Hess invokes archaic methods in logic of column

Abram Hess’ views on the alleged unfitness of gays to adopt and raise children (“Fathers and mothers,” Feb. 1) are spectacularly uninformed and prejudiced. Adoption is a complex subject fraught with difficult decisions, yet for Hess, things are clear. Not only does he assert that every child “needs a father and a mother,” he then claims, “Homosexuals cannot be the parents every child was meant to have,” and goes on to speculate that “the impetus behind homosexual adoption” is to “lend legitimacy to the sham of gay marriages.”\nHow does he know? Has he ever talked to a gay couple with the desire to raise children (say, our vice president’s daughter and her partner)? Hess’ column shows confusion about many issues, and his invocation of God is shameful. But most flagrant is his faulty reasoning that because it takes a male and a female to reproduce, therefore only a man and a woman can be good parents. First off, the ability to have children obviously does not imply the ability to raise them, as countless teenage pregnancies attest each year. Vice versa, the inability to have children does not logically imply an inability to raise children either, as many dedicated single parents show as well.\nIn short, Hess is talking nonsense. Indeed, much more research is needed on child development and parenting by different-sex, single or same-sex parents, but Hess doesn’t bother to address that issue. Nor does he entertain the thought that, just maybe, the ability to show love and responsibility are more important than the biological make-up of a child’s parents. Instead, Hess ends by stating that a child would be better off in an orphanage than “in the hands of two men dedicated to having sex with each other.” Hess here employs the age-old discriminatory strategy of reducing gay men to their sexual activities. As if gay men (or lesbian women) were not humans with a full emotional and intellectual range; as if heterosexuals didn’t like sex just as much. I am afraid many Americans still share Hess’ reactionary views on gays. A scary thought.\nJohn Baesler\nDoctoral candidate