MULTI-GENERATION QUEER FAMILIES: FOREGROUNDING
THE LGBTQIA1 CHILDREN OF LGBTQIA1 PEOPLE
BELLA MANCINI PORI* AND EDWARD STEIN**
INTRODUCTION .............................................. 57
I. IMMUTABILITY .......................................... 61
II. HOW FEAR OF THE QUEER CHILD INFLUENCES LAW ................ 66
A. LAWS RESTRICTING LGBTQIAþADULTS .................. 66
B. THE SPECTER OF THE LGBTQIAþCHILD IN CUSTODY AND
VISITATION CASES.................... ................ 68
C. CENTERING MULTI-GENERATION QUEER FAMILIES IN THE FIGHT FOR
LGBTQIAþRIGHTS ................................. 75
CONCLUSION ............................................... 83
INTRODUCTION
In the last several years, state legislatures have introduced a disturbing array of
anti-LGBTQIAþbills that take aim at queer
1
and trans
2
children. Many of these
*State Legislative Counsel, Center for Reproductive Rights. The views expressed in this Essay are
exclusively those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center for Reproductive Rights,
Cardozo School of Law, or Yeshiva University.
** Professor of Law, Cardozo School of Law. The authors wish to thank the Gertrud Mainzer
Program in Family Law, Policy and Bioethics for support for this project. Additionally, we are grateful
to the members of the New York Area Family Law Workshop for their helpful comments, including, but
not limited to, Akshat Agarwal, Anita Bernstein, Doron Dorfman, Elizabeth Emens, Cynthia Godsoe,
Clare Huntington, Sarah Lorr, Solangel Maldonado, Noy Naaman, Neoshia Roemer, Laura Savarese,
and Barbara Stark. Finally, we want to thank Erez Aloni, Luke Boso, Alexander Chen, Karen
Czapanskiy, Susan Hazeldean, Christina Mulligan, Chan Tov MacNamarah, and other participants of
the West Coast Sexuality, Gender and the Law Conference held in March 2024 at Loyola Law School in
Los Angeles. © 2024, Bella Mancini Pori and Edward Stein.
1. This Essay uses different terms to discuss sexual orientation and gender identity. When discussing the
movement for (or against) equal rights for people of different sexual orientation and gender identities, we use
LGBTQIAþ, an acronym for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and asexual people. We use
this acronym in its most expansive sense, to also include two-spirit people and others with sexual orientations
and gender identities who consider themselves part of the movement but are not represented by an existing
letter. When referring to individuals and families, we use the term “queer,” as both a short-hand, and to
acknowledge the many variations and combinations of sexual orientation and gender identity. When we are
discussing historical laws that took aim at gays, lesbians, and bisexuals specifically, or modern laws that
specifically target transgender and non-binary children, we will often use specific terms to discuss the impacted
people. Finally, we will use LGBTQ rather than LGBTQIAþin some places to acknowledge the limited scope
of our argument and research, especially as it applies to intersex people. The unique issues faced by intersex
parents and intersex children are not directly addressed here, and would benefit from deeper consideration. For
example, some of the same states that ban gender affirming care for minors still allow “gender normalizing
surgeries” on intersex infants. See Ido Katri & Maayan Sudai, Intersex, Trans and the Irrationality of Gender
Affimring Care Bans, 134 YALE L. J. (forthcoming 2024). For discussion of the perils of lumping various
sexual and gender minorities into a generalized LGBTQIAþrights movement, see Marie-Ame
´lie George, The
LGBT Disconnect: Politics and Perils of Legal Movement Formation, 2018 WISC. L. REV. 503 (2018).
2. When we use the word “trans” or “transgender,” we use it in its most expansive sense to include
non-binary people. Note that, even though “queer,” as we use it, includes trans people, we will
sometimes use the locution “trans and queer” to emphasize transgender people specifically.
57
bills have become law.
3
See, e.g., H.B. 322, 2022 Leg., Reg. Sess. (Ala. 2022); H.B. 1557, 2022 Leg., 124th Reg. Sess.
