This legislative season there are bad bills stalking bastards. Of course that’s nothing new. Anita Field has been tracking the proposals and recently wrote about them on the Bastard Nation Action Alert site. I’m also posting them here. I’m starting with Anita’s comments on Massachusetts where 3 bad bills have reared their ugly heads. Bastard Nation and MARTA oppose all of them. Over the next few days I’ll be posting the BN Massachusetts action alert so you can help kill the bills before they run amuck. The testimony of BN and MARTA will follow. In the meantime, keep a barf bag handy. And keep mind that these bills come from the “good guys–whoever they may be. And now Anita…Three new bills, three Black Holes. It boggles the mind. HB 2190, SB 63 and SB 77 were introduced in January and they appear to be almost identical. SB 63 is sponsored by Sen. Karen Spilka and SB 77 by Sen. Susan B. Fargo, also left oversfrom last year. All three bills are a repeat of last year’s amended bill, SB 959 which was a good bill that went bad in the Joint Judiciary Committee. Thankfully, it was pocketed by Gov. Romney Continue Reading →

When we last left the Morriseys (except for their comments re: Wendelboe and Woods), they were demanding that the American Adoption Congress let them speak at MY conference presentation. While I’ve seen some bad behavior from them before, this, I thought, was serious shark jumping, though hardly equal to their 2003 report to the Lexington, MA police claiming I had threatened to kill Jean on alt.adoption, of all places. I’m not a member of the AAC. Even if I were, I’d not be privy to its decisions regarding policy, speakers, or anything else. I, therefore, haven’t seen the letter, but I understand that AAC wrote to the Morriseys explaining politely why they could not horn in on my presentation or attend the conference: little things like conference proposals and deadlines. That would have been enough to restrain the less obsessed. and more polite. After all, the Morriseys aren’t queer and the Wakefield Sheraton Colonial Hotel and Golf Resort is not St Patrick’s Cathedral. In-the-know people, however, warned me that the Ms might just show up at Wakefield anyway. I said, you’ve got to be kidding. They weren’t. Right on schedule, the Morriseys arrived Thursday morning at the hotel to set Continue Reading →

About a month ago I wrote a letter to the editor of Foster’s Daily Democrat (Dover, NH). based on an earlier blog. It was was published today–and well worth repeating. Fosters Daily Democrat, March 13, 2007 Wendelboe and Woods inconsistent To the editor: Rep. Fran Wendelboe and former state Rep. Phyllis Woods have gotten their socks in a bunch over HB 184. The bill would repeal the state’s 2003 parental notification law that requires doctors to notify at least one parent 48 hours before performing an abortion on a minor. The other day the two Republicans tried to pull the notification law out of the dumpster, insisting that parents need a right to a “say” in their minor daughter’s decision to undergo an abortion. Woods claimed parental notification is a compelling state interest necessary to protect “minors against their own immaturity.” In her testimony before the House Judiciary Committee, Wendelboe favored “good medical care for our daughters” and groused that minors “can’t get a tattoo or even an aspirin from the school nurse, but they can have a secret medical procedure without their parents’ knowledge.” Wendelboe and Woods weren’t always so concerned about immature decisions, parental notification, and good medical Continue Reading →

Bastardette attended the American Adoption Congress conference outside of Boston, March 7-11. I’ve already posted a few pictures of Bastard Nationals with DMC, but here are some shots taken at the Bastard Nation book table. I posed a lot of people next to one of our Spermies–like Niagara Falls. I was sure I had a picture of blogger FauxClaud, but it didn’t show up on the disk. I’ve ID’d all but a couple people whose names escape me at the moment. I’m working on it and will add them when I’ve got them. I can’t link to CUB–I get a weird message from Blogger about it, and I have no idea what it means–but you can link to CUB from the sidebar on the right. In the meantime…. Authors Ann Fessler, The Girls Who Went Away and Craig Hickman, Fumbling Toward Divinity: The Adoption Scriptures. Bill Cordray, Baster Nation Celeste Billhartz, The Mothers Project and Bastardette. Fred Greenman, AAC General Counsel and Barbara Raymond, author, The Baby Thief: The Untold Story of Georgia Tann, the Baby Seller Who Corrupted Adoption (April release) Marianne Novy, Professor, Dept. of English, University of Pittsburgh; Alliance for the Study of Adoption, Identity, and Kinship. Continue Reading →

Bastardette is currently at the American Adoption Conference in Boston. Here’s a few pictures with of Bastard Nationals with DMC–Darryl McDaniels– who gave the opening keynote.(1) Bastardette(2) Craig Hickman(3) Maryanne Cohen

