 |
|
Musing on Sydney's news
1 September 2003
Adopting double standards
The other say the Sydney Morning Herald ran a story called Couple 'kept children in cages'.
Apparently an American couple have been accused of keeping their five-year-old twin sons "locked in filthy makeshift cages for nearly 20 hours a day". There were many cockroaches in the cages, and the blankets and mattresses in the cage were stained with the children's faeces and urine. Police said that the kids could not yet speak and weren't even toilet-trained.
By contrast, yesterday the Sunday Times ran a story about an attempt to liberalise adoption laws to permit gay couples to adopt. To quote an opponent of this move: "I don't agree with gay couples adopting children. Adoption has to be in the best interests of the child. There's no doubt that children being children, and society being the way it is, those children will be taunted."
Okaaaay, so let's get this straight. Our guiding principle is "the best interest of the child". So far so good. But it seems we're also dividing potential adopting parents into straight and gay, being good and bad respectively. Yet some straight couples have been proven to have perpetrated the most gross abuse imaginable on innocent children. Of course, it's possible that gay parents could do the same. After all, people are people, and some are good and some are bad, regardless of sexuality. However, while we concentrate on potential adopters' sexuality we're missing the big issue.
Children need loving parents who try to do the best for them. Everything else by comparison is window dressing.
If there is a problem with harassment in schools, doesn't it make sense to put a little pressure on schools to foster a caring culture? For more details about the need for schools to make more effort (or at least some effort) to encourage a caring culture, see my article: Tell me why I don't like Mondays. I would suggest that those who worry about possible taunting of gay couples' kids to take up this issue. That way, they'll save a lot more kids from grief.
So far, the main arguments I've heard against gay adoption go along the line of: "I, and people like me, don't like gays and so our kids (who have been influenced by us) will make life for children of gay couples a nightmare". Others just proclaim, "parents should be a man and a woman". L - A - W. Law. No argument. No explanation. This is The Decree.|
Many people think that the issue of allowing gay couples to adopt is a gay rights issue. It's not. Gay rights is incidental. This is a child welfare issue. If you disagree with this, you are subjugating the rights of children to other agendas, which most reasonable people (I think there are still a few around) would see as not acceptable. In NSW alone there are over 20,000 children who are wards of the state. Children without homes, without families, without someone to love them. What I'd like to know is what the hell are these kids doing rotting away in institutions when there are perhaps thousands of couples out there who would love to adopt them? We may worry about harassment, but how well do you think these kids fare in institutions? Do you think they aren't being harassed? People in institutions, including kids, play rough. Is the idea of two dads or two mums so terrible that it's better to lock innocent kids up? Some people fear that a child could be "turned gay" or sexually abused if brought up in a gay family. Of course, children are never abused sexually in heterosexual families, right? |
 |
Below is a quote from the Justice Action website in regard to juvenile justice. Bear in mind that I have no idea what their views are on gay adoption and cant say whether they would endorse this article or not (Phew! That should keep the law suits away):
"Children who came directly under the power of the state for their own protection ( state wards), because they were orphaned, abandoned, neglected or abused, are now the largest per capita group in our juvenile jails (and hence our adult jails). Today whilst they represent but 0.2% of N.S.W.'s population of children, they are represented in the juvenile jails at a rate of 17% (N.S.W. Cabinet figures). Although the real figure is likely to be higher, this figure places ward representation at 181 times the norm".
This is perfectly logical. Why wouldn't children who are institutionalised be far more likely to be institutionalised as adults? Do you think they will be free of harassment in gaol? Do you think that many of them will be (often unwillingly) engaging in homosexual sex when in gaol? I believe the word, in certain quarters, for attractive young men in gaol is "chicken".
So what on earth are we saving these kids from when we deny them the chance to live in a loving home with two dads or two mums? Who cares, if they're gay or straight, Egyptian or Lithuanian, or Martian for that matter? Just as long as they're out of this cycle of institutionalisation and lolling comfortably by the heater in the lounge room, with mum and mum (or dad and dad) sitting at the sofa all watching telly or having a chat?
It seems that as long as we continue this petty game of "kick the queers" these kids will end up in cages, either way.
This site and all material on it is copyright © Grea Korting 2005