This article adds more information to the story I posted earlier. Notice the law signed was to prevent same sex couples from being able to adopt, it was designed to let Christian agencies to discriminate against same sex couples. Scottie
A Knoxville couple is suing the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services, saying a state-sponsored Christian-based adoption agency refused to help them because they are Jewish.
It is the state’s first lawsuit to challenge a new law that allows religious adoption agencies to deny service to families whose religious or moral beliefs aren’t in sync with the provider’s, the family’s attorney told Knox News on Wednesday.
The adoption agency, the Holston United Methodist Home for Children based in Greeneville, Tennessee, denied Elizabeth and Gabriel Rutan-Ram from acquiring Tennessee-mandated foster-parent training and a home-study certification as they attempted to adopt a child from Florida last year, the Rutan-Rams say.
The organization was previously but is no longer an arm of the Holston Conference of the United Methodist Church. A spokesperson for the conference directed questions to the home.
In December, the Greenville-based Holston sued the Biden administration for regulations that prohibit discrimination in programs funded by U.S. Health and Human Services grants “on the basis of religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and same-sex marriage status,” saying it violates its First Amendment rights.
In that lawsuit, the organization said it receives public money to provide foster care placement and training, among other services, for the state Department of Children’s Services.
The Home for Children’s president and CEO Bradley Williams could not be reached for comment Wednesday. Instead, a receptionist at Home for Children told Knox News to email the organization’s law firm, Alliance Defending Freedom, which bills itself as “the world’s largest legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, marriage and family, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.” Representatives of the firm did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
The lawsuit was filed Wednesday by Americans United for Separation of Church and State on behalf of the Rutan-Rams in Davidson County Chancery Court. A spokesperson for DCS declined to comment on pending litigation, as did a spokesperson from the state Attorney General’s Office.
The lawsuit comes nearly two years to the date that Gov. Bill Lee signed into law a measure that allows religious adoption agencies to deny service to same-sex couples. The law allows adoption agencies to refuse to participate in a child placement if doing so would “violate the agency’s written religious or moral convictions or policies.”
“The Tennessee Constitution, like the U.S. Constitution, promises religious freedom and equality for everyone. Tennessee is reneging on that promise by allowing a taxpayer-funded agency to discriminate against Liz and Gabe Rutan-Ram because they are Jews,” Alex J. Luchenitser, associate vice president and associate legal director at Americans United, said in a news release.
“Public funds should never be used for religious discrimination,” Luchenitser told Knox News. “The law should never create obstacles that keep loving parents from taking care of children who need a home. That should certainly never occur because of religious discrimination.”
The couple is joined by six others in the suit against the state. They are:
The Rev Jeannie Alexander, an interfaith pastor from Davidson County
The Rev. Elaine Blanchard, a Disciples of Christ minister from Shelby County
The Rev. Alaina Cobb, a Christian minister from Davidson County
The Rev. Denise Gyauch, a Unitarian Universalist minister from Davidson County
Dr. Larry Blanz of Davidson County, a retired psychologist with more than 40 years of experience that includes working with foster parents and children
Mirabelle Stoedter, a Davidson County resident who serves as treasurer of the Tennessee chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
Attempting to adopt
After realizing they could not have biological children of their own, in early 2021 the Rutan-Rams located a child in Florida they were excited about fostering with plans to adopt. They say they were initially told by Holston that the organization would help them with their out-of-state placement.
However, on the day they were to begin their training, the organization told them it only serves families who share their Christian belief system, the lawsuit says. The couple was not able to complete the process to become foster parents to the child.
“I felt like I’d been punched in the gut,” Elizabeth Rutan-Ram said in a news release. “It was the first time I felt discriminated against because I am Jewish. It was very shocking. And it was very hurtful that the agency seemed to think that a child would be better off in state custody than with a loving family like us.”
The Rutan-Rams are currently fostering and hope to adopt a teenage girl through a separate agency, Luchenitser told Knox News, and they also would like to adopt another child in the future.
Wouldn’t it be a great world if people acted this way instead of acting only for themselves? Scottie
Remember when it was cool to help others, social welfare programs & orgs, & humanity? Everyone needs help in their lives. Now with unprecedented inequality, only the privileged get help.
He should know, his daughter helped raised the price of EpiPens
No one should be as rich as Elon Musk when millions of Americans still don’t have health care.
Tax the wealth created by capitalism. Fund the vulnerable exploited by capitalism.
