Why Gay Parents May Be The Best Parents

[sixpence]

[quote name='Jesus_lol' timestamp='1326823224' post='2370531']
in this thread:

People who wont accept a study because the result doesnt conform with their worldview [b]AND/OR have some ability to determine when a study is poorly designed [/b]complaining about doctors that they assume wont accept results that dont conform with their worldviews [b]as seen on their website banner[/b].
[/quote]

that being said, occasionally people post not-so-well-designed studies on PM that support the Church's stance on whatever it is and there are usually fewer complaints

[fides' Jack]

Also, the study implies a theme of normality, as in, "these kids are just fine or are more normal than other kids."

What is normal? If it's defined by societal standards, then it doesn't count, anyway. Instead of telling me that they're better, tell me [i]how[/i] they're better. Then I can argue with something. What makes them more mentally stable?

[Papist]

[size=4][font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]Have you not heard of [color=#000000]Diederik Stapel?[/color][/font][/size]

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Papist' timestamp='1326837991' post='2370637']
[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]Have you not heard of [color=#000000]Diederik Stapel?[/color][/font]
[/quote]
I've heard of Stapel. What's the connection here? Just curious.

[Papist]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' timestamp='1326838715' post='2370639']
I've heard of Stapel. What's the connection here? Just curious.
[/quote]



That researchers can produce whatever they want regardless of the data...just as long as the results tells what peers want to hear.

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Papist' timestamp='1326839498' post='2370646']
That researchers can produce whatever they want regardless of the data...just as long as the results tells what peers want to hear.
[/quote]
Stapel's behavior was not tolerated and the guy is completely discredited and facing criminal prosecution. Sure, a scientist can theoretically be dishonest and make something up, but this is about as far as you can get from the general ethos of scientific research. I still don't quite get your point. Is there an actual connection with the research pertinent to this thread?

Edited January 17, 2012 by Laudate_Dominum

[Ice_nine]

[quote name='fides' Jack' timestamp='1326837168' post='2370628']
Also, the study implies a theme of normality, as in, "these kids are just fine or are more normal than other kids."

What is normal? If it's defined by societal standards, then it doesn't count, anyway. Instead of telling me that they're better, tell me [i]how[/i] they're better. Then I can argue with something. What makes them more mentally stable?
[/quote]

I believe in another thread about the gays, or one the derailed into homosexuality, someone talked about how one criterion of a mental illness/disorder is that it inhibits one's ability to function. Some were saying that there was a little colluding among lobbyists/political groups and the APA to get homosexuality off the list of disorders, while Jaime (I think) said that since being a homosexual in today's culture no longer is as inhibitive in terms of functioning as it was, that it cannot be rightly diagnosed as a psychiatric disorder in general.

That thread also mentioned that psychology is a soft science and the standards change along with the culture. That's the issue with being "normal" if you live in a screwed up place normal can be pretty wrong, but the majority sets the standard of behavior. Watching porn and masturbation are ubiquitous ills of our present culture, and championed by "progressives." And while we as Catholics know that behavior is abhorrent, it's commonplace and therefore: normal.

That was a bit of a tangent, but I hope I helped answer your question, or shown how it's not really aquestion that can be answered by psychology alone. Sorries.

[BG45]

[quote name='sixpence' timestamp='1326835329' post='2370609']
that being said, occasionally people post not-so-well-designed studies on PM that support the Church's stance on whatever it is and there are usually fewer complaints
[/quote]

I haz a sad I can only prop once.

[Ice_nine]

I guess the reason I posted this, which I only realized in retrospect, is how can we Catholics defend the faith without sounding like callous arse portals? This does not appear to be a rigorous study. Well, at least the article itself didn't provide any hard data, but with some research maybe someone could if they had the time. And even if there was substantial data the article itself seems to revel in its own inconsistency "The report didn't compare the adoption preferences of gay couples directly with those of heterosexual couples . . . But research suggests that gays and lesbians are more likely than heterosexuals to adopt older, special-needs and minority children."

More likely than whom? The heterosexual couples that you didn't compare them to?

But how do you respond to someone saying "so you'd rather have a kid raised by heterosexual crack addicts than a loving and committed gay couple?" without raging at the absurdity of the question, sounding like an arse portal, and getting your point across without people getting all self-righteous (which they will most-likely accuse you of being)?

[LilyLou]

I don't agree with the premise of the study for many of the previously mentioned reasons. It compares adoption by gay parents (a process that almost ensures that the couple want the child) to a whole slew of situations that result in heterosexual parenting. This isn't to say that all heterosexual parents don't want their children we all know that's not true. Though I agree that it would be more interesting to look at gay adoptive parents alongside heterosexual adoptive parents. They went through similar processes. BUT how many stories have we heard of wonderful parents who raise children who don't turn out the way we would expect them to. Does this success rate make them "bad parents?" No, IMO. Raising children can be hard for even the most devout parents and there isn't a guidebook. To say they are "better" parents is completely subjective.

[4588686]

[quote name='brianthephysicist' timestamp='1326833784' post='2370594']
83% of all statistics are made up. Including this one.
[/quote]

Always good to see a physicist who regards statistic as the essence of cow. Because statistics is not important to modern physics at all.

[img]http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/pics/Boltzmann.jpg[/img]


I think you just pissed off Boltzmann

[Laudate_Dominum]

I can't help falling in love with statistics... Seriously.

[BG45]

[quote name='BG45' timestamp='1326829181' post='2370567']
I tend to distrust every study now to an extent, because I know just how easy it is to bull-poopy one.
[/quote]

I should add, that was pretty much every assignment I had in one class last semester. "Tear apart this study, show me how they're lying."

