesbian and gay parents are as fit, effective, and successful as heterosexual parents.28 The organization also confirmed research showing that children of same-sex couples are as emotionally healthy and socially well-adjusted and at least as educationally and socially successful as children raised by heterosexual parents.28
The APA issued a pamphlet that states:
- Both heterosexual behavior and homosexual behavior are normal aspects of human sexuality. Both have been documented in many different cultures and historical eras. Despite the persistence of stereotypes that portray lesbian, gay, and bisexual people as disturbed, several decades of research and clinical experience have led all mainstream medical and mental health organizations in this country to conclude that these orientations represent normal forms of human experience.30
Case studies in discrimination
In 44 states, “equitable treatment” for same-sex couples, reflected in local law, entails denial of civil marriage and the family protections it confers. In nine states, equitable treatment means prohibition of adoption by same-sex couples. In 30 states, equitable treatment includes discrimination in housing or jobs based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Consider the following vignettes, all possible (as is Case 1) under current laws in the geographic areas specified:
CASE 2
A Massachusetts lesbian married to a same-sex spouse who bore the couple’s children is offered a job promotion managing the Arkansas branch of her company. She has to decline the promotion because her company cannot continue her family’s medical insurance in Arkansas. Nor would she have legal custody of her children in that state or be able to adopt them there.
CASE 3
A married lesbian is hit by a car while crossing the street at a medical conference in Dallas. The funeral home refuses to release her body to her spouse for burial near their home in Connecticut. The decedent’s brother is called because he is the closest legal relative under Texas law, but since he never approved of his sister’s lesbian sexual orientation, he has her body transported to his family’s plot in Virginia.
CASE 4
A physician who is a lesbian is recruited to a state university in Michigan in 2003. She moves there with her domestic partner and their two adopted children, one of whom has cerebral palsy, and is promoted to the rank of associate professor in 2007. The next year, the Michigan Supreme Court interprets a 2004 constitutional amendment to mean that state institutions are prohibited from providing domestic partner benefits to same-sex couples. This leaves her stay-at-home spouse and their children without health insurance.
In each case, “equitable treatment” that is legal nevertheless injures the stability, integrity, and health of families, and ACOG’s Code of Professional Ethics fails to serve its mission of promoting women’s and family health.
AAP, APA endorse civil marriage
After reviewing 25 scientific articles on families parented by same-sex couples and the development of children in those families, the AAP concluded in 2006 that:
- These data have demonstrated no risk to children as a result of growing up in a family with one or more gay parents. Conscientious and nurturing adults, whether they are men or women, heterosexual or homosexual, can be excellent parents. The rights, benefits, and protections of civil marriage can further strengthen these families.28
