Disclaimer: This is a humor piece, it is not meant to influence or inform, only to be amusing. Please do not use my comments section to post actual facts. You’ll just piss me off. Thanks.
I woke up way too early this morning. My life in the last few weeks has included falling way too hard for the media coverage of the political events in Iowa (I’m right next door) and adoption activism. No wonder these things got mixed up in my mind being up at this ungodly hour.
I began to think about the current crop of GOP candidates in terms of adoption, specifically what role they would fulfill if they were part of the adoption community….
(insert soft focus and the dream music from any 1970’s sitcom here)
Mitt Romney-Birth father, adopter, envies adoptees, duh, he’s Mormon.
Michelle Bachman-Adopter, with a blog and a website, working on a book, will tell you how important she is to the adoption community, known to troll adult adoptees reminding them how grateful they should be while misquoting Margaret Mead, who she thinks wrote a baby book.
John Huntsman-Adoptee, but nobody has noticed.
Newt Gingrich-Late Discovery Adoptee, claims to be grateful, but is troubled by sexually charged homicidal fantasies involving his adoptive mother.
Sarah Palin-Adoptee that wants to adopt, already has really bad ass names picked out, but has been turned down by every agency in the country. She can see Russian babies from her house.
Ron Paul-Adoptee, nobody listens to him, compensates by overachieving, but just can’t please his adoptoraptors by becoming president, destined to fail. Also wonders if his children are actually his. He still truly believes he came from the hospital.
Rick Santorum-definitely not a birth father. Google it.
Herman Cain-Adoptee, look at the group picture.
Rick Perrry-Sperm donor, but underutilized, has probably not fathered any children, intelligence means more to potential buyers than good hair.
(Que end-of-dream-sequence music)
According To Addie 
Thank you for posting this, Heidi.
“Information is power, the saying goes.”
Which is one reason, among others, why adopted people deserve to have the right to information about their origins restored to them – and I use the word “restored” deliberately, because that right was eroded and eventually lost during the middle of the 20th century.
I would also like to include the opinion of Margaret Somerville, Canadian ethicist and academic. She is the Samuel Gale Professor of Law, Professor in the Faculty of Medicine and the Founding Director of the Faculty of Law’s Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law at McGill University. She is a remarkable woman and someone to be taken seriously even where one disagrees with her.
The excerpt (below) is from a 2007 panel discussion about ethical problems relating to assisted reproductive technology, but she also relates to children’s human rights in general:
“Recently I’ve been working on children’s human rights with respect to their biological origins and biological families.
In that work I’ve argued that we must recognize that children have human rights with respect to knowing the identity of their biological parents and, if at all possible, their immediate and wider biological families; having a mother and a father, preferably their own biological parents; and to come from natural biological origins.”
She also says that “It is one matter for children not to know their genetic identity as a result of unintended circumstances.
It is quite another matter to deliberately destroy children’s links to their biological parents, and especially for society to be
complicit in this destruction.”
You can read more here:
http://www.canadianconstitutionfoundation.ca/files/pdf/The%20Intersection%20of%20Freedom%20-%20Margaret%20Somerville.pdf
She also believes that emphasis should be placed on the rights of the child, so that if an adopted person seeks disclosure of their adoption records, that information should be disclosed *whether the parent who placed the child consents or not*, because everyone has the human right to know their origins.
The reverse, on the other hand, wouldn’t necessarily hold true. In her opinion, a parent would only be entitled to information about a child who’d been placed for adoption if they consented.
“For those of you who are new to this, mandated open records ”unseal” original birth certificates of adult adopted children..”
Also for those who are new to this it might be worth noting that adoptees do not remain children all of their lives. They do become adults. For perspective should those not adopted be referred to as adult biological children, adult natural children, adult unadopted children? Sounds rather silly, doesn’t it?
I would think that even those who are new to adoption would realize that children (by definition) grow up.
It was a simple typo. Thanks for pointing it out.
Kippa:
“…having a mother and a father, preferably their own biological parents; and to come from natural biological origins.”
With regard to reproductive technology, I’d have to say that Professor (?) Sommerville is arguing against invitro and other forms of artificial reproduction, which is consistent with traditional Catholic teaching. And I fully agree that, if mandated open records becomes the norm, donor records must also be released as well. That would be simple justice — the same standard for both mother and father.
As for the final paragraph, it’s important to distinguish between “rights” and “desires.” As “Addie” pointed out, these individuals are no longer children, but adults. “Mutual consent” would seem to be the logical middle ground.
Nice try fuckwit.
here’s the second comment she refused to put up…
Comment:
Please do not presume that I would think that mutual consent would be a logical middle ground. I do not. My biological history belongs to me, just as yours belongs to you. I have as much right to know what that heritage is as anyone else.
There is no middle ground. Something that is so uniquely mine cannot be denied me, it is my right to know this.
And the response..
Frankly, it’s not my concern whether you think this is logical middle ground — you are entitled to your opinion, and the express it … on YOUR blog.
As I’ve said to Kippa, I’m not interested in prolonging the discussing about open records on my blog at this time. There are strong points of view, and frankly because each of us has formed an opinion from which we are unlikely to budge, further discussion is pointless. I’ve deleted your comment, in keeping with my comments policy.
Feel free to link and respond as you see fit … but at EMN, I get to moderate and direct the conversation as I see fit. I’m sorry if you disagree with my viewpoint.
Heidi Saxton
Author, “Raising Up Mommy” and “Behold Your Mother” (http://www.christianword.com)
Founder, “Extraordinary Moms Network”
(http://extraordinarymomsnetwork.wordpress.com)