Know your ballot: Proposed Initiative Act No. 1
Besides deciding on a new US President, Fayetteville Mayor and local City Council Aldermen, you’ll find five other ballot issues when you vote this year. We’ll do our best to let you know what’s up with each one. Don’t hesitate to chime in and correct us if we’re wrong. Cool?
First on the list is Initiated Act 1 which would prevent unmarried couples from being able to adopt a child in Arkansas.
This issue is pretty heated since it doesn’t take too much thought to realize that it is an attempt to keep gay people from adopting a child.
A blanket rule that just says “no, you can’t adopt because you’re not married” doesn’t exactly take into consideration the best interests of the children involved. Of course, that’s just our opinion.
If you can’t decide how you personally feel about this issue, we’d suggest voting “AGAINST” so the welfare experts can continue to decide on a case-by-case basis whether or not a couple should be allowed to adopt a child.
Who supports this: Family Council Action Committe
Who opposes this: Arkansas Families First
Comments
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Strokitecture
October 21, 2008
i just want to say good job to our buddies at the flyer. thanks for bringing real topics forward in a simple way that hopefully compels even a few people to read up on what they will soon be voting on. props and cheers.
Strokitecture
October 21, 2008
ok now that the above has been stated…
if you don’t vote against this bull**** you are a selfish bastard with no concept of the human capacity for love and are clearly afraid of life simply because you do not always understand it.
Total Bastard
October 21, 2008
I agree.
Gay people deserve the same rights as everybody else.
Boggy Creek Creature
October 22, 2008
Let me add my voice in thanks for The Flyer. The breakdown of the ballot really helped me and the wife make up our minds. Excellent job, ya’ll.
Viva The Flyer!
Stephen
November 3, 2008
I disagree Strokitecture. And the fact that you state your opinion with emotion instead of reason serves only to dissuade me from listening to your argument, if you call an ignorance filled rant an argument. Statistics show that people (not even considering unmarried couples here; unmarried couples have a worse rate than platonic roommates so I’m being nice here ) who enter into rental or mortgage agreements have a higher chance that one party will decide to leave before the end of the agreed term than do married couples. Divorce is a horrible thing for a child to go through, and the odds are already stacked against children that they may suffer it in their parents. But as bad as the rates of divorce are, they pale in comparison to the rate of failed relationships that didn’t result in marriage, even those that last many years. The issue here is not gay couples, they are not a legitimate union recognized by the state at this time. I support gay marriage, but until it’s legalized, I do not support them adopting children. Thats much like Pot heads trying to get pot legalized by arguing it’s good for sick people. First fight for gay marriage then you can adopt kids! The issue here, is couples who can get married, even by a justice of the peace quite cheaply (mine was), but have chosen not too. Child services would not adopt a child out to a couple only recently together. So if a long standing couple is not willing to publicly cement their relationship, how are they do be proven serious enough to be together for that child for possibly 18 yrs. or more? If they can’t commit to each other, how to the child? I will be voting yes to this act. It takes a couple to create a child, it takes a couple to raise a child. My mother did her best, with my Father there she could have done better. Vote your conscience and together we will all decide.
bob
November 4, 2008
First i must say thank flyer for put this out and putting it laymens terms. It really has helped me decide how i am going to vote, except for this particulare issue. At first i was against this, but thinking about it and stephen your argument was very good and has put me on the fence. God I love this country.
George
November 4, 2008
I stronglY recommend voting NO to Act 1. To Stephen’s point, let’s say an unwed couple does adopt, one of them turns out to be a deadbeat and bails out. This still leaves the child with one more loving parent than they had before. Or maybe the couple splits up and both are committed to remaining quality parents. My wife and I are both wonderful parents…we were just terrible as husband & wife. Should our child be taken away b/c we are no longer married? Would that be the best thing for her? Definitely not. That’s the argument you’d basically have to make to vote for Act 1.
VOTE NO!!!
SteezyDeezy
November 5, 2008
Let’s move forward Arkansas! SERIOUS FAIL tonight!
Angel Lust
November 5, 2008
No one who knows me would ever consider me a liberal and I have no interest in what people call the “gay agenda”.
I do work treat children in foster care on a daily basis. Every day, I see children desperate for the simple need of safety and freedom from physical and/or sexual abuse in a home where the message is that someone cares for their welfare.
Passage of this issue seriously limits those opportunities.
It is a sad day.
Farrah
November 5, 2008
This is hugely disappointing.
Stephen (again)
November 6, 2008
Like I said, ACT 1 had nothing to do with HOMOSEXUALS at all. They were not going to get children given to them anyway, whether this passed or not, because they’re union is not valid in this state at this time. The fact that this act was being championed in public by HOMOSEXUALS who were spouting support of the ACT as being anti-gay goes a long way towards explaining why it passed as easily as it did. If anything this bill was anti Hippie. Not to be unfair, however, the vast majority of people who would have STILL (keep that in mind) been able to adopt children had this failed to pass, are far left couples who refuse to get married or publicly acknowledge their cemented relationship because they feel they have the right to do so and are bawking at government meddling in their lives. Homosexuals either male or female, cannot adopt children had it passed or not, period, due to other adoptive regulations and practices pertaining to non-family members living in the home the child would live in. What I’m amazed by is that the Homosexual community would embraces defeating this act because it’s passing would, by loop hole, give them a stance one rung closer towards being a normal couple, in spite of the fact that statistical evidence shows that children placed in non-married homes for whatever reason, are at a much higher risk of being subjected to physical, mental, or sexual abuse. Use the democratic system thats in place to get your right to marry (dem. congress, senate, and pres. now shouldn’t be hard), then you can adopt kids. Don’t, however, get involved in ACTs that have nothing to do with you whatsoever and risk endangering the lives and well being of children who have suffered enough already, just to further your own agenda. Tisk Tisk Tisk. This is how you risk marginalizing non-homosexuals like myself who support your right to be a couple and wedd, which will do more to hurt you than some act that has nothing to do with you anyway. Just my two cents. OBAMA RULES SOON : )
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