PARENT'S RIGHTS NOW!

The AP has reported that the biological father of the Malawian boy adopted by Pop Icon Madonna is now having doubts about the transaction. The boy's father, who is illiterate, now claims that he did not understand that the adoption would permanently sever the parent/child relationship between him and his son. Regardless of the outcome of this case, it demonstrates that extra precaution should be taken to insure that those who are surrendering their parental rights understand what they are doing. This is expecially true in those cases where one of the parties is illiterate, there is great financial discrepancy between the biological parent and the adoptee parent, and the adoption is cross-cultural. Even more caution should be taken where the child is illegitimate, paternity has not been established through genetic testing, and the putative father is surrenderng his pateranl rights.