Quick Words of My Own: The Message is More Important than Who Writes It

On February 21, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Adoption Loss, Adoption Psychology, Adoption Trauma, Family Preservation, Haiti's Orphans, International Adoption, Race and Adoption

While I have been unable to find my own words since the earthquake in Haiti because suddenly there are orphans, orphans, everywhere orphans, or so-called orphans, I have found comfort in the words of others. This is why I have directed my readers to other bloggers who have written about the adopt-an-orphan craze that is sweeping America and parts of the world.

At the time the earthquake hit, I’m dealing with medical, legal, financial and emotional fallout from my adoptive mother in and out of the hospital and nursing home. I should be on top of the world — the book I spent the better part of the last seven years writing is now published! Instead, I’m sunk in depression.

Also, it just so happened that a few of my online friends have had inspirations, but with no blogs of their own, they have asked me to guest-post their works. I am happy to do so.

And, to my surprise, another avenue of correspondence led to yet more postings from afar: the United Adoptees International, a worldwide adoptees news group, sent me Press Releases to post on my blog. Many of my readers are adoptees and first parents who circulate through our known blogs and websites, and, many of my readers are adoptive parent organizations who do not want adoptees’ birth records open to us, and who are foaming at the mouth to adopt those poor Haitian orphans who actually want to stay in their own home country with their families. So, as a comfort to me, and as a service to those who have asked me to post their material, I have posted material from others.

The United Adoptees International, based in The Hague, The Netherlands, is especially dear to me. I will close this quickly written post with this quote from an email received this morning from the media director: “… is ok to post our messages on your blog. The more people read our signals the better.” Usually, my correspondence is with the Director of the UAI, but as he was out of office, I corresponded with someone else.

The messages are clear and direct: while do-gooder people have the intention to help Haiti or other poor countries by taking their children to a “better” place with more money, etc, those foreign-born adoptees grow up and feel isolated from their homeland. It is far more important for the message to get out and to be read by people I know are reading my blog because they don’t like the messages here, than for me to have long stretches of time between my own posts. Writers do have other obligations in life so I am happy to post the words of others in between my own works. As the owner of the website and blog, that is my choice.

Joan M Wheeler, BA, BSW, author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

Vote for Idea For Change in America: Return Adult Adoptees the Right to Their Original Birth Certificates

On February 16, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights

Hey, folks! Keep up the good work! Vote for Cully Ray’s Idea by clicking on the link below or at the left:

Idea for Change in America: Return Adult Adoptees the right to their Original Birth Certificates
http://www.change.org/ideas/view/return_adult_adoptees_the_right_to_their_original_birth_certificates_2

———————————————-
Update: We are now in 2nd place and the first round has been extended to February 25th.

