Not letting a little thing like insurrection stop them, the Trump administration on Thursday finalized a rule that will allow foster care and adoption agencies, along with other public health and social service organizations receiving taxpayer funds, to discriminate against LGBTQ people and others.
“This is not normal,” I tell my son. At 17, he’s old enough to understand that logically, even if he barely remembers a time when our president wasn’t an egomaniacal, violence-enabling, reality-show host. Even though our leadership will change for the better on January 20th, though, I worry as he heads towards adulthood in a country still deeply divided. Can we adults give him, and all young people and children, the country they need to grow into happy, healthy adults? Will the ideals of freedom and equality for all ever be more than distant visions?
In a year like no other, LGBTQ families, like all others, struggled with the physical, mental, and economic challenges of the pandemic. And with children of LGBTQ parents much more likely to live in poverty than those with non-LGBTQ parents, the pandemic may have hit many LGBTQ families, like those of other marginalized groups, particularly hard. Pandemic aside, there were many political and legal challenges—and a few victories—directly related to LGBTQ parents and our children in the U.S. this year. Here are the highlights, good and bad.
In the latest of a series of anti-LGBTQ moves, Hungary’s parliament has changed its constitution to ban same-sex couples and most single people from adopting children.
This morning, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to take a case in which Indiana was trying to deny the right of married nonbiological mothers in same-sex couples to be recognized as legal parents by being put on their children’s birth certificates. An appeals court had ruled in January that both mothers must be allowed on the birth certificates; because the Supreme Court has refused to take the case, that decision stands.
The U.S. Supreme Court is currently considering a case that could let taxpayer-funded adoption and foster care agencies around the country use their religious beliefs as a reason to discriminate against LGBTQ people and others. New research from the Movement Advancement Project (MAP) shows the widespread impact that could have on children in care.
Indiana continues to press the U.S. Supreme Court to take a case that would deny the right of married nonbiological mothers in same-sex couples to be recognized as legal parents by being put on their children’s birth certificates. It doubled down in a brief filed with the court last week. Double down with me as we take a look at the case—and how parenting bloggers are inadvertently playing an odd role.
Two—yes, two—lesbian moms of color have been named to Joe Biden’s all-women White House communications team.
As Thanksgiving approaches this year, I am thankful for many things—and not only that I’ve finally learned to make a decent pie crust.
Happy November 18th! Today is the anniversary of the historic 2003 ruling that made Massachusetts the first U.S. state to allow same-sex couples to marry. It also marks the 2003 repeal of the U.K.’s anti-LGBTQ Section 28 law. Additionally, it’s the “Massaversary” of when my spouse and I legally wed (though we celebrate our true anniversary in April).
