Monday, June 12, 2006

HUMAN RIGHTS

Last night I spoke with a birthmother friend over the phone. We got into a discussion on birth certificates and the open records fight. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that she was right. This fight is about our rights as adoptees. Every non adopted person has the right to his/her original birth certificate. Yet we don't. Its not about confidentiality or right to privacy. In that regards, our right is being violated. In Sunquist case in Tennessee, a Supreme Court Justice stated that the right to privacy was the right to be free from government intrusion. Adopted adults are the ones that suffer from governmental intrusion. Our birth certificates are sealed from our view. It is our birth that it records. Our records do not belong to adoptive parents or birth parents. In forty five states, the government holds us bound by contracts made by us but not signed by us.

Even though I feel that both adoptees and their birthparents owe each other honesty and truth, we as a country can't mandate that. You just can't regulate human behavior. Its impossible. Everyone's rights will be trampled then. Contact between all parties can't be intermediated through outside parties. Yet that is commonplace with several states who have confidential intermediaries. Here again the rights of the triad are being trampled by governmental intrusion.

We are the forever children of adoption. Our right to our records is being kept under lock and key. Held forever in secrecy by those who think they know better than us to control our lives. I am tired of being a perpetual child in the eyes of the law. I am tired of being treated like I am not entitled to the records that record my life.

6 comments:

soledadsista3 said...

I completely understand...after having stumbled onto my birthmother, we have both been unable to find my birthfather and thus, I cannot have any access to my original birth certificate. She has actually tried several times to simply request it under my birth name, but to no avail. I feel like without the formal paper stating the truth of my birth that my birth isn't real yet...I am still born to two people who adopted me...not who created me...

Marie said...

This is why its blatantly obvious that we adoptees are objects, things that others own like cattle, dogs, or coats. There is not the least bit of consciousness that shows that we have the right to be human beings like everyone else. I have maintained that since we are OWNED by the state, we are SLAVES of the state. I'm so angry as I write these words that my hands are shaking, as always when I realize how we have NEVER had civil rights.

Anonymous said...

Oh, Amy... I am soo so sorry.

It's so oddly frustrating to read your words... here... your own QUEST to find the truty of your origins are thwarted at evry turn... by a Big Brother who knows best. Stunning. It's absolutely STUNNINGLY barbaric to me that you are denied this fundamental truth.

Particularly when I consider the fact that I found out the truth about my origins when I waSn't even LOOKING for the truth... didn't even KNOW there was a truth to be found.

The laws surrounding adoption laws in British Columbia, Canada changed back in 1992. When those laws changed, it became possible for ANY party in an adoption triad to find the other members... whethere they were looking for eachother or not. That was how my birthmom found me even though I didn't even know I was adopted.

Doesn't that seem ludicrous??? That while you are ACTIVELY seeking your truth... mine was thrust upon me when I wasn't even looking. What the hell will it take for equilibrium to be reached.

Much affection, my friend.

Anonymous said...

sorry 'bout the typos... typed that REALLY fast.

Amyadoptee said...

Since I live on a ranch, I kinda feel qualified to answer you Marie. The cattle and the horses on this ranch have their papers. Their genetic history can be traced all the way back. Especially the horses since they all go back to Poco Bueno. The ranch has won awards because of that horse. Like the Best Remuda Award. By the way a remuda is a herd of horses. So I am reminded daily that I am property of the state of Indiana. LOL of course. Everywhere I turn I have to deal with my own adoption.

Marie said...

Ooooh adopteeamy-you really made a point here. Adoptees are actually lower on the pedigree scale than horses. That says it all, doesn't it? Yes, everywhere we turn it's in our faces that WE ARE LESS THAN ZERO and on the butt end of jokes with sitcom material. They mop the floor with us, yet the whole adoption crime ring system is still locked securely in the closet when it comes to civil rights.