posted by Cully Ray
———————————————-

Click the link below to view this discussion.
http://www.change.org/ideas/view/return_adult_adoptees_the_right_to_their_original_birth_certificates_2
~~~

Joan M Wheeler

author of Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

Truth, Honesty, and the American Way

On February 16, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee False Legal Birth Certificate, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights

When I wrote my letter to the South Dakota Senators (see previous post) asking them to vote yes to the Bill allowing access to adoptees for a noncertified copy of their original birth certificates, I couldn’t help but notice the following:

When a new certificate of birth is established pursuant to §§ 34-25-15 to 34-25-16.2, inclusive, the original certificate of birth together with the adoption information or other evidence upon which a new certificate is made shall be sealed, filed, and may be opened only upon order of a court of competent jurisdiction, or by the secretary of health for purposes of properly administering the vital registration system or for purposes of complying with section 2 of this Act.

Pay attention. The existing law states:

When a new certificate of birth is established

That means, as I have stated in a previous Post, that all adoptees suffer the re-writing of their birth certificates as an automatic procedure as part of the process of finalizing the adoption. THIS PRACTICE MUST STOP!

I have been saying this since 1974 when I was 18 years old and was contacted by siblings I never knew existed. Three days after that shock, my adoptive mother dumped my birth certificates and adoption papers on the kitchen table in front of me. When I looked at my Birth Registration in my birthname and the birth certificate made with my adopted name, I was shocked into realizing that the FACTS OF MY BIRTH had been changed. This does not make logical sense. Why is this even legal? This is why I wrote my Idea For Change on the Change.gov website: “Make falsifying birth certificates of adoptees illegal”. See the Widgets at the left side bar…

Normal people – non-adopted people – and probably many adoptees themselves, do not understand the basic principles here. If we keep asking for ACCESS and ACCESS to UNCERTIFIED copies of our UNALTERED Original Birth Certificates, that is all we may get. THAT is fine, if you want to look at a copy of your birth certificate.

But why should we allow for the continuation of falsifying new adoptees’ birth certificates? Stop the cycle of re-written histories. Stop the fraudulent abusive attack on human infants and children who have no legal representatives to stand in their defense to say NO to “when a new certificate of birth is established…”.

The above referenced South Dakota Bill being voted upon today would give South Dakota adoptees the following:

Upon receipt of the written application and proof of identification, the department shall issue to the applicant a noncertified copy of the unaltered original certificate of birth.

Yes, by what we know of as “a clean bill”, this Bill will give adoptees exactly what is stated above. That is a victory, should this pass, for South Dakota adoptees: access to a noncertified copy of their unaltered original birth certificate. That would be a huge accomplishment, more than what the majority of states do not do for adoptees who want their original birth certificates.

For those purposes, this is a Clean Bill.

But it isn’t really a true clean bill. Two obstacles are still in our way: the assembly line manufacturing of millions more falsified birth certificates each time an infant or child is adopted, thus continuing the cycle of lies. This gives years of possibilities for adoptive parents to continue to lie to their adoptees when they are children and to continue to do so when they are adults. This needs to stop.

The OTHER obstacle is that adoptees who achieve access to noncertified copies of their birth certificates are still being discriminated against because receiving a noncertified copy IS still discrimination. Stop this charade.

The Netherlands gives us a perfect example of how to register the births and adoptions of all their adoptees: 1 birth certificate and 1 adoption certificate. That ensures the total security of the BIRTH CERTIFCATE of the adoptee; as in: a person is born only once — That is a fact of life. And, once a child is adopted, there is an adoption certificate with all the facts of the adoption stated clearly. The adoption facts and the birth facts are clearly defined. No adoptive parent in Holland gets away with the luxury and the falsehoods of having in their possession a “new” birth certificate that implies that they GAVE BIRTH TO A CHILD THAT THEY ACTUALLY ADOPTED.

These documents are open to the three parties: the adoptee, the natural parents and the adoptive parents. There is no chance that the adoptee will use their CERTIFIED birth certificate in fraud (by posing as another person) because both the birth certificate and the adoption certificate are needed for proof of identification and citizenship.

