Mar 17 2010
When bigotry is too good to lose.
Catholic adoption agency Catholic Care has won a high a court ruling granting them an exception to the Sexual Orientations Regulations, under the United Kingdom Equality Act, which forced adoption agencies to consider homosexual couples as potential adoptive parents.
Catholic adoption agencies were given 18 months to comply with the legislation or close, many threatened to close and some did, others complied it the law whilst Catholic Care sought and exception, threatening to close if one was not granted.
The exception has been granted under the fine print of the law which allows for the exemption could apply “to any charity subject to it being in the public interest”.
There is no doubt the good work that Catholic Care does in adoption cases, its been established for over 100 years and works in some of the most deprived parts of my home region of Yorkshire in the north of England. They just don’t offer adoption services to same sex couples, which clearly is not so good.
Gay rights groups are up in arms about this ruling.
“It’s unthinkable that anyone engaged in delivering any kind of public or publicly funded service should be given licence to pick and choose service users on the basis of individual prejudice. It’s clearly in the best interests of children in care to encourage as wide a pool of potential adopters as possible.” Jonathan Finney of Stonewall told BBC News.
No-one wants to see established adoption agencies close, certainly not those with good track records for supporting adopted children with their new parents. However Catholic Care have sucessfully held the government to ransom over this legislation by threatening to back up shop unless they were allowed to continue to discriminate against homosexual couples.
It would seem however, that the high court has decided that some forms of bigotry are too good to lose.
If you enjoyed this post. Please share it with others by adding it to the following social bookmarking sites. This is greatly appreciated and doesn't go unnoticed. Just click the graphics below.
34 Responses to “When bigotry is too good to lose.”
Leave a Reply
Please write in good English, using correct spelling, punctuation and grammar. Please also capitalise your sentences correctly.
The SHIFT key is your friend.
I think you need to be careful about throwing around accusations of bigotry – there’s a real issue about freedom of conscience at stake here. When the Equality Act was going through Parliament, there was a request from Catholic adoption agencies to be exempted, so that those running the agencies would not be put in the position where their consciences were compromised. That request was denied in the interests of ‘diversity’. Given that the exemption would not have prevented secular agencies from placing children with same-sex couples, I fail to see how an exemption for Catholic agencies would do anything other than promote diversity: different agencies would have been free to serve different people in ways that suited particular needs.
However, the state seems to think that it has the right to impose a monolithic view of equality, which no one seems to be able to challenge without being accused of being a bigot, or worse. This is a major cause for concern: the twentieth century was littered with examples of totalitarian states which claimed the right to define what was acceptable thought. Those who challenged such states were those who refused to allow their freedom of conscience to be denied to them, who dared to challenge the dominant thought culture. We are all more free as a result of their bravery. And many homosexual and bisexual people have stood firm in defending their conscience over the years as they have challenged dominant prejudice. We all benefit from their bravery.
Those of us who have had to struggle with the weight of other people’s expectations should be the last to deny the freedom to other people to be true to their consciences. If you really want to build a society that is free, and that genuinely values diversity, you must respect that freedom, even, and perhaps especially, if you profoundly disagree with them.
Well a bigot, by definition, is a person blindly attached to their opinion, and in particular someone who does so in the face of reason and evidence to the contrary.
As there is no evidence to support the belief that heterosexual couples always make better adoptive parents than homosexual couples, someone who persists in this belief is a bigot. I have no trouble throwing the word around.
Nor do I have any problem in the state legislating against bigoted practices to ensure minorities do not face discrimination when they seek access to employment, healthcare, services (both public and private) or anything else for that matter.
The subject in question is adoption services but it might equally apply to a homosexual couple being able to have access to a hotel room. The principal is the same.
If people are free to act on their bigoted beliefs, LGBT couples will face discrimination and limitation on their access to services that straight couples would not face.
Notice there is also a HUGE difference between the state legislating against ACTING on bigoted beliefs and preventing people from HOLDING or even verbally expressing such beliefs.
We are free to think however we like, we are free to express those views, we are not and nor should we always be free to act on them.
Catholic Care and Catholics and other Christians worldwide are free to object to Gay Adoption, they are free to voice their objection. What this legislation was supposed to prevent is them acting in a way which is discriminatory to Gay or Lesbian couples.
The legislation has seemingly failed, this is a problem.
Mmm, really?
