TY - BOOK ID - 78494264 TI - Giving up baby PY - 2015 SN - 1479883077 9781479883073 9781479897926 1479897922 9781479806362 1479806366 9781479867523 1479867527 PB - New York London DB - UniCat KW - Abandoned children -- Legal status, laws, etc. -- United States. KW - Abandoned children -- United States. KW - Adoption -- Law and legislation -- United States. KW - Adoption -- United States. KW - Birthmothers -- Legal status, laws, etc. -- United States. KW - Birthmothers -- United States. KW - Abandoned children KW - Birthmothers KW - Adoption KW - Social Welfare & Social Work KW - Social Sciences KW - Social Welfare & Social Work - General KW - Birth mothers KW - Birthparents KW - Mothers KW - Children, Abandoned KW - Exposed children KW - Homeless children KW - Legal status, laws, etc KW - Law and legislation KW - LAW / Child Advocacy. KW - United States. KW - Legal status, laws, etc. KW - United States KW - Child placing KW - Foster home care KW - Parent and child UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:78494264 AB - “Baby safe haven” laws, which allow a parent to relinquish anewborn baby legally and anonymously at a specified institutional location—suchas a hospital or fire station—were established in every state between 1999 and2009. Promoted during a time of heated public debate over policies on abortion,sex education, teen pregnancy, adoption, welfare, immigrant reproduction, andchild abuse, safe haven laws were passed by the majority of states with littlecontest. These laws were thought to offer a solution tothe consequences of unwanted pregnancies: mothers would no longer beburdened with children they could not care for, and newborn babies would nolonger be abandoned in dumpsters.Yet while these laws are well meaning, they ignore the real problem: somewomen lack key social and economic supports that mothers need to raisechildren. Safe haven laws do little to help disadvantaged women. Instead,advocates of safe haven laws target teenagers, women of color, and poor womenwith safe haven information and see relinquishing custody of their newborns asan act of maternal love. Disadvantaged women are preemptively judged as “bad”mothers whose babies would be better off without them.Laury Oaks argues that the labeling of certain kinds ofwomen as potential “bad” mothers who should consider anonymously giving uptheir newborns for adoption into a “loving” home should best be understood asan issue of reproductive justice. Safe haven discourses promote narrow imagesof who deserves to be a mother and reflect restrictive views on how we shouldtreat women experiencing unwanted pregnancy. ER -