Family – Page 9 – Feministe

Florida Adoption Ban Deemed Unconstitutional

Great news! A 30-year-old ban on adoption by gay individuals and couples has been struck down by a Florida circuit court and ruled unconstitutional.

A Miami-Dade circuit judge Tuesday declared Florida’s 30-year-old ban on gay adoption unconstitutional, allowing a North Miami man to adopt two foster kids he has raised since 2004.

In a 53-page order that sets the stage for what could become a constitutional showdown, Circuit Judge Cindy Lederman permitted 47-year-old Frank Gill to adopt the 4- and 8-year-old boys he and his partner have raised since just before Christmas four years ago. A child abuse investigator had asked Gill to care for the boys temporarily; they were never able to return to their birth parents.

”This is the forum where we try to heal children, find permanent families for them so they can get another chance at what every child should know and feel from birth, and go on to lead productive lives,” Lederman said in court before releasing the order. “We pray for them to thrive, but that is a word we rarely hear in dependency court.”

”These children are thriving; it is uncontroverted,” the judge added.

Moments after Lederman released the ruling, attorneys for Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum announced they would appeal the decision to the Third District Court of Appeal in Miami.

”We respect the court’s decision,” said attorney Valerie Martin, who had argued in support of the ban during a weeklong trial Oct. 1-6. But, she added: “Based upon the wishes of our client, the Department of Children & Families, we have filed a notice of appeal this morning.”

The attorney general’s office had argued that gay men and lesbians are disproportionately more likely to suffer from mental illness or a substance abuse problem than straight people, rendering them less fit to parent — especially children in foster care who already are under tremendous stress.

Yeah, totally no prejudice there!

In any case, it’s very good news . . . and now we wait and see where it goes.

h/t Feministing

Safe Haven

Safe haven laws have been enacted all over the country in order to allow overwhelmed parents to leave infants in safe places like hospitals and police stations without repercussion. Despite using language like “minor” or “child” as opposed to “infant” with the surface intent of protecting all children, these laws were never actually intended to cover tweens and teens whose parents find themselves without the will or means to care for them.

But they are.

Nebraska in particular has come into the public eye after nearly thirty children have been left by parents under the safe haven law in recent months, ranging from infancy to 18 year-olds. Now children from out of state are being left as well. The legislative issue is that a linguistic loophole has allowed some to interpret the law “to mean that children as old as 18 could be abandoned. Others have taken the common-law definition of “child,” which includes those under age 14.”

The irony is that safe haven laws were designed against the “dumpster baby” over-reported pseudo-phenomenon of the late 90’s in order to prevent panicky teen mothers from freaking out over their secret pregnancies and dumping their babies at prom, encouraging them to surrender infants safely instead of aborting, killing, or discarding them. The real issue is that the state is bombarded with parents and guardians too overwhelmed to take care of their kids and the state doesn’t know what to do.

Now Nebraska lawmakers are attempting a band-aid solution for the issue by simply trying to outlaw the abandonment of older children without (to my knowledge) a more comprehensive look at why the children are left in the first place. Reported issues do not directly, surprisingly, have a lot to do with economic circumstances, but reportedly with issues managing behavior of difficult children, kids with behavioral and psychiatric disorders. While economic issues add additional stress and worry to existing difficult situations, most of the families and children who used safe haven laws were reported to have been unable to access services to aid the family with counseling and support, or were unable to get results from these services.

Mark Courtney, an expert on child welfare at the University of Washington, said that what happened in Nebraska “would happen in any state.”

“These days there’s a huge void in services for helping distressed families,” Mr. Courtney said.

When children are abused or neglected, they can be taken by the child-welfare system, and possibly enter foster care. When they commit crimes, they enter the juvenile justice system. In both cases, children and parents are supposed to receive counseling and other aid.

But when troubled children do not fit those categories, they often fall through the cracks, Mr. Courtney said. Even middle-income families with health insurance often have only paltry coverage for psychiatric services and cannot afford intensive or residential treatment programs. The poorest, on Medicaid, often have trouble finding therapists who will take the low rates. And some parents are reluctant to seek whatever help does exist.