You say that there is “a HUGE difference between the state legislating against ACTING on bigoted beliefs and preventing people from HOLDING or even verbally expressing such beliefs”. Suppose the state were to legislate that you are free to believe that having a same sex relationship is OK, but you were banned from actually having such a relationship. Would you still believe that it is possible to divorce belief from action so easily? It’s always easier to believe that other people can divorce their beliefs from their actions more easily than you can or should be asked to do so yourself.
And as for “we are free to think however we like, we are free to express those views, we are not and nor should we always be free to act on them” – do you really believe that? Does the state have the right to tell us when we can act on our deeply held beliefs? I doubt you’d think that if the state started clamping down on gay pride marches whilst claiming that you were free to believe in gay rights as long as you didn’t act on those beliefs.
And can you really equate the adoption of children with the hiring of a hotel room so easily? The principle is not the same. The receiving of a service for which you are paying (the hotel room) is one thing. Being allowed to assume the responsibility for the nurture and upbringing of children is quite another. I do not understand how the language of “rights” was ever allowed into the debate about adoption, because the “rights” of the propsective parents should not be the key concern: the needs of the child ought to be paramount. However, whilst adoption agencies are saddled with the burden of having to be seen to be respecting the alleged rights of prospective adoptive parents, it is far from clear that the needs of the highly vulnerable children involved in all of this will be given the attention that they deserve.
All of this is highly sensitive, and the law is a very blunt instrument to introduce into it. And the sort of vituperative anger that you have expressed hardly helps the debate in so delicate an area. Stop and think whether you really want the state telling you when you can and when you can’t act on your most profound beliefs. If you can’t see why that is a problem, you will never help build a truly free and liberal society.
Liberalism is based on the harm-principal. The basis of denying rights to act according to conscience are done solely on the basis that allowing such a right would cause harm to others.
To deny someone the right to act according to their conscience when it harms no-one is illiberal, hence your reverse argument about being “free to believe in gay rights as long as you didn’t act on those beliefs” does not hold with liberal principals, because acting on those beliefs does not harm others. For the purpose of the harm principal – merely causing offence does not constitute harm, however denying equal opportunities does constitute harm. Its a fine line and this line is drawn normally along the lines of the facts and the evidence. A person does not have the right to have their unsubstantiated beliefs respected.
To automatically assume that gay couples are unsuitable parents because of their sexuality is unfair, unjust and is not backed by any evidence. Furthermore, the right to equal treatment for LGBT couples is essential in the battle equality. The notion that we are all born equal is another central tenant of liberalism.
Broadly Marston I think we agree, we are both seeking a more liberal, tolerant and fairer society, where we differ is in how far we believe the state can legislate to achieve those aims.
We are intellectualising this debate somewhat and I’m conscious might be losing the none-politicos by using language like this, but you seem to be advocating a type of anarchistic-liberalism, whereas I’m seeking a more classical-liberal approach.
Most US readers are going to completely misunderstand this discussion of liberalism anyway, because they associate the word liberal with the democratic socialist / social democratic arm of the Democratic Party. Whereas the context of our discussion of the term places it more within the realms of the ideology of personal liberalism expressed by the Libertarian Party (which is somewhat anarchist) vs European Liberalism (which favours state intervention only where necessary).
I don’t want to prolong this discussion, but I think two points need to be made. Firstly, a point of political principle: classical Liberalism has always recognised the need to place limits on the rights of the individual in order to ensure liberty for all. That is why Stonewall and other gay rights activists need to accept that some agencies might not place children with gay couples, whilst Catholic agencies need to accept that secular ones will. That is part of the diversity that is to be expected in a pluralist society. The case I am advocating is most definitely not libertarian, but a classical liberalism of the sort espoused by John Stuart Mill. There was a time when members of the Liberal Party used to read his work, but I doubt members of the modern Lib Dems are familiar with it. It might explain something of the party’s lack of direction.
Secondly, your claim that “a person does not have the right to have their unsubstantiated beliefs respected” is wrong on two counts. Firstly, it flies in the face of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and of the European Convention on Human Rights, both of which clearly state that freedom of religion is a fundamental right. Secondly, to dismiss faith as “unsubstantiated belief” ignores the profound experience of faith that many people worldwide have, and have had for many generations. You clearly have a problem with religious belief – you’ve written in pejorative terms about it before – but you should not underestimate the significance of it. For many people their faith, like their sexuality, is a significant part of who their identity and self-understanding. And don’t forget that your political views could be dismissed by others as “unsubstantiated beliefs” – on the basis from which you are arguing, that would give people the freedom to deny respect to your views. I doubt that was what you intended.