What is so difficult in America that our feeble-minded society cannot accept the true facts of life and the true facts of adoption?

Even lawyers in this country cannot wrap their brains around what I just wrote. Listen, it is simple: stop thinking like backward thinking Americans and start thinking like progressive people and get the job done right. Stop lying to adoptees. Stop fraudulently falsifying our birth certificates because THAT action is morally wrong and needs to be illegal. Stop patronizing adoptees by patting us on the head as if we are still little children, “Here Suzie, here’s your NONCERTIFIED ORIGINAL BIRTH CERTIFICATE, now go away.”

We are American citizens who deserve the right to ONE BIRTH CERTIFICATE and ONLY ONE BIRTH CERTIFICATE, and if we are adopted, WE DESERVE TRUTHFUL DOCUMENTATION of our ADOPTIONS, not a NEW BIRTH CERTIFICATE that is FRAUDULENT.

I’ve been saying the same thing for 36 years. I said it when I was 18 and I am saying it now at age 54. Stop this nonsense of altering our facts of life. No other class of people is discriminated against like this. No class of people is set apart — segregated — from the rest of a free society in the same way adoptees are.

These laws were written at a time when being born illegitimate was shameful. More unmarried couples are co-habiting now and are having children together without the legal binds of marriage. Single women who are lesbians are having children via anonymous sperm donation. (That signifies yet another injustice not covered in this blog post). More single men who are gay are having children via an egg donor or a surrogate mother. (These kids also do not have true birth certificates because it is easier to leave off the name of the missing genetic parent, but again, that is the subject for another discussion).

But all adoptees are not illegitimate. And for the ones who are, they still have one mother and one father who created them and those are the facts of life. If adoptive parents don’t like that, too bad. YOU were lucky enough to be raised by the parents who gave you life, so don’t be smug by withholding the truth to your adoptees. Only when adoptive parents realize that they are part of the problem by not standing up to the government and saying “No, do not issue a falsified birth certificate, issue an adoption certificate instead”.

I am a half orphan born to married parents. Yet, my birth certificate was seized by my government and sealed from me. A new birth certificate was then issued, as if I were born illegitimately and must be segregated apart from the rest of society. Both of those indignations must be addressed by a repressed society that still abuses adoptees.

What does CNN News anchor Anderson Cooper say when he opens his show? He says, “Keeping them honest”.

I’d like to see the entire United States kept honest by changing adoption and birth certificate law to represent the true facts in an open, honest government, federally mandated, not state-run, because adoptees are denied federal civil rights by the current system.

Joan M Wheeler

author of: Forbidden Family: A Half Orphan’s Account of Her Adoption, Reunion and Social Activism, Trafford Publishing, Nov 2009.

If you have any comments on this post, please send an email, with your full name and reason for contact, to: joan@forbiddenfamily.com.

ACTION ALERT! Bastard Nation: The Adoptee Rights Organization

On February 16, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights

SOUTH DAKOTA –SB 152 – Unconditional Access to OBC’s – Vote Yes

SB 152, a 100% unconditional open records bill, will be voted upon on the floor of the South Dakota Senate on Tuesday, February 16th.

Bastard Nation: The Adoptee Rights Organization, urges everyone to write to the Senators of South Dakota immediately and ask them to vote YES on SB 152, which will give all adoptees equal rights. SB 152 will allow any adoptee 18 years or older to obtain a copy of that person’s original birth certificate upon written application, with no conditions or restrictions.

SB 152 is sponsored by Senators Adelstein, Jerstad, and Merchant and Representatives Lederman, Feinstein, Lust, McLaughlin, and Sly.

The bill was heard first by the Senate Health and Human Services Committee. The only change made in committee was omitting a contact preference form in the bill. It was felt that this form was not necessary to the bill. The Senate committee passed the bill with a vote of 4 to 2.

Help make 2010 the year South Dakota goes over the top! Please bombard the senators with your letters of rousing support!. You can read the bill at:

http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2010/Bill.aspx?File=SB152SHE.htm

CONTACT INFORMATION

South Dakota has made it very easy for everyone to write.

http://legis.state.sd.us/email/LegislatorEmail.aspx?MemberID=30s:

Go here to get started: Start out with first Senator on the list. Put SB 152 in your email subject line. Write your letter or attach it, click Send, and then in the Drop Down Box, choose next Senator in line and click Send, etc… It’s like an easy cut-&-paste arrangement. All you need is one letter.

PLEASE FORWARD FREELY.

