The Reparative Therapy Debate

Same-sex attraction. Is it just me, or has the “norm” for opinions about this changed drastically in just the past few months? I may have been completely oblivious and out of the loop, but at the beginning of this year, it seemed like it was perfectly okay to oppose same-sex marriage. People still got mad at you for it of course, but the general consensus was that everyone could have their own opinion. Where the heck did that attitude go? I didn’t realize how much I liked it until it was gone, replaced by the attitude that if you opposed same-sex marriage, you were a homophobe, a bigot, a wacko who must belong to a cult, etc. Oh well I guess. It looks like this is how it’s going to be from now on, and those of us who still think acting on homosexual feelings is wrong are just going to have to deal with it. So before I go on and say what I think about this issue, know that I am perfectly well aware of what people will think of me if they see this.

I believe that same-sex attraction, while perhaps not necessarily a choice, isn’t something you are born with. Even the American Psychiatric Association, a very pro-same-sex attraction organization, has this statement on their website. “There is no consensus among scientists about the exact reasons that an individual develops a heterosexual, bisexual, gay, or lesbian orientation.”

There is a thing called reparative therapy that is intended to, and does, help those who feel attracted to their same sex but don’t want to feel those feelings. Just like any other form of counseling, reparative therapy a very viable option for someone who isn’t satisfied with their life and wants to change things. However, several states have banned reparative therapy for minors, a move that President Obama approves of and encourages. WHAT THE HECK? At first glance, banning reparative therapy may look like a good thing. What if a teenager seeks out reparative therapy because they think they are gay, but don’t want to be, and can’t change? Won’t they be damaged because of it? Uh, that’s the dumbest argument on the planet. First, the same thing could be true for any other kind of counseling, for any other problem. If a person has depression, and they (of course), don’t want that in their life, should they not seek help simply because that help might not work? Of course not! They should do all they can to get rid of the thing that they don’t want, or at least gain the ability to manage it. Why not allow the same courtesy to individuals with same-gender attraction? One argument, of course, that people use against reparative therapy for SSA is that since a person is born that way, it’s cruel and horrible to try and change that, even if they want to. This, also, is a ridiculous argument. Most of the people who are against reparative therapy are very much in sympathy of transgender people, even transgender children and teenagers. And yet, people are all born either a boy or a girl. It doesn’t make sense for someone to argue against reparative therapy, and yet sympathize with transgender individuals. Since transgender people are “born that way,” (either a boy or a girl), wouldn’t it be just as cruel and horrible to try and change them to the opposite sex, even if they wanted to, as it would to try and change someone with SSA? Pick a side people, you can’t have it both ways.

I’m not saying that everyone with SSA should be put into reparative therapy. That’s not what I’m saying at all. The point is that if there is a choice for someone to attempt to change their gender, there should be a choice for someone else to attempt to change their sexual orientation.

Those Darn Differences

Differences. Aren’t they annoying? Isn’t it just so lame when you want to do something different than your husband for a date night? Isn’t it hard when you’re crying because you think your husband is ignoring you, but in reality he’s just got his mind on a really hard school project? Isn’t it a pain when your husband doesn’t mind being late for things but it drives you nuts? Yeah, sometimes these things are annoying and hard and painful. But who cares? I’m grateful for the differences my husband and I have. Our differences seem to coordinate so well that they help round us out as a couple. I might think that going out to dinner is the perfect date, but if we always did that, we’d be broke. My husband might think that grabbing a movie from Redbox and eating popcorn is the perfect date, but if we always did that we’d get fat from the popcorn. I may think he’s ignoring me and get all emotional, and he might be too focused on homework, but this gives us the chance to learn to be selfless and mindful of someone else.

I recently took a little personality test for one of my classes. It wasn’t anything big or scientific, but it got me thinking about differences. The test had questions like “Are you good at math?” Then it had questions such as “Can you discern how other people are feeling?” These two traits, being logical and being emotionally aware, are completely different. But where the heck would the world be if only one of them existed? Without math, not only would we not have complicated things like computers and space shuttles, we wouldn’t even have seemingly simple things like money or compasses. And yet on the other hand, if there wasn’t compassion in the world, we would have a lot more war, a lot less fun and games, and a lot more disease. If no one had compassion what would motivate people to become the doctors and scientists who cure sickness and save lives?

Differences are so crucial to the world that we live in. They are crucial to our communities, and they are so incredibly crucial to our families. I’m so grateful for the differences between my husband and I. I’m glad we are the same with regards to what we believe, what we think it most important, and what we want to do with our lives, but I’m glad that we have those small differences that make our lives interesting!

The Overpopulation Trickery

Babies. The world needs more of them. But what about the overpopulation of the earth, you ask? Well, sorry to tell you, but the population of the world is going to peak in 2065, then it's going to decrease exponentially just as it has risen exponentially over the past two hundred years or so. Yes, there are more people alive in the earth now than at any other time in history, but the biggest reason for that isn't that people are having too many babies. It is that people are living longer now than ever before. Because people are now living into their 80's and 90's instead of their 40's and 50's, there are more people. In fact, contrary to popular belief, people in most developed countries are not giving birth to enough people to replace them. The "replacement rate," or the number of children that each woman must have in order to keep the population at a steady rate is 2.13. The .13 is to take into account those children who die before reaching adulthood. But in America, the fertility rate, or average number if children that a woman gives birth to in her lifetime, is 2.01. In most European countries, it is much lower. Spain's fertility rate is 1.43, Switzerland's is 1.54. Latvia is 1.35. In Germany, the fertility rate is 1.43, and the government actually pays people to have children. 

