Recently we noted the passing of Mildred Loving, whose Supreme Court case in the 1960s struck down the nation's anti-miscegenation laws. Mildred was black. Her husband Richard was white. It seems like such a distant event, although I was already in medical school when it happened. What hasn't died, yet, is irony (despite the Bush administration's valiant effort to snuff it out). Consider this:
Several leading child welfare groups Tuesday urged an overhaul of federal laws dealing with transracial adoption, arguing that black children in foster care are ill-served by a "colorblind" approach meant to encourage their adoption by white families.[snip]
Recommendations for major changes in the much-debated policy were outlined in a report by the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute.
"Color consciousness -- not 'color blindness' -- should help to shape policy development," the report said.
Groups endorsing its proposals included the North American Council on Adoptable Children, the Child Welfare League of America, the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption and the National Association of Black Social Workers.
At issue is the 1994 Multi-Ethnic Placement Act -- and revisions made to it in 1996 -- governing the adoption of children from foster care.
One part of the law directs state agencies to recruit more adoptive parents of the same race as the children. The new report says this provision hasn't been adequately enforced and calls for better funded efforts to recruit minority parents.
The more contentious part of the legislation prohibits race from being taken into consideration in most decisions about adoption from foster care. For example, white parents seeking to adopt a black child cannot be required to undergo race-oriented training that differs in any way from training that all prospective adoptive parents receive.
A key recommendation in the new report calls for amending the law so race could be considered as a factor in selecting parents for children from foster care. The change also would allow race-oriented pre-adoption training. (AP via CNN)
My reaction to this was very negative -- to say the least. While, on reflection, I understand the challenges for older children, the alternative is to let these children languish in foster care. These children are not black or white. They are children. The parents aren't black or white. They are parents. Yes, I know this isn't quite right. People still cling to racial identities. People cling to lots of things that are harmful, however. Racial identity is one of them.
I taught my children the race of their mates was not an issue for us, but if they had a choice among otherwise identical people, I, for one, would prefer if they chose someone from another race. Because we aren't going to get over this race problem until we have some serious race mixing.
And that's the way it worked out. And now I have one of the world's most beautiful grandsons.
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"Because we aren't going to get over this race problem until we have some serious race mixing."
Ah, sex. Is there any problem you can't solve?
If there is, I don't want to know about it.
And a cute baby it is. Revere graced me with a picture of the little tyke.
I think the paintbrush though that was used on Bush about this is a little on out there though Revere. These groups are not the government, although they are by implication pushing for a change in who gets what when there is an adoption. Its not the Administration, its people with agenda's. WASP's are adopting black kids from orphanages as are the Catholics in record numbers down here in Tennessee. I was a little surprised when my sons best friend came home with him and he was black and picked up by his very blonde white mom and dad. But it really gets down to one thing and that is the care and upbringing of a child who wouldn't otherwise have a shot at most anything. Interracial marriages are in full swing in the South and there is rarely a bat of an eye on the same street as MLK walked. He would be well pleased.
I think the NABSW understand one thing as do most leaders in the "black" community. If interracial marriages and adoptions continue, there aint going to be any more "black" America. It will be as Jefferson foresaw it as did Adams, only Americans. And that is how it should be. I long ago quit labeling people as Black, White, or anything "XXXX" Americans. I now require all of my employees to refer to each other as Americans of XXXX descent. None of this black or white guy stuff. Truth be known I cant confirm all of my lineage and it doesnt bother me one bit.
Randy: I don't believe I said anything about Bush. And I am against racial identity no matter who pushes it. I am not a multiculturalist. I am a humanist.
Thank you for a very uplifting opinion. I couldn't agree more Revere.
"What hasn't died, yet, is irony (despite the Bush administration's valiant effort to snuff it out)."
MRK, I think Revere is taking a shot at Bush without actually linking Bush to this issue. That's what it looks like anyway.
So am I white like my dad or Asian like my mom? Which race(s) am I supposed to adopt??
Charlotte: The Human Race.
I feel like the issues of eligibility and training should be separate. The article highlights the potential pitfalls of allowing race to be a criterion for whether parents are allowed to adopt transracially. But it doesn't say what the downsides would be to including some kind of education for those who do.
I can posit a couple myself; the extra step might discourage transracial adoptions; it might offend prospective parents; the classes or materials might be poorly designed or themselves offensive. But I can also see it being useful to provide classes, or books, or mentors, or contact info for other multiracial families. It wouldn't necessarily have to be mandatory; simply changing the law to allow for such referrals might be enough to make many parents look into it.
Children are children; parenting is natural. People still need help learning how to do it, from discipline to potty training to first solid foods; many biological mothers need support and information in order to breast feed, which is about as natural as it gets.
