Meanwhile in Louisiana, a House Committee decided to uphold traditional marriage or something by deferring a bill that would have allowed non-biological and “second” parents to adopt.
Louisiana law allows for adoption by a legal relative, but the House bill would add “second parents” to the list of people who can petition for such adoptions. The bill doesn’t specify whether the second parent would be male or female, so it would allow both members of a same-sex couple to adopt a child for the first time.
Currently, if a same-sex couple in Louisiana adopts a child, only one parent can be recognized as the legal guardian. Lesbian mothers at the hearing testified that their children face the risk of not having both parents recognized in the event of a divorce, the death of the primary guardian or a medical emergency involving the child.
An interesting note: Rob Tasman, assistant director of the Louisiana Conference of Catholic Bishops, says the church doesn’t sanction adoption to any unmarried couples, homosexual or heterosexual, because the church doesn’t approve of single-parent homes either. That’s right: this anti-gay measure has also effected unmarried heterosexuals who want to adopt, not to mention the thousands of orphans rotting in orphanages on the taxpayer dime.
Wouldn’t it be great if the orphans themselves wrote a joint statement that said, “We wanna get adopted. We don’t care if it’s a single mother, a single father, or a homo duo… just get us out of this hell hole.” Of course, the Catholics and anti-gay organizations would just say that someone taught them to write that; y’know because kids can’t think for themselves.
Mike in Asheville
Ahh the Catholics, proving themselves to be cultists yet again.
ronbo
Are the Catholics really this crazy? They seem hell-bent on making life miserable for the masses. What can we do to help stamp out their bigotry?
Jeffree
Louisiana has found an excuse to further degrade one of the worst foster care/ adoption systems in the US. The aftermath of Katrina caused an addition of 350 (est.) children to be added to a system, kids who wouldn’t have ended up there without the disclocation of families, death of parents, and the overall chaos of figuring out legal guardianships.
The system was already in shambles: too many kids orphaned or abandoned, too few potential adoptive parents.
Eliminating whole classes of people from adopting (singles, L/G/B’s) means the surplus of children needing temporary or permanent placement continues to grow.
This is shameful behavior on the part of the legislature & the private (religious-based) agencies responsible for those children’s welfare.