This Is What Happens When Kids Learn About Same-Sex Marriage

Confused? Traumatized? Not a bit.

[Update: It seems the video's owner has made it private. I'm not going to try and find another copy; if he wants privacy, I'll respect that.]

(Via Truth Wins Out.)

Happy International Women’s Day

It’s International Women’s Day, a holiday first celebrated in 1909 in honor of a 1908 strike by women garment workers in protest at their working conditions. Now, it’s a holiday endorsed by the U.N., which has set the 2010 theme as “Equal rights, equal opportunities: Progress for all.”

While the holiday gets little attention in the U.S., people in other areas of the world whoop it up, as evidenced by the many events listed on this slightly more commercial International Women’s Day site. (There are 238 events IWD events listed for the U.K., but only 124 in the U.S..)

I’m all about celebrating women here at Mombian, though, so here’s a topic for discussion today:

How has either being a mother or being LGBT changed your awareness and/or involvement in women’s rights and issues?

Engaged (Legally or Not?) Here’s a Survey

Passing along this request for volunteers to participate in an academic study of same- and opposite-sex engaged couples. I am not affiliated with the project; please contact the researcher if you have questions. (I do think it is important to have LGBT voices in broad research like this, though.)

Engaged volunteers needed!

I am looking for volunteers for a study of attitudes towards marriage and parenthood among engaged couples. The study consists of a 25-30 minute online survey. To qualify for the study, you must be 20-35 years old, live in the U.S., and plan to marry or have a commitment ceremony within the next 365 days. You and your romantic partner must not have children, and this must be the first marriage for both of you. Read the rest of this post »

Wanted: Your Experience with Paid or Unpaid Parental Leave

I’m passing along this request for your comments (and possible participation in an interview) about paid and unpaid parental leave. I’m not involved in the project, but I think it’s vital to have LGBT voices heard in studies like these.

Human Rights Watch, a nongovernmental human rights group, is interviewing parents (including LGBT parents) about their experiences with paid and unpaid maternity and paternity leave, and the impact on their families. The interviews will be used for a report (using pseudonyms, not actual names of interviewees) and, depending on the findings, for making recommendations on US law and policy.

Paid parental leave is considered a human right under several international treaties (not ratified by the US), and 177 countries now have laws guaranteeing paid parental leave. Only a few, including the United States, Papua New Guinea, Swaziland, and Australia, do not have national laws on paid parental leave. Australia is about to fall out of these ranks by offering 18 paid weeks starting in 2011.

In the United States, the national Family and Medical Leave Act requires only unpaid leave. Only two states (California and New Jersey) currently offer paid parental leave, and a handful of others offer temporary disability insurance to mothers after childbirth. States that do offer such paid leave generally fund their programs through small payroll deductions, minimizing the impact on any particular business.

For the most part, it is up to employers to decide whether to offer this benefit. Some people are fortunate to work for generous employers, but the majority of US workers do not have paid parental leave benefits. Read the rest of this post »

Work/Life Balance and the LGBT Community

A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of participating in Fem 2.0’s “Work/Life in Our Communities Blog Radio Series” as part of a panel on “Work/Life and LGBT Families: Reimagining Policy for ALL Families in the 21st Century.” The radio series is part of their larger 2010 Wake Up! Campaign, which also includes a blog carnival running through Saturday.

This is my contribution to the carnival.

My personal story of work/life balance as an LGBT person is pretty boring. My employers and my spouse’s employers have all offered full recognition and benefits to same-sex partners. We’ve never had any trouble with co-workers about our orientation. Heck, my co-workers threw us a baby shower. Sure, there was the amusing issue of sitting in a meeting, obviously flat-stomached, and having to mention that I might have to leave early because I was having a baby any minute now—but my straight, about-to-adopt co-worker was in a similar situation. (They threw her a baby shower, too.)

My work/life issues therefore are mostly the same as those faced by people of all gender identities and orientations—finding the time for both work and family, dividing household work with my spouse, and so forth.

There is some evidence, however (ably analyzed by sociologist Abbie Goldberg in her Lesbian and Gay Parents and Their Children), that same-sex couples as a whole divide household work more equitably than opposite-sex ones. Indeed, when I tell straight moms that my spouse gave birth to our son, and stayed home for the first eight months or so, at which point we switched because of shifting job opportunities, they look at me like I’m from Mars.

It’s nice to have that flexibility.

At the same time, the flexibility has limits. Read the rest of this post »

Even the Mulleted Deserve Equality

Sometimes, in our efforts to correct one instance of intolerance, we forget others.

