Gladney Back in Honduras

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This is from the US Department of State.  No explanation of Gladney’s recent boot from Honduras, but they’re back now. The only possible explanation I’ve heard, and my source didn’t have any documentation,   is that the problem may have been administrative. Messages for U.S. Citizens in 2012 February 17, 2012 Reinstatement of U.S. Adoption Agency by IHNFA (Instituto Hondureño de la Niñez y la Familia) The U.S. Embassy in Honduras informs citizens that the Instituto Hondureño de la Niñez y la Familia (IHNFA ) recently reinstated U.S. adoption agency Gladney Center for Adoption, per IHNFA’s resolution SG-009-2012.   This message updates the prior Message for U.S. citizens published on January 30, 2012.  Gladney Center for Adoption is now accredited by IHNFA and is approved to process adoptions for families in Honduras.   The Embassy continues to monitor the adoption situation in Honduras and will update U.S. citizens accordingly.  Meanwhile, we recommended that families who have not finalized adoptions contact IHNFA directly at at 011-504-2235-3565 to be sure their applications are handled by an accredited adoption agency.  

Washington SUB HB 2211: The testimony Bastard Nation would have submitted

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TESTIMONY SUB HB 2211: Adoptee access to their own original birth certificates Washington Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee xxxx, 2012 OPPOSE Privilege is the opposite of rights Our Washington representative may not be able the attend the hearing so we are submitting this testimony/letter via email. Bastard Nation: the Adoptee Rights Organization is the largest adoptee civil rights organization in the United States. We support full, unrestricted access for all adopted persons, to their original birth certificates. (OBC). Bastard Nation’s roots are in Washington State, and we would like nothing more than to support SUB HB 2211. Unfortunately we cannot. The sticking point is SUB HB 2211’s “affidavit of non-disclosure,” otherwise known as a Disclosure Veto. This veto creates a special third party privilege for birth parents that no one, parent or otherwise, possesses:  to bypass state law and to personally bar the state from releasing another person’s birth certificate to the person to whom it pertains. This onerous and discriminatory veto privilege, already in place for Washington adoptions finalized on and after October 1 1993, is extended in SUB HB 2211 to cover adoptions finalized before October 1, 1993;. The bill expands the pool of adoptees unable to Continue Reading →

Washington SUB HB 2211: Dead according to sponsor and Wa-Care

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Washington SUB HB 2211 is reportedly dead.  Last night, Wa-Care, promoters of the bill, announced on Facebook and in a post on its mail list that Rep.Tina Orwall, sponsor of the bill, had informed them that it had died in the Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee. Not surprisingly, uber powerful Sen.  Jim Hargrove wielded the coup de grace. I’m  a little unclear what exactly happened since there was no hearing and the Washington Leg page doesn’t indicate, but it looks like he decided to refuse the bill a hearing. Normally I would wait for an official announcement, but since the bill’s sponsor has sent out the word, I’m passing it along. We are not sorry that SUB HB 2211 is dead.  The bill was restrictive,  maintaining and expanding the current disclosure veto system. But we also knew from the beginning that as long as Sen. Hargrove was calling the shots that nothing would happen.  Hargrove, in the Washington legislature for 28 years, has consistently and malignantly opposed all attempts, restrictive and non-restrictive, to free the state’s adoptees from their chattel status. We did not expect a sudden change of heart. We do not know what Hargrove’s problem is, but as long as he is permitted to continue to reign in the Continue Reading →

SB: 713: Missouri Thy Name is Misery

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Last year the Missouri legislature passed a really bad law, (SB 351)  that permits a handful of adoptees to get their identifying information from the state if their  birthpparents give their consent or there is evidence that the birthparents are deceased.  Note that the OBC is not released; only identifying information vetted by a low-salaried apparatchiki.  This year SB 1137,  has been introduced, which contains the same rules only the OBC would be released upon proof of birthparental consent or death.  This is what passes for progress in the Show Me State, which takes its motto way too seriously.. Now, we have Senator John Lamping (R-Dist 24),  stirring this stink pot with.SB 713, designed to further ridiculiousize  the absurd legal condition of Missouri’s adopted class.  In the words of the Senate SB 713 Summary: This act modifies the provision in current law allowing for identifying information to be be obtained from a biological parent who is deceased by also allowing such information to be released  if  the biological parent is proven to be 100 years of age or older at the time of request. In other words, if you’re an old bastard with a walker and bedpan, Sen.Lamping considers you mature and safe enough for a birth certificate.  Polite Continue Reading →

Washington State Sub HB 2211: Are adoptees a runny infection?

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Get this straight. Washington HB 2211/Sub HB 2211 is not an adoptee rights bill.  It does not restore the right of Washington State’s Class Bastard to their original birth certificates. HB 2211/Sub HB 2211 expands the already-in-place October 1, 1993 disclosure veto backward to include all adoptions. HB 2211/Sub HB 2211 creates a new and unique tiered DV system that not only retains the current segregation of the adopted from the non-adopted, but creates two tiers of black-holed adoptees segregated from the non-vetoed adopted and from each other.This miscreation of the bureaucratic mind  is supported by naive deformers who believe that something is better than nothing, even as they claim to abhor the something. Tina Orwall THE STORYEarlier this session WA-Care  (and on Facebook) the latest iteration  Washington’s Gang that Couldn’t Shoot Straight, got  a bill,  HB 2211 introduced, that would  open  the original birth certificates of the state’s adoptees, except when it didn’t.  Promoted as an “adoptee rights bill” the proposal, sponsored by adoptee Rep. Tina Orwall, (D-DesMoines) would not only keep the current October 1, 1993 disclosure veto in place, but extend it backwards to blackhole  those adopted anytime in the past; thus, expanding the pool of those whose Continue Reading →