~~~

NOTE: Even though the above link “Start” does not work (blocked from their site), go to the link above, or here:

http://legis.state.sd.us/email/LegislatorEmail.aspx?MemberID=30s: and create your letter. The drop-down list is easy to follow to click and send your email letter. I just did it and sent my letter to all the Senators on the list. Took about 20 minutes. Do it. Do it NOW.

~~~

Here’s the bill:

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY, 2010

823R0481

SENATE HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES ENGROSSED NO. SB 152 – 2/10/2010

Introduced by: Senators Adelstein, Jerstad, and Merchant and Representatives Lederman, Feinstein, Lust, McLaughlin, and Sly

        FOR AN ACT ENTITLED, An Act to provide procedures by which adopted persons may obtain their original birth certificates.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA:
    Section 1. That § 34-25-16.4 be amended to read as follows:
    34-25-16.4. When a new certificate of birth is established pursuant to §§ 34-25-15 to 34-25-16.2, inclusive, the original certificate of birth together with the adoption information or other evidence upon which a new certificate is made shall be sealed, filed, and may be opened only upon order of a court of competent jurisdiction, or by the secretary of health for purposes of properly administering the vital registration system or for purposes of complying with section 2 of this Act.
    Section 2. That chapter 34-25 be amended by adding thereto a NEW SECTION to read as follows:

Any adopted person who is at least eighteen years of age and who was born in this state, such adopted person’s attorney, or if such adopted person is deceased, any descendant of such

adopted person may obtain a copy of that person’s original certificate of birth from the Department of Health by filing a written application with, and providing appropriate proof of identification to, the department. Upon receipt of the written application and proof of identification, the department shall issue to the applicant a noncertified copy of the unaltered original certificate of birth. The department may charge the same fee as provided pursuant to § 34-25-52. The Department of Health may promulgate rules, pursuant to chapter 1-26, for the administration of this section.

Stop the Cycle, Stop the Loop of Lies

On February 15, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee False Legal Birth Certificate, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Genealogy

Cully Ray posted the following today on the Change.gov website:

http://www.change.org/ideas/view/return_adult_adoptees_the_right_to_their_original_birth_certificates_2

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.

Guest Post – Kinship Bonds, Adoption and Discrimination

On February 14, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee False Legal Birth Certificate, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Adoption Loss, Adoption Trauma, Family Systems, Genealogy, Reunions are not bad

Kinship bonds cannot be diluted by the sealed original birth certificate. States began passing laws forbidding marriage between those males and females who were bound by close family ties such as father/daughter, mother/son, brother/sister, and first cousin/first cousin. The reason given was that it was more likely that undesirable traits would be passed on to the resulting offspring between closely related parents. While the genes were not always recessive, these inherited DNA traits were not to be desired…. Any adopted persons, now adult age, have no evidence of existing kinship bonds to anyone whom they would meet and could marry – – if their adoption was finalized in a state whose adoption records, including the original birth certificate, is sealed for life. Thus, it is legal for any of them to marry kin even though the law of the land forbids this – – for good reason (to protect the offspring). Adopted persons who live under this condition of the sealed record/original birth certificate, for a lifetime, are defined by the law, by implication, of having a separate status. The blood tie is simply not in existance for them. Separated from the rest of the non-adopted population, these adults suffer discrimination.

Mary L. Foess

AAC, CUB, ORIGINS,Am-FOR, A.I.M, Truths in Adoption Triad, and Bonding by Blood, Unlimited

e-mail: southpaw45hye@yahoo.com

Web site: http://www.ArmenianAncestryBook.com

Legislative Call for Action: State of Michigan, USA

On February 4, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights2 Comments

FORWARD THIS TO AS MANY PEOPLE AS YOU CAN…AND ASK THEM TO DO THE SAME.

From: Mary Foess,

Bonding by Blood, Unlimited, of Vassar, MI, founder and president since 1988

Thur, February 4, 2010

Dear Friends,

I became privy through an e-mail sent to me yesterday that two hearings have been scheduled by the Committee for Families and Children’s Services (House of Representatives) for these two bills: House Bill # 4006 and House Bill # 4015. The chairperson for this committee is Rep. Mary Valentine. The sponsor of the bills is: House Representative Lesia Liss.

ASAP: Send your 1 page letter of support, preferably snailmail, to:

State Rep. Lesia Liss, House of Representatives, 792 H.O.B, P.O. Box 30014, Lansing, Michigan 48909

SEND IT NOW!

On the envelope (I put this type of thing on both the front and back of the envelope), include:

