Thoughtful decisions

 Hello everyone, I hope you have had a wonderful week!

This week has been full of new learning experiences. I wanted to share some of the things I've learned because maybe you are like me and had never heard about a few of these things. 

In 2013, there was a law passed which redefined the definition of marriage. Up to that point marriage had been defined as being between a man and a women. Now after the Supreme Court hearings, marriage is accepted to be legal between same-sex individuals as well. We learned in class about the process of getting to the point where the Supreme Court passed this law. There were multiple briefs that were brought up to help sway the opinions of Justice Kennedy. Justice Kennedy had been holding out on passing the laws because of his concern with how this would effect the children who come from the families of a same-sex marriage. The APA (American Phycological Association) created one of the briefs that collected a large amount of data and studies in order to convince Kennedy of the outcomes for the children of these families. This brief included a conclusion that stated, "Not a single study has found children of lesbian or gay parents to be disadvantaged in any significant respect relative to children of heterosexual parents." This statement, along with other briefs and information that was presented, swayed Justice Kennedy's opinion and the redefining of marriage was put into place. 

Now you could have been like me, and many of my classmates, and were surprised when that statement was put out about the APA's brief. It seems almost impossible to have such a definitive conclusion that not a single study had found a disadvantage of those family situations. So, as a class we searched into another brief that was analyzing the APA's brief. It was suprising to find what information and studies the APA had used to come to that conclusion. There were so many aspects of those studies that were not reliable methods used to find data. For example, sampling groups used were often generalized meaning most people being studied were white or from a higher economic status. Also many of the studies didn't even include comparison groups. How strange is it that when trying to figure out if there would be negative outcomes for children depending on their parents marrital status, they wouldn't even use a comparison group to compare if one was better than the other. There were other aspects of the research that didn't necessarily seem the most effective. Even with these flaws in the study, the brief was submitted as a resource for the Supreme Court to use and make their decision which ultimately allowed for the law to change. 

With all of this information it may be hard to see how it effects us today. One thing to consider is how our decisions we make should be made thoughtfully and thoroughly. I do not fully know my stance on if marriage between same-sex should have been redefined or not. I do feel that there may be more to the decision then just the effect it could have on children. Should everyone have equal opportunity to be married? If I were just to make a decision for the redefinition of marriage based on the outcome of children from same-sex families, I would probably have to do more research and studying from different sources to decide if there were any negative outcomes that would be detrimental to those children. I am grateful that I am not in the Supreme Court and having to make those kind of decisions for the whole country but I do understand how important decisions we make in our daily lives may not effect the whole country but could change our lives and affect those around us. 

I encourage you all to do more research on this subject and make your own decisions and opinions based on what you learn. I know I would like to learn more about the affects this court case has had on our world today and I would like to see if more research has been done recently to address the outcomes for the children in same-sex families. I have learned from these reviews that I have done of the briefs; how important our decisions are. We need to be thoughtful in our decisions and do our own research. Do research with an unbiased stance. I will be trying to do this more in my daily life and I hope that you will too!