So, among the many distinctions Florida holds is the one that is a throw-back to the Orange Juice Lady's days in 1977: the Sunshine State won't allow gays and lesbians to adopt children. Mind you, many other people are allowed to be adoptive parents. Murderers, for example, or drug dealers, I suppose, could provide a more stable and loving home environment than a gay couple.
People who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender can be foster parents. But when they prove to be the right match for a kid in need of a permanent home...well, their crack-addicted in-laws are really more appropriate, doncha think? There have been lackluster challenges to this discriminatory law in the state legislature. A state representative or senator will file a bill, and it will either get lost somewhere in the committee paperwork (buried somewhere under some resolutions proclaiming March "Florida Loves Flowers" month or something) or a committee will hear the bill on condition that the sponsor agree to "table the bill" (a.k.a kill it) after a discussion in which supporters will plea to stop the madness, and opponents will spew forth with hateful homophobic vitriol into the public record.
There is a case in Miami challenging this law which you can read about here. Note that the two experts the state brought in to testify both want to mix their brand of Christianity into social policy. And one went so far as to say that not only are gay people unfit to be adoptive parents, so are Native Americans!
What a world we live in...
1 comment:
I don't understand the members of the Florida legislature at all. I lived there for two years and found people to be polite and courteous to me but then the Vote No on 2 thing happened and I wondered where everyone is? Some of my friends here where I am now have gay relatives and these people have adopted children or had them naturally and are the most loving, good parents I know. The kids in trouble are the children of parents have over indulged their kids with too much of everything. Loving parents are whoever they may be two men, two women, a grandmother and an aunt who are taking care of children if there is no parent, even a single parent does a good job. If the children are safe, happy and well, anything is OK.
Peggins
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