Chiang-Cruise

Click here to watch the video.

Mark and Allan recently featured in the magazine “That’s Life” with their story “Two men and a baby”.

The Rainbow Families Council have issued their Federal Election Statement.  There are still many areas of the law that discriminate against our relationships and our children.  Make time to see you local member/candidate or at least write them a letter.  The points in this statement are very helpful in raising the matters that affect us all.

?In April 2010, a national network of advocates, community members, researchers and service providers identified the following three priorities for reform and resources at a federal level:

• Marriage equality

• Removal of discrimination in adoption law, and

• Ensuring that federally-funded services are inclusive of children with same-sex parents and their families.

Rainbow Families Council is the Victorian community organisation representing same-sex parented children and their families. We urge all parties and independents running in the federal election to consider these issues.

2010 FULL REPORT – LGBTI National Findings on Relationships and Well-Being

The final and full report of the Australian national NOT SO PRIVATE LIVES survey is now available online.

The 2,032 participants were 18-82 years of age, from each state and territory, and from metropolitan and rural Australia. Results are presented based on gender identity (male, female, and gender different), six age groups (18-19, 20-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60-82) and three age cohorts (<25 yrs, 25-34 yrs, 35+ yrs). Additional findings are provided for transgender/transsexual and intersex participants.

[Source: Original Document]

Rodney Croome is an advocate for gay human rights and author of Why vs Why: Gay Marriage. In this impassioned argument he talks about marriage as a bond “to the exclusion of all others”. Croome argues that equal marriage rights – and the right to choice – are highly meaningful if Australia is to consider itself a nation of inclusion. He touches on gay parenting, Gillard’s failure of empathy and six reasons why we should change the laws to allow gay marriage.

[Source: Original Video]

The conference will be covering topics for gay dads in surrogacy, co-parenting, gay dads from a straight relationship, fostering and adoption, step gay dads (partners) and of course gay guys wanting to be dads. More information from Drummond Street Services on 03 9663 6733 or download flyer.

Same-sex couples may have the right to adopt in NSW before year’s end.

The ALP, Liberals and Nationals have all granted their members a conscience vote on MP Clover Moore’s Adoption Amendment (Same-Sex Couples) Bill, which is likely to be debated in August.

The bill has the support of the Greens in the Legislative Council.

“Both the NSW Liberals and the Nationals will have a conscience vote on this Bill,” a spokesman for Opposition leader Barry O’Farrell said.

“This is a matter for individual MPs to determine their own position and to vote according to their view. In our party’s tradition such votes are seen as a strength that reflect the different opinions that exist in the community on these issues.”

Premier Kristina Keneally told Southern Star the bill had her in-principle support and that she would take part in debate over it.

“I know of … same-sex couples who successfully foster children but are unable to adopt them,” Keneally said. “I also personally know same-sex couples who are raising children together. Like all good parents, they love their children and want the very best for them.”

Keneally said her faith was no barrier to supporting the bill, though she expected there would be some critics.

“What I know as a Christian, as a Catholic, is that Jesus himself was about love.

“Jesus loved all and he accepted all and for me that is the strongest message that comes out of the gospels. When I see gay and lesbian people giving that unselfish love to a child, that’s something that I … want to support.

“However, I am aware that there are very deeply held, divergent views on this issue and adoption by same-sex couples is a sensitive issue for the [wider] community.”

NSW GLRL co-convenor Kellie McDonald welcomed Moore’s bill.

“These amendments will enable same-sex couples to apply to become legal parents of children in their care, giving their children access to rights and entitlements such as a parent’s superannuation or worker’s compensation if their parent is injured at work,” McDonald said.

“Same-sex couples, like all other prospective adoptive parents, should be judged on their individual merits and their capacity to provide a loving and stable home for a child. Sexual orientation is not a meaningful indicator of parenting ability.”

“There is no evidence to suggest that a person’s sexual orientation has any bearing on their suitability to be an adoptive parent, therefore there is no reason to legislate to exclude someone from being able to adopt on the basis of their homosexual orientation or family arrangements,” Clover Moore told Parliament in presenting her bill on Thursday.

[Source: Original Article]

Great to see some more positive stories of Gay men doing fostering and as this report in Southern Star shows, young gay men are also keen to foster.  Great article.

Dale Elliott and Daniel Brighton don’t fit the profile of ‘traditional’ foster parents. For one thing, they’re very young — 22 and 21 respectively. For another, they’re gay.

The couple, who’ve been together for more than three years have been approved as foster carers as part of the Benevolent Society’s foster care program and are currently awaiting ‘the call’ telling them a child needs to go into their care.