ATTN: Chief of Staff: Elena P.

We have at least 2 weeks to compose a 1 page letter, one which will include at least 3 reasons why you support the release of an adopted adult’s original birth certificate, and any/all of your contact info printed in the letter, as well. I suggest that you put your cell phone # (or landline if you don’t have a mobile phone), an e-mail address, and any other contact information. I used to include a work phone before I carried a cell phone. I include my Web site card; I used to put in a color photo of myself, just to get their attention.

I cannot emphasize this enough: You do not have to be a ‘member’, or a person who has experienced adoption, or a parent who had to relinquish your child, a person who was adopted as a minor, or an adoptive parent, to be qualified to write a letter. Also, your issues could have taken place outside of Michigan, as mine did (Washington, DC). You may be a counselor, a preacher, a teacher, a psychologist, or even just a ‘mom or dad’. Our birth records (adoption files) and original birth certificates have been sealed in our state for over a 64-year-period, to my knowledge. Though a newer law was passed in about 1980, we still have people whose finalizations of adoption fall between the years re: approx. mid-1945 and mid-1980 such that they have had their files and original birth certificates sealed – – – forever. This is a 35-year period called, ‘The Sandwich Years’. For all the previous years, since certified birth records were recorded by our state, anyone’s original birth certificate was available! This practice of sealing our records and our OBC – Original Birth Certificate – – – document is a recent phenomenon. It came on the heals of Freud’s Blank Slate Theory. The question I keep coming back to is this: WHY are our birth certificates sealed at all? This document is available to all other citizens…so why not us?

The legislator’s chief of staff, Elena P., told me that the birthparent letters are needed – – by a high number. They are still using the old, tired argument of the problems surrounding their claim that they made promises to birthparents that they’d have a lifetime of protection from this ‘said’ child that they relinquished. We have had to include a veto, so their claim holds no water. An issue of the AAC Decree had a good article which had a chart naming the main arguments they use against unsealing our records. It was posted in the form of a chart. Each claim or “red herring argument” was disproven by statistics, those well researched by either the AAC or other organizations. Another common practice which I’ve seen in states (and Ontario), ones which have successfully passed legislation for release of our original birth certificates, is posting the date this will take effect in newspapers and on the Internet. This is in reference to the release of the original birth certificate upon request of the ‘said’ person listed on it! The time period varies between the law’s passage and when the OBC will actually be issued.

More info:

The hearings are on March 17 and March 24, at 10:30 A.M. in: Room 326, 124 N. Capitol Ave., Lansing, Michigan

Since I had attended similar hearings there 2 years ago, I recall that there was seating in the lobby. We then went through some simple security screening before being allowed to ride the elevator upstairs. My childhood years’ memories include remembering this building as a big, Lansing hotel and restaurant on the ground level floor. It faced the capitol and was a ‘corner’ building (Michigan Ave. and Capitol Ave.) There is a parking ramp to the south, just off to a nearby side street which is the first one south of the Capitol (runs east and west, whereas Capitol Ave. runs north and south). I am driving to the hearings and have room for at least 3 adults. I will be leaving my home by 7:45 a.m., barring bad road conditions which could prevent me from going! Parking was a problem for me in 2008, but I managed….

The Fax # for Rep. Lesia Liss’s office is: 1-517-373-5910, in case you’d prefer to send your letter this way. She will be taking ALL the letters to the committee in a large, manila envelope or portfolio, then giving them to the members of this committee. Call me if you’d like a complete list of the committee members and all their contact information.

Thank You,

Mary L. Foess,

Bonding by Blood, Unlimited, of Vassar, MI, founder and president since 1988

cell phone: 1-989-823-4013 E.T. zone

e-mail address: mlfoess@Gmail.com

Web site: http://www.ArmenianAncestryBook.com (you may get some writing ideas for your 3 points from viewing this Web site)

profession: elementary teacher

AAC, CUB, ORIGINS, Am-FOR, A.I.M. (Michigan), and Truths in Adoption Triad of Michigan member

Vote for Adoptees’ Civil Rights at Change dot gov

On February 3, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee False Legal Birth Certificate, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Family Preservation, True Birth Certificate for Donor-Conceived

I’ve been reunited for 36 years and in the adoption reform movement for the same amount of time. We march on Washington, carry picket signs, send letters, write books, conduct research, cry, organize conferences, organize state legislative lobby groups, get side-swiped, start over, sign petitions, blog, start new groups, over and over and over again.