Two weeks ago, a Miami-Dade judge declared Florida’s anti-gay adoption law unconstitutional and allowed Vanessa Alenier to adopt the one-year-old she and her partner Melanie Leon have been fostering.

The ultra-conservative Orlando’s Florida Family Policy Council (FPC) sent out an alert to its members last week, describing the ruling. It included a photo of a lesbian couple sporting mullets the likes of which I haven’t seen for many years. Neither woman is smiling, and I doubt most people would consider it a flattering photo.

The couple in the picture, however, is not Alenier and Leon. Orlando Sentinel writer Scott Maxwell rightly calls the Family Policy Council to task for this, and offers up a strong endorsement for allowing loving same-sex couples to adopt.

He calls the mulleted couple “abnormal-looking,” though, and says: “The couple look so odd (you literally can’t tell whether they are male or female) that one might wonder how any judge could place a young child with such a disturbing-looking duo.” Read the rest of this post »

Work/Life and LGBT Families on Fem 2.0 Radio Today

Work/life balance is an issue near and dear to many of our hearts. Achieving that balance can be even tougher for LGBT people, who may have to contend with a variety of unfriendly laws, policies, and attitudes.

I’ll be speaking this afternoon on Fem 2.0’s “Work/Life in Our Communities Blog Radio Series” as part of a panel on “Work/Life and LGBT Families: Reimagining Policy for ALL Families in the 21st Century.” Thanks to Heather Holdridge and Gloria Pan for the invitation.

I’ll be joining Cathy Renna, head of Renna Communications, and Jaime Grant, Director of the Policy Institute for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, both also lesbian moms. Good company indeed!

There will be a live chat and tweetup of the event (#fem2 and #worklife), and you can also dial in to participate: (724) 444-7444; Call ID: 74229. I hope you’ll join us, despite the short notice.

The show will air 1-2 p.m. ET, but will also be available for later listening. Go here to listen, or try the widget below. (Sometimes it needs a few seconds to load.)

What’s In a Name?

I am not “Mrs. Rudolph.” That should not surprise readers here, for lesbians who take a partner or spouse’s name (and are thus eligible for the “missus” title) are few and far between. Rudolph was the last name I was born with, and despite the inevitable jokes at Christmas time, it’s the name I’ll keep for the rest of my life.

My son’s teachers, however (and, I venture to guess, most of the teachers in the school), insist on calling all of the mothers “Mrs. [Lastname].” All of his peers also seem to use “Mrs” for adult women.

Maybe it’s just my inherent feminism, not to mention too many years in the corporate world, where “Ms.” was de regueur. I twitch involuntarily when I hear someone address me as “Mrs. Rudolph.”

I’m trying not to make a big deal of it. I also really don’t want to come across as the uptight, oversensitive, PC type. I’m not, really.

I try to gently correct. “Ms. Rudolph,” I say —but it never seems to stick.

On the other hand, I am out to my son’s teachers, so the fact that they call me “Mrs.” is in some way a positive acknowledgment of my relationship status. That’s progress of a sort, even if feminism still has a ways to go.

Anyone else ever encounter this? How do you handle it?

Gay and Lesbian History for Teens

(Originally published as my Mombian newspaper column, October 2009.)

October is, among other things, LGBT History Month, which makes it the perfect time to write about Gay America: Struggle for Equality (Amulet: 2008), by Linas Alsenas. The book is a history of gay men and lesbians in the U.S. from the mid-nineteenth century through 2005. It fills a much needed gap, not because of the subject (there are a small but a growing number of LGBT-specific histories), but because of its audience: teens.

LGBT histories for that age group have been sorely lacking, consisting mostly of Becoming Visible: A Reader in Gay and Lesbian History for High School and College Students (Alyson: 1994), by Kevin Jennings. (Yes, the same Jennings who is now heading up the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools). Jennings’ volume is useful, but is more a source book than a narrative like Gay America. Both are needed. Read the rest of this post »

COLAGE Is Hiring

I’m passing this message along from the folks at COLAGE, who are hiring for a couple of positions.

I also want to offer outgoing Program Director Meredith Fenton my best wishes for her future endeavors. She was a great help in promoting Blogging for LGBT Families Day among COLAGErs and has always been willing to help build connections between the community of LGBT parents and that of our children (which aren’t always two separate communities, when it comes right down to it).

Please contact COLAGE with any questions about the below.

COLAGE is excited to announce two opportunities to join our team. We are hiring a full-time National Program Director and a part-time national Communications Coordinator. Read the rest of this post »