Marston,
For the record On Liberty by John Stuart Mill, is still the book passed between party presidents of the UK Liberal Democrats so it remains very close to their main tenant and core message.
I think you have misunderstood my meaning on my second point.
When I said “a person does not have the right to have their unsubstantiated beliefs respected”, I’m saying that such beliefs are open to criticism, ridicule, mockery and do not have to be taken seriously or even considered by the rest of us.
If you want to belief the sky is yellow, then that’s your problem, you’re free to do it, but don’t expect the rest of us take you seriously. And if you start insisting that we paint our combat fighters yellow so they are camouflaged against your “yellow” sky, society has a right to ignore you, it also has a right to prevent you from running around an airbase with a tin of yellow paint.
Equally if your unsubstantiated religious beliefs tell you that homosexuality is wrong and that you shouldn’t offer goods or services to homosexual couples, then society has a right to tell you that’s unacceptable and legislate against you doing it.
But that’s getting away from the topic of Gay Adoption. I could almost accept your argument that “Stonewall and other gay rights activists need to accept that some agencies might not place children with gay couples, whilst Catholic agencies need to accept that secular ones will” except that this seriously disadvantages the children who Catholic Care work on behalf of, because it seriously limits their access to good adoptive parents.
On what basis does “society has a right to tell you that’s unacceptable and legislate against you doing it”? At the end of the day, the belief that it is right to allow gay couples to adopt is just that – a belief. You can’t prove that it’s right. Some people accept it and some people don’t. On that basis, it is no different from a religious belief, and therefore the state has no right to legislate that one belief is to be enforced and another denied.
Ah… this is where I can take the liberal high ground… Something must be shown to be dangerous before you ban it. Therefore, it is not for me to prove that Gay couples make good parents, its for those on the other side of the argument to show they don’t.
The belief that gay couples make bad parents is unsubstantiated, there is no evidence to support that belief. There is no evidence to support the hypothesis that a persons sexual orientation affected their parenting skills.
On that basis there is no justification for denying adoption services to gay couples. To do so would be acting on an substantiated belief.
Until you have a good reason to deny adoption services to gay couples and frankly I don’t believe there is one, the liberal approach is to allow it.
Your final sentence has an interesting choice of words: you don’t “believe” that there is a good reason for denying adoption to gay couples, and therefore the state should “allow” it.
You’ve acknowledged that the claim that gay couples should be allowed to adopt is a belief. Like all belief, it cannot be proven by empirical experiment: it belongs to that realm of claim and counter-claim that is the stuff of public discourse. It is, to use your words, an unsubstantiated belief. But it’s a perfectly legitimate belief, which the state has allowed to be put into practice.
But your original post claimed not just that the state should allow it, but should enforce it, even against the consciences of those who do not share the belief that gay couples should adopt. That is what is illiberal.
Sorry mate: you’ve just fallen off the liberal high ground!
Actually, what I’m highlighting is where the burden of proof should lie. The burden of proof should never be on disproving unfalsifiable claims.
I believe in the theory of gravity. I cannot prove the theory of gravity, however it could be disproved by empirical evidence to the contrary. In the absence of such evidence I’m going to assume the theory of gravity is correct.
Equally, show me a study that proves that gay people always make worse parents than straight couples and I’ll reconsider my views on allowing gays to adopt. In the absence of any such evidence, I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that on average a gay couple who is keen to adopt makes an equally good parents as a straight couple keen to adopt.
Or to put it in more empirical terms, as there is no evidence to suggest a correlation between ones sexuality and ones skill as a parent, there is no logical reason to discriminate against adoptive parents on the basis of their sexuality.
Interesting debate…
Well done Marston…you’re the first person to actually challenge David on his own ground
Sorry David, I just had to leave a comment. No hard feelings though.
Madame,
You make it sound like I don’t tolerate dissenting views. Or that people are not allowed to express a different opinion on this web site.
Its not like Marston has to pluck up any type of courage to debate with with me. I’m not going to ban or block him for disagreeing with me, and he knows that!
