LGBT Parenting Roundup

Time for another collection of recent news about LGBT parents. First, though, make sure you’ve voted for Mombian as Best Large Blog in the 2008 Weblog Awards. Even if you voted yesterday, please do so again. You can cast a vote once every 24 hours, and they all count. Many thanks!

• If you’re married, civil unioned, or domestic partnered, and both of you are on your child’s birth certificate, you should read Nancy Polikoff’s post, “Why Lawyers Recommend Second-Parent Adoptions (even if you’re married).” This is something I’ve said many times before, but Nancy’s a lawyer, and she says it better.
• Joan Garry, former Executive Director of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) and Co-Chair of the National LGBT Finance Committee for Obama For America, wrote “What is it like to be a gay parent?” for the New Jersey Star Ledger. Then she wrote a piece at HuffPo, “What People Really Think About Gay Parents,” in response to the bigoted feedback she got on her first piece. Both worth a read.
• The Arkansas chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit on behalf of more than a dozen families, challenging the new Arkansas law banning unmarried couples from becoming foster or adoptive parents.
• The New York Times published an editorial inveighing against the Arkansas law. Nancy Polikoff points out that the paper has supported our families for many years.
• The Fort Myers News-Press has a sympathetic piece on the state of Florida’s appeal of a lower court ruling that allowed a gay man to adopt.
• As of January 1, it is illegal for adoption agencies in England, Wales and Scotland to discriminate against same-sex couples.