Some people think that lowering the amount of people in the world is a good thing. But if you really think about it, it's not. Basically, if there are a lot more old people than there are young people, the economy will crash. There won’t be enough young people to generate the revenue for Medicare, Social Security, etc. There won’t be enough doctors to care for the elderly. China is finally realizing this, so they changed their one child policy so that Chinese families can now have two children.

Besides all that boring stuff, who on earth would want to live in a world without babies? There is no other thing that I can think of that inspires people to work harder to build a better world than when a parent looks at their child and thinks, “I want him to have a better life than I do.” You can’t look at a baby without getting a happy, hopeful feeling inside. Babies are the future, not the past.

Families. What makes up a family? In the past, the definition of a family was simple. It was a mom, a dad, and their children, with grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins mixed in. Now, there are so many definitions of a family that you can't even really have a definition or someone will get offended.

But I don't really want to talk about the numbers so much. When I first started this blog, I thought I could be super objective and that I could write in a secular way about families. However, I've discovered that I can't really do that, at least not all the time. Because for me, families aren't just a fundamental unit of society. They are a fundamental reason for life. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and we believe that families are a central reason for being alive in this world. I believe that if you do it right, families make you happy. I know that my family makes me happy, both the family that I grew up in, and the family that I started when I got married to my husband in April. I believe that a family that is made up of a mom, a dad, and (hopefully) children is the best model. The thought of the millions of people in this world who don't have a family to go through life with makes me so, so sad. My family means everything to me, and my greatest desire in life is to have a happy family. That is what I want to do. I would like to have a career as a Child Life Specialist or simply a preschool teacher, but I won't be disappointed if that doesn't happen. In fact, I will be disappointed if it does, because that will mean that for some reason, I wasn't able to have kids or I wasn't able to be a stay-at-home mom. I'll talk more about that in my next post. Anyways, there are a few of my thoughts about family.

I'm taking a Family Relations class here at BYU-I this semester. For one of our homework assignments, we studied the research that the Supreme Court used in March of 2013 to decide that children are not adversely affected when they are raised in a family with parents of the same sex. This research was conducted by the American Psychological Association. I’ve made a list of the errors in the research:

Only 59 samples were cited in this study, and most of those samples were extremely small. One sample only contained 5 couples, and several didn’t contain any. They simply asked psychologist’s opinions and used those as empirical evidence.

At least 11 of the 59 studies compared gay and lesbian parents with single mothers. A lot of other research has been done that shows that a child is at a distinct disadvantage when he/she is raised by only one parent. Saying that gay parent’s children have better lives than those with single parents isn’t saying much (this isn’t universal of course, but in general, single parent homes are not good for children.)

Most of the homosexual couples sampled were privileged Caucasians, meaning that they had a significantly higher education than the average single or heterosexual mother. Because of this, they are more likely to have more resources, etc. than less privileged parents.

The study claims that gay fathers are no different than other fathers, but the only evidence they have to back up that claim is the opinions of the gay fathers themselves, who of course are biased.

Most of the samples were “convenience samples,” meaning that most of the couples sampled were known by the researchers, or knew someone who knew the researchers and chose to participate in the studies. Also, some of them answered the call to be in the study through a gay-lesbian magazine. As most people know, you only volunteer to be in a survey if you have a strong opinion about it.

This study did not focus on the usual child outcomes that are looked at in other family studies. In most other studies, drug abuse, alcoholism, education, sexual abuse, etc. are evaluated. In this study however, the researchers mostly focused on the opinions of the parents. How the parents thought their children were doing, how they thought they were doing as parents.

This research is obviously very flawed, and not reliable at all. However, when it was presented to the Supreme Court, several of the judges didn’t even look at it. This decision made an impact on the Supreme Court decision earlier this year that legalized gay marriage. However, there has been research that was done in the right way on the subject. I would encourage everyone to check out this website.http://familystructurestudies.com/ Look at the methods, the sample sizes, the comparisons, and the random selection of the samples. This is much better research. Also, look at the results under the tab "Outcomes for Children." I love children so much, and it makes me so sad to think about how many more children will be affected by same-sex marriage. I will probably have to care for some of these children in my career, and I hope and pray that I will know how to help them.

About this blog

Starting a blog is something I never thought I'd do. It's not really my style. However, in my Family Relations class this semester, we're required to start a blog and the more I've thought about it, the more I think it'll be a fun experience. This blog is going to be all about families. I'm not sure exactly how I'm going to go about it yet, but I do know that once a week I'll be writing a post about the importance of families. I don't think this will be very hard, since family is so important to me. Anyways, that's about it! I'm excited to let you guys know what I'm thinking and learning about families!