All of the above

The Society for the Promotion of Community Standards is attacking the families commissioner and Peter Dunne for expressing an inclusive view of what a family is. They do this by posing a question: are any of the below a "family"?

1. Two lesbians who have chosen not to enter a so-called "civil union", cohabiting in a sexual/domestic relationship, together with children born to one or both partners via IVF.
2. A transexual, who has undergone a sex operation to become a 'women', and a homosexual man, cohabiting in a sexual/domestic relationship, together with a child for whom the homosexual has guardianship responsibility (the child was born to a lesbian, now deceased, who used the man's donated sperm for IVF treatment). The two adults have chosen not to enter a civil union.
3. A bisexual person living in a sexual/domestic relationship with a lesbian and and a homosexual man, an adult three-some, together with children born to the lesbian via IVF and children for whom the homosexual has guardianship rights due to the passing away of a lesbian through whom he obtained children prior to living with the bisexual.
4. Two homosexual men who have chosen not to enter a civil union, cohabiting in a sexual/domestic relationship, who live with their children they have both fathered through one lesbian woman via IVF, as well as the same lesbian mother.
5. Two bisexual couples who are in a loving open group relationship together with kids they have had from previous short-term relationships before opting for a bisexual lifestyle.
6. A de-facto heterosexual couple living with a bisexual and her kids.
7. A middle-aged homosexual man living in a civil-union relationship with a 16-year old homosexual boy, together with three young boys born to a lesbian (now deceased) with whom the older man assisted in creating a 'family' via IVF.

Speaking for myself, I think the answer to this is "all of the above". Family is not defined by heterosexuality, by legal status, or by having children. It is not a matter of genetics or who is fucking who. Instead, it is defined by love and by an unbreakable connection (meaning that even though people may get divorced or seperated or grow up and move on, even though they may hate one another, there is a sense in which they still belong; no-one can throw you out, and you can never really leave). To the extent to which the above groupings share this trait - something SPCS is conspicuously silent on, preferring to concentrate instead on gender and sexuality - they are families.

(Though actually I prefer Wittgenstein's theory of family resemblance to any sort of essentialism, but the above still applies to the extent that we can find traits that roughly capture most of the resemblence...)

I'm also amused by SPCS' complete misunderstanding about bisexuality - and their total lack of imagination of other possible groupings. Traditional polygymy or polyandry doesn't get a look in, and neither do groups of ordinary heterosexual couples who have decided to live communally and like partner-swapping. But all of these are likewise families to the extent that they share the characteristics above (and all are also likely to outrage the fundamentalists).