Research Paper
Gay Parenting and Assisted Reproductive Techniques:
A Symbolic Interactionist Perspective

Introduction
Gay rights have become a prevalent issue within the last decade. In the United States, gay marriage has been legalized in five states. With this has come a flurry of accompanying issues that must be addressed, this includes gay and lesbian fertility rights. Many gay and lesbian couples undergo assisted reproductive techniques (ARTs) in order to have children. In the United States, fertility clinics are privatized, this means, among other things, that doctors have the right to pick and choose whom they take on as patients. There is no guarantee for gay couples seeking fertility treatment; many couples trying to have a baby are turned away based on how a doctor feels about same sex families. As it stands, no physician or hospital receiving government funding can discriminate against a patient based on his or her race, color, religion or national origin (Appel, 2006). It goes against the human rights of the potential patient to discriminate against them based on their sexual orientation. How do anti gay legislation further conceptualize the idea the nuclear family? Using a Symbolic Interactionist perspective, this paper looks at how gay and lesbian families use family symbols and rituals as strategies to negotiate family identity in interactions with families of origin, social network members, and community institutions, as well as challenge hetero-normative ideologies of family life.
Context
Increasingly, there has been a rise in non-biological parenting in gay and lesbian families. An increasing number of lesbians and gay males form families with children. In a 2001 census, the first to collect data on same sex partnership, found that 34,000 couples identified as same sex common law couples, and 15 percent of female respondents said they were living with children, compared to 3 percent of male respondents (Statistics Canada, 2002). There are many cases where families become pregnant through alternative insemination, fostering or adoption, where the parents are not always biologically related to the children. Many gay and lesbian couples undergo assisted reproductive techniques (ARTs) in order to have children. As more and more gay couples look to reproduce, the debate over whether or not doctors should be allowed to refuse treatment based on personal prejudices continues. These kinds of restrictions violate the reproductive rights of gays and lesbians. Often gay and lesbian couples will undergo ARTs in order to conceive. This is often achieved by means of surrogacy, egg donation, artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization (Robertson 2005). At this time, the United States Supreme Court, nor any other lower form of court, has tended to the issue of the existence of basic rights when using or attempting to use assisted reproduction technologies (Robertson 2005). In Canada, the Assisted Human Reproductive Act was put in place in order to help people reproduce safely and to ensure that reproductive technology continues to be ethically valid (CBC News 2009). According to a report on CBC News (2009), the legislation came to light after the Royal Commission on Reproductive Technologies took place in 1993. Were policy put into affect in the United States similar to Canada’s Assisted Human Reproduction Act, discrimination against patients based on sexual orientation would be considered a criminal offence. Furthermore, imposing a policy like the Assisted Human Rights Act would help advance the fight for equal gay and lesbian rights. Focus: Theory of Symbolic Interactionism
The central theme of symbolic interactionism is that human life is lived through symbols. Symbols are culturally derived social objects having shared meanings that are created and maintained in social interaction (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004). Through language and communication, symbols provide the means by which reality is constructed (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004). Reality is primarily a social product, which emerges from and is dependent on symbolic interactions for its existence. Individuals learn the appropriate values and norms of the social group through the process of socialization. They learn ideals and expectations that they are expected to follow such as family loyalty, solidarity, as well as age and gender differentiation. Symbolic interaction reveals how everyday experiences help construct and maintain society (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004, p. 8). Being taught ideals and expectations help children construct their knowledge of their culture and society, as well as the norms that are expected from my society in order for my behavior to be acceptable in the public and private. Traditionally and ideally, children grow up in the presence of several adults, a mother and a father and siblings. Thus, notions of gender roles in the family not only are socially constructed, but they are socially reproduced and pressured onto children as they are growing up, which predispose children to different gender oriented roles. However, in the case of gay parenting, there is a shift from the “nuclear family”, to the “extended family” (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004).
It is hard to define what a family is, as there are so many possible definitions, and what is socially accepted keeps changing. The generally accepted idea of family is that it serves as a function of social reproduction and support (Knutilla, 2008). This can be divided into three general categories: biological reproduction, support and socialization (Knutilla, 2008). Families procreate to further the population of society; the members serve as a constant support, protecting members as well as family heritage. Children are also socialized and integrated into society by means of primary socialization, done by family members.
