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"Choosing Children" is a pioneering film about parenting in non-traditional families and helped to open dialogue about the meaning and reality of the "modern family." CDF is proud to be the executive producer and distributor of this wonderful film.

This film takes an intimate look at the issues faced by lesbians and gay men who decide to become parents after coming out.


Producers Debra Chasnoff and Kim Klausner conducted a nationwide search to find the six families who tell their stories in "Choosing Children." They come from a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds and reflect the many ways lesbians are having and raising children.  

Growing numbers of lesbians are becoming parents by insemination with known and unknown donors, through sexual intercourse, and by adopting. They are raising children in couples, alone, with gay men, and in extended families of friends. "Choosing Children" explores each of these possibilities.

Some of the questions the film raises include:

• New Options: why are lesbians thinking about, and having children today?
• Donor Insemination: what's involved in getting pregnant this way and how does a woman explain it to her child?
• Non-biological mothers: can two women be mothers to the same child when only one of them has legal rights and social recognition?
• Biological fathers: why do some women choose anonymous sperm donors while others want the man to be known or involved in raising the child?
• Adoption: what are the constraints for lesbians and other unmarried women who want to adopt children?
• Male Role Models: how important are they? And how does growing up in a lesbian household affect a child's own sexual preference?
• Homophobia: how does prejudice against gay people affect how lesbians and their children are treated in the schools, by health professionals and relatives?

Mental Health
Family Relations
Social Work
Sociology
Child Development
Law
Health Care
Women's Studies
Civil Rights
and Lesbian and Gay Issues

"With openness and disarming humor...an educational film, in the best sense of the term. 'Choosing Children' speaks to the lesbian and gay community about possibilities for parenting, and to a wider public about the importance of understanding different ways of life."

--Karen Rosenberg, The Boston Globe

 "This celebration of lesbian motherhood raises issues of family formation and discrimination. It provides a useful basis for discussion...

--Carol Brown, Associate Professor of Family Studes, University of MA at Lowell