Adoptions and the right to an original birth cert

Not only bad practices by state & religious agencies but it could expose the rich & powerful in society...there must have been some truth in that remark made by Charlie haughey about TD's & children born in st ritas..why pass laws to reveal their secrets?

What utter bollocks!

Everyone's birth record is already a public record, and the Natural Parents Network of Ireland were one of the organisations who have campaigned for adopted people to be able to access their own birth certs for literally decades.

"Passed with barely a whimper"?! What are you like?! Literally decades of campaigning by natural parents and adopted people got us as far as this flawed and inadequate bill, which doesn't go nearly far enough. Legislation was first proposed by Mary Hanafin in 2000/2001, after years of campaigning. Brian Lenihan Jnr had public consultations with adopted people, natural parents, adoptive parents, adoption agencies and those in the fostercare system, lasting over two years. Katherine Zappone also proposed legislation. That eventually led us to where we are now - "the Birth, Information and Tracing Bill that passed this evening underwent six sessions in the Dáil, eight sessions in the Seanad and more than 30 hours of debate this year." (per RTÉ)

Passage was delayed specifically because the campaign groups (and they're not NGOs!) were so opposed.

What we've got is a law that gives adopted people their birth cert (again - already a public document), a mandatory information session if a natural parent has objected to them getting it (pre-supposing we're the criminals, or something, rather than the adoption agencies that falsified our birth certs and arranged illegal adoptions!), and might get us whatever out-of-date medical information is on our files.

It brings us into line with what people in England and Wales have had since the 1970s and people in Scotland have had since the 1920s. Did the sky fall in over there? No.

(Edited to clarify what NPNI campaigned for.)

I'm aware of some reunions that haven't worked out, but I'm also aware of many more that either were just "grand", or where things went very well indeed.

And of course there are many more adopted people who don't necessarily want their information in order to trace, they just... want their information. Because it's theirs. Everyone needs to know where they've come from. We're finally getting that recognised by the state, to some extent at least, even though many of us have been able to do our own research (and trace, if that's what we wanted) without their help, for years now.

This thread is about adoption ffs.

IVF is creating exactly the same issue which is blighting the lives of people who were adopted. And if its unregulated, there is no solution possible.

Surrogacy is breaking the bond between a child and the woman who housed and nourished them pre-birth. So not the same, but can have a similar emotional impact for some.

A surrogate mother is, by default in Ireland, legally the mother of the child. Regardless of who contributed the genetic material.

There is a difficulty in trying to advocate for a principle which will solve a particular issue that you want solved now, if you don't recognise that that principle must also apply to other scenarios which could have adverse consequences. Which is fine for you if you don't care about those other people. But others might want to look at the bigger picture and advise to go back to the drawing board and try to come up with something which will work for you without having those adverse consequences for others.

Are you trolling? I think you are.

No, they wouldn't. So why bring it up, then? If they 100% don't want to hear from the now-adult child they placed for adoption, then they're fairly likely to register a preference no-contact, wouldn't you say? At which point, a social worker will request medical and background info that can be passed on should the now-adult adopted person seek it.

Adoption is - in Ireland - a permanent legal solution to what was often a temporary human problem. The only option available in law, even currently, is closed, "secret" adoption. Even with the new law.

In the real world, though, closed, secret adoption does not work, for many adopted people and natural parents (or, as you call them, "suppliers of genetic material" 🙄). So we - natural parents, adoptive parents, adopted people, siblings, relatives of all of the above, lobby groups, and even adoption agencies and the Adoption Authority - living in the real world, just got on with things. We've all been doing searches, reunions, contact preference registers, and latterly, commercial DNA tests, and so on. For years now. Like other jurisdictions. The sky hasn't fallen in. Nobody turns up to doorstep anyone or seek "revenge" (seriously, da ****?) The new act simply recognises that, and makes a start at legislating for it.

Yup, legal adoption in Ireland was a ****-show. The same mistakes should be avoided in IVF and surrogacy. We know what the consequences of lack of regulation and enforcement are - illegal adoptions/surrogacy arrangements, exploitation of vulnerable people, children who grow up not knowing they're adopted/donor-conceived, adults who then give a "wrong" medical history to medics... We also know that surrogates, donors, and now-adult children conceived by donor/surrogate will want medical and background information, and possibly contact/reunion.

If a parent gives up their child for adoption, it would have to be assumed that the default position is that they do not want to be contacted. Because the very nature of adoption means severing all ties and the adopting parents become parents the same as if they had given birth to the child. To do otherwise would lessen adopting parents vs. natural parents. The biological supplier of material should not have to register a preference that they don't want to be contacted. They could however be give the option to register a preference that they are open to being contacted. It should be an opt-in rather than an opt-out.

Adoption is a one-way process. It actually has two stages. The person adopting can withdraw their consent before the second stage (but that withdrawal is not absolute in the sense that it can be over-ridden or ignored). There have been some cases where an adoption has been reversed, but that is rare. Once the adoption is ordered, the "biological" is no longer that child's parent and the relationship between the child and that person is the same as the relationship between that child and any other random person. If you were adopted, the legal relationship between you and the person who gave birth to you is same as the legal relationship between you and me. In the same way that you cannot expect to be entitled to be arbitrarily provided with my medical history, you cannot expect to be entitled to be arbitrarily entitled to the medical history of the "biological". I can volunteer my information to you if you want. The "biological" can also volunteer their information. But you cannot demand it.

