Tag Archives: HB 4623

STOP THE INSANITIY: SOME WEEKEND READING

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Feeling mad as hell and you won’t take it anymore? If not, you will after this! 73ADOPTEE WAITS FOR GODOT!RUN, DON”T WALK to Case Closed, Another Adoptee Becomes a Confidential Intermediary Statistic— 73adoptee’s memoir of her eight-year jack-around by the Midwest Adoption Center, aka, the Illinois Confidential Intermediary. You know, the CI program that Melisha Mitchell and Sara Feigenholtz expect Illinois adoptees to roll over and be grateful to them for. From what 73adoptee writes, it sounds like MAC operators Nancy Golden and Gretchen Schulert, have been possessed by the shade of the late Samuel Beckett. That can be the only explanation! After you read her account, go over to Guidestar (registration required) and check out how much the Nancy and Gretchen Show bilk bastards, their families, and Illinois taxpayers for each year–all with the blessing of the legislature. Just pour yourself a double Jack Daniels, type in “Midwest Adoption Center,”and read their 990s. While you’re at it, check out the Mitchell Mafia at the White Oak Foundation. After that little visit, there should be no doubt, even for the most sunny dispositioned adoptee, that that HB 4623 is about money. (see tag sidebar for numerous HB 4623 entries) 73adoptees’s Continue Reading →

ILLINOIS: "73 ADOPTEE" TELLS YOU EVERYTING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT THE CI SYSTEM AND WERE AFRAID TO ASK!

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Still not decided on Illinois HB 4623? (and other entries here). Still think something is better than nothing? If so, blogger 73adoptee has a lot to tell you about the Illinois Confidential Intermediary system. You know, the one that Rep. Sara Feigenholtz and Melisha Mitchell want to beef up just for you. The one that let’s the state monitor your identity. The one that says you’re too stupid, too clumsy, too insensitive, too dangerous, too crazy to own your very own birth certificate. The one that strips you of autonomy and free association. In her excellent blog Caveat Emptor On Confidential Intermediary Programs, 73adoptee aka Triona Guidry, discusses the Illinois CI system and her own experience as a client of the state CI scam. Here’s a sample: CI programs are little more than a panacea to placate open records advocates while paying lip service to helping adoptees. There are things about the process that aren’t in the brochure. First of all, you may not be eligible to apply. Once within the program, you may have little knowledge or control over what is done on your behalf. And if concerns arise, you may have little recourse. and Just about everything is Continue Reading →

OPENING PANDORA’S BOX: CONSERVATIVE COMPLAINTS ABOUT ILLINOIS HB 4623 (HINT: THEY’E NOT OURS!)

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Tonight Bastardette has to write a long over-due article for the Bastard Quarterly. But as a compulsive surfer she had to take a couple moments to see what non-bastards think about Illinois HB 4623. (We already know what Bastards think about it!). Let me tell you! It’s galling to be on the “same side” as these ahistorical sob sisters who can’t go from A to B without detouring to Peoria. The twisted paths would make Proust envious. At least the Illinois Catholic Conference, despite its control issues, remains neutral. As for the Illinois Review,‘s “Pandora’s Box” fears: why is this classical reference always used in an attempt to intimidate adoptees? As adoptee rights activist and poet Penny Partridge will tell you, what’s left in the bottom of the box is Hope. (left: Penny opens Pandora’s Box, performance piece, AAC Conference Portland, OR, March 2008. Photo by Bastardette). Lets begin!Illinois Federation for Right to Life Legislation: HB 4623–The Adoption-Confid Intermediary Bill ARGUMENT: A non-anonymous birth parent will out an anonymous birth parent. For their own good, the state has a duty to monitor, control and forbid free speech and association amongst its citizens. (Shouts to us in CAPS, but I’ll save Continue Reading →

BASTARD NATION ACTION ALERT! STOP ILLINOIS HB 4623! FULL ACCESS FOR ALL ADOPTEES!

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BASTARD NATION: THE ADOPTEE RIGHTS ORGANIZATION P.O. Box 1469 Edmond, OK www.bastards.org PLEASE DISTRIBUTE FREELY ILLINOIS ACTION ALERT URGE THE ILLINOIS HOUSE TO VOTE NO ON HB4623 HB 4623, sponsored by Representative Sara Feigenholtz, is a dangerous bill and must be voted down. Sometime during the month of April, the Illinois House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on HB4623. We do not know what day the bill will get to the House floor, so we must ACT IMMEDIATELY in order to let our voices be heard. {Please see easy Contact Information below} IF PASSED INTO LAW, HB 4623 WOULD……..give birth parents 6 months after the bill is passed to file “Denial of Information” forms with the Adoption Registry. Any adoptee whose birth parent files a “Denial of Information” form will NOT receive an original birth certificate. This section includes a 6 month advertising campaign to let birthmothers know their choices. …..define three different classes of adult adoptees, those born before 1946, those born between January 1, 1946 and January 2009, and all prospective adoptions. …..give all prospective birth parents 21 years in which to file a Denial of Information Form. Current law requires them to file a denial within Continue Reading →

FIGHT BACK! ADOPTION REFORM ILLINOIS RELEASES ANALYSIS OF HB 4623!

