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>> 25 1 Decisions, Decisions Gay Men Turn toward Parenthood When I first interviewed Rufus and Trey, they had been waiting for a child placement for just a few months. They were both excited to talk about the adoption process; this was not always the case for couples who had been waiting for many months or even years for a child placement. Both fairly young (Rufus was 37 and Trey was 32), they conveyed a boyish excitement about their impending parenthood. As Rufus exclaimed, “I have always loved kids. . . . I just feel like I have a lot to offer.” Both men voiced a long-standing interest in parenthood, and both described themselves as “very familyoriented ,” although Rufus also acknowledged having temporarily “shelved” his dream of becoming a parent when he came out. He said he had no role models for what gay parenthood might look like, and he therefore admittedly “bought into” common notions about the fundamental incompatibility of gay life and parenthood. Later, in his early 20s, he began to meet gay parents , which helped to shift his thinking about parenthood from “I want to do it” to “I can do it!” It was not long after he met Trey that the two began to talk about children. Rufus explained, “Trey and I have talked about having 26 > 27 related to them, and before pursuing adoptive parenthood, make peace with any feelings of loss related to not passing on their genes. Finally, gay men who decide to adopt must then decide what type of adoption to pursue, taking into account such considerations as finances and moral/philosophical beliefs. As this chapter reveals, gay men inevitably confront and wrestle with the importance of biological and genetic relations and heterosexuality to dominant notions of family, and, in turn, with stereotypes regarding the incompatibility of homosexuality and parenthood (Stacey, 1996). The men’s narratives highlight the varied ways that gay men may resist or challenge the dominant discourses regarding family—as well as the ways they may ultimately internalize them. * * * Men who decide to become parents in the context of same-sex relationships engage in a different decision-making process from that of their heterosexual counterparts. Whereas parenthood is culturally accessible, socially valued, and even expected among heterosexual married men and women, gay men who wish to parent are subject to societal scrutiny and questioning. Gay men who seek to adopt, far from being applauded for their desire to make a difference in a young child’s life (as heterosexual adoptive parents often are), are vulnerable to suspicion regarding their motives (Hicks, 2006a). Further, the households of gay male couples who seek to adopt are often presumed deficient by virtue of the fact that they typically lack a live-in female parental figure (Hicks, 2006b). Indeed, men are generally stereotyped as being less effective nurturers and caretakers than women (Coltrane, 1996; Quinn, 2009), and thus the presence of two men is not necessarily viewed as better than one (Stacey & Biblarz, 2001). Such judgments are routinely made by both the broader society and adoption agencies and create a challenging climate for gay male couples who wish to become adoptive parents, who must navigate an interrelated set of assumptions regarding gender, family, and sexuality that are biased against them (Oswald, Kuvalanka, Blume, & Berkowitz, 2009). Invidious stereotypes about gay men’s motivations to parent and about their parental fitness are offset by a societal climate in which gay parenting is becoming increasingly possible and accepted, although still debated. The gay men who became parents in the United States in the 1980s and even the 1990s were to some extent pioneers who had few visible role models of gay fathers (Gianino, 2008; Mallon, 2004). Today, gay men in the United States are surrounded by more examples of gay parenthood than ever before, and 28 > 29 many of them highlighted their own coming out as a crucial event in which they juxtaposed their own parental aspirations against their imagined future as a gay man. The men were diverse in the degree to which they internalized societal imperatives regarding the impossibility of gay parenthood, and, in turn, the degree to which they felt that they had—albeit temporarily—forestalled their own parenting desires upon coming out. “When I Came Out, I (Temporarily) Gave Up That Dream” One-third of the men whom I interviewed (24 men, including four couples ) acknowledged that they did not think parenthood was possible when they came out. These men were often interested in becoming...

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