Could your kids be given to 'gay' parents?

WordNetDaily.com ^ | July 1, 2004 | Stephen Baskerville

[RogerFGay]

In the debate over gay marriage, strikingly little attention has been paid to the impact on children. Some question the wisdom of having children raised by two homosexuals, but the best they can seem to argue is that serious flaws vitiate the literature defending it.

Almost no attention has been devoted to what may be the more serious political question of who will supply the children of gay "parents," since obviously they cannot produce children themselves. A few will come from sperm donors and surrogate mothers, but very few. The vast majority will come, because they already do come, from pre-existing heterosexual families. In Massachusetts, "Forty percent of the children adopted have gone to gay and lesbian families," according to Democratic state Sen. Therese Murphy.

Sen. Murphy seems totally oblivious to the implications. "Will you deny them their rights?" she asks. With some 3 percent of the population, gay couples already seem to enjoy a marked advantage over straight ones in the allocation of supposedly superfluous children.

But whose rights are being denied depends on how deeply we probe and what questions we ask. Granting gay couples the "right" to have children by definition means giving them the right to have someone else's children, and the question arises whether the original parent or parents ever agreed to part with them.

Not necessarily. Governments that kind-heartedly bestow other people's children on homosexual couples also have both the power and the motivation to confiscate those children from their original parents, even when the parents have done nothing to warrant losing them.

Sen. Murphy formulaically asks us to take pity on "children who have been neglected, abandoned, abused by their own families." But this is far from the whole picture.

Ever since the federal government became involved in the child-abuse business some 30 years ago, governments nationwide have had the means and the incentive to seize children from their parents with no due process finding that the parents have actually abused their children. The 1974 Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA, also known as the Mondale Act) provides generous financial incentives to states to remove people's children under the guise of protecting them. In the aftermath of CAPTA, the foster-care rolls exploded, as children were torn from their parents and federal funds poured into state coffers and foster-care providers. According to the Child Welfare League of America, "There were many instances then, as now, of children being removed unnecessarily from families." Many foster homes were far more abusive than the families from which the children had been removed.

But the federal government, ever ready to create a new program to address the problems created by its existing programs, had a solution. The 1997 Adoption and Safe Families Act provided more federal money to transfer children from foster care into adoption, enlarging the client base of stakeholders with a vested financial interest in available children. Gay marriage expands this client base still further.

Among the states that have taken fullest advantage of this gravy train is Massachusetts. A typical case is that of Neil and Heidi Howard, whose children were seized by the state's Department of Social Services (DSS) with no charge of abuse against either parent and no evidentiary hearing. DSS tried to put the children up for adoption and were prevented only by lengthy court proceedings and extensive publicity in the Massachusetts News. Other families are not so fortunate.

This traffic in children has been in full flow since well before gay marriage. Belchertown attorney Gregory Hession alleges a "child protection racket" rife with "baby stealing and baby selling." Hession describes courts where the hallways are clogged with parents and children being adopted. "You could hardly walk. You had never seen such mass adoptions before." Reporter Nev Moore of the News describes the auction blocks for children operated by DSS:

If you prefer to actually be able to kick tires instead of just looking at pictures you could attend one of DSS's quaint "Adoption Fairs," where live children are put on display and you can walk around and browse. Like a flea market to sell kids. If one of them begs you to take him home you can always say, "Sorry. Just looking."

This is the bureaucratic milieu – largely hidden from all but those who must endure it – into which gay marriage advocates want to inject millions of new couples in search of children to adopt.

The number of truly abused children cannot begin to fill this demand without government help. We know that statistically child abuse in intact two-parent families is rare, and two-thirds of reports are never substantiated. Yet even in those instances of confirmed abuse, a little digging reveals the pernicious hand of the government generating business (and children) for itself.

Child abuse is overwhelmingly a phenomenon of single-parent homes. Government and feminist propaganda suggest that single-parent homes result from paternal abandonment. In fact, they are usually created by family court judges, who have close ties to the social service agencies that need children. By forcibly removing fathers from the home through unilateral or "no-fault" divorce, family courts create the environment most conducive to child abuse and initiate the process that leads to removal of the children from the mother, foster care, and adoption. Gay adoption is simply the logical culmination in the process of turning children into political instruments for government officials.

What this demonstrates is that same-sex marriage cannot be effectively challenged in isolation. Opponents must bite the bullet and confront the two evils that pose a far more serious and direct threat to the family than gay marriage: the child protection gestapo and the even more formidable "no-fault" divorce machine.

Failure to grasp this nettle will leave social conservatives exposed to ever more contempt from a public that is crying out for leadership to rescue the family but which has been led to view social conservatives, however unjustly, as puritanical bigots who want to deny equal rights to homosexuals – rights that entail powers of totalitarian dimensions, undreamed of before the sexual revolution.

---

Stephen Baskerville, Ph.D., is Charlotte and Walter Kohler Fellow at the Howard Center for Family, Religion, and Society and president of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children. The views expressed are his own.