Since we don't live in a racially blind society, there's nothing inherently bad about giving parents information that might help their kids navigate the complexities of identity, or deal with incidents of racism. Many parents won't need the help, but some can benefit from it, as Johnson points out.
And I say that as the proud aunt of two biracial children.
Believe it or not, quite a few years ago someone actually asked me in so many words: "Would you want your sister to marry one?" I looked him in the eye and said calmly, "She did - and nobody died from it."
Fast forward 25 years, and my niece is finishing up a political science degree at Harvard and planning to go to Harvard Law, and my nephew has just gotten out of the Marines and plans to pursue a career in forestry. And of my three sibs' and my marriages, my sister's is the only one that's still going strong after 30 years.
Miscegenation. Hah. Around here we call it "hybrid vigor."
There are two separate issues here. The first is the welfare of the individual child. That should be paramount in any adoption consideration. The second is the welfare of society, and it is certainly legitimate for government to institute policies whose long-term effects are to benefit society. It seems to me that color-blind adoption policies are the right approach for both of these issues.
What I find is weird, is the attempt to tie genes with memes.
On the surface it makes sense that black kids should learn something about the cultures of their ancestors. But wait a moment here... why only black kids? Why shouldn't adopted kids of other ancestries learn something about the cultures of Africa and the Caribbean? And why shouldn't they all also learn something about the culturs of Asia, Europe, all of the Americas, and so on...?
In other words, why not train adoptive parents to teach any kid they adopt about all of the world's cultures as far as possible...?
This in turn leads to another interesting question.
Why is it that parents have to jump through all kinds of hoops to have a kid by adoption, while there are no standards whatsoever about who can have a kid by making one from scratch?
So, a modest proposal.
Parenthood classes in highschool. For everyone, including gay kids (who may become parents, and will certainly have friends who do). If you don't pass the parenthood class, you don't graduate, period.
The idea that home-made babies deserve any less protection from ignorant or unfit parents than do adopted babies, is nuts.
Parenthood is the most important job in our society, and the entire world is overpopulated by a factor of two to three.
Every baby needs to be a wanted baby, there should be no throw-away babies, no wasted babies, and no surplus babies. Only the babies people truly wish to have, and those babies should be given all the education, all the love, and all the opportunities that their societies can provide.
And every prospective parent needs to be fully informed, properly educated, and fully capable of doing this most important job.
"And every prospective parent needs to be fully informed, properly educated, and fully capable of doing this most important job."
"Parenthood classes in high school." - This is a brilliant proposal!
First, LOL g336 for this remarkable and probably totally unintended line, "...while there are no standards whatsoever about who can have a kid by making one from scratch?" That damn itch, difficult to get rid of it.
Next, I couldn't agree more with the following line, "Parenthood is the most important job..."
Of course you ruin it by the following, "Parenthood classes in highschool."
Why is it that the government that most of you posters and commenters alike condemn for just about every ill that has befallen this world is perfectly compentent to teach high school kids this "most important job"?
This paragraph explains what you really want, so you should just come out and say it instead of hiding behind the rightousness of proper parenthood. "Every baby needs to be a wanted baby, there should be no throw-away babies, no wasted babies, and no surplus babies. Only the babies people truly wish to have, and those babies should be given all the education, all the love, and all the opportunities that their societies can provide." What you are advocating is not parenthood classes but Pregancy Termination 101.
For everyone, including gay kids (who may become parents, and will certainly have friends who do). If you don't pass the parenthood class, you don't graduate, period.
Um, I am happily child-free, and have known since high school that I wanted to be. Mandatory parenting classes would have been offensive and pointless for me. People already assume women who don't want kids are unnatural or will grow out of it. I'm almost 30, and no sign of that yet... and if my biological clock ever does start ticking, I'll beat it to smithereens with a sledgehammer.
Besides, if you remember high school health, you know it was a joke; parenting classes would be no different. And I was lucky enough to take ones that actually discussed condom use. I'd settle for that being a nationwide thing; it would go a long way towards fulfilling the goals you lay out.
pauls lane -- way to go in smacking that strawman. But no; the idea is, if kids are taught real information about sex, safe sex and birth control, then the need for abortion drops sharply. If kids are made to understand the sheer amount of work involved in taking care of a baby, and the impact it will have on their lives, the vast majority start taking a lot more care about not getting pregnant in the first place. That has been shown in Europe, Brazil, and everywhere that real evaluation of different styles of sex ed classes have been done in the US.
Funnily enough, though, the same people who are violently anti-abortion are so frequently also the violently anti-sex-ed, anti-contraception, "abstinence only" types, despite the evidence that this does not work.
