Redefining Optimum

homophobia, homosexual, ivf, childless, children, babies, infertile, infertility, lesbian, gay, prop 8, stupid,
I won't bore you with the entire post, mostly because it just makes my stomach hurt, but the salient details in the back story are: Lesbian couple in Scotland wants the same access to government sponsored IVF that hetero couples in the UK enjoy. Government says "go have sex with men." Lesbian couple sues and wins.

Now for emissary's conclusion on all this:

The regrettable part of this story is that the board eventually changed its mind after being sued. It sets a bad precedence for two specific reasons. The first is that it forces the taxpayer money to pay for children who will be given to a home without a mother and a father. The second is that, since IVF is so expensive, the government may not be able to help as many heterosexual couples who could provide a more optimal life for their children.

First of all, it sets a bad precedent, taxpayers will pay, not taxpayer money, and the children will be born in the home, not given to the home.

Now that I've corrected the basic English, let's review emissary's argument. Basically, if the government pays for IVF for homosexuals, less heterosexuals will be able to have babies, and heterosexual couples are automatically better parents.

The first argument is patently false on its face. The UK health care system (socialism!) views infertility the same as any other medical condition and pays for a certain number of treatments over a certain time period. For everyone. If more people need IVF, more IVF will be paid for, they won't ration it any more than they would ration bypass surgery. They may well raise taxes to pay for the increase in IVF, but heteros will still get the same amount of IVF as they always were.

The second argument relies on debunked research into same sex parenting. Hetero couples are not automatically better parents than gay couples. (Research does show that children do better with two parents instead of one, but that has to do with economics and the time available with the child, not the sex of the parents.) According to emissary, a man and a woman are automatically better parents, even if the man is a pedophile and the woman is a junkie. When you find yourself making that argument, you need to admit that you're a homophobe, and that you don't really like children all that much.