When it comes, it will be the culmination of a yearning the pair have shared since the start of their relationship.

“We couldn’t go and adopt, surrogacy is extremely hard, and a lot of fostering organisations have their ideals of the perfect family, with a mother staying home and not working,” Elliott told Southern Star.

“So many options were closed to us. Then we saw the Benevolent Society’s stand at [Mardi Gras] Fair Day earlier this year. We went to an information session, had our first in-home meeting, and then applied.”

The application process is exhaustive. Applicants are assigned a case worker and must attend training sessions, in-home assessments and safety checks before a final decision is made by an approval panel.

“It is very thorough, but for us, it all happened quite quickly, because we’d been ready and wanting to do it for two years. On average, the process takes six months, but we managed to do it in two and a half months,” Elliott said.

While he said their parents and friends had been supportive of their decision, he conceded that they had faced some resistance — more so because of their age than their sexuality.

“We definitely felt like we had to prove ourselves. Everyone else in the training sessions already had kids, whether they were lesbian couples or straight couples. But we’re very stable — we own our own home, we’re not going out partying every weekend.

“The approval panel never made a judgement against us based on our ages. They just needed us to prove that we could handle having a foster child, that we could nurture and care for them the same way an older carer would.”

info: Visit www.fosterachild.org.au

[Source: Original Article]

Thanks to Felicity from Rainbow Families for the heads up on this report.  I am posting some details below and a copy of the report is attached.  I have had a quick read of it and it seems like a powerful resource.  It would be good to have something similar done in Australia.  If there are any researchers out there who would like a project to tackle.  I am sure Rainbow Families would be willing to help.

Title: Different Families – The experiences of children with lesbian and gay parents

Press Release: Stonewall today publishes groundbreaking research examining the experiences of children with gay parents. ‘Different Families’ is based on interviews conducted by the University of Cambridge with over 80 children and young people from the age of four, all of whom have lesbian and gay parents. The research also provides shocking insights into the prevalence of homophobia in Britain’s schools, including primary schools. The children who experience this, although not gay themselves, identify that many schools still don’t address it.

‘We still do things together, and we’re still a big family and we’re still happy … and we still care for each other and we’re still there when someone needs someone.’ Jasmin, 8

‘I just feel there’s some difference between the other families and us. The way we all work together … We all link up like a puzzle.’ Eleanor, 8

Ben Summerskill, Stonewall Chief Executive said; ‘For the children of lesbian and gay parents their families look remarkably like everyone else’s. This research highlights how it’s the prejudices of others which often causes them far more distress than their own personal or family characteristics – and is further evidence of the urgent need to tackle homophobia in our schools.’

Among the report’s recommendations, some of which were made by the children interviewed, are for schools to respond robustly to homophobic language and bullying. YouGov polling commissioned last year by Stonewall showed that anti-gay bullying is almost endemic in Britain’s schools. Nine in ten secondary schools teachers reported that children – regardless of their sexual orientation – currently experience homophobic bullying in their schools. This affects children of gay parents too:

‘Sometimes they say … everybody’s got a dad, he must be dead, or something. I say no, he’s not dead, I’ve got a donor dad … sometimes I get teased by them calling my dad a donut dad … They say … I know what gay means, it’s two naked men dancing around on a boat.’ Mark, 8

‘In school I don’t like it how people make fun of gay people. Like when they say “that’s so gay”. Most people say it as a joke, and it’s not funny at all.’ Maheen, 13

‘She said, ‘well your mum’s gay, so why aren’t you?’ … and then it turned to really nasty comments about my mum. Oh your mum’s an effing dyke and all this stuff and I just thought that’s not on …  I just ignored it, but it just got worse.’ Meg, 16

‘Normally people just say like … “gay dad” … and stuff like that. Normally I try and say something back because it like makes me feel better. Or I just try and ignore it. That’s harder obviously … The teachers tell them off but … secretly they always carry on.’ William, 15

[Source: Original Press Release]

Senthorun Raj who is the Policy and Development co-ordinator of the NSW Gay & Lesbian Rights Lobby has written an interest piece in relation to the current NSW Bill relating to Same Sex Adoption. 

"It is in the best interests of children to have both a mother and a father." In a society where marriage, heterosexuality and family are so closely intertwined, such a simple, albeit cliched, statement would seem uncontroversial. In fact, the idea of a mother and a father in a married relationship carries such political and cultural currency that it is hard to imagine having children in circumstances that do not fit neatly under the matrimonial rubric. So how do we then manage to contemplate a family unit that is not only unmarried, but has two mums or two dads?