Trying to bring back child labor for 2022 huh.
And then they pick a celebrity with zero political experience to be president?
I am the best. I have the best brain. Only I can do it. Only my son-in-law who can’t pass a security clearance can do this. No media allowed when I met with Putin.
Just say you enjoy the cult.
A former Speaker of the House is threatening jail time for members of Congress who are investigating the violent January 6 attack on our Capitol and our Constitution.
Increasingly strange to watch governors claim trans teenagers aren't old enough for gender-affirming care but a teenager is old enough to be forced into giving birth https://t.co/gHl8E3Hr7b
We have been arming the Ukraine lately, as have Britain and Germany. I suspect Ramirez wants the readers to think it would be okay to preemptively attack Russia. Folks, slow down and give it another millisecond of thought, does that sound like a GOOD idea? If so, please get immediate counseling. At the same time the right wing is hammering Biden on his Ukraine policy the Republicans in congress that are in the pay or under threat from Russia are demanding that Biden rule out sending any troops. So Biden did say he wouldn’t send any US military troops to fight Russia in Ukraine. What a set of foreign asset assholes. Scottie
Since life changes all the time, it must be terrible to be a conservative who practically wets their pants when anything changes. Such an absurd cartoon. Also, “woke” is an obsolescent term. How is a gay M&M any more or less stupid than a straight one? You know what is stupid? People who worry about this crap.
News headline: “M&M characters get new, more inclusive look”
No WONDER poor ol’ Payneful is having a snit. “My GOD, how is it POSSIBLE for important cultural icons such as the M&M characters to CHANGE when they were already PERFECT, just like God made them in the garden of Eden? What is this world COMING to?!! (etc)” Scottie
Tom Hanks narrates a new spot that marks year one of Joe Biden’s presidency, one that tries to reinforce a message that the country is on the right track. This scares the right because he is a prominent well liked person. So they have to attack him as much as they can. Rather than admit that Biden really has accomplished quite a bit in just one year and would have done a lot more if the right had not tried to block everything that would help the country jsut because they don’t want Biden to have a win. That is how radical the right has become, doesn’t matteer if the country really needs it they will block it to deny the Democrats a win. The Democrats don’t do that … yet. Scottie
What a misrepresentation. She was saying take care of your self over the weekend, do what you need to do that recharges yourself, and then come back at the issues / problems strong on Monday. What is controversial about that message? Unless the left fighting the right wing ongoing sabotage of the country is scary for the right? Scottie
The right is losing its collective mind over this. Just like they did the Potato head and Dr. Seuss stuff. Love seeing them scream about candies having sexual personalities. It is just candy, people. Scottie
Abbott publicly signed the bill at an event hosted by the Founders Classical Academy of Lewisville, where he criticized schools shutting down during the pandemic and issuing mask mandates. He said the bill will help restore parents as the primary decision-makers of their child’s education and healthcare decisions.
“No government program can replace the role that parents play in the education of their children,” Abbott told the audience. “Our focal point is to ensure that parents are put at the forefront, both of education of their children as well as the decision-making for their child’s healthcare.”
Abbott continued to impart that the government often intrudes on parental decision-making and threatens the role guardians have in their child’s wellbeing. “Many parents are growing increasingly powerless about what to do to regain that control,” Abbott said. “That must end.”
Under the bill, Abbott said the state’s constitution will be amended to “make clear that parents are the primary decision makers in all matters involving their children.” The bill will expand parents access to school curriculum and ensure material is available online or in other easily accessible ways, he said.
“We will make sure parents concerns about school curriculum or policies will be heard quickly and respectfully,’ Abbott said, adding that under his plan the state will give parents the option if their child will repeat a course or grade level instead of leaving the decision solely to the school district.
To protect children’s privacy in schools, the state will also prohibit the selling or the sharing of students’ personal data outside of the Texas public education system, Abbott said.
Abbott, who is running for reelection, has made it a point to target inappropriate content in schools. In November, he directed the Texas Education Agency to develop statewide standards preventing “obscene content in Texas public schools.” Shortly after he told the agency to investigate criminal activity related to “the availability of pornography” in public schools, saying the agency should refer to such instances “for prosecution to the fullest extent of the law.”
Parents. Matter.
