Buffy St Marie

i did see that. i meant a response, which usually comes after something

Well she got ahead of it.

(her lawyers also respond on her behalf in the article, and she declined to be interviewed for it.)

I’m going to listen to this today:

https://dont-call-me-resilient.simplecast.com/episodes/how-we-tell-buffy-sainte-maries-story-matters-explained-by-a-60s-scoop-survivor

Would they have written it at 3:15am though? Or just made up a time of birth? (I'm honestly asking, and I suppose these are questions that could be addressed if the issue was dug into further.)

― Phair · Jagger/Richards · Carl Perkins (morrisp), Wednesday, November 8, 2023 11:44 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

You didn’t know that after a kid is born the parents can make up whatever time of birth they want? All of mine were born at 4:20 on June 9th.

some interesting discussion here but ultimately imho the inference doesn’t rely on any single piece of evidence (ie birth certificate) that is alone dispositive, sufficient or necessary for the conclusion that BSM pretended. rather it’s all of the evidence taken together that makes it basically incontrovertible. the lawyerly tactic (i mean this non pejoratively) of trying to sow doubt by unraveling the weakest points of the argument won’t really work, there are just too many things that all line up and point in the same direction, can’t all be coincidences

having said that, i haven’t seen anyone address the fact that the numbers on the birth certificate line up sequentially with other births and therefore aren’t consistent with adoption. so i think the certificate is more of a smoking gun than some want to admit

I do agree that there could have been more to say in this section. For instance, it's hard to know exactly how much independent weight to give to the record numbering. Like, from BSM's point of view, if you assume that the birth certificate doesn't reflect her actual birth parents and birth location, then it doesn't seem like a huge stretch to think that the birth date on the certificate is also false, i.e. they just entered the date the certificate was written (and that this accounts for the record being at #49). That's something a historical expert might have helped with - whether this is plausible given adoption practices at the time.

― jmm

what i meant more was has anyone found a historical expert offering evidence that the contrary interpretation is correct? if so i haven’t seen it. the birth record specifies that her parents stayed in the hospital for 3 hours and that she was born at 3:15am. not clear why they would fill something in for those field if it were an adoption

@ flopson, to be clear, I wasn't trying to "sow doubt" as to point out that the particular lack-of-follow-up regarding the singular assertions made by the Stoneham town hall clerk was, broadly, hurtful to adoptees, as the things that were being expressed were by-no-means conclusive. I remain convinced by the article and doc that some manner of deception was at play, for sure. Personally, and my relative agrees, the presence of a "birth hospital" and "delivering doctor" (the same hospital and doctor that had delivered BSM's sister) on the birth certificate effectively leaves us both sufficiently convinced that "BSM was not adopted, as she has claimed"; but again, I don't know for sure if this, too, was standard practice in the issuing of birth certificates for adopted children.

To be clear, I don't think she was adopted either. I think the mass of evidence points this way, and to make the contrary work basically means explaining away all the evidence.

sorry didn’t mean to imply that that’s what you were doing or that that was your motive. unfortunate choice of word on my part. all i meant the sum of evidence is much greater than its parts here

(xp)

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