We’re having a debate. Its civil and lively, everyone is welcome to express a different opinion. The only rules are these, (1) you refrain from being abusive and (2) if you express your opinion, then be prepared other people might disagree with it and tear your opinion to shreds. Though if you talk sense chances are people will agree with you.
Frankly the point is more like this:
Adoption is a “public service”. The limits on who a public service should be offered to should only be limited by practicality and the core goal, otherwise it isn’t really public.
The core goal of adoption is to benefit children in care. There has not been any credible evidence thus far that children are disadvantaged by being adopted by a same sex couple, thus there is no reason that they should be prevented from doing so. Preventing them from doing so only reduces your effectiveness in achieving the core goal, by having fewer children adopted into loving families.
To be honest this is a major issue about what happens when two forms of ethically protected rights meet, in this case sexuality and freedom of worship/belief. The position I generally take is this, I consider the Catholic leadership in the Vattican to be predominantly bigoted (as well as heavily sexist) and I take any other individuals as they come. I can’t take it seriously when people say “Homosexuality is bad because God says so.” I don’t differentiate between “homosexuality is bad” and “africans are bad” personally. The same goes for saying people who do certain jobs or watch certain TV shows are inherently bad.
I believe individuals should be free to act how they wish, within reasonable legal constraints (no murder assault etc), but organisations that offer public services should make them truly public. Thus an individual is free to act as a bigot on their own time, but if they intend to work for an organisation they should be expected to keep it to out of hours.
Are you saying that all matters of conscience should be kept out of the public sphere? In that case, those who campaigned for the abolition of slavery should not have been allowed to do so, as they were acting in accord with their Christian consciences. And members of groups like Stonewall should not campaign publicly, but should keep their private beliefs to themselves.
As for your claim about a lack of “credible evidence”, the real issue is this: there is a range of belief about a matters connected with sexuality and family life. Whilst a range of evidence can be produced to support those positions, there is no conclusive proof one way or another as to whether children flourish best in particular circumstances. That is why it is wrong to close down debate on these matters by enforcing one particular view with the force of law. And don’t forget that once upon a time, medical evidence claimed to be able to prove that homosexuality was a disease: you can end up with some very strange conclusions if you invest too much trust in supposedly objective scientific evidence.
But what is particularly bizarre about this debate is that whilst Catholic adoption agencies are asking only for the right to conduct their own affairs in accord with their own consciences, those opposed to them are seeking to enforce their view on all adoption agencies through the force of law. In that situation, who are the real bigots?
I think Anon, said it best Marston.
Matter’s of conscience are irrelevant, they are not the test for what should be in or out of the public sphere.
No-one is saying you cannot think or believe a certain way. What I am saying is you should not always be able act in accordance with your beliefs.
There are people out there who believe sex between adults and young children should be legalised (and I’m referring to NAMBLA, not the Catholic Clergy :p).
They are free to believe that for all I care, but they are not free to ACT upon their beliefs.
In the case Catholic Adoption agencies they are seeking a license to discriminate in accordance to their faith.
What if their religious convictions told them they had to refuse to serve blacks? Would you stop them then? What if their religious convictions told them they had to dress their wives head-to-toe in linen garbs? And that women weren’t allowed to associate with men who weren’t their husbands in public. Would you stop them then? What if their religious convictions told them they had to kill all non-believers, would you stop then them?
The problem is you can use a religious conviction to justify just about any form of discrimination, this is why I reject it.
But of course if Christians don’t act in accordance with their beliefs, irritable secularists such as yourself would be the first to condemn them for not practising what they preached!
And matters of conscience are not irrelevant to the public sphere: various causes have been largely or partly motivated by Christians who have been moved to act on their conscientious belief, such as the abolition of slavery, or the anti-Apartheid movement in South Africa. Are you really saying that Christians should have been banned from acting in public on those convictions?
And your scare-mongering that those with religious convictions might want to kill non-believers etc is pure fantasy on a level with those who say that all gays are a threat to children. It seems to be one of the mysteries of human nature that people are incapable of meeting those with different convictions from their own without attributing the worst of motives to them.
“Irritable secularist?” LOL – I like that one. Glad I succeeded in both irritable and secular at the same time. It beats being a religious apologist so I’m happy.
I’m not sure I accept the role of Christians in either the anti-slavery or anti-apartheid movement as been defining of the expression of Christian belief or conscience. I’d remind you there were arguments made in favour of slavery and apartheid from Christians of various denominations.