(Fla. 2022) (laws prohibiting instruction about LGBTQ people in schools); H.B. 648, 2023 Leg., Reg.
Sess. (La. 2023); S.B 14, 88th Leg., Reg. Sess. (Tex. 2023) (laws prohibiting minors from accessing
gender-affirming care). For a more complete picture of laws that have been enacted, see Snapshot:
LGBTQ Equality by State, MOVEMENT ADVANCEMENT PROJECT, https://perma.cc/RV29-D958. For
information about laws that have been introduced, see, e.g., Mapping Attacks on LGBTQ Rights in U.S.
State Legislatures in 2024, AM. CIV. LIBERTIES UNION, https://perma.cc/F8WG-Y3SB; 2024 Anti-trans
Bills Tracker, TRANS LEGISLATION TRACKER, https://perma.cc/TEH9-UTFV.
These bills and laws involve, for example, various limita-
tions on gender-affirming care, prohibitions on the discussion of LGBTQIAþ
identity in classrooms, and banning drag shows. In the same period, school boards
and parent groups have increased their efforts to ban books from school and public
libraries, with a special focus on books that discuss LGBTQIAþidentity.
4
The American Library Association documented 1,247 attempts to censor books in 2023, and the
number of titles targeted for censorship increased by 92% compared to 2022. Of the top ten most
challenged books, seven had LGBTQ content cited as a reason for challenge. (Two of the ten books
discussed race or racism.) Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2023, AM. LIBRARY ASS’N, https://perma.
cc/FY5J-9TL5.
The basic
fear animating these bills, laws, and policies is that exposure to LGBTQIAþpeople,
or even to LGBTQIAþ-supportive ideas, will somehow turn straight children queer.
Although these particular laws are new, the general goal behind them, to protect
children by shielding them from queerness, has been in circulation for a long time.
Clifford Rosky dubbed the anxiety underlying such laws “the fear of the queer
child.”
5
In the past, the LGBTQIAþcivil rights movement has responded to these
types of attacks by arguing that sexuality is immutable and, thus, that exposure to
queer adults will not make children queer or trans. While the immutability argu-
ment seems to have been effective, particularly in the fight for marriage equality
and extension of anti-discrimination laws to LGBTQIAþpeople, we argue that it
is beginning to outlive its general usefulness, and is largely useless when it comes
to protecting “multi-generation” queer families in particular.
6
An argument solely
rooted in the biological nature of queerness could be misused by opponents of
LGBTQIAþrights to prevent queer people from becoming parents, given that
they may be more likely to have queer children. If we accept that the development
of a person’s sexuality is complex and subject to many possible influences, some
3.
4.
5. Clifford J. Rosky, Fear of the Queer Child, 61 BUFF. L. REV. 607, 608 (2013).
6. We use the term “multi-generation queer family,” to refer to a family that includes a queer person
who has a queer child. See, e.g., Aaron Dickinson Sachs, Family Pictures: The Queer Relationalities of
Multigenerational Queer Family, 70 J. HOMOSEXUALITY 111, 118 (2023). Some scholarship on this
topic uses instead the term “second generation” to refer to the LGBTQ children of LGBTQ people. See,
e.g., Katherine A. Kuvalanka & Cat Munroe, The “Second Generation:” LGBTQ Youth with LGBTQ
Parents, in LGBTQ-PARENT FAMILIES: INNOVATIONS IN RESEARCH AND IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE
241 (Abbie E. Goldberg & Katherine R. Allen, eds., 2d ed. 2020). We prefer the “multi-generation”
terminology because it encompasses queerness across multiple generations, while “second-generation
queer family” does not. See, e.g., Nancy A. Orel, Lesbian and Bisexual Women as Grandparents: The
Centrality of Sexual Orientation on the Grandparent-Grandchild Relationship, in LESBIAN, GAY,
BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENDER AGING: RESEARCH AND CLINICAL PERSPECTIVES 175 (Douglas Kimmel,
Tara Rose, & Steven David., eds. 2006).
58 THE GEORGETOWN JOURNAL OF GENDER AND THE LAW [Vol. 26:57
