More on international adoption

Re-evaluating Adoption: Validating the Local
by Daniel Drennan

After it was reported that a French NGO named Arche de Zoé had attempted to airlift a planeload of children out of Chad for adoption in France, Ann Veneman, Executive Director of UNICEF, stated:

"This is not something that should be tolerated by the international community. It is unacceptable to see children taken out of their home countries without compliance with national and international laws."

Her outrage unfortunately reflects a one-sided worldview concerning adoption today. It can be traced back to Pearl S. Buck and other advocates from the middle of last century who saw in international adoption a "saving grace" for children around the globe. This sentiment, echoed in Arche de Zoé's mission statement, has always served as an excuse to use "orphans" as props, backdrops, and camera fodder. Operation Babylift, the post-Vietnam War media relations effort of the United States government, attempted to give Americans a positive spin on its role in the war. Unwitnessed, however, were distraught Vietnamese mothers, tearfully separated from their children who were forced onto waiting airplanes for transport overseas. Adoption's current vogue due to Hollywood celebrity public relations campaigns, which date back to the days of Joan Crawford, exemplifies but one of its more cynical manifestations. More recently, an article in New York magazine basically asks parents to quantify the unquantifiable: the love they have for their adopted children. These examples, including the statement from UNICEF, likewise reflect only one side of the debate: namely that of the adoptive parent, couple, and country.

This perception focuses solely on the unique instance of adoption as beneficent act; viewed only by itself, out of context, this is perhaps an inarguable truth. Yet individual adoption is deceptively marketed and packaged around this humanistic aspect. It mistakenly presupposes a globally valid nuclear family, as well as a concept of Third-World deliverance coming in individual doses from the developed regions of the world; it extols the child as now "better off," or "lucky," or "chosen." It depicts adoption as better than nothing and proclaims that little can be done on an individual level to change the global situation. Adoption can thus be seen to fulfill certain needs of dominant global culture, not just those of parents wishing to start a family, and focuses on children who are (perhaps ideally) least capable to speak for themselves.

These arguments, however, do not hold up to scrutiny and raise more questions than they answer. At the general level, the idea that nothing can be done to effect change in the world is self-deceiving and reflects a willful ignorance of the sacrifices required to make that change: the standard of living of the First World comes at the expense of the Third World; and there are things that could be done to greatly alleviate if not eliminate poverty in the world today if the collective will to do so, which would require change in the standard of living of the First World, existed. More specifically, even if we accept the premise that adopting children lifts them out of poverty or "saves" them, it is possible to argue that another First-World consumer in fact makes things worse on a global scale. To further deliberate: adoption on the international level creates a "demand" for orphans that is answered by Third-World countries and the agencies that serve them with a "supply" of children; it is problematic to bring a foreign-born child into a non-multi-cultural environment; individualistic, nuclear family-based cultures undo other more community-based cultures. Do we simply deny that baby theft and brokering exist? Is it not paradoxical that underclass children in First-World societies go unadopted, often for racist and ageist reasons? What aberrant First-Worldist rationale allows for the adoption of Third-World children, while forbidding adults from these same Third-World countries to emigrate, or while deporting those already present back to their home countries?

Extending this logically: does the Caribbean immigrant nanny in New York City (ironically perhaps tending to a Third-World adopted infant while far from her own family) not have the same rights as the mother she serves? As the Chadian village that has been convinced that there is a "better life" elsewhere for its children? As the adopted child who never asked to grow up in an alien and often alienating culture? Do they all have nothing to say because there is no equality of stature, no parity of action available to them, no ability to travel to Europe or America to select a white baby for themselves, no recognition of their way of life as valid, because they have no privilege and are exploitable? Should the world become suddenly egalitarian, all children given a place in their respective communities if not families, what would childless couples do then?

It is obvious why no one hears this side of the argument. The truth stings, and we recoil in the face of it, as when listening to news reports of the recent scandal from Chad; or when I hear a mother state of her daughter adopted from a former Soviet republic: "Of course I bought my baby!"; or when I stare at the check that my orphanage in Lebanon "accepted" as a gift from my parents; or when I realize that all of the names on my documentation that might link me to a birth family are completely falsified.