In moving to recognise the status of existing and potential same-sex families, the recently introduced Adoption Amendment (Same-Sex Couples) Bill removes the last piece of legislative discrimination against same-sex couples in NSW. The basic rationale behind this Bill is that the sexuality of prospective parents should not be a determinative factor when it comes to protecting the welfare of children.

In NSW, the Adoption Act currently uses an archaic heterosexual definition of "de facto", "spouse" and "partner" to preclude same-sex couples eligibility to be considered to adopt. Adoption is not a right. However, the legislative barriers in the Adoption Act send out a troubling social message that a person’s non-heterosexual orientation necessarily makes them an inadequate parent. It is unsurprising then that homophobic ideas that conflate pedophilia and homosexuality continue to exist, when the law itself seems to implicitly connect gay or lesbian parents as potential risks to children.

Discriminatory rhetoric used in protecting children is not new. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families have suffered the forcible removal of children. The commonly referred to "stolen generations" represents an era of government policy that imputed a lack of parenting ability to persons of an indigenous heritage. While such a racially motivated policy is now rightly met with abhorrence and apology, why does the NSW government continue to promote a construct of parenting that disenfranchises same-sex families?

While not contesting the value of the typical nuclear family, part of the problem with our understanding of parenting is the overemphasis of gender. Feminist politics has laboured across generations to contest the popular idea that women bear the primary responsibility or desire for raising children because of their reproductive anatomy. As surprising as this may be to some, not all women want to be mothers. The association between motherhood and nurturing, or fatherhood and discipline, reveals more about our limited cultural stereotypes than any gendered natural predispositions.

Social research on families ably demonstrates that it is the processes of parenting, rather than the family structure that matters. Credible psychological studies discern that children in same-sex families do not demonstrate any important differences in development, happiness, peer relations and adjustment.

Adoption often evokes the image of a mother giving her child to unknown parents. Despite the prevalence of this image in our cultural imaginary, this form of adoption accounts for only a very small percentage of adoptions in NSW. Adoption reform will have the most significant impact on the already 1500 children living in same-sex families in NSW (what is referred to as "known adoption").

If a child is unable to have both their parents legally recognised, they will be denied rights, entitlements and benefits associated with the non-legal parent. This includes automatic rights to inheritance, superannuation benefits or worker’s compensation. Parentage also ensures custody and contact for parents upon relationship breakdown, including child support obligations on a non-resident parent. The Bill also amends definitions of "step-parent" to to include same-sex couples and this will ensure children have greater certainty around their care and welfare.

Perhaps what makes the government policy situation to parenting in NSW more confusing is that same-sex couples are able (even encouraged) to foster children by the NSW government. Minister for Community Services Linda Burney has endorsed parenting by same-sex couples: "Lesbian and gay foster carers make a highly valued contribution to the NSW out-of-home care service system."

Despite considerable praise for same-sex parenting for vulnerable and displaced children, the NSW law denies these children the durability of having their relationship to their foster parents recognised. Permanency planning, which places children in long-term foster care, continues to be undermined, as children fostered by same-sex couples are then denied the security of adoption. Parenting orders that empower foster carers with parenting responsibilities expire once the child becomes 18, effectively terminating the legal parent-child relationship.

With the NSW government claiming it is committed to the most vulnerable groups in our society, particularly children, how can disallowing same-sex couple adoption be conducive to this agenda?

Even in the case of unknown adoptions, permitting same-sex couples eligibility for consideration does not undermine the rights of children or other potential parents. Relinquishing parents should have the broadest possible range of options for their children. The adoption process is intricately guided by the consent and wishes of the relinquishing parents. It should be left to the relinquishing parents to decide on the best place and parents for their child from the widest possible diversity of families.

Adoption reform is not foreign territory in Australia. Western Australia, the ACT and Tasmania (in specific circumstances) already permit same-sex couples eligibility to adopt children.

Equality and non-discrimination before the law are universal rights, not selective privileges. Passing the Adoption Amendment (Same-Sex Couples) Bill will not only benefit children, and existing same-sex families, it will also send an important social message that people should be judged on their individual merits, not on their sexual orientation.

Families come in all shapes and sizes. It is not the lack of a mother or father that should concern us. Rather, it is the continued stigmatisation of same-sex parenting and denying legal recognition to same-sex families that undermines the best interests of children.

Senthorun Raj is policy and development co-ordinator of the Gay & Lesbian Rights Lobby.

[Source: Original Article]