Cully Ray posted the following today on the Change.gov website:
The end of this round will be this Thursday (the 18th) and then the Final round will begin on Monday the 22nd… THIS IDEA WILL BE IN THE FINAL ROUND!! Thank you all so much for your support and All the Information that has been shared in your comments.
The Final round will be from Feb 22 thru Mar 4th. There will be 60 ideas presented and the Top Ten vote getters will be presented in Washington DC. As many of us know the amending/falsifying of Original Birth Certificates can and has caused problems, not only on a personal level but on State and Federal levels as well.
Please help get out the vote for the Final round, and again Thank You for everything you’ve done to get this idea to the Final Round!!!
love and hugz to all.
posted by Cully Ray
While the ideas presented by Mara and myself drew considerable less votes, I attribute the reason is because we were short-sighted in our wording. Cully Ray said it best, thus her idea got the most votes. In her above follow-up discussion comment, Cully links the two causes together with a slash: “amending/falsifying of Original Birth Certificates…”
Still, 457 votes for “Return adult adoptees the right to their original birth certificates” is a huge jump from the low-count of 43 for “Make Falsifying birth certificates of adoptees illegal”, and 71 votes for “Release Original Birth Certificates to Adoptees”.
Pay very close attention. I will add this word: CERTIFIED to the idea of “Return adult adoptees the right to their original birth certificates”.
There is no use to the release of UNCERTIFIED Original Birth Certificates to adoptees because that is another CONDITION that the government sets up to perpetuate the infantile treatment of adoptees who were factually born of one set of parents and adopted by another.
To release UNCERTIFIED copies of our true birth certificates is to continue the official lie in presenting our falsified birth certificates as true. Do not let the State and Federal governments get away with this! We know that our falsified and fraudulent birth certificates issued to us at the time of our finalization of our adoptions do not accurately state the facts of our births. THESE documents should be declared NULL AND VOID because of the official lies they uphold. We need to call an end to the issuance of such documents, and call an end to our dependence of the false legal need to have such documents as our legal identity papers!
The message really needs to reach the general public as well as drilled into the heads of adoption reformers: adoptees not only need to demand our civil rights to our true birth certificates, but we need to stop the legal practice of falsifying new adoptees’ birth certificates. We need to create the issuance of an official ADOPTION CERTIFCATE to REPLACE the falsified birth certificate.
Why? Because without stopping the falsifying of adoptees’ birth certificates, the system creates thousands of FRAUDULENT birth certificates for American citizens each and every day. This horrendous civil rights violation clearly must end.
If this practice does not end, 30 years from now, we will have witnessed yet another generation of adoptees fall victim to fraud and identity theft for the benefit of adoption. Thirty years from now, these fresh-faced adoptees will take over our activism and the right to unseal their (and our) true birth certificates. I don’t want to be fighting the same fight when I’m 84 years old.
We see it happening today. Those of us who are old enough to have been around 30 and 40 years ago at the start of our fight for Open Records know all too well that we have witnessed — and were powerless to stop — another generation of adoptees locked into the falsified birth certificate loop of lies.
Stop the cycle. Vote for the “Return adult adoptees the right to their original birth certificates” in this first round of votes in President Obama’s Change.gov’s website under the Human Rights Ideas for Change. Let the voice of the American people be heard by President Obama and his cabinet. Vote for this idea in the 2nd Round and make sure it reaches the final count to be sent directly to the President. The release of our birth certificates to us is our civil right AND it is our civil duty to prevent the falsifying of new adoptees’ birth certificates. STOP THE CYCLE. STOP THE ABUSE. STOP THE EROSION OF ADOPTEES’ CIVIL RIGHTS.
There are at least 6 to 7 million adoptees in America, yet obviously they are not stepping up to the plate to make their voices heard. Many adoptees still don’t rise up to political action. When adoptees themselves are so worn down by adoption’s dirty little secrets, we cannot stand up to fight the injustices perpetrated upon us. Therefore, it is up to us who do see the connections and injustice to keep shouting our cause loud and clear.
Adoptees … there are millions of you out there! Get off your duffs and vote! Get your pens and pads of paper. Get your computer keyboards tapping. Get to the post office and send your letters to President Obama yourselves. Tell him: Stop the abuse of adoptees. Slavery should hit home to Barak Obama. Slavery is alive and well in the American Adoption System. End adoption abuse now!
Parents of adoption loss also need to get off your butts and take action. Your rights are also being abused by the present adoption cycle. Put an end to it. Fight with all you’ve got.
TRUTH is on our side!
We know who our parents are!
We need to put the emphasis on truth: 1 birth certificate and 1 adoption certificate = Adoption Truth.
See it clearly and get the job done.
Joan M Wheeler
Author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009
The above ideas are laid out in finer details in my book.
FORBIDDEN FAMILY 