So, if i get a surrogate and we have a child, and my gay partner wants to adopt the baby so that we are both legal parents, surely it make no sense to deny the adoption?
I don't think that holds water. Gay rights are great, but childrens rights are greater. If there is any doubt about the rights of either group being infringed on by 'experimenting' then you have an immediate problem because nobody will sign off on experimenting on children to see if in the long term it will matter or not.
If there would be large numbers of cases proving that it essentially makes no difference then that would help, but you're in a chicken-and-the-egg situation.
I know of one gay couple in my circle of friends that would like to adopt a child and they've come to the conclusion that they themselves can't come to a 100% agreement between the two of them about what that responsibility exactly entails. It was a very eye opening discussion, because I think I went away a changed person, essentially form going to saying 'I don't see why not' to 'maybe it really is better, who knows'.
For me that's a weird thing because when I thought about this before I always thought that gay people would not 'overlap' with straight people on this issue but would be on the far side of a barrier that you can not cross because you can not imagine what it is exactly like to be gay when you are not.
This is a very complex issue, societal pressures are such that simply being raised as the child of two gay parents puts undue pressure on a child (for instance peer pressure), and that can cause serious damage. That's the sort of argument that they went on about and I had never even thought of it from that angle.
It would make sense not to allow you (not you personally, in fact anyone) to have a child with a "surrogate", i.e. a mother who deliberatly chooses before conception to play no role in raising that child.
Sure, I believe that no person should be conceived with the deliberate intention of one or both of his/her genetic parents* playing a fully meaningful parenting role in his/her life.
*or gestational mother in the case of a non-traditional surrogate
The argument I mentioned is concerned with psychological development not biological. I don't see how what your saying relates to the argument in any sense. Based on the argument, it would make sense to deny the adoption in your scenario.
To present the argument again, because homosexual parenting hasn't been extensively studied, we need to avoid homosexual adoption until a foundation of research can be established in this area. Research on developmental psychology guides many of the child adoption rules currently in place. The argument is that the same standard should be applied to homosexual adoption.
Again, note my use of distancing language. This isn't my opinion; I do not hold one on this issue because I'm not qualified in this area.
EDIT: The American Psychological Association has filed an Amicus Brief that is relevant.
"Because many beliefs about lesbian and gay parents and their children are open to empirical testing, psychological research can evaluate their accuracy.... the results of existing research comparing lesbian and gay parents to heterosexual parents and children of lesbian and gay parents to children of heterosexual parents are quite clear: Common stereotypes are not supported by the data... Some areas of research, such as gender development, and some periods of life, such as adolescence, have been described by reviewers as understudied and deserving of greater attention... There is no evidence to suggest that lesbian women or gay men are unfit to be parents or that psychosocial development among children of lesbian women or gay men is compromised relative to that among offspring of heterosexual parents... although a considerable amount of information is available, additional research would further our understanding of lesbian and gay parents and their children... It should be acknowledged that research on lesbian and gay parents and their children, though no longer new, is still limited in extent. Although studies of gay fathers and their children have been conducted (Patterson, 2004), less is known about children of gay fathers than about children of lesbian mothers."
Personally, seems like a reasonable standard of proof to me, but I think the people who hold the argument I've been presenting would say that the standard of proof necessary is up to the courts. Clearly there are areas that need more research, as the research is "limited in extent".