Discussion
Erving Goffman, a pioneer in symbolic interaction, suggests that gender is like a play, where humans are the actors assuming certain roles (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004). We name certain things, have certain roles in society, in order to properly play out these roles and make them believable to an audience we have to adopt certain characteristics which are easily identifiable to a certain gender. Even more so, Goffman says that the ‘props’ used help enforce gender distinctions, certain sports, toys, clothing, names etc. further separate genders and make the distinction between the two genders (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004). However, in a gay or lesbian family, how are these roles enforced? In the case of gay parents using means of assisted reproduction to achieve a family, many steps are taken to ensure the family is as close to a conventional model as possible. Rituals have also long been seen as being communicative of identity, as gay parents are able to use family rituals to negotiate identity of the family as a whole. In a study done by Suter et al. (2007) found that the inclusion of one last name, “legitimated their family form, in part, because shared last names signal family” (p. 33). Co-mothers, for this study respectively, asserted that last names communicate legitimate family status because they convey their sense of “commitment to family”(Suter et al., 2007, p. 34). Families build off rituals to create meaning. Engaging in roles in the same way as a nuclear family would allows for children in gay families to grow up patterning their behaviour in the same way any child would. Further, they found that the use of a single sperm donor allowed for the physical appearance of the children, "looking related" to symbolize family (Suter et al., 2007, p. 36). Although faced with prejudice while acquiring ART’s, many gay parents do everything they can to ensure their children grow up in a culturally acceptable household.
Mothers in the Suter et al. (2007) study identified “doing family” as a key ritual used to negotiate family identity (Suter et al. 2007, p. 36). The ritual category used in this study, mimics C. West and Zimmerman’s notion (1987) of “doing gender,” which depicts how gender is enacted through “routine, methodical, and recurring” social interaction (p. 126). West and Zimmerman (1987) assert that humans “do” gender, it is an active thing, and not a passive by product of society. We act in accordance with a gender, it not something that can be observed, it is executed through our interactions with others. The audience, according to West and Zimmerman (1987), and situation force you to change your script, as they are an active part of the way in which you interact with them. Doing family captures a similar process in which family identity, rather than gender, is created via the “doing” of ordinary and mundane patterned family interactions that may happen daily, weekly, monthly, or less frequently (Suter et al., 2007). People within the larger community can easily identify those doing family, acting out basic familial interactions, as a normal family institution.
Methods of symbolic interaction govern the way in which a husband or wife act within their family unit. However, because there is so much confusion and ambiguity with biology and gender, sociologists often turn to defining gender as socially constructed, greatly shaped by ones socializations and interactions with those around them (Karp, Yoels, & Vann, 2004). We learn these gender distinctions from our social relations (or watch how others interact and copy them). A gender divide is evident and enforced via material goods, social roles, etc. In terms of gay families, gender distcitions are challenged and it is up to each family to decide what roles they occupy.
Adopting this role-occupying notion of gender, Rank and LeCroy (1983) note that symbolic interactionism stresses that individuals gain meaning about the world by interacting with their social and physical environment. This “environment” can include family, peer, social groups and the media. Further, Rank and LeCroy (1983) note that family behaviour stems from point of view, which may differ for various religious and social groups as well as classes. The meaning and value individuals ascribe to things is directly related to their immediate surroundings, and the institutions they frequent. The change in conception of one individual, through, “change in social structure, gains new peer groups, or passes through the family life cycle”, their values may change (Rank & LeCroy, 1983, p.443). Thus, the norms of each family are a socially constructed reality, which is static and subject to change. There are many reasons that gay and lesbian couples are turned away from ARTs. Some argue that providing gay and lesbian couples with the technology to reproduce is not natural, they must sacrifice one happiness for another. What is most commonly argued is that growing up in a same-sex family can be damaging to a child. Margaret Somerville (2003), a prominent Canadian ethicists and professor at McGill University published “The Case Against Same-Sex Marriage”. It in, she argues not only against same-sex marriage, but also against same-sex families. She explains that society has taken on what she refers to as an “adult centered” perspective when looking at reproductive decision-making, opposed to a “child centered” perspective (Somerville, 2003, p.6). She continues to explain how a “child centered” perspective means that among other things, a child has the right to be raised by their biological parents (Somerville, 2003, p.6). Moreover, another issue lies within a societal context. In his article, “Modern Marriage: Revising the Cultural Scripts,” David Popenoe visits the issue of the decline in family life in Western society. Placing a strong emphasis on childcare within the family, he hypothesizes that the decline is the result of poor investments of time and values. He believes that the family is failing in performing the functions of procreation and socialization of children. Also, Popenoe has a very narrow minded view on domestic groups that he defines as a family. The ‘ideal’ family, according to the author, is the bread-winner/homemaker model, best known as the nuclear family form. Gender roles are being challenged and changed in the context of non nuclear families (Popenoe). Children are hard wired to distinguish between men and women and the current changes in families may produce children with confusion and mental trauma.
Conclusion
In conclusion, whether or not gay couples can legally marry should in no way factor into whether or not they can have families. Having a family should not be a privilege. The United States should stop making an already painstaking process more difficult by not enforcing the suggestions discussed by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. The fight for equal gay and lesbian rights is slowly but surely progressing, requiring that doctors provide ARTs to all patients, regardless of their sexual orientation is an important step. Being gay is not something one chooses, it’s something you’re born with, not allowing someone the means to start a family based on something they cannot change is not right. With same-sex marriage becoming legal in more and more places, this is clearly an issue at will not go away any time soon. It is wrong to discriminate against a group of people, and deny an individual their right to have a child based solely on their choice of lifestyle. Gay families are taking proactive steps towards normalizing the lives of their children.

References
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