Word, Ms Harriet Harman

[greenie_breizh]

"You can either be against discrimination or you can allow for it. You can't be a little bit against discrimination."

- UK Constitutional Affairs Minister Harriet Harman


The UK (well, the government) is struggling to decide whether or not Catholic adoption agencies should be exempt from following anti-discrimination legislation, and therefore still be allowed to reject same-sex couple applying to adopt a child.

'No Catholic opt-out' on adoption
Cabinet rejects exemption on gay adoptions

If the Cabinet goes decide against exemption, I feel like it'll be a step forward almost as important as the Civil Partnership law. Discrimination cannot be condoned just because you think your religion tells you it's okay to look down upon a certain portion of the population (that has done nothing wrong). We went over this with racial discrimination already, for Joss's sake.

Comments

[vae]

I simply can't believe their "if you make us consider gay couples as potential parents we're not going to play any more" attitude.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

...yeeeah see I'm not that surprised. And honestly, they go ahead and shut down their agencies. That'll say a lot about how they actually care for children.

[lvs2read.livejournal.com]

4% of adoptable children? Whose adoptions can be handled easily by a different agency? Pfft. Let the Catholics pout in the corner. Who needs 'em anyway. *eg*

I really like Harriet Harman, and I've never heard of her until today. *g*

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I have like NO CLUE who she is. To my defense, I really don't know the UK political / judicial system as well as I know how the US works, but still. Cool quote, she gets a mention. ;)

And totally for the agencies - if they choose to shut down rather than abide by the law? That says a lot about how they care for children (who are supposed to be their priority.)

[themegs.livejournal.com]

This is why I'm reluctant to tell people I am Catholic. There's so much hot air that goes against my heart. And the funny thing is that I long to live in a country where the only fucktards who have a problem with samesex adoption are the Catholics.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Honestly, it's not a Catholic thing. It's a religion thing. Apart from a handful of denominations and individuals, organized churches are total jerks when it comes to gay people, and still for no reason I find acceptable.

And god, I know the feeling - I wish our government was anywhere near enforcing anti-discrimination laws on adoption agencies. Right now a same-sex couple in France is officially still not supposed to have kids. Who cares we actually have 20,000 kids growing up in same-sex households...

[themegs.livejournal.com]

I attended Catholic grade school in the 1980s. I was too young at the time and had nothing to compare it to to realize it was pretty progressive as Catholic schools go. The 8th graders (aged 13, 14) had sex education that both stressed waiting until marriage and taught about sexually transmitted diseases, birth control pills, and condoms. At a Catholic school. Today, many public schools aren't allowed to teach about condoms. In science lessons we learned about dinosaurs and evolution, and it never seemed to be in conflict with the idea of God and Creation. I knew gay and lesbian couples, and my family never had any issue accepting them. So that's why, as an adult Catholic, it's shocking to me the things that other Catholics believe. It's certainly shocking to me what other Americans believe. In general, the coasts and the big cities are more liberal, and I grew up with the benefit of both.

So if a same-sex couple in France wanted to adopt, they do have options? Or are the Catholic agencies the majority of them?

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you were very lucky in the school you went to indeed.

A same-sex couple in France today CANNOT adopt, in any way. A same-sex couple in France today CANNOT get inseminated (nor can single women), and a male same-sex couple can certainly NOT use a surrogate mother to have a child. Apart from one or two exceptions, today according to French law, a child CANNOT have two parents of the same sex.

Which is ludicrous because 1) anti-discrimination laws mean adoption to a single person cannot be denied on the grounds of their sexual orientation (incredible logic and consistency in the laws there...), 2) Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands all have clinics that will inseminate lesbian couples and/or single women (at least European citizens), 3) divorces happen, 4) arrangements happen and 5) you can't stop human beings from having kids if they want to anyway.

So we have all these children in France today that legislation is completely ignoring and it's a very problematic situation. The children issue is definitely what we're having the most problems with right now. We have a form of civil partnership and even though our right-wing party won't support same-sex marriage, polls show the population is overall not entirely adverse to it. Bring the idea of children in, though, and everybody goes ballistic. It drives me insane.

[themegs.livejournal.com]

Wow. That's really shitty. You guys are definitely ahead on the same-sex unions, so I suppose it takes a few steps at a time. It just boggles my mind that it's an issue at all. Falling in love, getting married, raising a family are the most natural things in the world.

[alohomoraa.livejournal.com]

rien à voir, mais quelques icones qui ont des chances de te plaire. :)

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Heee, merci! *g*

[queenspanky.livejournal.com]

It's really interesting how this is playing out. Because, if you know your UK politics, you know that the minister in charge of anti-discrimination is Ruth Kelly, she of the mega religious Catholic sect, Opus Dei. She has never voted on LGBT matters in parliament. And has said fuck all about this. The most vocal person has been the education secretary, Alan Johnson, who is currently my fave of a bad bad bunch.

There is a feeling that they might try the same comprimise that they did with abortion: catholic agencies don't give kids to same-sex couples, but they have to, by law, send same-sex couples to an agency that will. I'm not a hige fan of this, since I think the uber-religious should get their heads out of their asses, but it is better than nothing. Of course, right now, the Cabinet's decree has been 'Fine. Close. You're only hurting the children and it will come back around to bite you in the ass. We think same-sex couples should be recognised as humans and aprents.' So yay for the Cabinet!

I think you and Fan' would very much like my friends gender theory/LGBT blog: http://rhetoricallyspeaking.blogspot.com/. He has some wonderful musings on this topic.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

I heard Ruth Kelly had now come out in favor of the law? I'm very impressed.

Overall I think it's pretty cool that the Cabinet's defending that position, and refusing to make an exception for religions. I'm fucking tired of hatred / discrimination being okay because it's supposedly based on religion.