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Sun 9 Nov, 2008 10:24 am
Arkansas voters passed by a 57% majority, a vile proposition stating:
"BE IT ENACTED BY THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ARKANSAS:
Section 1: Adoption and foster care of minors.
(a) A minor may not be adopted or placed in a foster home if the individual seeking to adopt or to serve as a foster parent is cohabiting with a sexual partner outside of a marriage which is valid under the constitution and laws of this state."
As a result... 400 children are required to be moved out of homes they were already placed in and into group homes or orphanages, immediately. Families will be separated.
Arkansas already has three times as many children needing foster care and adoption than it has available families to take them in. So the odds that these kids will be adopted by someone else are slim to none.
Many of these children have obviously endured hardships in the past, leading to their eventual adoption. Now, for them to be stripped from their adoptive parents, I can only imagine how this has to feel. This is not about pushing a gay agenda. This is about providing homes for children who have none.
This initiative was written because the Arkansas supreme court threw out a ban on fostering and adoption by gay couples in 2006. In 2006, the conservative court unanimously rejected the homophobic justifications for discrimination made by the Arkansas government writing: "These facts demonstrate that there is no correlation between the health, welfare, and safety of foster children and the blanket exclusion of any individual who is a homosexual or who resides in a household with a homosexual."
This is along the same lines as "Seperate but equal."
No, gay people, we won't let you get married. But you can be in civil unions and we promise that you will have all the rights and privilages of a married couple. Oh, but you can't adopt kids. And that kid that you did adopt already is going back into an orphanage.
Screw the voters. You can't tear apart families or screw over children just because the voters say that you can. I dearly hope that the Supreme Court rips Arkansas a new one, and does so asap.
The churches were the groups that largly funded and campaigned for this measure.
I guess ripping apart families or forcing kids in adopted homes to be thrown back into the system is the Chrisitian thing to do these days.
@Centroles,
Unfortunately, many of these regressive legal initiatives were placed on the ballot to be sure the radical religious right went to the polls to vote for McCain. The anti-gay-single parent ban initative was a bonus for the Republicans.
Same thing happened in California re the gay marriage ban.
BBB
this is so totally fucked up.
@Centroles,
Excellent post. I am anxiously waiting to see how some try to tear it apart with illogical rebuttal.
@flyboy804,
We could propose that radical religious right persons not be allowed to adopt children because they pollute their minds and destroy their ability to think rationally.
BBB
@Centroles,
That is absolutely disgusting if it's true. But where does it say that it applies to already-adopted kids? Why would they have to move?
Quote:Section 1: Adoption and foster care of minors.
(a) A minor may not be adopted or placed in a foster home if the individual seeking to adopt or to serve as a foster parent is cohabiting with a sexual partner outside of a marriage which is valid under the constitution and laws of this state."
co-habitating outside of a marriage which is valid... doeasn't say they are gay. It could be co-habitating of opposite sex as well, right? Or, am I reading it wrong?
@squinney,
yes I think you are correct, seems the issue in Arkansas is "sexual partner outside of a marriage" In Arkansas I am guessing that would include immediate family (if you get my drift)
I don't see where it says that children already adopted will be removed from their homes. I would like to see the full law if you have a link.
Even if they don't mean that the law is still beyond stupid.
Do they adress what would happen if a adoptive family headed by a single person or a gay couple moved to Arkansas?
@boomerang,
Boomer, it doesn't say anything about already adopted kids
Quote:(a) A minor may not be adopted or placed in a foster home if the individual seeking to adopt or to serve as a foster parent is cohabiting with a sexual partner outside of a marriage which is valid under the constitution and laws of this state."
-----
co-habiting refers to either heterosexual or homosexual partners, it is not
specified either.
@CalamityJane,
Yeah, so like I said, it doesn't mean those already adopted kids have to move. Centroles wrongly assumed that.
@CalamityJane,
That's the way I read it too, CJane but I'm wondering if there's something we don't know judging by Centrole's original post.
If that is really their intent all I can say is Arkansas would have to f*****g find me. And if they did find me they'd better be ready for a fight.
I think the law is really just to squeeze out gay families for adopting or fostering because lord knows all the gay people out there were born to straight people so straight people should never be allowed to have kids because some of them will turn out to be gay.
Ok..... Now I've confused myself.
@Centroles,
I checked the thread because of the title, ready to berate Centroles for painting all people from Arkansas with the brush of "backwards" when 43% must have chosen otherwise. Well, I still think that's broadbrushing, but the stricture re adoption seems extreme to me. I'd much rather a child be adopted by a qualified single person than not at all - indeed, there probably are equal positives re a single person and the average couple - and I don't expect that single person to never live with another, er, co-habit.
The available evidence seems to indicate that life is a lot easier
for those of us who don 't have kids.
David
The available evidence seems to indicate that life is a lot easier
for those of us who don 't have kids.
I think the key consideration
is that the kid shoud have the ultimate power of decision,
and be free to leave when he chooses to.
David
@Centroles,
That goes so totally against of common sense. And it is very sad!
But I have to disagree with the title of the thread-I don't think generalizing in any form and in this case the entire population of Arkansas is right. Don't forget these (43%) who voted against.
@SanFranciscan,
Quite right-- the title of the thread should be "Undeniable proof that Arkansas is a backwards hellhole
57% full of bigots and idiots"...
@flyboy804,
flyboy804 wrote:
Excellent post. I am anxiously waiting to see how some try to tear it apart with illogical rebuttal.
not attempting a rebuttal in defense of somthing indefensible, but the law's supporters must feel that anyone who has sex outside marriage is not fit to adopt children.
@BumbleBeeBoogie,
What a way to run a railroad.
I heard of something similar in mediaeval England, where a clerk added a sentence to an act of parliament something like "and the Town Clerk is hereby divorced" and nobody noticed until later.
Okay, perhaps it's not so similar. But why have these multi-clause bills? Seems very strange, and a recipe for much strife.
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