[NEWS RELEASE] Equality Florida on Outrageous Comments by Representative Baxley Disparaging LGBT Families
October 11, 2013
Equality Florida on Outrageous Comments by Representative Baxley Disparaging LGBT Families
“We hope Representative Baxley has the decency to apologize for his comments disparaging gay parents and our children. More than that, we invite Representative Baxley to educate himself, talk with us and actually meet our families. We are a diverse state and no elected official can fulfill their oath of office if they only respect and care about the people and families that look just like their own,” said Nadine Smith, CEO of Equality Florida.
“The entire child welfare community, every credible agency and all research, is unanimous in recognizing that gay parents are equally capable of of raising children and that our kids do just as well as their classmates.”
Equality Florida has requested a meeting with Representative Baxley after his comments on Tuesday, October 8 in the House, K-12 Subcommittee disparaging LGBT parents, comparing them to abusive parents and equating having same-sex parents with alcoholism. Below is the text of his statement:
"It's easy to say parents need to get involved, but half these kids are raising themselves; they don't have any parents that are functional. How can we address that? I know it's scope and I know it's hard, but you're probably their only hope. I mean I sat an hour and a half with a teacher telling me, well this child has got serial men coming through the house, this one has two mommies, this one has an abusive father who's home, this one has alcoholism, this one has drug abuse. It was a casualty warfare event to hear - just her classroom - how many dysfunctional, atypical - to me - uh, structures are in the way of a kid having a chance to learn." Representative Dennis Baxley see video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJBLU6vnQ3Q
Equality Florida is the largest civil rights organization dedicated to securing full equality for Florida's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. www.eqfl.org
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Media Contacts:
Nadine Smith, CEO, Equality Florida [email protected]
Sharon Kersten, Kersten Communications 305.458.3639 / [email protected]