On the question of mandatory parenting classes in schools....well, frankly, I can't see it as being worse than what people currently get, which is all too often nothing at all. I've fostered kids; I've seen the messes that cluelessness makes of babies and children. Cripes, we don't have to be talking about advanced theories of child development -- it wouldn't hurt for a lot of people to get information like "candy bars are not appropriate food for babies under 6 months" and "babies will put anything in their mouths, which is why you have to be careful about what is within reach" and "it is never, never, NEVER ok, under ANY circumstances, to shake a baby!" and "you cannot stop babies crying by hitting them." There are at least a few million people out there apparently unfamiliar with this kind of thing.
It's the same reason why "sex ed" was brought into schools in the first place. There are families and parents who are perfectly capable of handling the whole thing a lot better themselves, but the real target audience is the millions of youngsters who got/get wrong, damaging, or no information at all from home and who go on to get hurt. It isn't fair to leave huge swathes of the population ignorant because of their parents' prejudices or ignorance.
Anyway -- Sorry, caia, but there is no way of knowing who is going to end up with kids and who isn't, ahead of time. I favor "mandatory for everyone" as the only truly fair way. And information is never really wasted. Are you saying that you have never, in your life, been entrusted with the care for a small child, even temporarily? Even childless people can have babies or small children visiting, and lack of experience and common sense is still capable of hurthing those kids.
Again the whole person education has been seen as important as life time education.
Parenthood is for human race and is a public responsibility by individual choice.
To key in parenthood in formal education system is a reasonable investment as far as an individual and society are concerned. Only having plus, no minus.
This is the 'right thing to do's proactivity.
parenthood is NOT about sex. Parenthood could be the result of sex but it is not about sex.
I have no problems with educating children about sex and the sometimes unhappy results. I also have no problem about educating children about sex and the happy results. But we should call it what it is and not hide behind "the most important job". If it were my child being so educated though I think I'd take a real close look at the course material.
Can you really imagine the government getting involved in parenthood classes? They'd have to design a course that would appease everyone.
Chapter I Decision Time - so you want to have a baby? Good, but have you considered the damaging environmental impact your child will have on Mother Earth in his/her lifetime?
Chapter II Nappies - disposable or washable? Have you considered the impact of either on Mother Earth? Our landfills are full of used disposable diapers. It takes quite a bit of energy to clean dirty washables.
Chapter III Pink or Blue? Are you sure you want to dress your little boy in blue that horrible symbol of masculinity and male agression? Please reconsider pink for you baby girl that terrible symbol of feminine weakness and obedience.
Chapter IV Potty Training - please teach your little boy to sit when urinating so that all little boys and girls can be on equal footing when going to the open public restrooms. Its time we ended that perculiar dominating trait.
etc. etc. etc.
pauls lane -- Well, YOU were the one who decided that "What you are advocating is not parenthood classes but Pregancy Termination 101." I'm sorry, but the leap to "Pregnancy Termination 101" seemed to go hand-in-hand with the usual anti-sex-ed hard-right position.
Oddly enough, I still think that there is a point to be made there -- every baby being a wanted baby is largely contingent on people not getting pregnant 'accidentally'; not getting pregnant accidentally here being perhaps a key concept that you missed. Sex Ed has a great deal to do with that. And, when done right, it functions that way, too.
As for the rest, I simply cannot match your level of paranoia and suspicion. I leave you to it.
Luna - wasn't much of a leap at all. When terms such as 'unwanted babies', 'surplus babies', 'throw-away babies', etc. the next message will be an impassioned plea for "sex education", meaning birth control measures and then of course, whispered almost reluctantly, abortion. I am not anti-sex-ed but then again I would not and did not leave sex-ed for my children to a public school either. I monitored what was being taught and counseled my kids on what I believe to be right and what I know the school was teaching to be improper, at least as far as I was concerned. I was doing 'the most important job' by teaching my kids my morals, my ethics, in contrast to what the school was teaching.
My example of subject material in a government controlled Parenthood class was a bit tongue-in-cheek (and damned funny too) but every item I wrote about I've read or heard about. Someone, somewhere has demanded or stated those particulars. You think I'm being overly paranoid and suspicious? When a teacher places charges (or attemtps too) against a 5 or 6 year old kid for sexual misconduct, then I do become seriously paranoid and suspicious about the school system.
Luna_the_cat:
Are you saying that you have never, in your life, been entrusted with the care for a small child, even temporarily?
I was, actually; but all my babysitting jobs were when I was 11-13, i.e., long before I took high school health. :)
A full year of health class was required in my school (state?), but that was split: a half a year every other day in each of 7th and 8th grade, and a full year every other day in high school. 7th grade health was solely an encyclopaedic tour of every kind of drug they didn't want us to take... and I don't even remember what we spent all our time on in high school health. Sex didn't come up until the school year was nearly over.