Other countries are 40 years ahead of America in terms of equality for adoptees and their parents of birth.

What is America NOT doing right?

We are not demanding to stop the nonsense at the heart of the problem: stop falsifying birth certificates for adoptees. Repeal the law that started the whole mess in 1930. Go read the books. I’ve quoted them in my book, and in this blog. The authors have been pointing out the history of the heart of the problem for many years. Yet we keep circling around the issues. The people with the money, and their god, rule over the people with no money and no power.

Stop it. Just stop it! Put an end to seizing birth certificates and falsifying them when a child is adopted. Stop it. Don’t do it. End this barbaric practice of fraudulent birth certificates of adoptees —now.

I, and other adoption reformers, have called for an end to the practice of adoption itself.

In the place of adoption, we need to strengthen families in crisis so that they can stay together. If a child cannot be raised by the parents of birth, kinship care and guardianship must be the final options presented. Both closed and open adoption has been proven over and over again to be detrimental to the adoptee and to the families that get left behind.

Please see the Widgets at the left Side Bar to vote at the Change.gov website for adoptees’ civil rights under the general topics of Human Rights and Human Trafficking. Add your comments to these pages. Even if you are not an American, leave a comment and vote.

End adoption slavery now.

California’s Relative CareGiver Law Recognizes Guardianship Over Adoption by Non Family Members

On February 2, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptee's Conflicting Emotions, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Adoption Loss, Adoption Psychology, Adoption Trauma, Family Preservation, Family Systems4 Comments

Even though this was made public in 2007, this bit of legislation – now is California Law – has just come to my attention (bold emphasis added):

CALIFORNIA STATUTE PUTS EMPHASIS ON PLACEMENT WITH EXTENDED FAMILY

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed the Relative Caregiver Bill (AB298) into law, allowing foster children greater access to permanent placement with extended family members. The statute allows for extended family members to be given legal guardianship as a preference over adoption by non-family members. In addition, the law – enacted in October – requires relative caregivers to be given information regarding the options of legal guardianship and adoption, including the long-term benefits and consequences of each option. To read the law, go to: http://www.legislat ure.ca.gov/ port-bilinfo. html and search by bill number.

When I searched for the Bill under the above number, I could not find it. Fellow adoption reformer, Cully Ray, confirmed the correct Bill name and number to be Relative Caregiver Bill AB12 (http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/ab_0001-0050/ab_12_bill_20100128_history.html).

There have been recent amendments made to his law (269 pages can be found at: http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/asm/ab_0001-0050/ab_12_bill_20100125_amended_asm_v95.pdf).

There is even a newsletter. Again, I am late to this, but the information, though late to me, is valuable: Kinship Quaterly: A Resource Newsletter for Relative Caregivers in LA County Written by Relative Caregivers in LA County (PDF – Issue 1 Vol 1 Year 1). http://dcfs.lacounty.gov/kinshippublic/documents/kinshipquarterlyvol1.pdf.

This is hope for the children NOW who are faced with temporary family crisis of poverty, job or home loss, parental death of one or parents, or foster care placement, to not only stay together as a sibling group and a family, but to have the decency and respect of care-giving adults to acknowledge that a child’s family of birth comes before ANY consideration of coerced relinquishment to adoption, ANY “placement” for adoption, and that LEGAL GUARDIANSHIP is preferred BY LAW before adoption by a stranger is even considered.

Imagine that: human compassion, respect, dignity for children who suffer family stress and loss, especially children who have lost one or both parents by death. Real, domestic, half and full orphans in California (USA) from the legal separation by adoption, and protected from the seizure and seal of their birth certificates, and protected from the falsification of facts on a “new” and “amended” birth certificate issued upon the finalization of every adoption.

If the adults involved in coercing my father (in 1956) into relinquishing me, a newborn infant, to a closed adoption of distant relatives of my deceased mother, had been faced with a law to prevent such coercion, I would have been raised perhaps by my father, or by the distant cousin and his wife who actually adopted me — in a totally open and honest relationship with my father and my siblings.

Instead, the resulting trauma of losing my mother of birth to her early death was compounded by my loss of my father and my full blood siblings because people thought that they were doing the right thing by: taking me off of my father’s already full plate of worry and obligation, giving me to a loving married couple who were childless for the first 18 years of their married life.