The leader of the anti-apartheid movement in the UK was Peter Hain (now secretary of state for Wales) and he was and remains a very secular politician.
And I’m not scaremongering by suggesting that those with religious convictions might want to kill non-believers. Look at Islamic States, apostasy is capital offence under Sharia law, as is homosexuality, adultery and countless other moral “crimes”.
Christianity maintains similar punishments in the bible, its just that practising Christians have thankfully been secularised enough to resist them. Though they don’t have the balls to write them out of the bible… I wonder why?
But this wasn’t my point. My point was that a religious conviction or belief can be used to justify just about anything. Therefore its a dangerous right to defend absolutely.
Political belief can also be used to justify all sorts of things – are those with political convictions to be asked to leave the public sphere?
Yeah, I agree. Marxist philosophies and their derivatives be used to justify all sorts of crimes against the individual. As has the Nazi belief in the Final Solution. More recently we’ve seen things like Guantanamo Bay, extraordinary rendition and the Patriot Act introduced and used to steam-roller civil liberties in the US and equivalent paranoid legislation in the UK.
But ironically almost every time a Political Belief has been used to justify an atrocity it shares something in common with religious beliefs. Namely it has no grounding in reality and no evidence to support its necessity.
Bad politics, like religion is based on beliefs and ideology rather than facts and evidence.
And rolling back up the thread I know you are trying to corner me by getting me to admit that my statement about gays making equally good parents is a belief because I said…
Until you have a good reason to deny adoption services to gay couples and frankly I don’t believe there is one, the liberal approach is to allow it.
You tried to take my use of the word “believe” to imply this was a belief. When in actually fact when I used this word I was saying I was unaware of any evidence or studies to the contrary. And I was in fact challenging you to present one.
So don’t go there eh?
So the word ‘believe’ means whatever you want it to mean – just like Humpty Dumpty in Alice in Wonderland!!
No, you are trying to attach your own meaning to my words.
You know I often write in a fluid conversational style, but in this case I think my meaning was pretty clear.
The object (in the sense of a grammatical object) of my sentence was the evidence (“good reason”), this dictates how the comment should be read.
You’ve resorted to petty insults, twice now Marston. Please reign yourself in.
I said that matters of conscience should not be allowed to make services which should be public less than such. Slavery and the like does far more than denying services to a portion of the public.
It is fine in my opinion for people to debate these matters all they like, it is fine for Christian adoption agencies to say they believe in traditional male-female married couples as the best option for parents. Unless or until there are solid, practical reasons to deny adoption to same sex couples though they should treat them the same “on the ground” as any other couple.
There are gay and lesbian Christians. I don’t believe all Christians are so narrow minded on matters of sexuality. Even if they were they’re free to live their own life how they wish. They should not however be allowed to impose their own moral standards on services performed on behalf of the nation without said standards being generally agreed upon by the nation itself. If parliament decided gay couples and adoption wasn’t acceptable that is one thing, it has followed due process, but to allow organisations to do so because a 2,000 year old book tells them to is just plain wrong in my opinion.
So in short, they can campaign all they like but if they want to refuse a service to people because of their unilateral moral stance that is what I truly find unacceptable.
“Though if you talk sense chances are people will agree with you.”
Well it seems like you’re not talking sense and that’s the reason Marston is not agreeing with you. I think he has a very interesting and sound way of presenting you with the same “sense” that you on the other hand, won’t even consider.
I wonder who is the closed minded one here.
I won’t be commenting on this thread any more, so don’t worry. But Marston deserves to speak his mind without being attacked with mindless “Marxist philosophies”.
They are after all the reason South Africa is in such a mess. Where are they now with their philosophies? They don’t seem to condemn the slaughtering of helpless people (in fact they support it, as long as their back pockets are filled).
The Marxists promises and preaches peace etc etc etc, but doesn’t act on it. Wouldn’t that also label them as bigots? In this regard, they are merely deceiving people in believing that their way would be best. So in actual fact, you loose your individuality and you don’t know where you belong. And this is exactly what they incorporate in their “political correct” and bias ways.
Marxists = Communists
I spit on them!
Congratulations Madame on singularly failing to understand or even read the discussion!
No-one has attacked Marston with “Marxist Philosophies”, mindless or otherwise.
