Massachusetts says Catholic families cannot adopt children

The state of Massachusetts is refusing to allow Christians to adopt children. (at least Christians who belong to more conservative denominations of Christianity)

Kittie and Matthew Burke are a married couple who are observant Catholics. The state rejected their application to adopt because the child might turn out to be "transgender", and if that was the case the state believes they would not be "affirming" to the child's "gender identity".

Massachusetts vs. Christians on transgenderism: When religious discrimination becomes state establishment of religion | Washington Examiner


Some might claim they were not actually being discriminated against because of being Catholic, but there was no evidence for how they might treat their future child besides the fact that they were observant Catholics. That means that being Catholic was tantamount to the reason they could not adopt, one could say.

There are a lot of Catholics in these Northeastern states (NY, NJ, CT, RI, Massachusetts). It's a legacy of Irish immigration in the 1840s and later Italian immigration around the 1900s, when poorer immigrants were moving into the big city areas. (Today most Catholics have moved further out from the big cities but are still within those states)
In fact 67% of the Christians in Massachusetts today are Catholic.

 

Seems wrong to deny children parents.

 

Maybe the state should compromise and let the family adopt from a birth mother who was Catholic?

 

My thoughts is if there's a deficit of orphans then you can be picky.

Typically there's more orphans than there are parents that want to adopt.

What this is going to do is force people to leave the state. So kids being put up for adoption in Massachusetts will be less likely to be adopted.

 

There are a deficit of white babies - especially normal healthy ones.
(Even when it comes to crack babies, there's still plenty of demand, the white ones get grabbed up, often a family will sign up for them even before they're born)

The surplus is in the black and brown orphans. And especially when they are older than about 4 they are nearly impossible to place.

 

Well, I certainly think that certain religious teachings can be very abusive to teach to children, like what my grandmother pounded into my head when I was but a wee lad. I remember being in KINDERGARDEN and my vision of what would happen to me if I did bad things (which weren't very well defined, as I think it was meant to mean whatever those who were 'in charge' said they were) was that I would be sent to hell, where I would ride a slide (the metal kind that will give you 2nd degree burns if you ride them in Florida in summer without hosing them down first) made out of razor blades, land in a pool of rubbing alcohol, only to heal while going back to the ladder to do it all again, for all of eternity!

The very fact that my 4 or 5-year-old self's imagination came up with that tells me whatever messages I was getting were not healthy for kids, and should never be taught. I would have no problem with prohibition the teaching of religion to kids under the age of 18. Treat it like sex, where everyone knows everyone is doing it (at least the adults, hopefully), but nobody talks about it.

 

OK I thought you were a libertarian, but you now sound like a communist.

Glad I can still be surprised.

 

but not say two or three year olds.

What all of them are adopted up and 6-year-olds and 9 year olds and so forth then maybe we should talk about illuminating 60% of the population from the adoption process

So it seems like laws banning Catholic people from adoption should not exist.

 

Well can a child consent to religion?

 

In Germany, parents used to tell their small children that Krampus would get them if they did not behave.
Many of the stories they would tell children could be kind of disturbing but usually had a message to teach. (Like Hansel and Gretel, or the original version of Snow White before the sugar-coasted Disney version)

 

Can they consent to potty training?

 

just as wrong as Christians refusing to allow LGBTQ to adopt, imo

 

Aren't these the same people who say a child in the womb can't consent to anything, so abortion should be the choice of the mother?

 

Yes.

 

It's been a while since I had small ones, but potty training wasn't optional.

 

You're getting away from the topic.

The point I made was kids can't consent to religion. You distracted with this potty training crap I don't know why, maybe you thought it was clever.

But my point still stands and you haven't argued against it.

Why would people need to brainwash and browbeat their kids and two following a religion if it was correct?

 

To some degree they can. There are lots of normal things kids can't consent to, but it is a part of childhood.

Sometimes it can be questionable when exactly things go too far and parents excessively impose their religion on their children. But that can be true with many things, not only just religion.

Usually authorities will only get involved if the religion is a cult, not a mainstream religion, and what is being done to the child seems obviously not appropriate or directly harmful, or unusually extreme.

Sometimes ethnicity can be involved. Authorities might be more likely to get involved if, for example, if an Arab family adopted a white child and were doing controversial things, rather than if the child were of some "Muslim" ethnicity and might naturally have grown up with parents who did that.
(Obviously developed white countries draw the line at female circumcision, however. Not okay, but even then the authorities often feel reluctant to punish too much)

 

That depends what you mean by "brainwashing" Obviously children do need to be "brainwashed" to some small degree to be able to raise them right.
Telling them they have to do certain things or making them believe certain things about the world that they do not fully understand.

