I’ve been fairly neutral on Pete Buttigieg, I found it interesting that a newbie got so far in the Demo race last year. He said some things I liked and some things I didn’t like–none of which I remember now. I pretty much forgot about him until a few days ago when the news broke that he and his husband Chastan, in grand bourgeois style, are in the final stages of adopting a baby. Grumbles and pearl-clutching from cons and christo-fascists.Huzzahs and fist bumps from Libs. Gasps of horror and disdain from AdoptionLand: Mayor Pete was stealing–or buying–some mother’s child.
I planned originally to skip over this minor celebrity adoption kerfuffle. What with Covid rampaging through the country (especially in Texas where I live), Afghanistan and the Taliban, the earthquake in Haiti, and my temporary stress in moving to a new city in a few days, I’ve got better things to worry about. If someone does or doesn’t like this adoption for whatever reason, that’s their deal, not mine.
Then…Then…Then..I received an email late Wednesday afternoon from the 3.14 Action Fund inviting me to sign a congratulations card for the new dads. Will you take a moment to join us in congratulating Secretary Pete and Chasten on becoming parents? Sign here→
I figured this was a flim-flam fundraiser. Nearly every day I get stuff like this from the Trump Crime Family, but the sheer gross commercialism of this beg-at-thon knocked me in the head like a bag of doorknobs. For only $10.00 I can buy the privilege of signing a greeting card congratulating the couple on their adoption, which hasn’t even happened yet. ($18.00 is the average donation). It’s bad enough, but not surprising. Adoption is politicized all over the map, but this monetization of the intimate to raise political money is despicable and out of the Donald Trump playbook.
I absolutely do not object to queer adoption, and that’s not what I’m writing about. Moreover, I certainly don’t want to imply that Pete and Chastan are using this money to fund Pete’s political interests. In fact, 3.14 Action Fund is clear that the Buttigiegs have nothing to do with this fundraiser. The organization doesn’t need to ask their permission to shill in their name.
PAID FOR BY 314 ACTION FUND, 314ACTION.ORG, NOT AUTHORIZED BY ANY CANDIDATE OR ANY CANDIDATE’S COMMITTEE.
It appears that the 3.14 Action Fund just took it upon themselves to appropriate the Buttigiegs names and exploit their “adoption plan” and the infant they are adopting without their consent. Adoptees are excellent props. We’re born for that job.
Commercializing the Buttigieg adoption –raising political dollars on the backs of adoptees and the misery of others–lowers the adoption FU bar once more. The fundraiser is 
crude, distasteful and cloying. It insults adopted people and validates the belief of a large number of adoptees that they are commodities– nothing more than a piece of furniture. In the case of this fundraiser, adoptees don’t even rate as an old couch much less a Van Der Rohe Barcelona chair.
The campaign celebrates family tragedy and expects that libs and progs–and I suppose adoptees and both of their families– to divvy up celebratory cash to promote a laundry list of liberal-type politicians and issues, none of which are related to adoption reform and adoptee rights. I have yet to see political fundraisers funnel money into adoptee citizenship, rehoming, fixing foster care, and on a state level, the restoration of the adoptee right to OBCs and other records. The only time adoption gets mentioned, the object of adoptions–us–are made silent and invisible. At best a pretty prop. Our only purpose is to push agendas outside of our own self-interests to make other people feel happy and fulfilled. I honestly can’t think of any other marginalized group that is so “beloved” and so kicked to the curb.
The 3.14 Action Buttigieg fundraising campaign will certainly not hook-in adopted voters or supporters of ethical adoption practices. Even within the confines of low-brow US adoption culture, this campaign creates a new level of sleaze. This money-grabbing stunt guarantees I will never send a dime to 3.14 Action.Fund, and I will urge others to ignore any fundraising appeals they get from the organization–and to tell it why.
Pete Buttigieg needs to speak up and extricate himself from this ill-advised money campaign. He needs to demand that 3.14 Action Fund reject and return all monies collected under that scheme. He needs to make clear to the public that he and Chastan will not tolerate his soon-to-be adopted child or any other adoptee—being used as a political money tree or themselves to be appropriated to do so. The baby they are adopting will not be amused 20 years from now to see that they were put on the auction block and marketed for their political value.
Finally, out of common decency, 3.24 Action needs to make a public apology to adopted people and their families for the gross and venal use of adoptees whether the Buttiegs speak up or not,and return the money.
NOTE: At the present time I take the 3/14 Action Fund disclaimer as truth and that the Buttigiegs had nothing to do with this cheap shill. . If I learn later that the Buttigiegs actually OK’d this exploitative gangbang, I will take them to task, too