In fact the only time Marxism has been brought up by anyone in this discussion was to use it as an example of where political beliefs can be responsible for great evils.
So go on, be angry with the world, scream and shout at the wrong people if you like, but don’t kid yourself that you are talking sense.
It is also a significant mistake to confuse left wing liberal views with marxism, just as it is to confuse right wing conservative views with for example totalitarianism. (Avoiding Godwin’s law there on purpose)
It is also worth noting that “true” communism has never been implemented, and it is very dubious whether the system would be workable at all. In reality Communism actually became a back door for dictatorships who used the “communist” ideology as nothing more than a public relations tool. The idea of Communism is to have power and wealth spread equally among the people, in which real world “Communist” state do people actually share wealth and power in this way? Thus any state which uses opression is not truly Communist.
I’m not saying Communism is a good thing, I feel it’s probably unworkable, but it is used too often as a panic response by right-wingnuts. A lot of people still seem scared of Communism for some reason.
I agree with a lot of what you said there Anon. Marxism has some laudable principals but unworkable practicalities.
Communism by necessity becomes controlling and oppressive. It also is sunk by its own ego, believing itself to be the best political ideology and therefore the only one that should be allowed to exist.
Which also feeds back into an intolerance for changes within the system, along with the people who suggest those changes.
That said a lot of the historical fear about communism was probably regarding what happened to the previous holders of power, much as with the French revolution. Communism in and of itself doesn’t scare me, it is what people do with it that scares me. This is a disparity in my emotions I oddly first found in the Discworld novels, where Ankh Morpork is ruled by a dictator who wields absolute power but who wields it benevolently… at least for the city as a whole, rather than individuals. He is compared to the previous encumbants a “good ruler” however he is still a dictator and capable of being quite Machiovellian. It is easy to confuse the system of running a nation with the people most strongly associated with that system sadly, along with tendencies within certain kinds of persons that lead them to specific systems rather than the system directly causing a person to run a nation in a given way.
I will say this, I am libertarian and I believe in everyone’s freedom to do what they want so long as there is no fraud, physical harm, or force involved. This protects individualism and is the principle that all rights should be based on.
I don’t understand why one would involve the state in this when they could just CREATE MORE AGENCIES.
I am absolutely one hundred percent am for the acceptance of homosexuality in society, but I completely understand where Marston was coming from.
This is supposed to be about the children and instead people are turning this into a war for gay rights which hurts THE CHILDREN because it closes down religious institutions that would have been there to help them. And there will be far less new agencies popping up because future religious institutions that do not believe in gay adoption will not bother to create new agencies.
Plain and simple forcing others to conform to your own views creates the very problem that you seem to be against which is CHILDREN NOT HAVING ENOUGH adoptors. Less agencies means that there are less resources to help the children. If this is truly FOR THE CHILDREN then people, at the very least, should have been forcing the state to create incentives for new adoption agencies that made adoption available to all to be created. THUS CREATING MORE AGENCIES THAN THERE WOULD BE. The more agencies there are the better it is for the children regardless of their policies.
Now do I personally agree with religious institutions policies? Yes. Do I personally believe they are bigoted? Yes. Do I even like religion? Not really (although I do have an interest in some.)
However, the state can not force tolerance for gays. Tolerance can only arise organically. And when you force the state to impose itself on others whom you disagree with, you open up a can of worms you may wish you had left closed later.
To me, this seems to be a clear case of gay issues over children’s issues which means the children lose out.
I meant do I personally DISAGREE with religious institutions policies. My bad.
Ray this is about putting children first, its about ensuring they have access to the broadest set of potential foster parents/ adoptive parents possible. If you deny gays the right to adopt you limit children’s access to loving families. By denying gay people the right to adopt you deprive children. Not vice versa.
You’re not listening. It’s almost as if you haven’t read a word I said at all.
I understand that you want to give children the broadest set of potential parents. I’m all for that…
The point is though that if you are going to do this you might as well create more agencies that are without bias as opposed to trying to make all existing ones conform. Because when you try to do this you only end up forcing agencies that otherwise would be there to close.
I don’t disagree with you on the objective I just disagree with you on how to get there.
I am listening Ray (well reading), but I seized on your accusation that this was about putting gay issues over children’s issues.
What are advocating is however counter productive to the objective we agree on of giving children access to the broadest set of potential parents.