The blind eye turned to this bigger picture naturally overlooks the reality of adopted children's lives. Those who spent years in my orphanage remember being told that some parents-cadeaux (gift-parents) were coming to "choose a lucky child." We are chastised that we should stop searching for something that cannot be ours. For many here, we are "les enfants du peché" -- the children of sin -- and are not welcome, or else we are grudgingly received with grating platitudes. This article will tar me as an ungrateful adoptee, which is the furthest thing from the truth. None of the above monological attitudes take into consideration the thoughts, feelings, or needs of the very subjects of their so-called advocacy. They are meant to deflect questioning and derail criticism, while disparaging non-First-World views concerning adoption. They place adopted children in an existential limbo which is unjust, uncharitable, and ignoble.

Many of us recall being informed that we are fortunate since adoption is not allowed "among the Muslims." To those who are raised believing in the supremacy of the couple and child(ren)-based social unit, the very idea of growing up in an orphanage, with no "family," or otherwise under "guardianship," is unfathomable, if not horrifying. Since moving back to Lebanon three years ago, I have realized that the Qur'anic invocation concerning adoption has everything to do with children maintaining their lineage, their name, and their place in the community. Most remarkable then is the fact that these very concepts -- of lineage, name, appearance, and original community -- are the issues that most plague adult adoptees. So it should come as no surprise that those who find their birth parents -- for example, as documented in the film, Daughter of Danang, or the recent Reader's Digest article entitled "The Lost Princess" -- are often welcomed "home" by a village and not just a single family, in a complete reversal of their original trip to their adoptive land. This has been most astonishing for me in Lebanon, in terms of who has extended their community to me, beyond any preconceived expectations, much less familial or communal ties. There can be no feigning shock that the willful and deliberate misunderstanding of family and community should result in this most recent African scandal and the protests it begets, or that those destined for so-called salvation should be the ones who suffer most.

Many of the adoptees from my orphanage share one desire: the honest truth and an open discussion of their earliest days. This is where the original spin meets on-the-street reality, and it is a violent and unendurable encounter. Coming back to Lebanon has been nothing if not a rude awakening, and if I am no longer looking for my birth parents it is because I see in this search a selfish act, living now as I do in a place with an unimaginable poverty level and a political situation that is unstable to say the very least. Searching is thus a luxury, and I have let it go; comparatively speaking, I have nothing to complain about: what I have discovered regarding the abandonment and adoption of all of us who were processed through the orphanage in Beirut is too terrible to bear sometimes. I am loathe to hear questions from adoptees starting their search here, because I have little but heartbreak to extend to them. To continue to view adoption in its previous mythologised and romanticized manner has for many of us become insufferable, if not impossible.

At the same time, I am daily witness to endless First-World interference here on the political, cultural, and economic level and so can't help but make the logical leap to add adoption to a long list of injustices perpetrated from without. And I add my voice to those from the other side of the adoption myth, from fellow adoptees and the communities they come from, who now demand that the chance to critique be afforded those most justified to speak, yet most silenced. To quote an African Union missive in response to the recent events in Chad, there exists a lack of "dignity and respect" on the issue that is but a continuation of how the First World has historically viewed and treated the rest of humanity. The focus concerning adoption needs to shift from parent to child, from First World to Third. It is time to discuss international adoption openly and honestly, in order to be fair to all those affected by it. It is time to speak about the trafficking of the most fragile and defenseless of humans. It is time to speak about the hypocrisy that ignores the ever-growing gap between the First and Third Worlds and the terrible abuse of the current power imbalance between them -- a continuation of a sordid history in which the poor, the nether, the "uncivilized" portions of the planet serve as source material to be plundered, exported, and sold.

In naming their organization "Arche de Zoé" -- a play on the French for "Noah's Ark" -- we can see this age-old romanticism and arrogant interference semantically revealed: there are children saved, and the rest -- the unfortunate children of sin -- damned to their fate. This NGO and by extension the First World thus play God, with disastrous results. This missionary idea condemns people to their given status without considering it a direct function of the vagaries of international economic, political, and cultural systems put in place by the First World at the expense of the Third. We must acknowledge what international adoption represents, and what its consequences are, not just locally or individually, but globally and in terms of our shared humanity. To simply accept one perspective of adoption, one that doesn't give voice to adoptees and those of their places of origin simply because it validates our sense of self, is morally and ethically untenable.

Long after this story dies down, and Angelina Jolie and Madonna are out of the news, and the millionth casting call for Annie takes place, it is the children as well as their original communities who still have to live with and process what has happened to them. I would restate Ms. Veneman’s statement thus:

"It is unacceptable to see children taken out of their home countries."

