Johnny has two mommies – and four dads

As complex families proliferate, the law considers: Can a child have more than two parents?
By Drake Bennett
October 24, 2010

“To an unconventional family.” That’s what Paul, the roguish restaurateur and sperm donor, raises his glass to in this summer’s movie “The Kids Are All Right.” Paul is, he has recently discovered, the biological father of two teenage children, one by each partner in a long-term lesbian couple. Contacted by the kids, he has come into their lives and begun to compete for the affections of various members of the family he unknowingly helped create. Complications — funny, then sad — ensue.

The film’s family is indeed unconventional, but it is not unique. In the age of assisted reproductive technology, the increasing acceptance of same-sex partnerships, and a steady growth in “blended” families, more parents and more children are finding that traditional notions of the nuclear family don’t accurately reflect their lives and relationships. the rest