Natural Mom's Video

I'M LEGIT

An Important Announcement from Bastard Nation

According to the Daily Bastardette, Bastard Nation has issued an important statement on the status of Haitian orphans entering the United States. Indiana Open as well as Texans for Adult Adoptees OBC Access supports their efforts in making sure that these children are protected.

Please distribute freely

For the last week, Bastard Nation, like the rest of the world, has been watching the devastation of Haiti. The images are frightening, sad, and heartrending, especially those of the children.

We have also watched with alarm the rush to rescue Haitian children by adoption. Within three days of the earthquake, Catholic Charities of Miami had set up a scheme modeled on Operation Pedro Pan, a joint State Department-CIA-Miami Diocese project in the early 1960s to separate children from their parents, creating young pawns in the US war against the Castro government. Although “Operation Pierre Pan” in Haiti is on hold, at least for now, numerous evangelical churches and ministries, adoption agencies, secular organizations, unfinalized adoptive parents and other individuals--many with conflicts of interest--have joined the rescue mission call to remove children immediately, no matter what their family status, to the US for the purpose of adoption.

Haiti is still under rubble. Aid is slow to arrive. Survivors are spread out in shelters and camps, or live in the streets. The dead are unnumbered, unknown, and unnamed. Family members continue to search for each for other, and it will take weeks or even months for final conciliation.

The rush to relocate orphans, quasi-orphans, and potential orphans internationally is ripe for coercion and fraud. Adoption agencies, church agencies, and ministries especially--along with fraudulent and predatory “child welfare” agents--have much to gain from fast removal. The trafficking of Haitian children for sex, servitude, and adoption operated in Haiti before the quake. It certainly operates now. The unethical and possibly unlawful mass transfer of traumatized children, many with family status unknown, to foreign shelters, foster care, and adoption agencies, removed from their culture and language, with little hope of family reunification cannot be allowed or tolerated. We urge US State Department and other US authorities in Haiti to (1) remove private special interests and those with conflicts of interest, such as adoption agencies and ministries, from the child welfare decision-making process and (2) halt the evacuation of children and their placement for adoption in the US.
We also urge the State Department to suspend pending adoptions. Haitian paperwork is lost or destroyed. Rock Cadet, the judge most responsible and knowledgeable about pipeline cases, died in the quake. Though the US Embassy survived, US paperwork is probably unavailable for some time, if it still exists. Without proof of Haitian court or Embassy status, any adoption removal from the country, without thorough background investigation and due process, is illegal and not in the best interest of the child

Needless to say, no new adoptions should be processed.

In the post-quake chaos, children need protection from predatory snatchers. Bastard Nation, therefore, supports the expedited removal of Haitian children, orphans or otherwise, to credible and documented parents or family members in the US for temporary or permanent placement depending on the circumstances. These children must not be assumed adoptable and scooped up for fast-track adoption. They should be a top priority. We urge the State Department or other government or credible private and disinterested agencies to assist Haitians in the US to locate child kin and bring them to the US.
We understand why people want to open their arms and hearts to the children of the Haitian earthquake, but adoption is not emergency or humanitarian aid or a solution to Haiti’s ongoing problems. The immediate rescue effort in Haiti should focus on emergency services, individual and family care and family reunification, not family, community, and cultural destruction and the strip-mining of children.


This statement has been faxed to the US State Department.

We Are Still Here

I apologize for not keeping everyone updated on the current events happening in Indiana and the nation as far as adoption, adoptee rights, and their families are concerned. I have had other issues distracting me that out weigh the importance of adoption and its issues. I hate that it is doing this. I promise to be a little more dedicated in the months ahead.

Please read the current legislative information going on in the Indiana General Assembly at Indiana Open. I have shut down the email lists for both Indiana Open and Coleman Moms and Babes because they were very inactive. I still have the Facebook and MySpace pages for Indiana Open as well as the Coleman Moms and Babes Myspace. So please stay tuned for further information. I promise to be more active in regards to the news.

Dreaming Big

I have been wanting to finish up my education for years. I have tried many times to get it going again. I have failed numerous times. I am in the process of getting things together to apply again. For this situation, I am going for something very specific. I want to receive my registered nursing degree. It will start out as an associate’s degree. I look forward to putting that degree upon my wall in one of those gorgeous diploma frames.

I know that right now that I am highly educated. Most of my education has come from the school of hard knocks. That type of education does not allow me to get the job that I want to help raise my daughters in a healthy environment. It does not allow me to get them the very things that they desire and deserve. I also want my daughters to have a great education. With that degree, I will be able to get them that education. I want them to be able to place their diplomas and degrees in one of those beautiful college diploma frames. I want them to have the world. For me, that means that I have to get a degree in order for them to achieve their goals.

The Demons In Adoption Award Winner

Have you seen this year's winner for the Demon in Adoption Awards? Its Bethany Christian Services. I personally believe that it is a well deserved reward.

According to the article:

Anti-abortion pregnancy counseling centers have been a growing phenomenon since their invention in the early 1970's and are one of the main suppliers of infants for the adoption industry. With more than 1100 anti-abortion pregnancy counseling centers, Heartbeat International is one of the largest supply chains of infants. Three out of the five aforementioned, Angel in Adoption receiving centers, is an affiliate of Heartbeat International, and so is the subject of this article, Bethany Christian Services.

Of course they also did the Sixteen and Pregnant on MTV recently as well where they showed an exchange happening on the street corner. I have heard repeated stories where they coerce women out of their children. They make false promises of open adoptions. They let the openness in those adoptions fail.

Congratulations for being the Demon in Adoption.

Time to Get Ready

It is time to get ready for the next Indiana legislative session. The Adoptee Rights Demonstration included a few state legislators from Indiana. It is time to start contacting them again. I know that it is a painful process. I know that it is a time consuming process but we have to start doing it. It really does not bother me anymore. I can afford to take the time to get those letters written. I am a stay at home mother that home schools. I can get it done. Indiana Open is here to support all adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents who want to achieve this goal.

It just takes a couple hours out of a person's day. You can do it on the weekend. We have to remind them that we are still here and we are still fighting. We have the statistics on our side. We have the data on our side. We can do this. Here are a few examples of what to remind the legislators of:

• In the state of Oregon alone, abortion rates decreased 10-18% when adoptees were allowed access to their original birth certificates. In fact, there was no federal mandates or legislation issued during the first five years after the bill was enacted.
  
• Right to privacy is not the same as right to confidentiality. These are two separate issues. Only time that anyone is guaranteed confidentiality is under HIPAA. A birth certificate is not a medical document. It is a government document that records someone's birth.
• The right to privacy means the right to be left alone. With a contact preference form, a birth parent can disclose their preference to the adoptee without the adoptee being denied their privacy rights under the United States Privacy Act of 1974. The federal government does guarantee that every citizen has a right to access the documents that it has on its citizens. The exception, though not stated in this Act, is adoption. Adoption is a state issue, not a federal issue. The right to privacy also means the right to be free from governmental interference as decided in Roe vs. Wade and Griswold vs. Connecticut.
  
• We are a country of majority, not a country of minority. If a majority of the people want adoptee access, then the country should give its adopted citizens that right. 90% plus of birth parents support their relinquished son's or daughter's right to access their original birth certificate.
  
• The very people opposed to adoptee access are also the ones that were opposed to the sealing of those records.
  
• If a woman relinquishes a child but the child is never adopted, the original birth certificate is never sealed.
• Birth parents are also denied access to the documents that they have signed.

Will you join us in this fight to restore the dignity of adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents?