Sick loved one? Too bad & tough luck queer.
by Matt | January 30th, 2008 |The Kentucky State Senate passed today a ban on the recognition and offering of domestic partner benefits. If the bill becomes law it would ban the Kentucky state government and all its sub-divisions including colleges and universities from offering important health and other domestic partner benefits.
According to the Courier-Journal (Louisville, K.Y.), college and university presidents have opposed the bill saying it hurts their ability to recruit and retain the best candidates for professorships and other positions.
If we remember way back to the beginning of the major pushes for marriage amendments, particularly when President George W. Bush announced his support for a federal amendment in 2004, we’ll remember that proponents of the constitutionalized bans claimed they only sought to “protect” what they saw as “traditional” marriage. No one then, or at least no one seen as sane, was claiming to push for a total non-recognition of LGBT people and families.
Wednesday’s action in the Kentucky Senate seals what many LGBT activists and leaders have known for a while: The anti-gay, religious right will not stop until all levels of government completely ignore and out-right ban any recognition or legal protection for LGBT people and families.
While the movement to constitutionalize second-class citizenship failed at a federal level, it seems as though efforts to continue the legal sidelining of LGBT citizens continues in conservative states like Kentucky. In Arkansas, state legislators are now debating a bill to ban adoption by all LGBT people and any unmarried individuals. No one there has stopped to consider that the pool for those able and eligible for foster parenting or adoption will drop by half or more if that bill is successful.
In other states, similar total non-recognition efforts have taken place. By now, the aim of the anti-gay religious right should be clear. The American people, it seems, continue to be duped by talk of “values” and “tradition.” Unfortunately, our citizens haven’t yet grasped the fact that “values” really means “prejudice” and “tradition” really means “institutionalized bigotry and discrimination.”
Technorati Tags: Kentucky, Senate, Gay, Domestic Partnerships
6 Responses to “Sick loved one? Too bad & tough luck queer.”
“No one there has stopped to consider that the pool for those able and eligible for foster parenting or adoption will drop by half or more if that bill is successful.”
Matt, if you can cite numbers and a source for that claim, that’d be very useful to know. Seriously.
By Casey on Jan 31, 2008
I actually posted on this a couple days ago.
In “National family group battles gay adoption ban” it was said:
The Family Council Action Committee recently launched a campaign to restrict prospective foster and adoptive parents to married, heterosexual couples, which comprise only 50% of all households in the state. The effort would take the form of a ballot initiative. Arkansas Families First, a statewide coalition of family and child welfare advocates, is fighting against the anti-gay initiative, “standing up against political opportunists for what’s in the best interest of children.”
And, of course, with marriage rates continuing to decline and divorce rates continuing to increase, that 50% number should very soon become 49, 48, 47, 46, and so on.
By Matt on Jan 31, 2008
Next thing you know they’ll be trying to pass a law banning domestic partner benefits at the private level. That is why we should and must fight back against these bigots or else they’ll legislate ex-gay therapy into law and those who are gay will be given two choices ex-gay therapy or the gas chambers.
By Adam Kautz on Jan 31, 2008
It is interesting to me that as the general American public continues to move towards understanding and acceptance of gay people and relationships, there are still governmental drives against them. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is still in place despite some 70% of service members being OK with its repeal. Have “We The People” lost control of our government?
By Brian on Jan 31, 2008