Under my Parental Bill of Rights, we will amend the Texas Constitution to reinforce that parents are the main decision makers in all matters involving their children. pic.twitter.com/z64eobbk7Y
Under the Parent Bill of Rights, Abbott said any educator convicted of providing minors with “obscene” content will lose their educational credentials and state licensing, forfeit their retirement benefits and will be placed on a “do not hire” list. The state will also require schools to post the bill online for parents to access.
“Also school districts will be required to provide parents with information and options for charter schools, magnet schools and other public schools as alternatives for their children,” Abbott said.
Former U.S. Secretary of Education Bill Bennett, who served under President Ronald Reagan, congratulated Abbott on the bill and reiterated the importance of parents involvement in classroom issues. He said the bill will likely be imitated in other states. “Not every teacher is a parent but every parent is a teacher,” Bennett said. “We know that the parents influence on the child is the greatest influence of any adult…We need to restore the priority of the parent to the classroom and to the child’s education which is what you are doing.”
Bennett also advised parents to not be “intimidated by the cult of expertise.” “When it comes to education of children, if you don’t understand what they’re talking about, you’re probably right and they’re probably wrong,” he said. “It’s not complicated what to teach children and what parents want schools to do is teach children how to read, write, count and think and develop reliable standards of right and wrong.”
Abbott’s action follows the lead of other Republican leaders across the U.S. who have issued similar bills. Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a Parents Bill of Rights in June of 2021. The Intercultural Development Research Association, which has voiced opposition to Abbott’s “critical race theory” bill that went into effect in December, issued a statement Thursday denouncing the governor’s bill, calling it another coordinated attack on the rights of students, parents and teachers in public schools.
We expect to see a “parent’s bill of rights” released in Texas today. If it’s anything like similar proposals, it will be nothing more than a coordinated attack on the rights of students, parents, and teachers in public schools. #TeachtheTruth 🧵https://t.co/MYtNi6epKX
“All families must be part of building excellent and equitable schools regardless of their racial or ethnic background or socio-economic status,” the statement said. “Unfortunately, many schools have not prioritized or invested in developing authentic relationships with families, particularly those of color, those with limited incomes, and immigrant families.”
The IDRA also called out groups attempting to pit families and schools against each other with the goal of passing legislation that “whitewashes and simplifies” history.
“These groups, who purport to represent values such as ‘equality’ and ‘transparency’ are feeding some families inaccurate information about their schools and encouraging them to make harmful demands and violent interventions in school policymaking to advance policies that actually widen inequalities and exclusion,” the statement said. “They are pushing their economic, social, and political agendas under the name of ‘parent engagement.’ This is dangerous.”
Please notice it is the right wing ideas and parents that are being encouraged to interfere, given authority over the classroom, and are being touted as needing to tell schools what to teach. If you are progressive, believe in equality, understanding, and tolerance, then keep it to your self. This is simply an attempt to legalize brain washing kids into a right wing 1950’s agenda / propaganda. Remember get the kids young, drill into them to be good little republican worker bees and you got a bunch of future white supremacist running around. Not all kids will go that way, but look at the problems we have in the rural areas of red states where this basically has been done in their schools. The Christian white nationalist right wing Republican is a minority trying desperately to keep the power and advantage the had to continue to rule as they did. It is that simple. They are using the same tactics Putin used and farmed out to other authoritarian states to demonize and then erase LGBTQ+ people from their societies. They idea of no mask or never shutting schools is to keep the parents working. The wealthy lost a lot of profit of the workers, need to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Why is the only parents that matter over healthcare are the anti-maskers? Why do those kids get to make other kids / families sick? Also notice the constant slam that the educators and the educated are wrong. If you don’t understand what the teacher is saying then the teacher is wrong! Don’t trust science and facts, go with myth and make believe to again be a good dumb worker bee. Scottie
For the first morning since last Sunday I feel almost normal. I have been sick for a week, Ron thinks we had a version of Covid. I don’t care what the name of the thing is all I know is it put me in my bed. I like my bed but not anywhere that much. But the roundup still got done. Ron said I was crazy and I told him it is an addiction to editorial cartoons. Scottie
After a blockbuster year, the 5 biggest Wall Street banks just paid out $142 billion in bonuses and compensation for 2021 — $18 billion more than in 2020.
Why do banks do so well when people are suffering? Let's go back to the 1980s.https://t.co/IebqruygTd
Republicans can’t defend their policies. Killing the political conversation is their mission.
Republican religion, nor their pro-life gaslight, will ever look to help the poor/vulnerable.