Take a child in a Catholic Orphanage, if we allow this orphanage to continue a policy of rejecting LGBT parents, then you are depriving the children in that orphanage access to widest set of potential parents.
If this was just about gay-rights, then we would only need to do what you suggest and create more non-discriminatory agencies as this would fulfil the goal of giving LGBT couple access to children they can adopt, however, it does not give all children access to all potential adoptive parents.
So do you see its your proposal that puts gay rights over children’s rights?
Will some adoption agencies be forced to close? No. Some may choose to close out of their own bigotry conscience, but should this happen, well we can always replace them with the new non-discriminatory you were talking about setting up. Its not as if the children will disappear.
“What are advocating is however counter productive to the objective we agree on of giving children access to the broadest set of potential parents.”
We agree on the objective. We disagree on how to get there as I said. We probably also don’t agree on it being the grand solution I would use to give children access to the broadest set of potential parents either.
“Take a child in a Catholic Orphanage, if we allow this orphanage to continue a policy of rejecting LGBT parents, then you are depriving the children in that orphanage access to widest set of potential parents.”
I hear what you are saying. And I agree, they will not have access to the widest set of potential parents within that agency, but just the children being in any agency, regardless of it’s policies, does this as well. Sometimes it’s just a matter of location.
My belief is that smart anti-stagnation laws (Which I would define as laws that prevent children from sitting in one agency for too long.) Would do so much more for these children if we’re seriously talking about giving children access to the widest set of potential parents and would instantaneously cure the need to interfere with organizations that don’t take your view.
And when you put in to effect laws that are going to ultimately going to cause some agencies to close and argue that you can “replace them with the new non-discriminatory [I was] talking about setting up.” You’re basically at this point reducing the amount of resources that would be available to these children. If you start with 1000 agencies. Put in to effect laws that cause, let’s just say, 100 to close (as well as prevent potential religion-based organizations from popping up). You’re wasting resources to replace them when you could have 1100 agencies available each one with people working towards finding children a home. Which is a far better thing. It helps to reduce the amount of children within each agency and simply puts more resources behind each child.
“If this was just about gay-rights, then we would only need to do what you suggest and create more non-discriminatory agencies as this would fulfil the goal of giving LGBT couple access to children they can adopt, however, it does not give all children access to all potential adoptive parents.
So do you see its your proposal that puts gay rights over children’s rights?”
Absolutely not. Creating more agencies benefits everyone as I said above. So PLEASE don’t try to turn that one around and say that i’m putting gay rights above children’s rights. It’s simply not true. The only thing i’ve done is consider other people’s liberties and beliefs in conjunction with implementing policies I feel would benefit the orphan population.
My solution to problems in the adoption system is as follows:
If we want to improve the adoption system states (which do not have the right to discriminate against anyone based on race, religion, sex, gender, orientation…etc) should create more adoption agencies and introduce anti-stagnation laws which would put limits on how long a child could reside in a given agency giving them a much better chance of being in an agency that benefits from location or successful policies and has higher overall adoption rate.
My plan increases the overall resources available to the population of adoptive children and doesn’t interfere with the practices of current agencies.
Yours is:
If we want to improve the adoption system, we should put in place policies that would allow gay people to adopt in any agency they choose to adopt at.
This will cause agencies to close and will be the reason that some new agencies never form. (And i’m sure that there are cons to my plan as well. It’s not perfect but it does a lot to improve the system and doesn’t infringe on anyone’s rights or cause anyone to make, what they feel, is a moral decision.) And statistically it doesn’t make sense. There could not be enough gay people lining up to adopt children that would justify your plan. And under my plan it wouldn’t matter. Gay people would be able to adopt from many agencies that were not create FOR THEM, but created to provide more resources to adoptive parents and children. Your taking potential agencies out of the game with your plan. So I think I am correct in saying that you are putting gay rights above what is beneficial for the children.
And I don’t recall saying that agencies were “forced” to close (although I may have.) But it’s besides the point. The main point is that they will.
Actually they won’t, or at least they haven’t. Britain passed laws banning adoption agencies from discriminating against LGBT parents several years ago and the one adoption agency, Catholic Care of Leeds which threatened to close and unsuccessfully challenged the law seeking an exception, is still open and providing adoption services. What’s more its now legally obliged to consider LGBT parents.
Your fears are unfounded. LGBT people acting as adopted parents is now a reality in the UK. It hasn’t hurt adoption services.