Perhaps such parenting basics as you describe could and should be added to the health classes; it's not like we couldn't have given some time over to it. And hey, while they're at it, they could expand their definition of health beyond "drugs-sex-body image-eating disorders." But like I said above, just making every school in the country deal honestly with safer sex would be a huge step forward.
pauls lane -- you have managed to leave me confused about whether or not you approve of sex ed. First you make the statement that the plea for "wanted children only" is equal to advocating for abortion; I respond that, in the first instance, sex ed is about preventing accidental and unwanted pregnancies in the first instance; you respond that yes, you knew that, you are all for sex ed, and that is not what you meant (then you go into the "oooh the horrible liberal educators will fill people's heads with nonsense" rant); then I say, well, usually the "You are advocating ABORTION!!!1!!1" response goes hand-in-hand with anti-sex-ed hypocrisy; and you respond with "it's not a big leap from sex ed to abortion" and that sex ed is horribly flawed. WTF?
Have I missed something? Do you want to try to explain your position to me in simple sentences, because I obviously need this?
Re: the rest...well, you know, I'm positive you do think they are right. Most everyone thinks that, obviously, they are right and that positions they disagree with are wrong. Sadly, that has as much weight as any other opinion...which is to say, none.
It isn't wrong to say that children need resources, or that the earth is facing an overpopulation problem, so be really sure about how many kids you want. If you want to say this is nonsense, you have to be able to demonstrate that.
And as for sex ed....ya know, the ministers who tell their children that having any sex at all before marriage will mean that they are damned to hell, and who beat their daughter into a coma when they find out she has gotten pregnant at 16, also really truly believe that they are doing the right thing and handling it better than the school would. (And, yes, this has happened.) There is something to be said for making other alternatives available for the kids involved.
I am never going to defend the school system against the charge that it can be equally as stupid. I've seen it be equally as stupid. It is run by individuals, not "the government"; these are individuals who work for the government, and under the auspices of the government, but do not lose sight of the fact that the individuals doing things are individual people, not a conglomerate hive-mind. And however carefully any guideline is crafted, by the government or by any other organisation on the planet, there are ALWAYS, in every single possible organisation, going to be individuals who manage to either bend those guidelines until they break, or who enforce them to the point of utter ridiculousness and the destruction of common sense. This is not a problem you remove by removing guidelines, either -- then you get people who just make it up as they go along, and yet again, the good and intelligent people will be sensible, and the stupid people won't and will do stupid things, and the apathetic people will do nothing at all and let situations run themselves to destruction. It's always luck of the draw. Guidelines exist to try to cut down the range of the variability, and yes, they do tend to serve that purpose.
caia -- yeah, I do know what you mean. Sure, I would be willing to support adding those basic parenting facts to health classes. Almost anything would be better than the current nothing.
Bleah, not enough coffee. In the above comment,
Re: the rest...well, you know, I'm positive you do think they are right.
should be
Re: the rest...well, you know, I'm positive you do think you are right.
Luna - stay with me here, it is not difficult.
1. Original comment was about Parenthood classes.
2. The comment I disagreed with attempted to link sex-ed w/parenthood classes. My position is they are not the same.
3. I am leery of government mandated Parenthood classes for various reasons, mostly though because I don't trust the government. I am leery of anything mandated by the government. I spent 30 years in the government; hence my apprehension. I know how fond the government is for the flavor of the month in any discipline.
4. My apprehension is justified when commenters here link parenthood classes to sex-ed. Some apparently do not see the difference in making a child and rearing a child. You become a parent after the child is born. You are not a parent when performing the act that might make you a parent some 9 months down the road. If commenters here cannot understand the difference how am I to conclude that the government can? Remember I spent 30 years in government.
5. If the purpose of these Parenthood classes is sex-ed, then don't call them parenthood classes. Call it for what it is and don't hide behind the word parenthood. I guess a case could be made that part of proper parenthood is practicing birth control so that your children don't do without anything because you now have another mouth to feed. Kinda sad that.
6. I think sex-ed is a necessary evil in the schools. I handled it with my kids my way. Just like I handled the history they were being taught and other classes. Basically the only subjects the schools got right were math, english, some science and probably geography. I confess I couldn't keep up with geography after the collaspe of the Soviet Union. I put my full faith in the school to keep up to date on the changing geography. You see my point here? I do tend to cloud my points. The schools did an excellent job in teaching what they are supposed to teach; reading, writing, and arithmetic. Not so good on the others subjects.
Now about government employees. When on duty a government employee is the government. They are not just working for the government or employed by the government, they are the government. A teacher is the face of local government in teaching. A county police officer is the face of local government in law enforcement. County police officer is county government. A state police officer is the face of state government in statewide law enforcement. State police officer is state government. Works that way right up to and including the federal government.
An example - you, a parent are having difficulties with one of your child's teachers. Doesn't matter what it is (unless it is suspected child abuse - then everyone's rights go out the window) Who stands behind you? Who stands behind the teacher?