[Norseman82]

[quote name='Ice_nine' timestamp='1326826022' post='2370547']
wheres?!
[/quote]

Try here:

[url="http://foryourmarriage.org/married-parents-are-important-for-children/"]http://foryourmarriage.org/married-parents-are-important-for-children/[/url]

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='BG45' timestamp='1326845712' post='2370701']
I should add, that was pretty much every assignment I had in one class last semester. "Tear apart this study, show me how they're lying."
[/quote]
That sounds like a fun class. It's disturbing to realize how saturated the media is with boolsheet. I see viral misinformation on FB quite frequently. It's hard to have to explain fallacies and statistics, especially when so many people are perfectly comfortable with motivated reasoning and confirmation bias (and a simple lie is often more attractive than a complicated truth). Just remembering that recent thing on FB involving a vaccine "study." Oy vey.

[Jesus_lol]

[quote name='Basilisa Marie' timestamp='1326823724' post='2370534']
You're so meta.
[/quote]

So meta it hurts
.
[quote name='dUSt' timestamp='1326824193' post='2370538']
Umadbro?
[/quote]

Chill as ice, man.
[spoiler][img]http://www.badmovies.org/movies/coolasice/coolasice1.jpg[/img][/spoiler]

[quote name='BG45' timestamp='1326829181' post='2370567']
More like, for me at least, an abiding knowledge that what is correct data wise is not always published because it is no politically correct. I've seen a lot of stuff that flies in the face of "common knowledge", including critiques of certain groups statistics that show them to be literally impossible to be real; no one will publish such things though, because they don't wish to go against the politically correct groups and the groups that have money.

An example. One researcher I know did a series of studies that showed there is no significant correlation between restrictive underage drinking laws and traffic accidents. Methodology is sound, every journal he submitted to agreed. However, all wanted him to change the wording of his conclusions so that it would still mostly support the party line, and to cherry pick what statistics were used to be more supportive of the party line.

Another was turned down by some journals for saying that the best fathers in her study were not the ones who were visited in prison by their children, but the ones who kept their kids from visiting because they didn't want them exposed to such an awful environment. I think she eventually got it published and became decently successful in the field, despite it flying in the face of what everyone "knows to be true".

This sort of stuff happens all the time. That's part of why I say I want the raw data and to run it myself before I trust statistics that could have been pulled out of thin air. Especially if there's a chance they've made their own construct and named it what they want; a Factor Analysis, which could have been run on all the variables that were collected, could have determined there was an underlying construct to some of the questions. You can sieze on that and name it whatever you want, as long as you make an argument for why the name works.

We like to call those "fishing expeditions", "the kitchen sink", and "voodoo science". Not Factor Analyses, but just tossing everything (and the kitchen sink ) into a factor analysis, figuring out what holds together, and then doing the rest of the research process from that point on. It's not that I only distrust this study's data, I tend to distrust every study now to an extent, because I know just how easy it is to bull-poopy one.
[/quote]

Oh im fully aware studies can be falsified, and i understand your potential objections. My point was that many of the posts against the study were not based on a legitimate beef with how the study was run, rather on a confirmation bias caused suspicion. if this study said the exact opposite thing, and was posted on a catholic site called "Familymatters.com" or "Nuclearfamily.com", there would be a lot less people complaining.

[quote name='sixpence' timestamp='1326835329' post='2370609']
that being said, occasionally people post not-so-well-designed studies on PM that support the Church's stance on whatever it is and there are usually fewer complaints
[/quote]

exactly. ^see my response to BG



i think its a bit interesting we are focusing on the comparison between functional gay couple adoptions and functional hetero adoptions. Unless the study is blatantly wrong, what it says to me is that being adopted into a gay family is better for the kid than staying with their dysfunctional but "normal" hetero family. it also seems like the kid is better off than remaining in foster care.

I would like to see a direct comparison like you guys are talking about, but if this study isnt completely fabricated, it seems to point towards Gay adoptions being at the very least "better than nothing", and that kids with 2 dads are better of than kids with no dad.

Edited January 18, 2012 by Jesus_lol

[brianthephysicist]

[quote name='Hasan' timestamp='1326844891' post='2370684']
Always good to see a physicist who regards statistic as the essence of cow. Because statistics is not important to modern physics at all.

[img]http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/pics/Boltzmann.jpg[/img]


I think you just pissed off Boltzmann
[/quote]
Yea....it's what we in the business like to refer to as a "joke"....

[Laudate_Dominum]

[quote name='Jesus_lol' timestamp='1326848471' post='2370733']
Chill as ice, man.
[/quote]
Win.

[4588686]

[quote name='brianthephysicist' timestamp='1326848694' post='2370734']
Yea....it's what we in the business like to refer to as a "joke"....
[/quote]

A joke is never just a joke.

[4588686]

[quote name='BG45' timestamp='1326845712' post='2370701']
I should add, that was pretty much every assignment I had in one class last semester. "Tear apart this study, show me how they're lying."
[/quote]

I guess we've had very different experiences with this. I know a lot of Professors who run stats and I'm 'friends' with one who specializes in stats and media analysis and I've never seen the sort of endemic corruption or bias that you're describing. There are biases in academia. And academics can misrepresent the raw data. But most academics I know (outside of critical/cultural studies) are pretty open to new points of view and deliberate misrepresentation of the data is the exception rather than the rule. In my thesis class we had it hammered into us that there is no shame in your thesis not being born out by the data and you need to learn how to draw lessons from a failed hypothesis that can be just as valuable as a negative one. Every investigation is valuable. If your thesis can't be proven by the data then dig deeper and figure out why. What were you wrong about? What assumptions did you have at the outset that the data didn't support?