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Adoption Reform Illinois has just released its analysis and projected effect of HB 4623. Entitled Separating Fact from Hype, [pdf] the two-page report contains little nuggets the Mitchell-Feigenholtz spin machine doesn’t want you to know about its 77-page “simple” and “adoptee friendly” bill. For example: HB 4623 allows birth parents wishing no contact to exercise an access veto. In these situations adoptees will receive a birth certificate with the names of the parents and the birth name of the adoptee removed. Yes, under this bill your own name can be removed from an original government document that is about you and belongs to you. As someone pointed out earlier, isn’t that records tampering? Sure it is! But, I guess if it’s about adoption it’s OK for apparatchiks to fold, spindle, and mutilate you. Just be grateful you were born. Be happy that friendly politicians and paternalistic adoption industrialists are here to feel your pain. Take what your unworthy infantile ass can get. Shut up! Go here to access the Green Ribbons sponsored Adoption Reform Illinois resource page. All documents are in pdf form so be sure you have Adobe to read them. Besides Separating Fact from Hype you’ll find a Continue Reading →

ILLINOIS: MITCHELL-FEIGENHOLTZ SPIN MACHINE GOES INTO ACTION! WHAT ARE THEY AFRAID OF?

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On March 31, Melisha Mitchell, putative author of Sara Feigenholtz’s notorious 77-page monster HB 4623 sent a mass mailing to AdoptionLand constituents asking for support. In this letter, Ms. Mitchell plays games with numbers, flogs the Illinois Registry, and claims that the only “real” opposition to the bill comes from “right-to-life” groups and “obscure internet entities.” The “obscure internet entities” she forgets to mention include Illinois Open, Bastard Nation, the Green Ribbons, Ethica, A Day for Adoptee Rights, BJ Lifton, Carol Schaefer, Sandra White Hawk, Maine Senator Paula Benoit, and New Hampshire Representative Janet Allen. “Obscure” indeed! Scroll down to my entry “Illinois Adoption Reform Coalition Urges: Reject HB 4623” for the Illinois Adoption Reform letter these and other prominent adoption reformers and activists signed and sent to the Illinois Legislature and the media last week. The Mitchell-Feigenholtz spin machine thought the rest of us would roll over. We have not and will not. Mitchell’s letter raises all sorts of questions: How “simple” can a 77-page procedure be? Why are some adoptees more deserving than others? Why are birthparents and other relatives (!) given 5 disclosure “choices”? How, ethically, can a birthparent for the cost of $40 wipe out their Continue Reading →

ILLINOIS: ASTOUNDING CLAIM–MOST ADOPTEES ALREADY HAVE THE NAMES OF THEIR BIRTHPARENTS!

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Recently, an Illinois adoptee sent me an email from Melisha Mitchell regarding HB 4623’s provision on deceased birth parents. In it Ms. Mitchell makes the astounding claim that 80-90% of Illinois adoptees already know the names of their birthparents, particularly the names of their first mothers! I am publishing this letter in full, with permission of the recepient, but am withholding the name upon request. I have highlighted the most egregious statements in yellow. Dear XXX: Thanks for all your (really good) questions regarding the pending Illinois legislation. I was in Springfield last week, and came home to dozens of emails on the bill…including yours…and shall do my utmost to answer your questions… In a message dated xxx, XXX writes: >Will birth parent “requests for anonymity” eventually expire under HB 4623? Yes, under the proposed law, all birth parent requests for anonymity throughthe Registry will expire upon the birth parent’s death. >How will the State of Illinois know when/if the birth parent has died? I can see if a death >certificate is issued in Illinois – what about anywhere else in the world? As you point out, if the birth parent died in Illinois (or was born in Illinois, which Continue Reading →

ILLINOIS OPEN’S ANITA FIELD: "…FEIGENHOLTZ FOLLOWED HER OWN PATH – ONE OF COMPROMISE…"

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Here are some recent comments from Illinois Open’s Anita Field. “Curiously,” we only learned of the impending March 12 introduction of Amendment 1 (aka a re-write of the bill) on Monday March 10 in an article in the Chicago Trib. Tuesday, March 11 Anita entered the hospital for scheduled surgery. We were told by Feigenholtz’s office that the vote on Wednesday would be on the “new language only” not the bill itself. On Wednesday, the bill passed out of committee after a show hearing whlie Anita was in surgery. See previous entry for Reform Coalition statement on HB 4623.We aren’t going away! Dear Illinois Open Friends, Thank you all for your support during the days when Representative Feigenholtz was preparing her bill. I tried my hardest to let her know that adoptees don’t want restrictions put upon them by the state. She countered by saying I’m living in a dream world and don’t understand the underbelly of politics. I worked very hard to persuade Representative Feigenholtz that the time was right for a clean bill, one that would help all adoptees equally. I know many of you wrote to her not once, but several times, without ever receiving a reply. Continue Reading →

ILLINOIS ADOPTION REFORM COALITION URGES: REJECT HB 4623

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On March 28, 2008 Adoption Reform Illinois issued a letter to members of the Illinois House of Representatives and the media. The letter was signed by Illinois Open director Anita Field Walker, Green Ribbons Illinois representative Triona Guidry and 27 prominent adoption reform leaders urging the defeat of HB 4623, a so-called records access bill which would open records to some Illinois adoptees while trapping many in the lucrative Illinois Adoption Registry. (More names may be added to the protest at a later date.) Background leading to this letter can be found in several Bastardette entries for February and March 2008. Later tonight I will post Anita Field’s personal comments about HB 4623 and tomorrow I will publish Melisha Mitchell’s claims regarding the bill and opponents. Additional commentary will follow in the days and weeks to come. PLEASE DISTRIBUTE FREELY! NEWS FROM:ADOPTION REFORM ILLINOIS Attn: News Director March 28, 2008 For Immediate Release Contact: Triona Guidry Adoption Reform Coalition Urges: Reject HB 4623 We, the undersigned members of the adoption community, urge legislators to oppose Illinois House Bill 4623. As written, this bill offers some adopted adults the chance to access their original birth certificates, while banning others from accessing Continue Reading →