I don’t know if this story would get enough national traction as California’s proposition 8 last fall, but it should. In the state of Kentucky, currently there’s a proposed bill that would impose a ban on foster care of children in homes of gay couples, and or couples unmarried but cohabitating of the opposite sex. The Bill has as proposed is known as the “Child Welfare Adoption Act”. One has to wonder if the welfare of the children are truly the concern here.
You may say foster care is no big deal, but the ban itself would have a direct impact on adoptions of children in that state. Now I don’t know how many kids are adopted or waiting to be adopted in Kentucky, but I do know that per this release, a ban would cost the state about $5 million dollars in the first year, should it become law. In these economic times, it would seem to be a pretty noble feat to still want to adopt kids – kids in need of some form of permanence by way of a home.
That said, I think the ideological thinking of the religious fundamentalist should be superseded by the need to provide homes for these kids. Who cares if a couple is *gay. Seems like if they’ve met state mandated standards of care, that this would not be an issue. Isn’t it time for us to stop allowing old world ideas to shape our lives, and invariably the lives of our children?
*According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, there is no credible scientific evidence that the sexual orientation of parents has any effect either on the quality of parenting or on the wellbeing of their children. (source)
What say you?