Today is the deadline for filing 2011 U.S. tax returns. In a timely piece, Nadine Smith, executive director of Equality Florida (and a mom to the adorable boy who met First Lady Michelle Obama recently), writes about federal tax inequality for same-sex couples. She gives us our quote of the week:
We have an 11-month-old son, and we know that it is our actions that will teach him more than just our words. How can we raise him to be honest and have integrity in his interactions with other people, if we fill out a form that denies our existence as a family?
So many people seem ready to deny the existance of LGTB families. It makes me sick. Just because it doesn’t conform to your sense of family doesn’t make it any less a family!
I don’t know if you’ve recently heard about OneMillionMoms ban on Urban Outfitters for them featuring two girls kissing. They wrote a letter to Urban Outfitters claiming that this was offensive to their families. HOW? How is one lifestyle different from a next? So because I marry a woman suddenly my family is offensive? As a society we need to sit down and redefine the idea of a family. Two mothers with children can be a family. Two fathers with children can be a family. We do not all have to look exactly a like to fit in.
I wrote about it on my blog. I hope you do too. We need awareness.
Yes! It’s tax day that got me all cranky again about when our family is and isn’t supported by law, forms, and red tape. I posted a rant on Facebook after filing my taxes as a single person (who’s been coupled for 10 years and raising two daughters) – and my FB friends who had (unlike me) entered into whatever their various states sanctioned (civil union, domestic partnership, marriage) soon responded by confirming that my visions of a tax purgatory accompanying these hard-won institutions …were not too far off.
Thanks for sharing the article, and for creating a site where our families can share what matters.
[...] same-sex couples, filing taxes turns headaches into migraines. And then Mombian posted this: A Taxing Problem for Same-Sex Families. Apparently I am not the only one for whom Tax Day touches a [...]