 

a lot of religious people want to browbeat their children into believing in their religion because it's not true. You don't need to browbeat people into believing things that are true.

And this is a very shitty approach to religion because when they find out you lied to them they won't believe that damn word you say.

no I think the lines pretty clear. When you say you have to believe for professed belief in this or you have to play this sport or you have to read these books or play this instrument in order to receive my love first off It isn't Love second it will make that kid hate whatever you're trying to force on them, and that's crossing the line.

It really is pretty obvious when you make the condition of love their obedience to certain things within reason you're crossing the line.

authorities only get involved in the harm is passing the threshold of abuse so at the last possible moment where it crosses over from being socially acceptable to socially unacceptable.

That's not a good benchmark. A child that's fed not beaten and not raped but also not loved doesn't grow up to be a good functioning member of a society.

That is because authorities have a great power and therefore a great responsibility the threshold of when authorities are involved is not a good threshold.

You can be an absolutely terrible parent without needing authorities to get involved.

Laws establish a minimum acceptable standard.

 

Potty training was dead on topic. At least in the direction you took it. As you said, "can a child consent to religion?" Religion is one of a multitude of things that children are taught. Whether it is "correct" seems rather besides the point.

The idea that the State would prohibit the teaching of a religion by parents seems to open a can of worms. What if the parents are communists? Libertarians? Can the state review parental political views to determine if they meet some sort of State guidelines on appropriate ideology?

In this case the State has an ideology that they want children to be taught, Trans-ideology, so screening for Catholics makes sense if you are promoting the State religion of "trans" over the more traditional kinds.

 

No they don't. Brainwashing is only ever used for nefarious purposes.

It's only ever used to get people to believe lies you don't need to brainwash people into believing the truth the truth simply is.

Telling them they have to do certain things that they have to do isn't brainwashing that's telling them the truth.

Telling them they have to do certain things to appease your religious sensibilities that's brainwashing and it's projecting your self onto your child it's a self-centered move. And it's out of fear that your religion is a lie because you would need to do that if you believe it was true

 

I didn't take it in any direction you asked a question and I answered it. I fail to see the relevance.

You should have answered the question. Yes children can to some degree consent to religion. Religion isn't necessarily bad. But if you tell your kids the truth about it it has a better chance of staying with them and the good aspects live on

One issue religious people have is the inability to argue for their position.

I never said anything about the state prohibiting anything.

Whataboutism isn't a good argument.

Argue that yes children can consent to religion it's just you have to give up a little bit of control. There are many Churches that offer child friendly religious teachings. And that children want to participate in.

It isn't forced on people, they accept it. You know you can grab the school by its tender bits pretty easy. You can also run for school board. People accept it because they don't want to be called names.

 

I think you are looking at generalities. You need to get into specifics. In some ways there is no difference between "brainwashing" and how children are ordinarily and properly raised.

The job of any parent is to instill values and beliefs, and rules. The question is what those values and beliefs are.

I'm not sure that I understand examples you are trying to make that do not involve this.

In what specific ways do you think parents would be likely to impose their religion that would be negative, which do not just involve sharing their beliefs with their children?
(Keep in mind a lot of the rules imposed by religious parents are likely to be very similar to those imposed by non-religious parents)

 

How can I it's a very general discussion.

Brainwashing is strictly to get people to believe things that are false. You don't need to brainwash to get people to accept things that are, they can see for themselves.

Lying and brainwashing will make sure your values and beliefs die when that child finds out how full of **** you were.

You don't need to do that if you tell the truth.

I didn't give any examples so there is nothing too understand here.

Telling them that this is the only correct religion that's a lie 100% of the time it's said. Telling that lie is about control. When they find out you lied and the will. They'll abandon your joke of a religion.

Instead say this is our religion and this is why we chose it. Give reason not BS like it's the only correct one.

Rules are important regardless of religion but if you lie to them (brainwash) they will figure it out and disobey and never trust again.

As a result your values deserve to die because they needed lies for preservation. I would say if your value need this they are false.

 

Then, by that definition, parents who indoctrinate their children into a cult are not brainwashing them if the parents believe it is true.
Otherwise, who is to say what is "true"?

You really don't seem to have put much thought into this.

Highly unrealistic. Letting children "see everything for themselves" and relying entirely on that is not a viable strategy for parenting.

Whose truth? Truth is not always obvious in these situations.

I still do not really know what you are specifically talking about.

How about "Mommy and daddy believe this is the only correct religion"?

It's an inherent part of many religions to believe that one is the correct one, and all the others are either wrong, inferior or very flawed.