Supreme Court Upholds Gay Adoption Ban in Florida

The Florida gay adoption ban is an old fight that has been going on for years, ever since the days of Anita Bryant, back in 1977. It was the same Anita Bryant who fought to repeal a gay rights ordinance adopted by Dade County (and the same Anita Bryant who later divorced her husband, go figure. Apparently, religious beliefs only apply when they are convenient).

Curtis Peterson, the state senator who sponsored the adoption ban said at the time that its purpose was to send a message to gay people that “we’re really tired of you” and “we wish you’d go back into the closet.”

Well, that’s not going to ever happen. Things in this country may get worse for gay people and many may opt to move to a more progressive place to live, be it another state, or another country. But one thing that 99.9% of us will never do is to go back into the closet, because the closet is death to life. There is no going back from freedom.

The people who really lost out in this case are the children who will not have the support services of adopted children. There will still be gay people and gay couples with children in Florida, but for the sake of any benefits they may receive from being legally adopted, they won’t receive them. It will be them who will suffer.

Another site that I was reading goes into further detail on this.

Is this what Florida really had in mind?

In a setback for the gay rights movement, the Supreme Court refused Monday to hear a challenge to a Florida law that prohibits homosexuals from adopting children.

Florida’s is the only such statute in the country, and the prohibition is the only categorical adoption ban on the state’s books. Florida evaluates adoption applications from all other would-be adoptive parents, including those who have failed at previous adoptions and those with a history of drug abuse or domestic violence.

Conservative groups whose recent focus has been on blocking same-sex marriages cheered the decision. It “sends a huge message that the court is not going to be open to a broad-based homosexual agenda,” Mathew Staver, president of the Liberty Counsel in Orlando, Fla., told the Associated Press. Other states, he said, should start considering similar laws. [...]

Although Florida’s adoption laws once contained a preference for married couples, the state repealed that provision in 2003. One-quarter of the adoptions in the state are by single people. (source)