By Stuart Webb | WeaponizedNews.Com | March 20, 2015
Heather Barwick, the daughter of a lesbian couple, has come out in opposition to gay marriage. She wrote an essay titled “Dear Gay Community: Your Kids Are Hurting” [1]. In the essay Heather discusses her absent father and upbringing by her lesbian mom and step-mom.
“Do you remember that book, “Heather Has Two Mommies”? That was my life. My mom, her partner, and I lived in a cozy little house in the ‘burbs of a very liberal and open-minded area. Her partner treated me as if I was her own daughter. Along with my mom’s partner, I also inherited her tight-knit community of gay and lesbian friends.” she openly describes.
Although Heather expresses her deep love for the gay community that helped raise her, she confesses “I’m letting myself out of the closet: I don’t support gay marriage.”
In the first part of the essay “Children Need a Mother and Father” [1] Barwich proclaims “Same-sex marriage and parenting withholds either a mother or father from a child while telling him or her that it doesn’t matter. That it’s all the same. But it’s not. A lot of us, a lot of your kids, are hurting. My father’s absence created a huge hole in me, and I ached every day for a dad. I loved my mom’s partner, but another mom could never have replaced the father I lost.”
But traditional marriage and having straight parents isn’t a guarantee for a wonderful family and childhood. “I’m not saying that you can’t be good parents. You can. I had one of the best. I’m also not saying that being raised by straight parents means everything will turn out okay. We know there are so many different ways that the family unit can break down and cause kids to suffer: divorce, abandonment, infidelity, abuse, death, etc.” Heather admits.
The family unit in general has suffered catastrophic wounds over the last few decades. The rise in out-of-wedlock births, the mainstreaming of divorce, and infidelity in general has and is destroying families.
In the second part of the text “Why Can’t Gay People’s Kids Be Honest?” [1] Heather points out that children who have divorced, separated, or adoptive parents can express their opinion on why they are hurting but children of same-sex parents can not share their feelings for fear of it being deemed politically incorrect, offensive, or intolerant. “If we say we are hurting because we were raised by same-sex parents, we are either ignored or labeled a hater.”
The issue of same-sex marriage is definitely a prominent topic of the recent years and does not appear to be leaving center stage. Personally, I don’t support changing the definition of marriage, but I also don’t support infidelity, divorce, or men abandoning their families. If men and women abandon their children and a same-sex couple graciously provides a home for them, we should be grateful. Heather ends her essay with “I know this is a hard conversation. But we need to talk about it. If anyone can talk about hard things, it’s us. You taught me that.”
Children raised by same-sex parents have the right to express themselves and we should encourage discussion if we are going to move forward as a society. Simply ignoring Heather Barwick’s first hand experiences and writing her off as a bigot is the definition of bigotry.