Bern, 10 April 2011 – Last Saturday, the Kornhausforum in Bern, Switzerland, served as the venue for the National Rainbow Family Conference. A colourful programme made up of panel discussions, scientific presentations and an exhibit illustrated the current situation of rainbow families in Switzerland. The umbrella organisation’s principal demand is equality in adoption law. The politicians in attendance expect a repeal of the ban on adoptions for registered partners no earlier than 2016.

More than 200 people made their way to the Kornhausforum in Bern on Saturday, taking up every last seat in the venue. “We are surprised and pleased about the great interest for us and our cause,” said Maria von Känel Scheibling, vice president of the Rainbow Families Umbrella Organisation. Scientists in the fields of psychology, sociology, law and social psychology presented the audience with the latest research on rainbow families. The term encompasses families in which at least one parent identifies as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender.

Dr. Lisa Green, psychologist from Constance, for example, presented various studies on “planned lesbian families”. All of them concluded that lesbian mothers weren’t better or worse mothers than heterosexual women. Similarly, the latest research shows that children from rainbow families don’t get teased any more than other children, nor do they later become gay more often. They do as well as children growing up in heterosexual relationships. “It’s not the parents’ sexual orientation that’s important, but the climate the children grow up in,” said Green. This indicated that there was no reason to legally bar lesbian women from having access to reproductive technology and adoption, as is currently the case in Switzerland.
In her virtual tour on developmental psychology, Dr. Heidi Simoni, director of the renowned Marie Meierhofer Institute for the Child in Zurich, concurred that it was the quality of the relationship to his or her caregivers that was the deciding factor in a child’s successful development. “Being a good parent has nothing to do with gender or gender roles,” she said and questioned whether the heterosexual nuclear family might not be a myth after all.
One highlight of the day was the panel discussion with three young adults who had all grown up in rainbow families. They told about their childhood years and their experiences as rainbow children— which were positive across the board. Their open and spontaneous testimony really touched the audience. Social education worker Christian Gertsch illuminated the situation of gay fathers. He mentioned the large number of unrecorded cases of gay fatherhood and made the case for more visibility: “We have to show ourselves, and the laws will follow.”

Indeed, to become visible and confront parliamentarians in direct conversation with the concerns facing rainbow families was identified as the most promising political strategy in the politicians’ panel discussion. “You have to show yourselves, because otherwise your children don’t exist,” said Katharina Prelicz-Huber (Green Party). There currently are two motions pending in the National Council. The first one, presented by Prelicz-Huber, demands the repeal of the ban on adoptions for registered partners. The second one was presented by Mario Fehr (Social Democrats), and it focuses on the right to adopt the child(ren) of one’s domestic partner. The politicians in attendance expect a repeal of these bans no earlier than 2016.

The umbrella organisation plans to send a signal with a day of action in front of the Federal Palace in Bern on 7 May 2011.