On March 7, Erik Smith and I will hold a workshop at the annual conference of the American Adoption Congress in Boston. Our subject is “Putative Father Registries and Safe Haven Laws.” The AAC received many more workshop proposals than could be accommodated, and we are fortunate to be selected. Since Dad is usually left out of the safe haven equation, we are excited about the opportunity to bring him in. Not everybody, though, thinks that it’s such a good idea. A few days ago the AAC received an email from our friends the Massachusetts Morriseys, co-founders of Baby Safe Haven New England and members of the National Safe Haven Alliance. Calling themselves “experts,” and without any idea of what Erik and I will present, they requested that they be added to OUR workshop, since Erik and I are distributing “disinformation.” This doesn’t surprise me. Since they jumped onto our computer and TV screens four years ago, the Morriseys have, like Theordore Roosevelt, tried to be “the bride at every wedding, the corpse at every funeral.” Because Roosevelt was the president, he could get away with it. The Morriseys can’t, though Boola-Boola, they do try. As propagandists and obsessive exploiters Continue Reading →

Perennial clownster California Assemblyman Alberto Torrico is back Recently our favorite Kalifornia Kollectivist and his prankster friends Assbs Bonnie Garcia and Todd Spitzer introduced AB 81, described as “almost identical” to last session’s Schwarzenegger-vetoed AB 1873, a bill which expanded the test drive time…er I mean, age of kids that parents can no-muss -no-fuss drop off anonymously at the neighborhood fire station. Currently babies no older than 3 days are eligible for legal dumping. Torrico wants to raise the age to 30 days to give moms time to decide if sleep deprivation, dirty diapers, and post-partum depression are worth it. (Be careful what you ask for Al!) If you don’t believe me, go to Stupid things Californians Say about Baby Safe Haven Laws. By the time AB 81 is over with, there will probably be enough material for Volume 2. It’s one thing when the CranksRUs at Bastard Nation and other uppity adoptee and adoption reforms groups oppose a safe haven bill. What else can you expect? We’re selfish, spoiled, and ungrateful that we weren’t dumpsterized. But AB 1873 was opposed by the heavy hitters of the California safe haven movement: impeccably credentialed LA County Supervisor Don Knabe and Debi Continue Reading →

Beautiful! This just in from Andalusia, Alabama: Baby’s mom found, no charges filed. Last Friday police were called to investigate the attempted safe havening of a newborn girl at Andalusia Regional Hospital. Normally, safe haven desperadas are met with open arms and blind eyes. In this case, though, the authorities blinked. The baby, wrapped in “soiled beach towels” and with her cord still attached, was suffering from abnormally low body temperature, a condition that led authorities to believe (reason not stated) that she had been left in an abandoned building for 12 hours before the hospital turnover. After emergency treatment in Andalusia, the baby was transported to Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola where she was listed in serious condition. Here’s the “good” part: “[Andalusia Police Chief Wilbur] Williams said that investigators learned the woman’s identity on Saturday after receiving a tip from her husband. He said the woman cooperated with their investigation. She was questioned by law enforcement authorities, including the district attorney, on Saturday.”Williams said the man suspected his wife was pregnant, but that she had led her husband to believe that she had a tumor for which she was being treated. She delivered the baby at home while Continue Reading →

Sunday, a curious post popped up on alt.adoption from our friends, the Massachusetts Morriseys. It appeared in an ongoing thread on what else but… baby dumps! I’m publishing the post in full, including the prior comment in which a poster discusses the difference between traditional sealed records and safe haven no records. The difference is that a record does exist with closed adoptions and that the b-mom took some control of how the child she created, bore and delivered was relinquished. There is always the hope that those records will become available to the person they are about. Raymond Once again here’s the record in Massachusetts. All 4 babies safelysurrendered under the Baby Safe Haven law have full medical histories,and 3 have full family histories. Women are encouraged to give all ofthis information at any time as they are fully immune fromprosecution. There’s an ongoing effort to have women return followinga safe haven surrendering to give this info at any time. Prior to passage of the law 3/4 of babies lost their medical history,and heritage through death or refusal of women to give the info due topossible prosecution. That data is absolute for the 4 year periodprior to passage of Continue Reading →

I’m in the middle of writing two cumbersome out-of-control blogs, but this lovely story from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram crossed my screen (relevant parts posted here) that I just had to share: A woman dropped off a baby Thursday at a southwest Arlington fire station, the first such incident since the city put up signs advertising that parents can drop off unwanted infants with no questions asked. The 5-pound, 14-ounce boy, only a few hours old, was dropped off about 3 p.m. at Fire Station No. 10 on Southwest Green Oaks Boulevard. Firefighters looking through window blinds had noticed that a woman had driven into the station’s parking lot, sat in her car for a few minutes, then drove off, said Battalion Chief Mark Reichert. About an hour later, he said, she came back, walked to the station’s door, handed firefighters the baby in a blanket and said she found him in a trash bin. Firefighters asked her no questions, Reichert said. Hold it! Hold it! Hold it! Let me get this straight. A woman walks into a fire station, babe in arms, claiming she found it in a trash can, and nobody asks her any questions, not even her Continue Reading →