User:Yanyra562/Gay parenting

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In 1960 there was a shift in how many people felt empowered to take charge of their own lives and come out as gay or lesbian for the first time. A whole movement was shifting were more women and men came out and divorcing from their heterosexual relationships. The number of divorces and custody battles over the children was significant from 1967 to 1985. Parental rights for gay and lesbian parents were a challenge because of their sexual orientation. There is a public record of court hearings of gay and lesbian parents trying to obtain custody or visitation rights for their children. The public record court cases can show a pattern of gay and lesbian parents' rights to their children. There was a stigma associated with why gay and lesbian parents could not obtain custody of their children. There was the reasoning that because a man or woman was gay or lesbian, they could not be parents. There was also that parents who were gay and lesbian could not obtain custody of their children because it could cause psychosexual development and cause rejection of their peers. They also shared that being brought up in a gay or lesbian home could cause emotional or behavioral problems. This is what the lawyers and even judges used to avoid granting custody to gay or lesbian parents. Some of the made public record cases show how Judges would not grant custody of the children because the parents' sexual orientation could cause harm to the child. In other cases, the parent may be granted visitation rights but would have to follow rules that the judge would implement. some of the rules the judge would give would be not to be part of an activist group; also, they could not have their partner near the child when having visitation rights. They would have the parent sign an agreement to these rules and have regular psychiatric examinations. As time passed by in the early 1970s, there was a shift in changing the rulings of parental rights in the courts. There was now phycologist who were testifying for gay and lesbian parents about how their sexual orientation had no significant effect on the child. As time passed, more and more studies contradict what was being used in courts to take children away from their gay and lesbian parents. In the early 1970s and 1980s, there were gay and lesbian parents that were winning cases and able to obtain custody of their children as well as not have to sign contracts that would force them not to be part of activist groups and not have their partners near their children.