If the natural mother wants to retain contact with the child they can have the child fostered.

If I want to adopt a child - I'll adopt a child. If I want to be a foster parent, I'll foster a child. I wouldn't adopt a child and then have to deal with the sh1te of the natural parent hanging around and contacting the child whenever they felt like it.

Two basic options to the natural mother at that stage:

1) Put your child into a temporary arrangement

2) Put your child into a one-way arrangement which permanently severs your legal connection to them forever.

If you decide to choose 2, then it is fair to suggest that you accept, and want, the consequences.

There are inherent biases in your anecdotal evidence in any case

Your reductive post is quite crude and even callous.

There are successful adoptions that work well for adoptees , birth parents and adoptive parents, where the arrangement informally keeps the communication open. That's how it works here for the trickle of adoptions still taking place, and that seems to be the best practice, not sure why anyone would wipe it off the table as an option in some totalitarian swipe.

Fostering is intended to be temporary, for a few months, not an indefinite "might actually be whole life" situation. Fosterers are paid to provide that temporary service. It's very different to adoption.

On a practical level, how do you forsee a fostering situation working between countries? And do you think foster carers are somehow readily available?

And on "dealing with the shite" of birth parents, when you adopt, or indeed have natural children, yes, you have to "deal" with all sorts of shite. It comes with the territory of being responsible for another human. The other "shite" you would have to deal with is a child who wants to find their birth parents and has huge pain from not being able to do so.

Such ignorance - wilful, at this stage - in these two posts.

How many times do we need to explain to you that no such right to privacy existed - birth certs are public records - and that the vast majority of girls and women placing children for adoption never sought confidentiality. We know this from personal testimony, research, and records. Even if they had sought it, or were promised it, there was no basis for an adoption agency or the then Adoption Board to agree to it.

This has been explained to you multiple times before, but you don't seem to get it.

No, there isn't. There's a contact preference register. You can argue about "enforceability" but I, as an Irish citizen, have the right to contact absolutely anyone I want. So do you. Does the person I want to contact have to accept it? No. There are already laws around that. Why would this area be any different? More relevantly, why would this area be any different when there's absolutely no need for it to be different?! Natural parents and adopted people have known how to trace each for literally decades, and have been doing it. Generally, we do it ourselves better than the agencies or Adoption Authority or Túsla do! Does everything work out? No always, no. But usually it does. Nobody doorsteps the other party, there are no "revenge" attacks or whatever the hell it is DT thinks happens.

Now we can just do it more efficiently and quicker, and many of us will be happy just with whatever of our information is on our files.

I've seen adoption files - such as they are. "Your mother was 23 when she had you and was working as a childminder at the time. She had met your father in college and they'd be going out 6 months when she got pregnant. She wasn't in a position to support you and decided adoption was the best option. She came from a small family from the midlands and had two brothers. He was from the same town. Both were healthy. She likes music and dancing and he was into films..." Yeah, really useful waiting 30 or 40 or 50 years to pass that sort of bland "information" on.

Hahahahaha! Why the **** would you assume that?! The thousands of reunions that have taken place in the last few decades - many of them initiated by natural parents - might be a clue you haven't a bull's notion what you're talking about. Considering the number of forced and illegal adoptions where consent was neither sought nor granted, you've some neck to make an ignorant statement like that.

Bullshit.

Adoption is a life-long process that's - lest you forget - supposed to be in the best interests of the child. Not the natural parents. And not the adoptive parents, either. The child. Life-long, because me being adopted however long ago was a legal decree back then that I have to live with for the rest of my life. It also impacts my kids' lives. And their kids. Yes, in the 1950s, the middle of the last century, we in Ireland thought it was a simple, one-off process and the child arrived with the new parents as a tabula rasa. Other places had already figured out back then that that wasn't the case, and had better systems including access to information, even back then. Almost a century later, that's finally being acknowledged in Ireland, too.

Where it's legislated for, btw, open adoptions often work extremely well, for all involved. But y'know, why bother with facts when you have your opinions.

Clap clap clap. Well done. You got something right. That's not in the legislation. For obvious reasons.

Should the supplier of genetic material have rights with respect to the resulting child purely because they are the source of that genetic material? That is a pretty basic, but fundamental question. My answer to that is "no". You can disagree if you want

Interesting standards you have for psychopathy there horse when you proclaim your sincere hope that another poster never becomes a parent.

If they're going to lie to their child about something so **** fundamental, I'd say that's pretty good evidence. Describing the person who bore the child you now have as a "supplier of genetic material and nothing more" would be more.

If you ever adopt a child, you can make sure to tell that child, as soon as they can understand, that they are different from your own "real" children. That you aren't their real parent.

Be open about it. Make sure they know, and everyone else knows. Just keep telling them they are different. Children can be cruel, but sure that's their problem I suppose!

"Supplier of genetic material" is the most general expression and encompasses everyone.

You appear to attribute some overarching importance to genetic contribution. Medical history etc.

The person who supplies the genetic material does not have to be just the person who gave birth. In fact, the person who gives birth may have supplied a totality zero of the child's genetic makeup.

Is a woman who gives birth to a child that was conceived with a donor egg not her mother? She gives birth to the child, raises it, cares for it. I would call her the mother. If a woman adopts a 6 month old baby and raises it and cares for it, then she is the mother. I'm not going to be the person who tells her "yeah, but you're not actually that child's mother". You can if you want.

Do I know any birth parents?

No, I've never met anyone who had a child 🙄