Fox News Fears Class Bastard

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Are any of us surprised that Fox News hates fears bastards? I Fox News ‘Expert’ Keith Ablow: Media Matters Founder Is ‘Dangerous’ Because He Was Adopted By Zack Ford on Feb 15, 2012 at 11:51 am Fox News’ infamous psychiatrist Keith Ablow has today joined the network’s personal attacks on Media Matters’ David Brock, suggesting Brock is “dangerous” because he “is an adopted boy”: ABLOW: He’s a dangerous man, because having followers and waging war… this isn’t accidental language. It’s about violence, destruction, and he feels destroyed in himself. […] This is an adopted boy who needs to plumb the depths of his psyche. He was adopted. Many adopted children are tremendously well-adjusted, but for some reason, this man feels he’s unloved and unloveable, shunted to the side, and that’s the antidote he feels: unlimited power. Guess what? It never ever works. Watch it: This is not the first time Ablow has attacked Brock for being adopted. He made similar claims last summer, suggesting Brock is “looking for any way he can get narcissistic reinforcement to tell him he’s a decent person.” Ablow notes that he has never actually evaluated Brock, but his generalizations and extrapolation about adoption are likely offensive to anyone who was adopted, Continue Reading →

Washington HB2211 is NOT Oregon Ballot Initiative 58!

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I’ve got a lot to say about what’s going on in Washington State. Unfortunately, I’m very backed up tonight, with among other things-updating Bastard Nation’s opposition testimony. In the meantime, though, please go over here and leave your opinion about some grossly inaccurate information spreading the bill. To make a long story short (which I’ll be making long, of course, in my blog) HB 2211 passed the House on Saturday.  The bill, which already expanded the Disclosure Veto, now has been amended to create a tiered system of DVs. One set of timeframe rules for one group of adoptees; a second set for another group.  Just how legalistic and lunatic can these guys get? Now, HB 2211 is being compared to Oregon’s clean law with no vetoes, no restrictions, no conditions. Please go over here and let your opinion be heard.  HB22211 is anti-adoptee and anti-adoptee rights.

U Are a Gift: The Commodification of the Female Body on a Very Bad Website. Your value is in your Unplanned Pregnancy

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The other day, the ever eagle-eyed Claud D’Arcy found a website, U Are a Gift, that is truly beyond words.  If I didn’t now better, I’d think that U Are a Gift, with its bizarre pictures of gift wrapped pregos, is a parody page. After one gets over the trauma of puerile aesthetics (Ad Busters take note!), one can only wonder who would take this site seriously.  The average 12-year old, with no prompting from any of us, should figure out quickly that U Are a Gift is somebody’s fantasy in pink. U Are a Gift is operated by a MILF  named Carol  (no last name) who wears jeans and suffers from grammar, punctuation, and capitalization impairment.  We think she thinks she’s cool–a word she uses to describe open adoption (the film Juno is a great model for living-a-happily-ever-after life) ). Carol tells us that before God, or rather, “Jesus, CEO of the Universe,” whispered in her pretty ear to set up her page (or mission, or business or whatever it is) she was: ….in the executive search business for 20 years. In my business I have always created opportunities for people and not allowed them to miss out on Continue Reading →

Bastard Nation’s Letter to Kathleen Strottman, CAAI: Your message is "we don’t count."

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Below is the email I just sent to Kathleen Strottman, executive director of the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute, regarding the organization’s neglect to include adoptees and first parents in the international adoption roundtable it is co-sponsoring with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, scheduled for February 16. (see blog entry directly below this for details.) .  If we get a response, I’ll post it here. ****** Dear Ms. Strottman: Bastard Nation: the Adoptee Rights Organization is extremely disappointed  to learn that the Congressional Coalition’s roundtable on international adoption scheduled for February 16 has ignored the input of adoptees and our first parents. The list of roundtable invitees is packed with representatives of adoption agencies, policy makers, and adoptive parents, all of who make their living from adoption or otherwise benefit from current adoption practice. They do not represent the political and personal interests of adoptees or first parents either domestically or internationally. Unfortunately, the absence of adoptee and first parent voices at the roundtable is the continuation of a long pattern of neglect by the CCAI, federal, state, and local legislators, policy makers, and public and private agencies who dismiss the producers and products of adoption as stakeholders, when in Continue Reading →

BULLETIN from the Land of a Gazillion Adoptees! Contact the Congressional Coalition Today!

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 Just received this  bulletin  from Kevin Ost-Vollmers, the Land of a Thousand Adoptees, regarding the bureaucratic silencing of of adoptees and first parents by the US Senate Foreign Relations/Congressional Coalition for Adoption Institute. Of course, none of this should be surprising.  Adopted people and their first parents–the alleged beneficiaries of adoption policy, laws, and international agreements– don’t count. From past experience it takes a crowbar to break into federal and state) adoption roundtables, hearings,  and inquiries unless you are an adoption agency or represent an adoptive parent organization–and usually the latter aren’t even welcome.   I am shooting off a short email to Kathleen Strottman right now and will post it later today.  In the meantime, read Kevin’s alert and send Strottman an email. Adoptees are not silent pawns. We won’t shut up.    Thursday, February 16th the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee and CCAI will host a roundtable on intercountry adoption. The voices of adoptees and first parents will not be at the table or solicited. Update: The initial post said February 14th.  The roundtable will be help on February 16th. It has come to the attention of Land of Gazillion Adoptees that the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute (CCAI), along Continue Reading →