Are you parent one or parent two?

[CoolBreeze]

Are you "gender neutral"? Are you parent one or parent two? How do you decide which one you are? Do you take turns? Have we gone crazy? YES!

WASHINGTON - Goodbye, Mom and Dad. Hello, Parent One and Parent Two.

The State Department has decided to make U.S. passport application forms "gender neutral" by removing references to mother and father, officials said, in favor of language that describes one's parentage somewhat less tenderly.

The change is "in recognition of different types of families," according to a statement issued just before Christmas that drew widespread attention Friday after a Fox News report.

Official announcement of the change was buried at the end of a Dec. 22 news release titled "Consular Report of Birth Abroad Certificate Improvements" that highlighted unrelated new security features.

The new policy is a win for gay rights groups, a vocal and financially generous Democratic voting bloc that has pushed for the change since Barack Obama began his presidential transition in late 2008. The decision follows last month's vote to end the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, which gay leaders consider one of their biggest victories in years.

more...
http://www.dailymail.com/foodandliving/201101091371

[Tom Taggart]

Open season for mischief in divorced families. For example: Father and mother divorce. Father has dual nationality (let's use Costa Rica, which apparently isn't a Hague Convention signatory); Father and his girl friend sign pass port application as "parent 1 and parent 2"--arguably legal since there is no state designation as "parent" (in Ohio it is custodial and non-custodial parent); and the Federal law doesn't describe what "parent" means.

Father & girlfriend & kid take off for Costa Rica--mother of the child, his ex-wife, has no idea that they've even applied for a passport for the child.

[Bob Campbell]

Keep up. The plan was changed last week to allow both answers, Mother or father, or parent.

[genlock]

Global warming or climate change.