- Courtesy of Gary Gates/UCLA
Roughly one in four same-sex couples in North Texas are raising children, a rate that’s among the highest in the country.
Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington ranks 12th on the list of metropolitan areas in the U.S. where same-sex couples are most likely to be raising children, according to a recent study by Gary Gates, a demographer at UCLA who studies U.S. Census data.
According to Gates, 3,178 of the estimated 12,761 same-sex couples in North Texas are raising children, or 24.9 percent.
San Antonio is No. 1 on the list of 52 metropolitan areas nationwide with populations of more than 1 million, with 33.9 percent of same-sex couples in the Alamo City raising children, according to Gates. Houston is No. 7 at 27.2 percent, while Oklahoma City is No. 10 at 25.4 percent.
Last week, The New York Times reported on Gates’ study, noting that child-rearing among same-sex couples is more common in the South than in any other region. Gay and lesbian couples in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas are more likely to be raising children than their counterparts on the West Coast, in New York and in New England. From the NYT:
Experts offer theories for the pattern. A large number of gay couples, possibly a majority, entered into their current relationship after first having children with partners in heterosexual relationships, Gates said. That seemed to be the case for many blacks and Latinos in Jacksonville, for whom church disapproval weighed heavily.
“People grew up in church, so a lot of us lived in shame,” said Darlene Maffett, 43, a Jacksonville resident, who had two children in eight years of marriage before coming out in 2002. “What did we do? We wandered around lost. We married men, and then couldn’t understand why every night we had a headache.”
Moreover, gay men who have children do so an average of three years earlier than heterosexual men, according to census data, Gates said. At the same time, there are fewer white women of childbearing age nationally, according to demographers, while the number of minority women of childbearing age is expanding.
I have to applaud these couples. They are giving good homes and sound parental guidance to children who need these things. That takes a helluva big commitment and it’s a helluva sacrifice for the parents. What a great example these couples are setting for all of us. Thank you.