Mar
12
Along with the prevention of animal cruelty and poverty, no cause hits closer to home than reversing a law that was established on pure discrimination...
I recently turned 22 years old. I was born in 1988. However, there's one thing that divides me from your average US citizen.
My birth certificate is stamped with the year of 1999. This is the year my adoption became legalized. It does not have that familiar scent that most 20+ year-old documents bear, it does not have wrinkles, grooves or discolorations that most 22-year-old birth certificates may have... The state seal of approval and issued year on my birth certificate matches that of my 11-year-old niece... According to the State Department, this is my one and only certificate of birth. I am legally prohibited from attaining my own original certificate and documentation that was assigned to me the day of my birth.
In eras before my time, adopted and/or children surrendered by their biological mother or father were referred to as "bastard" or "illegitimate" children. Merriam Webster defines the word "bastard" as:
1. an illegitimate child
2. something that is spurious, irregular, inferior, or of questionable origin
3. an offensive or disagreeable person
It is very hard for me to contain my annoyance and disagreement when explaining or speaking about this issue. Because very, very few know of it. And most are completely surprised when told.
It is the above definitions and the medieval ideals that accompany them that have produced today's "modern" law which denies adoptees in the United States basic access to their own information. It is discrimination based solely on a child's non-standardized way of entering the world.
Times have changed. What is socially acceptable of a family has changed. It's time this law caught up with today. I'm not a child, and neither is the 43-year-old American adoptee whom receives a slap on the hand when trying to gain the right everyone else has. This has nothing to do with being adopted, how much I dearly love my mom and dad, the state I live in, or where I'm from - it's about my basic right that the government believes I do not deserve - because I was born to a 16-year-old, unwed, orphaned, high school student. I look at my birth certificate and do not see a vital document, but instead a reminder that my original origins are illegitimate, and not worthy of legal documentation; and that I was not born in 1999.
God forbid I should ever run for President.
A ten-year lie on a birth certificate- the most absurd insult I've heard of yet regarding a certificate! I'm angry right along with you!
Thank you! I have yet to pursue getting a "copy" of my original.