" . . . I think it would be really boring if everybody had just a mom and a dad. It's really special how I have a mom and a mama!"
Cody Jurs-Allen, second-grader, son of lesbian mothers
" . . . I asked [my son] Jonathan what he felt were the strongest negative and the strongest positive aspects for him in having grown up with lesbian parents. He said the strongest benefit he felt he gained was that he knew that he did not have a lot of the hang-ups that some other boys did about men and women. And the most negative aspect he felt, Jonathan said, was the ridicule he got from some kids with straight parents. 'You mean, from your peers?' I said. 'Oh no,' he answered promptly. 'My peers know better. I mean other kids.'"
Audre Lorde, lesbian mother
"People who don't like gays feel that way because there aren't so many gay people and they're not in a gay family so they don't know what it feels like. The other kind of family that is not lesbian or gay was started first, and people think it shouldn't change. They think people are supposed to stay the same. I want them to know that I probably have more than they do because I have two moms and a stepmom too!"
Keely Coffrin-Shaw, third-grader, daughter of lesbian mothers
These kids were planned and their lesbian mothers were very engaged in parenting. At the end of high school, the teens tell us that they have excellent grades, feel connected to their families and friends, and admire their parents."
Nanette Gartrell, principal investigator of "Adolescents with Lesbian Mothers Describe Their Own Lives," a study for the Williams Institute that found teens living in homes with two mothers to be more successful at school and generally happier in life.
"My grandpa majored in biology in college, but he wasn't allowed to teach at a high school because he was black. Not long ago, I spoke on a panel at a high school with my mom. This guy in the audience told my mom that he wouldn't want her to teach his kids because she is a lesbian. It reminded me so much of what happened to my grandpa. I think homophobia is like any other 'ism.' It's the racism of today. Like racism, you learn it from the people you grow up with, from your parents, from television, and from society."
Rayna White, eleventh-grader, daughter of a lesbian mother
