Blog for LGBT families day

supergee mentioned it's Blogging for LGBT Families day. I'm, you know, for them.

I'm really very frustrated with my state and how little it supports them. From the marriage and benefits laws and rulings (we even still have a sodomy law on the books though at least that was overruled in the courts) to the adoption laws and how judges have been pressured not to let same-sex couples adopt. I think it's reprehensible and embarrassing.

I think people who are prepared and capable should be able to adopt children regardless of gender, sexuality, and state of partnered-ness. Lord knows we have enough single parents who didn't choose to be that way. Someone who wants to be one ought to be able to without jumping through more hoops than a woman getting a divorce claiming custody. And any caring couple who can support a child ought to be able to adopt, in my opinion. Furthermore, the same-sex partner of someone who chooses to bear or father a child should be able to adopt that child with the birth mother or father, just as a step-parent can today.

If you are part of an LGBT family, know that I support you. And I am working on my state.

Where can I get numbers on starvation in Detroit and Flint?

Is anyone studying poverty in Michigan? Or would these numbers show up in county 'cause of death' statistics? Is starvation an official cause of death? Possibly would hospitals and doctors have numbers on how many patients they've treated for malnutrition? (I'm guessing not unless someone was studying and tracking it)



As an aside, if you want to see real answers from the Obama campaign about how he'd deal with poverty and economic problems, some are posted on MOMocrats. So go read them. :)

Before Roe V. Wade: Memories of a Gynecologist who was There

As reactionaries around the country continue to try to undermine and take away the abortion rights conferred by the Roe V. Wade Supreme Court decision, Dr. Waldo L. Fielding reminds us what it was like before.

I marched for women's rights in the spring of 1991. We marched under the symbol of the wire hangar, something many women used on themselves or had used on them in back alley abortions, risking accidentally punching through the abdominal wall or other types of tears that could lead to infections and even death. Dr. Fielding reminds us this was a symbol, but it was not a myth.

Recommended reading for everyone.