[FormerLib]

Granting gay couples the "right" to have children by definition means giving them the right to have someone else's children...

The Homosexual Agenda is all about gaining access to other people's children, and you only get one guess as to the reason they want them.

As Dr. Laura put it, "These people want to do your kids."

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

BTTT

[EagleMamaMT]

Read later.

[Jasper Willowtree]

Question: can so-called gay individuals or couples become foster parents?

[A. Pole]

In Massachusetts, "Forty percent of the children adopted have gone to gay and lesbian families," according to Democratic state Sen. Therese Murphy. Sen. Murphy seems totally oblivious to the implications. "Will you deny them their rights?" she asks. With some 3 percent of the population, gay couples already seem to enjoy a marked advantage over straight ones in the allocation of supposedly superfluous children.

Diversity bump.

[FormerLib]

Question: can so-called gay individuals or couples become foster parents?

That depends on the locality, I believe.

But the answer should be "No!"

Actually, it should be "Hell No!"

[Jasper Willowtree]

my fear is if they are precluded from these foster programs could the aclu come in and sue under some constitutional pretext that could force municipalities and states to give foster parent status to homosexuals...afterall is about the chullrun...

[Salman]

Almost no attention has been devoted to what may be the more serious political question of who will supply the children of gay "parents," since obviously they cannot produce children themselves.

Absolutely false premise. Most gay people have normal sex at some time in their lives. Many marry (to the opposite sex) and have children. Then they "come out".

Such is the case with that gay bishop.

[dmz]

Lumping all gays into the child molester bucket is as absurd as lumping all pro-lifers in the abortion doctor murderer bucket.

It's just not that simple, folks.

[FormerLib]

Sexual deviants should not be given custody of children.

Homosexuals are, by definition, sexual deviants.

[TaxRelief]

DSS Cashing In On Kids

by Allison Hart

It was an all too familiar refrain last year, heard loud and clear from the halls of the Mecklenburg County Department of Social Services: there is no financial incentive to take children into custody, and any insinuations of big boards with adoption goals tied to funding were nothing more than the paranoid ramblings of a few disgruntled critics.

A recent influx of cash received by the DSS, however, indicates otherwise. Indeed, the Mecklenburg DSS earned more than a little spare pocket change this year when the state’s Department of Health and Human Services allocated $129,000 to the county department for exceeding adoption goals in fiscal year 2003.

The department adopted out more than twice the number of children the state required to receive additional money under the Adoption Assistance program – and the collection rate, both of children and of revenue, has prompted critics to question the monetary benefits tied to children in DSS custody.

Mecklenburg County’s adoption goal was set at 81 children last year. The department reports that it adopted out 171 children – 90 more than the goal. All of which might sound like a lofty accomplishment, especially in light of social workers’ claims that adopting out children is a far superior alternative than allowing them to linger in foster care. Of course, there wouldn’t be so many children to safeguard from lingering in foster care if so many children weren’t being taken from their parents. And in North Carolina, Mecklenburg DSS leads the pack in the number of children taken into custody, while lagging behind other counties in rates for reuniting children with their parents. How else, critics contend, would they be able to produce such lucrative adoption rates? To adopt the children out, you first need the children.

Breaking down this year’s allocation of adoption assistance funds shows the Mecklenburg DSS received about $1,433 per child over the county’s adoption goal.

County commissioners approved accepting the money, along with increased revenues in childcare subsidies from the state and higher Medicaid reimbursements from the federal government, during their Aug. 12 meeting. The item was included in their consent agenda, which means it passed with numerous other items without discussion.

According to the information provided in the commissioners’ meeting packet, the Mecklenburg DSS plans to use the additional adoption assistance money “only for specific adoption related activities.”

DSS officials did not responded to our questions about what those specific activities would include, and commissioners didn’t seem concerned enough to ask during the meeting.

“There was so much other stuff on the agenda, I just decided I had already talked about a half-dozen other items and sometimes I just get tired of being the one to bring it up,” said Commissioner Bill James. “I read the agenda items and thought, well, there’s an issue here, but just because there’s an issue doesn’t mean I’m going to be the one to bring up every issue. There are nine members of the board, and at some point somebody else has to take ownership of some of this stuff.”

So far, nobody has.

James said he thought the information included in the commissioners’ consent agenda implied that the DSS wanted to spend the money to attract qualified foster and adoptive parents. He disagreed with any allegations, frequently lodged by DSS critics, that the department only allocates a portion of the money to parents while keeping a portion to pad bureaucrats’ pockets. James said he has seen no evidence that would indicate those allegations carry any merit.

Hard evidence, though, might be difficult to track in an agency that has a budget of more than one-half of a billion dollars and little direct oversight. When the funding becomes that large, it’s disingenuous to say that one part of the department, or one group of its employees, doesn’t benefit monetarily when money is added into the overall budget. A little extra revenue for adoption bonuses used “only for specific adoption related activities” means that a little less money from a different slice of the funding pie needs to be used for the same purpose. A couple hundred thousand dollars here, a few more there, and before anybody knows it you’re talking about real money.

“The allegations that have been presented to us in the past is that the money didn’t go to the parents, that the money was being raked off the top and, therefore, government was participating in making a profit off of kids that were placed into foster care,” James said. “The problem is that allegation, while sensationalist, has been unproved. As far as I can tell, nobody has presented us with information that says that that’s the case.”

James said he asked DSS officials to answer that allegation several months ago during the controversial Stratton child custody case. He said the department provided a confidential spreadsheet to commissioners that proved the allegations false.

A spokesperson for the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services Division of Social Services said the adoption incentives are given to help adoptive families. The state’s incentive program mirrors a national adoption incentive program developed by the federal legislation called the Adoption and Safe Families Act.

In 2000, the US House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee concluded that North Carolina had missed its adoption goals in 1999 and therefore did not receive federal money. However, more recent federal records show North Carolina had boosted its adoptions in 2001, and claimed the third-highest amount of adoption incentive money that year among all other states. The report didn’t show how the states spent the money.

Maybe the incentives are enticing local departments to needlessly shuffle children through the entangled system called Child Protective Services, or maybe state and federal lawmakers aren’t giving local departments enough money to protect the children who need protecting.

But much like the congressional committee’s omission of a detailed analysis on how states spend money generated from meeting or exceeding federal adoption incentives, commissioners’ failure to ask those questions last week about the Mecklenburg DSS will keep the public in the dark.

Rhinoceros Times, April 23, 01

[familyop]

"Question: can so-called gay individuals or couples become foster parents?"

[familyop]

"Question: can so-called gay individuals or couples become foster parents?"


What we're seeing more of, are cases where social workers tell wives/husbands that if they don't divorce, they lose their children. Then either way, the social workers take the children.

I was subscribed to a number of domestic violence lists for social workers in the '90s. They were nearly unanimously against families and "het" married couples. According to them, all of the world's ills are caused by heterosexual marriage. But then who amongs us who has seen much of Social Work and Psych. students and instructors at the universities would be surprised?

And have a look at the APA, Division 51 stuff that the homo-activists started in the '90s (Clinton Administration) to "change masculinity" and all of that creepy garbage science. How could so many so-called family advocates be in the dark on feminist/homosexual activist government destruction against families for so long?

[little jeremiah]

You said:

"Lumping all gays into the child molester bucket is as absurd as lumping all pro-lifers in the abortion doctor murderer bucket."

Your comparison is senseless. Out of the millions opposed to abortion a tiny handful have committed murder against abortion docs.

But roughly one third of all child molestation is SAME SEX.

Haven't you read anything about the much higher percentages of homosexuals molesting children?

[gathersnomoss]

What is wrong with happy parents?

[familyop]

"Question: can so-called gay individuals or couples become foster parents?"

Oops. That reply was for another person. The answer to your question is, "Yes, they do it often." I have received many news columns of accounts of that happening over the past few years. Right now, there's a big rush by many of them to do that in several states.

[familyop]

"Lumping all gays into the child molester bucket is as absurd as lumping all pro-lifers in the abortion doctor murderer bucket."

Tsk, tsk, we should use our quantifiers. Here's the truth of that matter, backed by objective research.

Have a look at these articles from the Family Research Council and the American Family Association.

"Child Molestation and Homosexuality"

"Homosexuality and child molestation: the link, the likelihood, the lasting effect"

"Homosexual Rape and Murder of Children"

"Homosexuality and Child Sexual Abuse"

[familyop]

"Absolutely false premise. Most gay people have normal sex at some time in their lives. Many marry (to the opposite sex) and have children. Then they "come out"."

But what's the difference? Either way, homosexual adoption or homosexuals taking custody of children in divorces hurts kids. I have a friend whose ex-wife took custody of their daugther after divorcing him to stay with her "partner." There's nothing wrong with man, either. He's a good father. He was fooled by a lesbian who misrepresented herself while they were courting. It happens, and it has been done to many.

But the premise is not false. The divorce industry and social workers are working together to redistribute children in that way. It also works with the socialist tool of feminism (see Engels, Lenin, Mao, et al, on "women")

What we're seeing more of, though, are cases where social workers tell wives/husbands that if they don't divorce, they lose their children. Then either way, the social workers take the children.

I was subscribed to a number of domestic violence lists for social workers in the '90s. They were nearly unanimously against families and "het" married couples. According to them, all of the world's ills are caused by heterosexual marriage. But then who amongs us who has seen much of Social Work and Psych. students and instructors at the universities would be surprised?

And have a look at the APA, Division 51 stuff that the homo-activists started in the '90s (Clinton Administration) to "change masculinity" and all of that creepy garbage science. How could so many so-called family advocates be in the dark on feminist/homosexual activist government destruction against families for so long?

[backtothestreets]

To read later