Not to Change the Subject

By all means carry on with the Imus-Duke-Gangsta Rap discussion if you have something to say, but I just got a link to this article and I want to point out that most same-sex parents live in places (including us) where this could happen. Without explicit law protecting our rights to adopt regardless of our sexual orientation any judge at any time can make this kind of personal call.

It's the main reason we have gone out of our way to adopt in Chicago. Judges there are more likely to allow our adoptions. But they are not legally compelled to in any way. Where we live, they are neither legally compelled nor necessarily likely to allow it. Most queer families live in this kind of no-man's-land of luck and precedent. If our state passed a law tomorrow banning adoption by same-sex couples, it would put our family in serious jeopardy. A judge could argue that in the absence of a law at the time of our adoption, our adoption is retroactively invalid.

I don't think this is likely, both because our state is farily divided between "conservative" and "liberal" law makers and because the political and economic feasiblity of snatching children out of established families seems just about nil to me.

Nevertheless, this is a shadow we, and the vast majority of families like ours live under. Few states have laws explicitly protecting us, and the anti-gay marriage laws in many states (such as Georgia, in this case) give judges all kinds of rhetorical wiggle-room to come up with decisions like this.

I now return you to the previous discussion.

Comments

[mijk]

This is scary....

[mamamarta]

as a lesbian mom, i very much understand and experience on a visceral level the "shadow" of which you speak. as a lawyer, though, i'm pretty sure that any future legislation that purported to nullify your adoption would be ex post facto and its effect on your family would be prohibited by the constitution.

[christine]

Oh my goodness, these situations infuriate me! If the child were to live with her biological mother, she would still "be exposed to the homosexual lifestyle". Would this judge terminate parental rights simply based on the sexual orientation of the parent? I doubt it. This is such bullshit!

[Holly]

We live in a county that is an island in hte middle of a conservative state. Even still, only 2 of the 4 judges will sign off on 2nd parent adoptions because they fear that there are not enough laws/precedents to allow it.

[Jo in Utah]

Even as a heterosexual, decades married, almost a conservative, I think legislating families is wrong. How do you tell people they have to stop loving each other? When is it wrong to give children a loving and legally protected home? I can not, will not feel threatened by people loving each other. Darn it all anyway.

[Beth TigerMoon]

This burns my goat.

Errrgg.

[Lisa]

So he (judge) is kinda saying, "Because we don't allow you to marry, you can't adopt because we don't allow you to marry, and even though you have done everything to make a stable life for this child besides legal marraige, we don't allow you to marry so don't act like married people, because we don't allow you to marry." I know it is all about homophobia, but his circular logic is maddening.

I don't get how he can't see that he is creating more of an unstable life for this little girl than the adoptive parents ever could.

[Sara]

It's just so sad that in this day and age ignorance and suspicion of people different from ourselves still has such a grip on political life in this nation.

[Trey]

his warped sense of what is best for the child made it worse for the child.

how horrifying.

[Trey]

I"m wondering Mamamarta. I understand that California or Washington (where we adopted) can't 'undo' our adoption by passing a new law. Constitution and all.

But my worry is visiting or moving to another state. If some occurance put us in front of a judge in a legally glbt-hostile state (can't think of a scenario off the top of my head, but assume it does) and that judge decides that our adoption isn't recognized, couldn't they remove our daughter from our custody?

Perhaps legally in the end we'd win, but even then the trauma is terrifying.

Just asking. I still feel very very nervous when traveling as a family in Virginia or Utah (where we are from).