Psych services are infamously unavailable to the under- and uninsured unless one is a ward of the state. And sometimes when a child becomes a ward of the state services are over-assigned, so families whose employers aren’t as flexible, who don’t have the money to subsidize sliding-scale services, and have existing priorities for other children in the family, find it exceedingly difficult to move toward a successful family reunion. Moreover, family services are starved for cash and their clients are made to feel ashamed for needing their services in the first place.

Should these laws be revised to remove eligibility for children of a certain age to be admitted by parents as wards of the state, or is it better that kids are safely leaving environments in which their parents feel unable to care for them?

Opt Out, Push Out, and Pink Collar Paths

In ”The Other Home Equity Crisis”, Judity Warner claims there’s no real “Opt Out” trend, that instead:

“Women left the workforce when the cost of child care ate up their entire after-tax salaries, or when family-unfriendly workplaces pushed them out. Or when, like women without children or men with and without children, they were laid off in a bad economy.”

She quotes a congressional report that says:

“Women may be more susceptible to the impact of the business cycle than they were when they were more highly concentrated in a smaller number of non-cyclical occupations, like teaching and nursing”.

She also mentions that because women who leave jobs are viewed as deciding to be “moms” and men are viewed as “unemployed,” the latter are more likely to get benefits.

So what do we make of this?

Well, it’s critical for workplaces to become more family friendly. Single parents, poor parents, don’t have the option for one parent not to work. And for women and men to have equal access to unemployment benefits.

But it’s also critical for this “family friendly” path not to become a pink collar ghetto. I think the percentages of women and men who avail themselves of these options should ideally be more equal, to the extent we have power over that.

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Blacks, Latinos, and the precariousness of “middle class”

Today I listened to a segment on Democracy Now! about a new report that’s out from Demos and Brandeis University on the state of the Black and Latino middle class in the United States. The study, entitled “Economic (In)Security: The Experience of the African American and Latino Middle Classes,” finds that three-out-of-four Black and four-out-of-five Latino middle-class families are economically insecure and at high risk of slipping out of the middle class. From the report, which can be downloaded as a PDF from the Demos website:

African-American and Latino families have more difficulty moving into the middle class, and families that do enter the middle class are less secure and at higher risk than the middle class as a whole. Overall, more African-American and Latino middle-class families are at risk of falling out of the middle class than are secure. This is in sharp contrast to the overall middle class, in which 31 percent are secure and 21 percent are at risk. Specifically:

Only 26 percent of African-American middle-class families have the combination of as- sets, education, sufficient income, and health insurance to ensure middle-class financial security. One in three (33 percent) is at high risk of falling out of the middle class.

Less than one in five Latino families (18 percent) is securely in the middle class. More than twice as many (41 percent) of Latino families are in danger of slipping out of the middle class.

African-American middle-class families are less secure and at greater risk than the middle class as a whole on four of the five indicators of security and vulnerability [named by the report as assets, education, housing, budget, and healthcare]. Latino middle-class families are less secure and at greater risk on all five indicators.

Jennifer Wheary, a senior fellow at Demos and one of the co-authors of the report, elaborated on Democracy Now!:

And what we found was when we compared the situation of white middle-class families to African Americans and Latinos, there were vast differences. You know, and what was astounding to us was really looking at—these are, you know, African American and Latino families that, by all sense and purposes, have achieved the American dream, people who, you know, have two earners, two professional earners in the household, you know, maybe are trying to own a home or do own a home, you know, very—have achieved all the aspirations that we typically go for. But even among those people, when you look at, you know, where they’re weak economically, we found that about two-in-five Latino middle-class families are in danger of falling out of the middle class. They’re so financially vulnerable, don’t have assets. Maybe somebody in the household is uninsured. And one-in-three African American middle-class families are also in danger, so vulnerable, so weak, that they’re in danger of falling out of the middle class.

I haven’t read the report yet, but when I do, I fully expect to cry. In fact, as I listened to the segment on the bus home today, I actually found myself tearing up; not only because the larger injustices behind what I was hearing, but because it hit a very personal chord.