Helping the richest is their zero sum game.
Also, people like Putin create refugees through their military/foreign policy, [see Syria], yet conservatives love Putin.
By creating refugees, conservatives always have a boogeyman to frighten their base.
Conservative policies are about isolation and lonerism. Inclusion is a threat.
We are a society of different people, and that scares people who only value whiteness.
Empathy evolves in stages. Some people will always be stunted at the lower levels. Unfortunately, those at the lower levels can’t experience/see/feel what the people at the higher levels experience. That discrepancy between levels is what defines our current politics.
Under funding schools and education is criminal.
Teachers are long a target of conservative cuts. Teachers are 75% women.
We will never have strong communities until we invest in schools and teachers as core infrastructure. This is the foundation.
Unfortunately, there are Not two sides of the same. The GOP Big Lie is a Fact… and So is their attempt at voter-suppression. The Dem side is a Big Truth, and should be noted as such. At least he has confessed the “Big Lie” to be a lie. That’s progress. His lame attempt to both-sides the dishonesty is no more blameworthy than the snarls of a cornered beast. With apologies to Upton Sinclair, It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his standing within his tribe depends upon his not understanding it. Scottie
Is that not the job of the press secretary? It has been done in every administration I can remember. Often it is a deliberate attempt to get a conversation going in the media or to change the Overton window. I would point out the prior administration went through a lot of press secretaries because they were required by their boss to flat out lie to back up his many lies. Scottie
Other than a small minority of cult like followers no one likes tRump nor wants him to run in 2024. More and more Republicans are openly saying it as tRump’s influence over the base is shrinking. The 2020 presidential election was not about Biden and his polices, but a referendum on tRump. tRump was rejected. He will be rejected by an even larger margin if he runs again. Scottie
The right wing media is desperate to bring Biden down. Think on it, what have the Republicans done they can brag about? They are reduced to lying about supporting bills they voted against. So they hammer on Biden’s poll numbers. It is partly the Biden’s peoples fault, they don’t brag enough on what they have accomplished, unlike the former guy who had to make most things up. Scottie
The distinction is extremely clear to me. If you don’t get it, try being a pregnant female. BEFORE birth, there’s a woman who has bodily autonomy or she’s less than a full human. AFTER birth there are two humans.
This is BS propaganda. Abortions after gestational age of 21 weeks are extremely rare (<1%). They are fundamentally illegal unless medically necessary. The vast majority of those abortions are when the fetus is no longer viable. Overturning RvW most likely will not even ban these types of abortions more than they are now.
That fetus abandoned in the trash was most likely a baby that the mother had to conceal because she didn’t know what else to do. This is often caused by the stigma created by families about pregnancy outside of marriage by young women incapable of taking care of the child. It speaks to the fact that American society does less to encourage a mother to keep her child by supporting both the mother and child (the infamous “welfare mother” stigma). It’s so much easier for conservatives to punish the mother for getting an abortion and forcing her to carry the baby’s to terms and then abandon both mother and child. Scottie
Florida State Capitol building (Photo Credit: State of Florida)
TALLAHASSEE – A Republican majority Florida House Education & Employment Committee passed HB 1557, the Parental Rights in Education bill, colloquially referred to as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill advancing the measure to the full House.
HB 1557 and its companion Senate bill SB 1834, would ban classroom discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity in schools, erasing LGBTQ identity, history, and culture — as well as LGBTQ students themselves.
The bill also has provisions that appear to undermine LGBTQ support in schools and include vague parental notification requirements which could effectively “out” LGBTQ-identifying students to their parents without their consent.
“The Trevor Project’s research has found that LGBTQ youth who learned about LGBTQ issues or people in classes at school had 23% lower odds of reporting a suicide attempt in the past year. This bill will erase young LGBTQ students across Florida, forcing many back into the closet by policing their identity and silencing important discussions about the issues they face,” said Sam Ames, Director of Advocacy and Government Affairs at The Trevor Project. “LGBTQ students deserve their history and experiences to be reflected in their education, just like their peers.”
In an email to the Blade, Brandon J. Wolf, the Press Secretary for Equality Florida noted; “Governor DeSantis’ march toward his own personal surveillance state continues. Today, the Don’t Say Gay bill, a piece of legislation to erase discussion of LGBTQ people from schools in Florida, passed its first committee and became another component of an agenda designed to police us in our classrooms, doctor’s offices, and workplaces. Make no mistake — LGBTQ people are your neighbors, family members, and friends. We are a normal, healthy part of society and we will not be erased.”
