Supreme Court rules for adoptive parents in Baby Veronica case

[Xithras]

38. This is a horrific case.

Seriously, it's one thing to adopt an unwanted child, but it's unconscionable for an adoptive parent to actually fight to take a child away from a good, loving home simply because they have some legal papers saying they have a "right" to do so. Once they found out the true story behind what happened, they should have done the right thing. Moments like this one, however, make me wish I wasn't an atheist so I could at least look forward to them burning in hell for this kind of evil.

First, the argument that the father didn't support the mother during the pregnancy is irrelevant. Legally, a man is under no obligation to support anyone other than his children and the spouse he is married to. It's certainly BETTER if the father does offer support to the mother, but without any other kind of relationship between them, there is no legal expectation of support. As the father, he has to support the CHILD. The lack of a relationship between the mother and father has no bearing on his paternal rights.

Second, a lot of news media (and posters in this thread) are incorrectly stating that he agreed to give the child up and then "changed his mind". He knew that he was being deployed overseas and agreed to give the mother full custody. THAT'S IT. There is a HUGE difference between agreeing to give the other parent full custody, and agreeing to have your parental rights terminated. The two legal concepts are miles apart in their intent and scope. He never knowingly consented to an adoption, and immediately moved to block the adoption the moment he found out about it. He didn't "change his mind", the mother changed what she wanted.

Third, the idea of a "blood quantum" is widely regarded as a racist relic that was originally invented by southern American states to restrict the rights of Native Americans. It doesn't matter if he was 1/4, or 1/200th, or 1/1000th. He was a registered member of the tribe, living on tribal land, and participating as a member of the tribe. Saying that he "isn't really Native" is like saying that Obama "isn't really black". It doesn't matter WHAT your opinion is. If he identifies as black or Native American, that's his call, not yours. Both men have the ancestry to legitimately make the claim, and it's racist as fuck to claim otherwise. As in "You make Paula Deen look like a flag bearer for the Rainbow Coalition" racist.

As the husband of a tribally registered mixed Native American woman, and the father of three tribally registered mixed Native American children, I found both the judgment of the court and some of the opinions in this thread to be pretty sickening. The guy did absolutely nothing wrong, was never accused of any crime, or of abuse, or of neglect, was deceived out of his right to raise his own beautiful daughter by her mother, and is now being permanently stripped of his right to raise his child because he isn't "Indian enough" to make a bunch of pompous assholes happy. And for what? So that a pair of childless narcissists can fool themselves into believing that they're somehow saving her from the deprivations of being born poor and brown? To hell with them.

If I were the father, this would only be the beginning of my war.