Following Attorney General Investigation, Arizona-based Antigay Adoption Service Stops Business in New York: Lambda Legal’s Clients Vindicated
Posted on March 4, 2009
Filed Under Uncategorized
Adoption.com and Parentprofiles.com, national parent profile posting websites, discriminate based on sexual orientation.
(New York, March 4, 2009) — In an announcement issued today by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, the antigay Arizona-based Adoption Profiles, LLC and Adoption Media, LLC stopped doing business in New York.
The Attorney General’s announcement follows a complaint filed by Lambda Legal on behalf of a New York gay couple barred from posting their on-line adoptive-parent profile by the companies in question solely because they are a same-sex couple. Adoption Profiles, LLC and Adoption Media, LLC were violating New York laws prohibiting such discrimination.
“New York Attorney General Cuomo has sent a clear message to all businesses that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation will not be tolerated,” said Flor Bermudez, Staff Attorney at Lambda Legal. “Companies can’t come into New York and hang a sign on their door saying ‘Same-sex couples need not apply.’”
Lambda Legal clients Rosario Gennaro and Alexander Gardner knew for a long time that they wanted to have children and that adoption was the way to make it possible. The couple had a home study by a licensed social worker and obtained certification as Qualified Adoptive Parents from the New York City Surrogate Court. The couple wanted to post their profile on ParentProfiles.com and seek a match with a birth parent. However, the website’s eligibility requirements only allow a “Qualifying Husband and Wife Couple” that are “one male husband and one female wife” to use the service, thus discriminating against same-sex couples on the basis of sexual orientation, sex and marital status. The company was sued in California for violating that state’s antidiscrimination law and is no longer doing business there.
“We are thrilled that the New York Attorney General’s office made the right decision and that no couple will have to experience what we did in our effort to become parents,” said Rosario Gennaro.
The Attorney General’s announcement follows a complaint filed by Lambda Legal on behalf of a New York gay couple barred from posting their on-line adoptive-parent profile by the companies in question solely because they are a same-sex couple. Adoption Profiles, LLC and Adoption Media, LLC were violating New York laws prohibiting such discrimination.
“New York Attorney General Cuomo has sent a clear message to all businesses that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation will not be tolerated,” said Flor Bermudez, Staff Attorney at Lambda Legal. “Companies can’t come into New York and hang a sign on their door saying ‘Same-sex couples need not apply.’”
Lambda Legal clients Rosario Gennaro and Alexander Gardner knew for a long time that they wanted to have children and that adoption was the way to make it possible. The couple had a home study by a licensed social worker and obtained certification as Qualified Adoptive Parents from the New York City Surrogate Court. The couple wanted to post their profile on ParentProfiles.com and seek a match with a birth parent. However, the website’s eligibility requirements only allow a “Qualifying Husband and Wife Couple” that are “one male husband and one female wife” to use the service, thus discriminating against same-sex couples on the basis of sexual orientation, sex and marital status. The company was sued in California for violating that state’s antidiscrimination law and is no longer doing business there.
“We are thrilled that the New York Attorney General’s office made the right decision and that no couple will have to experience what we did in our effort to become parents,” said Rosario Gennaro.
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