My idylic childhood of 18 years as the only child of these loving parents in no way is a fair trade-off of the losses I, and my siblings and our father, had to endure for the sake of closed adoption. The love of my adoptive parents and most of my extended adoptive family, was conditional: I was never to know I had siblings, or blood kin, living in the same city. And to be socially shunned and mocked because because I accepted a reunion with my natural family…to this very day…

Thank you, California, for officially recognizing the sanctity of a child’s family and birth identity.

Added Information: NOTE — Bill number is AB 12, not AB 298:

http://www.actnowinc.net/AMUSTREAD.html

ASSEMBLY- MAZE BILL AB 298

ASSEMBLYMAN Bill Maze, R-Visalia, has heard too many disturbing stories about relative caregivers being “strong armed” by social workers to either adopt a child — or risk having him or her taken away.

It’s not right.

“Relative caregivers should be our first line of placement,” said Maze.

The source of these horror stories is no mystery. California judges who are determining the fate of a child are guided by state law to give preference to adoption by a stranger over guardianship by a relative. Also, the federal government rewards the state with a $4,000 incentive payment for each adoption of a foster child above a baseline rate.

“Given the difficult task of finding adoptive homes for the many foster children who do not have a relative caregiver, it is hard to understand why we would want to threaten to remove a child rather than accepting a relative guardianship as a permanent plan and placement … yet existing law allows this exact scenario to arise on a daily basis,” the Children’s Law Center of Los Angeles, which represents 20,000 abused and neglected youth, wrote in a recent letter to Maze.

As the law center noted, there are many reasons why a relative caregiver may prefer legal guardianship over adoption. “A grandmother or aunt might view adoption as ‘taking the child away’ from her own daughter or sister,” the law center wrote.

The law center is leading the push for Maze’s AB298, which would adjust state law to make clear that a child living with a relative guardian should be allowed to stay in that home when possible. The best interest of the child should be the guiding principle of these often excruciatingly tough custody decisions — and AB298 helps advance that goal.

Call for Signatures — Letter to President Obama, et al, From Family Preservation Advocate and The USA Adoption Community

On January 31, 2010 By legitimatebastardIn Adoptee Birth Certificates, Adoptee False Legal Birth Certificate, Adoptee True Sealed Birth Certificate, Adoptees' Civil Rights, Adoption Loss, Adoption Trauma, Family Preservation, Family Systems, Haiti's Orphans, True Birth Certificate for Donor-Conceived

Re-post with permission from Family Preservation Advocate Blogspot, at:

http://familypreservation.blogspot.com/2010/01/call-for-signatures.html

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Call for Signatures

I am hoping to get individuals and organizations to sign on to this letter.

To sign, please send an email to email@AdvocatePublications.com with your name, connection to adoption, location and a brief comment, if you’d like. Please pass the word via email lists, blogs, Facebook…

TO:        President Barack Obama
              First Lady Michelle Obama
              Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton
              Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius

RE: Adoption Practices

FROM: The Adoption Community

Now that Haiti has declared a moratorium on the post quake rush to adopt its children, we must continue to protect the Haitian children from any continued hasty removals by predatory groups who might fly in once the airports re-open to scoop up children, no matter how well-intentioned, as we reflect on the course of future adoption practices.

Those of us whose lives have been irrevocably shaped by adoption offer our personal insight and ask you to listen to our voices and painfully gained wisdom. Adoption can provide a caring and safe home, but must always put the best interests of children first. Adoption should always be about finding homes for orphans and children who have no family members able and willing to provide safe care. Unfortunately it has become more focused on finding babies or children to fill a demand of those able to pay high fees to obtain a child. Thus, for the sake of all children:

* We beseech lawmakers to not be influenced by lobbyists for the multi-billion-dollar adoption industry or by the religiously based organizations and agencies, no matter how well-intentioned, who wish to use the redistribution of children for financial gain or to recruit members of their faith. Follow the advice of child welfare experts and NGOs with no motivation other than what is truly best for children.

* We call for an end to federal programs that promote and encourage adoption, e.g. tax credits, Children in foster care are being used as pawns to get such laws enacted and renewed and then be left behind while prospective parents use tax credits to adopt from elsewhere.

* We encourage the formation of a federal department of Family Preservation that would allocate funds to help families in temporary crisis, whether financial or otherwise, receive the assistance they need to remain intact. Programs such as in-home care have proven highly successful and more cost effective than foster care removals which put children into high risk situations.

