By JAMILA RIZVI
My mum always likes to tell me that there is no substitute for a happy childhood. And she’s right.
Like me, the little girl in this video had a truly happy childhood. She was played with. She was read to. She was cared for. She was and still is, loved.
But there’s a difference between her and me…
The law doesn’t recognise her family as a family. Her family are invisible.
And how can that be? How is it possible that parents who teach their children to ride a bike without training wheels, who sit up with them all night when they’re scared of the snarling, spotty monster in the closet, who don’t sleep until that fever starts to abate, who listen to the terrible excuse for music that is made while studying for a grade 2 flute exam… aren’t considered a family in the same way mine is?
No matter how many people enter and exit through the revolving door of your life, the impact of those who raised you, always remains. I cannot comprehend that anyone who has had the luck and good fortune to have a happy childhood, could consider the family in this video as any less worthy than their own.
Words escape me, so I’ll steal someone else’s.
The Beatles were right: All you need is love.
Comments
10 Comments so far
Funnily enough, I quoted the Beatles to my brother today, the same quote too.
“All you need is love.”
That says it all really.
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I’m supporting same sex marriage and hope to see acceptance of it within my lifetime. Touching video!
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100% in favour of same sex marriage.
100% in favour of same sex couples adopting or making alternative arrangements to have children.
100% against the constant preaching about the subject.
The video was well made but so emotionally charged that it made my head spin. It contained no new angle. There was no new information. Just the same old, same old “we know what’s good for you”.
Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the law supposed to be reason free from emotion ?
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The application of the law is, the fight for change and creation of law rarely is.
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They are having a campaign in AllOut , they need 50,000 signatures . show your support here: http://www.allout.org/invisibleparents
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All I could think of while I watched that clip is that the dad is exactly like my husband is with our girls, and how my dad was with my sister and I.
Of course a persons sexuality is an important part of who they are. But it’s not as important as being a loving parent – if they want to be a parent that is.
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First up, I am entirely in favour of gay and lesbian couples having the right to marry.
But putting that aside, what I find odd is that marriage is the thing we choose to deny them. As I understand it (and please correct me if I am wrong), same sex couples can adopt children. They can foster children and obviously for lesbian couples, have children.
Isnt the environment that a child is raised in more important than a government-endorsed institution? If these relationships are deemed good enough for children, I just dont understand why allowing them to marry is a big deal.
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Hi there Sarah. My understanding is that gay and lesbian adoption is only legal in some of Australia’s states and territories, and not all. JR
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Does that mean that only gay couples living in those particular states and territories have access to adoption ?
Say for example the couple are residents of Queensland (and they can’t legally adopt there), can they pop over the boarder to NSW (for example where it may be legal) and lodge the paperwork there ?
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Gay guys can have children too. I know a gay couple who used their sperm & a surrogate mum from America. They now have twin boys with 2 different biological fathers.
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