12yo blasts adoption inquiry
Twelve-year-old Brenna Harding stared down conservative MPs David Clark and Fred Nile while giving evidence before the same-sex adoption inquiry.
The daughter of Vicki Harding and Jackie Braw told the committee last week she wanted her second mum, Jackie, to adopt her so they could be recognised as a family.
I think it would be great if she was legally recognised. I mean, I already recognise her as my mum. But legally there are things like medical [issues…], Brenna said.
Neither Clark nor Nile had any questions for Brenna or her mothers, despite the committee’s intense interrogation of the Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby earlier.
A third conservative MP on the committee, Labor MLC Greg Donnelly, made no attempt to hide his hostility to a dad-free family and pressed Brenna seven times on her relationship with her biological father.
He’s not my father, he’s my donor. He doesn’t live with me, he hasn’t raised me. I see him but he isn’t like Jackie, she responded.
Donnelly, a conservative Catholic and former secretary of the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Union, continued to press the family to respond to US research on single mothers.
A daughter has special needs of her father especially the approval of her attractiveness as a person, acceptance of body shape, encouraging the confidence to say no to drugs, and understanding what she should expect in her relationships with men including sexuality, he quoted.
Brenna said she felt her mothers had those things quite under control.
There are plenty of families with fathers where those messages are not delivered to their daughters. The proof is in the pudding, the children, Vicki Harding added.
The mothers had selected a school they knew would be good for Brenna, and addressed teasing by other students.
Kids find amazing reasons to tease kids. We had a very slight issue in grade three. This boy had heard those teasing words somewhere, he was eight years old, it hasn’t come out of thin air, Vicki Harding said.
He’s heard that at home, in his community somewhere. If there wasn’t discrimination this situation wouldn’t arise.
It’s not do we have children as GLBTs, because anybody’s children could be teased.
The Harding mother and daughter team are known in same-sex parenting circles as the co-authors of the Learn To Include children’s books.
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“A daughter has special needs of her father especially the approval of her attractiveness as a person, acceptance of body shape…”
Aside from everything else wrong that he’s said – are you kidding me about this part? Don’t we already have enough trouble with the mass social messaging that a woman’s main value is contingent upon how attractive men find her???
My father and I have an ok relationship except that the only praise he has ever given to me has been about my beauty. My other achievements have never rated a mention. Everytime he has spoken about another woman around me, their physical attractiveness is always the main comment.
Among my girlfriends and boyfriends this is a common father. We’ve all had eating disorders and issues with our relationships with men. I’m still working on learning to let me be myself around men, and not waste so much time always making sure i look/act perfect.
My aunts however, who are in a stable, committed, same sex relationship, were the ones who taught me that relationships are about respecting and loving your partner, about friendship and equality.
I love my dad but i certainly know who has had the more positive impact in my upbringing.
Its very good to see such a talented actress stand up for what she beleives in. It takes courage from a girl your age, and even a girl my age (16) to stand up for something this huge.
So I congratulate you on doing this, you rock Brenna Harding!!
XXX Catharyn, p.s love your performance as Georgina on Rafters <3
BRENNA YOUR AMAZING!
You’re an amazing friend!
Yes… I googled you :P
The Adoption Act 2000 No 75 needs to be amended to include all couples (both same and opposite sex). Guess when this legal recommendation came about, in 1997 – 11 years ago!
I recently had an intense argument with my male partner (we are a heterosexual couple), about queer representations in children’s literature.
He had brought home a book about a homeless dog who at the end of the day is adopted by a family. We only see the family at the very end, unsurprisingly depicted as mother, father and two children. Upon seeing this, I said, ‘How hetero-normative! But I liked the story about the dog.’
And the debate began! My partner became upset and said that putting in pictures of 2 queer parents would detract from the main story and result in ‘kids asking questions’.
I argued back that if we are serious about working towards a more inclusive society, then should we not start with the children? Besides, I think it is adults who have difficulty breaking down more rigid (dare I say: more homophobic) perceptions of parenthood, not kids.
We can give kids more credit and trust them to ask questions, and when told, ‘Well there are many different kinds of families, including ones with two mummies’ (for example), we can also trust that they will accept this and move on.
Moreover, my partner insisted that ‘if you want to read books about lesbian parenthood, then there are books on that, but this is not one of them’.
Clearly, I did not want the story to be anything other than a story about a dog, but consider it an injustice that the family depicted had to be a heteronormative one, as seen in most children’s books, thereby relegating more diverse forms of families into books dealing STRICTLY with why it is okay that they are different from heteronormative families.
It sucks to not be represented. It sucks to be relegated to the sidelines. As a woman, a woman of ‘Asian’ appearance, I know this very well.
To point out what has become invisible through the process of normalisation is always a risky endeavour. I just hope that I will have more productive arguments than the one I had a few nights ago, which ended with me saying that I wanted to ‘harpoon my boyfriend’s balls’.
Good on you! Brenna Harding your my hero!!!!!