* We seek federal protection of the constitutional right to parent one’s own children that are currently being violated by state laws such as Putative Father Registries.

* We insist on restoration of the rights of all adopted persons in regard to the discrimination they face in accessing their own birth certificate. We demand that the Federal government prevent states from issuing falsified birth certificates that state that adopted children are born to their adoptive parents, and that often change not just their names but their date and place of birth. This is state committed fraud and violates the basic right of every human to their identity.

Signed:

Signed:

1. Mirah Riben, mother who lost a child to adoption, New Jersey

2. Gaye Tannenbaum, New York adoptee

3. Caroline Collins, adult adoptee currently living in Texas

4. Aileen Brown, Mother that lost her baby to the adoption industry at 16 years old and ignorant of the effects adoption would do to herself and lost child, who would like to prevent it from happening to other families, Wisconsin

5. Rosalind Maya Lama, Lost a child to the foster care and adoption industry in New York
currently reside in California

6. Cathi Robinson, Natural Mother, Missouri

7. Roe Ruggerio Callahan, Philadelphia, PA

8. Amanda Woolston, Tennessee Adoptee residing in Pennsylvania

9. Bonnie Taylor, WV. Birthname (Teresa Elaine McKinsey) Born in York PA, adopted in Baltimore, MD Found birthfather (Gary Lee McKinsey-deceased), still searching for birthmother (Juanita Carson-McKinsey-Dunkelbarger-?Brashear).

10. Hannah Hope, natural mother, Essex, UK

11. Amy L. Loring – Lima, NY – Natural Mother

12. Celeste Billhartz, adoptee, Ohio

13. Samantha Franklin, Reunited Adult Adoptee, Oklahoma

14. Janet Sousa, adoptee and search angel. Owner of The Eyes Wide Open Registry, an online Emergency Medical Locators for Adoptee’s registry – Tampa, FL

15. Robert Wilson Harrington McCullough Haight, adopted person, Missouri, still denied access to his Original Birth Certificate

16. Lorraine Dusky, reunited natural mother in New York

17. Sandy Blais, Adoptee – Canada – please it is time to stop repeating the mistakes of the past that we should have already learned from.

18. Susan Gill, reunited natural mother, Nebraska

19. Laurie Staley, Michigan adoptee, adoptive mom

20. Alyce M. Jenkins, adoptive mother and adoptive/family rights advocate , NJ

21. Mari Steed, Intercountry adopted adult (Ireland, reunited); Birthmother, Pennsylvania sealed-records system (reunited)

22. Rupert Wolfe Murray

23. Dana Lowrey, adopted person, mother to a son lost to adoption, Reunited with all family members, Roseville California

24. Theresa Hood, Pennsylvania-born adoptee residing in New York, denied access to my original birth certificate

25. Barbara Pasternak, CT. I’m a Mother who had no choice when I lost my son to adoption 50 years ago. An adoptee is not, should not, be a commodity.

26. Bonnie Parmelee, mother to a son relinquished in late 80’s, happily reunited. NY

27. Julie Kelly (reunited adult adoptee) Vancouver WA

28. Lori Trevino, reunited natural mother, Wisconsin

29. Ibbaanika Bond, a natural mother of a child on which an adoption was unsuccessfully attempted.
Kansas City, Mo.

30. Joan M Wheeler, birthname Doris M Sippel, New York Adoptee reunited 36 years, I’m a half orphan, but sealed and amended birth certificate laws are meant to hide illegitimacy. I did not need to be “legitimized” by adoption. I needed to be raised with full knowledge of, and socialization with, my siblings, and father. Guardianship, not adoption; Family Preservation, not family separation.

31. Mara Rigge, Trinidad, California, Adoptee, Reunited With Natural Mother.

… … … … … …

As the author of this blog, Forbidden Family, and the author of the Book by the same name (see Widget at the Left) in which I state very similar legislative proposals on a Federal Level, I, Joan M Wheeler, suggest to add the following (no, this is not a contest as to who gets the prize for “winning” — this is to say that many of us have been saying the same thing for decades, without being heard). My proposals for Federal Legislation or a Constitutional Amendment are paraphrased from my book:

– to the proposed Federal Department of Family Preservation: whether financial or otherwise, Please add: “to protect our own domestic half and full orphans…”

– after Putative Fathers Registries, Please add: “and federal guidelines to discourage religious and social service programs (Crisis Pregnancy Centers) that encourage the relinquishment of infants from young mothers.”

– after, We seek federal protection of the constitutional right to parent one’s own children, Please add: “We seek federal protection of the constitutional right to our name at birth and our birth certificate at birth, and the right to be raised by our parents with our sibling groups intact.”

and

– “We seek federal protection to promote legal Guardianship instead of adoption to protect a child’s right to her name at birth, birth certificate at birth, and the legal right to continued social contact with parents, siblings, and extended family.”

It might be helpful to add that the Amended Birth Certificate issued at the finalization of adoption should be an Adoption Certificate that details facts of adoption.