Denying the right to adopt a child for all the wrong reasons

Elton John has been trying to adopt an HIV-positive Ukrainian child for a little while now. Of course, any reasonable person reading this could only feel joy at the prospect of such a good and great man desiring to rescue a young child, whom few others would want due to his HIV, from a place like the Ukraine and to give him a wonderful new home.

But then, not everyone is reasonable. Kind of like the Ukrainian minister for family affairs.

(KIEV, Ukraine) — Elton John will not be able to adopt a 14-month-old Ukrainian child because the pop star is too old and isn't traditionally married, Ukraine's minister for family affairs said Monday.

The pop signer toured a hospital for HIV-infected children in eastern Ukraine on Saturday as part of a charity project and said that he and his male partner David Furnish wanted to adopt an HIV-infected boy named Lev.

But the country's Family, Youth and Sports Minister Yuriy Pavlenko told The Associated Press that adoptive parents must be married and Ukraine does not recognize homosexual unions as marriage.

Oh, for fuck’s sake. Really? Being married to someone of the same sex as yourself denies you the right to save a child in these twits’ eyes?

The minister also cites Elton John's age (62) as a reason why he can’t adopt Lev (the HIV-positive child he and his partner have fallen for), saying that Ukrainian law requires adoptive parents to be within 45 years in age from the child's own age. Actually, unlike refusing adoptions on the basis of gay marriage (urgh), this is actually a lot more reasonable, in general. We’ve all heard those reports about 70-year-olds becoming mothers and such, and we’ve all (rightfully) questioned whether or not someone could still be allowed to have a child, whether born or adopted, if they were past a certain age limit. While I don’t think Elton’s 62 years make him too old in this case (especially considering his plentiful energy), a potential adoptive parent's age should definitely be a mitigating factor.

Well, that post seemed to have gone off-track a bit, there at the end. The point is that refusing someone like Elton John the right to adopt a child, especially when A) the child is seriously in need like Lev is and B) the potential adoptive parent is so obviously more-than-capable to love and care for the child, is just stupid.

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