Russia Advances Laws Banning Adoptions to Countries with Legal Gender Transitions

On 20 Novem­ber 2024, AP News report­ed that Rus­si­a’s upper house of par­lia­ment approved leg­is­la­tion pro­hibit­ing child adop­tions to coun­tries where gen­der tran­si­tions are legal, along­side bills restrict­ing the pro­mo­tion of child-free lifestyles. The arti­cle begins:

Rus­si­a’s upper house of par­lia­ment on Wednes­day endorsed a bill ban­ning adop­tion of Russ­ian chil­dren by cit­i­zens of coun­tries where gen­der tran­si­tion­ing is legal. The Fed­er­a­tion Coun­cil also approved bills that out­law the spread of mate­r­i­al that encour­ages peo­ple not to have chil­dren. The bills, which have pre­vi­ous­ly been approved by the low­er house, will now go to Pres­i­dent Vladimir Putin for sign­ing into law. They fol­low a series of laws that have sup­pressed sex­u­al minori­ties and bol­stered long­stand­ing con­ven­tion­al values…

Read more

Key Points:

1. The adop­tion ban would affect at least 15 coun­tries, pri­mar­i­ly in Europe, along with Aus­tralia, Argenti­na, and Cana­da, extend­ing a 2012 ban on US adoptions.
2. Russ­ian law­mak­ers also approved fines up to 5 mil­lion rubles for pro­mot­ing child-free lifestyles, claim­ing such mes­sages weak­en Rus­sia through pop­u­la­tion decline.
3. Putin has increas­ing­ly empha­sized tra­di­tion­al val­ues as oppo­si­tion to West­ern lib­er­al­ism, encour­ag­ing Russ­ian women to have up to eight children.
4. The leg­is­la­tion con­tin­ues Rus­si­a’s pat­tern of restrict­ing LGBTQ+ rights, fol­low­ing ear­li­er bans on gen­der tran­si­tion pro­ce­dures and des­ig­nat­ing the LGBTQ+ move­ment as extremist.