Gay Adoption as Political Weapon in USA Today Article

On the 20th of February 2006, a story ran on the front page of USA Today about the growing trend to use foster care and adoption bans as political weapons. I suspect that the root of this tactic is that the religious right is fearful of gay and lesbian parenting. They likely feel that gay men and lesbians are not worthy to raise children in a loving, caring and protective home. There also seems to be fear that to do so would cause the children to be tainted or for them to become gay or lesbian themselves. As gay men and lesbians, we know that the home of your origin has little or nothing to do with how we turn out. Otherwise, we would all have become heterosexual, would we not?

There may be an even more frightening issue at hand. If children are brought up in a home where tolerance is a value, will they not then grow up to be tolerant adults? I can’t think of a more wonderful idea, but I can see how a fundamentalist would be badly threatened by the idea. The most draconian of all tactics, used by the Republicans fundamentalists, is to bring up issues about homosexuality in election years by placing anti-gay initiatives on the ballot. As a result, they are attempting to prey upon the fear of their constituency and bring them to the polls for greater turnout. By doing so, their candidates might gain more votes, and they might garner more power. As a side issue, they also get to further beat up on and discriminate against their gay and lesbian compatriots.

As part of the USA Today story, there is a poll of its readers to see how they feel about adoption by lesbian and gay parents. Please take a moment to read the article and to share your opinion. I hope that you will agree that it is wrong to have discriminatory adoption and foster care placement practices written into state law and constitutions to prevent gay and lesbian parenting. There have been so many cases where GLBT couples have adopted children that are considered non-adoptable and have given them love that they would not have otherwise received. Additionally, it would be wrong to prevent biological gay and lesbian parents from raising their own children or to prevent them from being legally recognized as co-parents.

Please take a minute right now to read about this issue of GLBT adoption as political fodder and to fill out the USA Today poll on gay and lesbian adoption.

Sharing this story with as many other people as possible will help shed light on these attempts to shape public opinion and will give you a chance to provide your input to the process.

Categories: LGBTQ gay+adoption politics tactics tolerance intolerance