Sometimes it’s good to be reminded of how far we’ve come. In 1995, Floridian Mary Ward lost custody of their daughter to her ex-husband, even though he had been absent from the girl’s life for six years—and been convicted of murdering his first wife in a custody dispute. Why did the judge not award custody to Ward? She was a lesbian. Now, a new documentary tells the sobering story of the case.
Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) has just announced the publication of Transgender Family Law: A Guide to Effective Advocacy, “the first book to comprehensively address legal issues facing transgender people in the family law context and provide practitioners the tools to effectively represent transgender clients.”
This week’s quote comes from Catherine Couvert, a lesbian mom in Northern Ireland, who addresses her country’s failure to move ahead with a proposal allowing joint adoption by same-sex and unmarried couples.
Here are some of the LGBT parenting stories that caught my eye this week, which I haven’t written about in other posts:
Marriage inequality harms children. Obvious to most readers here, I imagine—but the right-wing has long owned the “best interests of the children” argument in advertising and media. Now, however, one LGBT advocacy coalition is taking back that argument, in hopes of defeating yet another state constitutional ban on marriage for same-sex couples, this time Amendment One in North Carolina. See their new ad after the jump.
Today is the deadline for filing 2011 U.S. tax returns. In a timely piece, Nadine Smith, executive director of Equality Florida (and a mom to the adorable boy who met First Lady Michelle Obama recently), writes about federal tax inequality for same-sex couples. She gives us our quote of the week:
Lots of good stuff this week, including some great personal stories as well as much-needed research on LGBT families of color. Enjoy, and have a great weekend!
Lesléa Newman is best known as the author of the first children’s book to feature LGBT parents, Heather Has Two Mommies, as well as other LGBT-inclusive picture books, such as Mommy, Mama, and Me; Daddy, Papa, and Me; and Donovan’s Big Day. The prolific author’s latest book, A Sweet Passover, does not feature an LGBT family, but is nonetheless a charming tale worthy of consideration by readers here.
The Defense of Marriage Act faces a federal appeals court; a pro-marriage equality initiative advances in Ohio; Chile passes an antidiscrimination measure, and more.
In a dazzling display of basketball prowess, the women of Baylor University won over Notre Dame in last night’s NCAA Championships. The annual March Madness basketball tournament also prompted the New York Times this week to examine how and why the coaches of women’s teams get paid far less than those of men’s teams. Does gender inequity play a role in how your kids perceive sports?
