Thursday, July 30, 2009

Birth Certificates: Why It's Good to Have One


So I'm sure everyone's aware of the Birther Conspiracy by now. This is the gem that claims Obama's secretly foreign, and therefore secretly not the actual President. The funny thing is, everyone's focus is primarily on the birth certificate. (It's real - go check it out for yourselves, damnit.)



To me this is extra funny because of course, I wasn't born in a hospital; there was no attending physician; and I didn't even get my birth certificate - or social security number - till I was 4 and my sister was 6.

Home birth, abstinence from medical care, and general crazy-in-the-woods isolationism were all really important to the theology of my now-senile (but always crazy) cult leader grandmother. She conned my mother and hundreds of other women into these home births, and encouraged them to stay "out of the system". That particular aspect of her theology kicked in sometime in the two years between my brother's birth and my sister's, so he has a normal birth certificate (although, obviously, not signed by a hospital administrator) and my sister and I eventually got "delayed birth certificates". A DBC is basically a piece of paper saying "Some people claim to be related to this kid". It helps when getting a driver's license or applying for a job, but it is missing some critical elements of credibility.

When she was 19, my sister had a chance to accompany my mom on a foreign business trip to Venezuela. Since my sister has been in love with the Spanish language since she was a second grader, she set about getting her passport. And you know what? It's hard to get one of those when you have no proof of your citizenship/existence before age 6. We ended up putting together a package for the Passport Office that included photocopies of birth records in the family Bible and dozens of pictures of my sister from being a squashy newborn, through years of pictures with my mom, my older brother, and myself, to her blonde-goth high school yearbook photo. Eventually she got the passport, went on her trip, and two years later even spent a semester abroad in South America. When I was applying for my own passport a year later, it was easier. I just sent them the same box, with a letter saying basically "You gave her one." Of course, I ended up tearing my shoulder a week before I was supposed to go to Germany, and in the past 8 years since then, I still haven't made it off American soil. Tragic, really.

All this is really is just to say: Not only did my grandmother totally warp my mind with her crazy dogma; She's ruined my chances of becoming President. Oh well, at least my kid was born in a hospital - I've got the paperwork and everything.

The picture in this post is of Barack Hussein Obama's certificate of live birth from the State of Hawaii. Never believe what FactCheck.org has thoroughly debunked.