This will kill kids, @RonDeSantisFL. You are purposefully making your state a harder place for LGBTQ kids to survive in. In a national survey (@TrevorProject), 42% of LGBTQ youth seriously considered attempting suicide last year. Now they can't talk to their teachers? https://t.co/VtfFLPlsn3
The Trevor Project’s 2021 National Survey on LGBTQ Youth Mental Health found that more than 42% of LGBTQ youth seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year, including more than half of transgender and nonbinary youth.
According to a recent poll conducted by Morning Consult on behalf of The Trevor Project, 85% of transgender and nonbinary youth — and two-thirds of all LGBTQ youth (66%) — say recent debates about state laws restricting the rights of transgender people have negatively impacted their mental health.
When asked about proposed legislation that would require schools to tell a student’s parent or guardian if they request to use a different name/pronoun or if they identify as LGBTQ at school, 56% of transgender and nonbinary youth said it made them feel angry, 47% felt nervous and/or scared, 45% felt stressed, and more than 1 in 3 felt sad.
The Florida House is moving to ban LGBTQ history and inclusive conversations in the classroom. They’re targeting the identities of CHILDREN.
We need to show students that they belong and that there is power in loving yourself.
I had chemo in 2020 which means I sat alone (b/c, the pandemic) with my hands/feet immersed in ice and have been nauseous/ constipated and lost my hair, eyebrows and eyelashes.
This has been worse. I’d rather get chemo all over again than get back on the phone w/@EmblemHealth 9/
People deserve to have the right of free healthcare. It should be one of the main functions of the government to care for the well being of the people. Oh wait it is but that part is ignore in favor of profit. We need universal expanded Medicare for all
9 day, 8000 worker strike and the New York Times hadn’t covered it once, they did however publish 26 separate articles about a rich tennis player being inconvenienced by Australia’s vaccine rules https://t.co/6quN1Iq0Y1
Biden acknowledges he didn't anticipate how much opposition he would face from Rs.
Which is something bc much of the 2020 primary was everyone yelling at him that he was failing to anticipate how much opposition he would face from Rs after he promised they'd have an "epiphany."
Justice Roberts, this shame is on you. Your legacy is that of vengeful racism. You destroyed voting rights for millions. You are the architect of undermining election integrity and global disenfranchisement of non-white voters.
Yeah, Lisa! Nothing worse than preventing the country from crumbling into the rubble of a third world nation! Good thing the Obstructionist party is hard at work preventing progress and making sure needless defense contracts keep getting filled! Scottie
Hillary has not even hinted at running. The right loves that they have made her such a boogieman after 30 years of attacks and they can not wait to trot her out to scare their base. It is that simple. No one in the Democratic party has wanted her to run again, it is just the left hoping to gin up outrage in the cult. Republicans had an opportunity to prevent this twice by voting to convict Trump. Republicans can also prevent Trump from running by taking him to task for his lies about voter fraud. They can also stop rigging the system in order to make it harder for people to vote and creating a situation where Republicans can overturn any election results they don’t like. Meanwhile, it is unlikely Hillary will be running since there is a Democrat in the White House. Besides what is the big deal? The Republican Party failed to lock her up, so it looks like she did nothing wrong. Scottie
I am seeing versions of this everywhere. It is very misleading. Democrats do not mind ID, but we are against the Republican ID requirements that make ID’s nearly impossible for some people to get and they accept only certain ID’s they think their voters might have no matter how obscure while denying popular forms of ID’s that Democratic voters might have. Scottie
on
This is BS propaganda. Abortions after gestational age of 21 weeks are extremely rare (<1%). They are fundamentally illegal unless medically necessary. The vast majority of those abortions are when the fetus is no longer viable. Overturning RvW most likely will not even ban these types of abortions more than they are now.
That fetus abandoned in the trash was most likely a baby that the mother had to conceal because she didn’t know what else to do. This is often caused by the stigma created by families about pregnancy outside of marriage by young women incapable of taking care of the child. It speaks to the fact that American society does less to encourage a mother to keep her child by supporting both the mother and child (the infamous “welfare mother” stigma). It’s so much easier for conservatives to punish the mother for getting an abortion and forcing her to carry the baby’s to terms and then abandon both mother and child. Scottie