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Father’s Rights: The Movie

OMG:

Amazing. I’m not even sure what to say.

Thanks to Jessica for the link.

Buffy, Superheroes, and Raising Young Feminists

Last week we all started watching Buffy together. After mocking Chef for a couple of years for hiding his Buffy fever from me, he finally suggested we watch it as a family thing. Although we all watched Firefly and Serenity — thanks to my sister who is deserving of the credit for assuring me that Joss Whedon does not suck — it’s Ethan’s first exposure to the series, as well as mine. So far we like it, but I’m told it’s going to get better after a couple of seasons.

One of the things that’s difficult about raising school age kids is the dearth of female and minority representation in age-appropriate venues — often what representation does exist is tokenism. With some searching beyond the old classics, you can find some really cool stuff for kids, but you usually have to take what good you get along with the bad. When girl children are present, children of color are not, or the girls are silly, consumerist-driven, and boy-crazy. When children of color are present, they are usually boys, and they often hew close to tired stereotypes about minority culture. Exceptions exist, of course, and we aim to find them. As a politically-minded parent, I am conscious to try and discuss what we watch with Ethan during and after we watch it, see what he thinks, and reinforce our pro-feminist, anti-racist, anti-consumerist values.

Chef yesterday had one such conversation with Ethan.

Chef: So, E, what do you think of Buffy so far?

Ethan: It’s pretty good. Buffy kicks serious butt.

Chef: What do you think of the fact that Buffy is a superhero that is also a girl?

Ethan: That’s part of the reason that I like it!

Chef: Me too. I think it’s great that there is a superhero that kicks so much butt that girls can identify with. Really, that everyone can identify with.

Ethan: What do you mean?

Chef: Part of it is that she’s a young person and young people don’t get a lot of power and attention. Like, what other kinds of superheroes are there that you can think of?

Ethan: Oh, Spiderman, Batman, Superman.

Chef: What do they have in common?

Ethan: They all end in -man. But there’s Superwoman and Batgirl, too. And Wonder Woman.

Chef: Do you think any of them are going to have a big summer blockbuster movie like Batman does?

Ethan: Like, never. But I really like Buffy.*

I do, too. And halfway through Season One I’m enjoying the sight of Buffy “kick serious butt” but I could do without the ever-constant threat of rape against her person. I know there’s a huge number of Buffy-loving feminists in the femosphere, ahem ahem, so I’d love it if you’d point me toward some cool Buffy analysis online.

Any other feminist-friendly movie and TV suggestions appropriate for school-aged children?

_____
* Ethan also seems to like that one of the major villains of Season One is a boy about his age.

How about this? Don’t change your name.

I previously posted this last week on my blog and on BlogHer. I had initially intended it to be my first Feministe post, but I then I found the CNN.com article, and I had to express myself immediately. If you haven’t read it already, then it’s new to you. 🙂

“Name change tricky for working women” [I guess the change is simpler for the lazy bums who can’t find a job?], at CNN.com/living [where the Women’s issues are shoved] via AngryBlackBitch.

Well before her wedding, Lauren Abraham decided she would take her husband’s last name, Mahoney.

First, she became Lauren Abraham Mahoney, then Lauren Mahoney, confusing her co-workers at Home Depot headquarters in Atlanta. The tedious legal process of switching her name took about nine months to complete.

Finally, more than a year after her wedding, the 29-year-old e-mailed 160 friends and acquaintances to alert them to a new e-mail account and clarify her identity.

“As I was meeting people over the last year with my new name, and I gave them my e-mail address, it was my old name, which they didn’t know,” she said.

Changing one’s surname after marriage is still more common than not for women, often because they hope it will make for fewer complications in the long run, when they have children.

Except for the fact that 1 out of every 2 married couples will get divorced, and the husband, the wife and the kids might all end up with different names.

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The Feminist Sibling

I have a little brother and I want him to be an ally to feminists, at the very least. He’s at that age where he’s discovering the ladies, and the ladies are discovering him, and it’s important for me that there isn’t any sexist bullshit going down. Unfortunately, some of his friends are all about the sexist bullshit, which means that when Big Sister (me) rides into town, she has her work cut out for her.

Baby Brother: If she’s seeing anyone else, I’ll have to kick that guy’s ass!
Natalia: Mmmkay… Do you really think that she’d like that? Or that it would solve anything?
BB: Not really. But I have to! To preserve my reputation!
N: That’s not the kind of reputation you want. An intelligent girl won’t go for that.
BB: But I have to prove myself!
N: You can prove yourself by being nice and polite and chilled-out.
BB: But I’m a man!

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“Pro-Life” Concern for Life Really Does End at Birth

I know we’ve said it over and over: “Pro-lifers” don’t seem to care much for “life” once people actually enter the world. They oppose contraception access, which could prevent millions of abortions; their political allies take no steps to assist low-income women; they oppose universal health-care; and they generally stand against any social program that would actually help women and children. In fact, 100% of the worst legislators for children are “pro-life.”

So it shouldn’t come as a surprise when anti-choicers oppose programs that help born people secure shelter. And yet, even I was stunned at this:

An anti-abortion group has broken up a deal between Planned Parenthood and Habitat for Humanity by blasting out 10,000 e-mails to Habitat supporters.

Planned Parenthood is building a 23,000-square-foot regional headquarters on Central Avenue, and planned to sell Habitat the land next door for a token $10 to build three below-market-cost houses. The deal benefited Planned Parenthood because the city required the clinic to put up buildings as a buffer between its parking lot and Cohen Way.

“We could have put up any building we wanted,” said Barbara Zdravecky, president of Planned Parenthood. “We wanted to donate the land so Habitat could build more attainable housing.”

So Planned Parenthood sold a large piece of land to Habitat for Humanity for $10 — PP needed buildings to go up in the space, and they figured that they would use the requirement for good. But “pro-life” groups were so outraged that they shut down the project — a project that had nothing to do with abortion, and only meant that there would be more attainable multi-family housing in Sarasota. According to the American Life League, the problem is any “association” with Planned Parenthood. Even when Planned Parenthood is essentially giving them a gift. Even when the “association” has nothing to do with any of Planned Parenthood’s activities, and simply amounts to more housing for low-income families.

Take action to counter anti-choicers’ stranglehold on the “life” issue: Go here to tell national Habitat for Humanity that they shouldn’t let themselves be bullied by anti-choice, anti-life asshats. And go here to donate to Habitat — and let them know that pro-choicers are their base.

Thanks to Thomas for the link.

Siriano, your license to fierce is hereby revoked

Christian Siriano: If you think of heterosexuals, they have white-trash women and trailer parks, and we have drag queens and trannies. I don’t know if I’m the one who can explain it. It’s, like, drag queens are just there. These answers are hard!

I swear, if I see this twit walking around Williamsburg again, I will be tempted to clock him upside the head with a pink flamingo. Let’s see, Christian. You grew up in the suburbs of Baltimore, went to school abroad in London, then got a big break on Bravo by flinging around 80s drag ball terms like “fierce” and deriding outfits as “a hot tranny mess” over and over.

In case anyone was confused about whether you meant “tranny” as a slur, now you’ve made it clear: trans people and drag queens are down there with “white-trash women” and trailer parks! You know, all those low-class bad things — gee, why didn’t you throw “welfare queens” in there too? Maybe I should get together with a couple of my white friends from lower-income backgrounds, get our car off the cinder blocks, and drive around Brooklyn looking for you. Pink Flamingo!

Time Out’s premise of asking a bunch of random homosexuals to weigh in on the rapidly self-devouring remnants of “gay culture” in New York is awfully thin to begin with. But Siriano somehow manages to suck the meaning out of the conversation every time he opens his mouth, like some kind of vacuous intelligence-leech. I mean, look at this:

Douglas Carter Beane: When a gay man does drag, it’s the most beautiful feminist statement. When straight men do it, you’ve got to train them not to be negative. I learned that from making To Wong Foo.

Christian Siriano: I love To Wong Foo! It’s so good, so fabulous.

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