Period. This admission, this truly local starting point, might hopefully shift the attention of adoptive parents beyond the children they have welcomed into their families to the world far outside their homes; a shift, by extension, from the North to the South, from the First World to the Third. It might also allow us to see, acknowledge, and validate for the first time the "world family" we are thus connected to. Most telling in the Arche de Zoé affair is the difference between the protest against the actions of this NGO in terms of "international law" and the outcry of a different kind that is directed against the received wisdom, the salvationist sentiment itself: a protest that seeks to address issues of globalization, world politics, local cultures, and international economics, directly challenges the prevailing notions of presumed universalist culture, rightly puts adoption back into context, and thus requires much more of us all in terms of good will, altruism, and selflessness.

To admit this, to shift perspectives, to recognize the other's viewpoint, would allow those of the developed world to understand what this most recent scandal represents to those they share the planet with, and would reveal that in the spectrum of adoption it is impossible to separate what deserves outrage from what does not; the application of make-up to Chadian children in an effort to literally paint them as Darfour refugees in preparation for their kidnapping from Africa is just one end of the spectrum, one manifestation of problems systemic to a First-World view of things. When voice is given to all concerned, when the discussion is finally and honestly balanced, only then will adoption no longer be tainted with the lingering remnants of an unjustly divided world.

A prayer for us all

Adoption sucks? Blame the mothers!

A comment I responded to. Bold Italics are hers, regular typing, me:

Anonymous said...
yes and children raised without FATHERS also have a very high rate of dysfunction.

Yes, they do. But, of course, you know they have a LOWER degree, statistically speaking, than do adoptees, right?

Of course you don't. Because adoption agencies don't bother to release that little factoid.

I do have a real problem with coercion whether it is abortion or adoption. you coerce people now to do anything you will pay for it later. doesn't matter what it is. doesn't matter if it is something that would be the best thing. if it is obtained by coercion, it will backfire bigtime.

Wouldn't that be nice. Sadly, too many adopters and agencies get away with it scott free. Welcome to reality.

that said, what i have found sorely missing in ANY of these anti adoption sites is any admission that these women brought this on themselves.

That's because these women didn't bring it on themselves. They brought UNWED PREGNANCY on themselves in many cases, SURE.

But being coerced and exploited, they did NOT bring onto themselves.

Tell me, are you one of those people who go around saying that women only get raped when they "bring it on themselves," too? I bet you are.

unless they were raped or incested, they made a choice to engage in sex with a man that had not made a commitment to them and any future children resulting from their sexual union.

Sometimes that's true. Sometimes it's not true. I had a commitment, and that commitment dissolved when he found out I was pregnant.

So much for this little bit of stupidity. Not to mention the fact that 60% of people don't live up to the marriage commitment anyway, so even that's no guarantee, is it. Oh, and guess what- the divorce rate is NOT lower amongst adopters!

Indeed, it may be true in some cases, but talk about the punishment not fitting the crime. You are some kind of warped, evil individual if you actually think that such a "crime" deserves the LIFETIME SENTENCE of losing your child.

Or that the CHILD deserves the LIFETIME SENTENCE of losing his or her mother for a mistake that he or she didn't even make.

You're one twisted fuck, you know that.

once they got pregnant from that temporary relationship, all the options have a problem with them. Abortion: no explanation required; it takes a life. and post abortion syndrome, guilt, etc etc. not to mention possible medical consequences depending on who you listen to Adoption: obviously you know the answer to this one. lots of pain etc etc. and adopted kids do have issues with it. not all, but some of them. Single parenthood: I know lots of single moms and most of them have hellish lives that are a much better advertisement for nonmarital sex than any talk on the subject could hope to be.

Well, then I guess rather than stealing babies and telling the women, "You deserved it," we should seek other options.

Oh, sorry, that's just TOO RADICAL a suggestion. Don't mind me, I make that whole "thinking outside the stigma box" mistake sometimes. You carry on with your bad self:

never enough money. Their kids have such emptiness where a father should be. I was raised by a single mom, my dad died, but I have talked to other fatherless kids and yes, there is always a hole there.

So let's make it TWO holes instead of one! That'll show those stupid little bastards! You wanna be born to a single mother? We'll fix you!

How much worse it must be for kids like the daughter of one single mom I know who keeps reaching out to her bio dad and he just always keeps flaking out on her and not showing up, etc. always an excuse.

Clearly, the mother's fault, there.

We had best make the mother take responsibility for HIS actions!

instead of people being "anti adoption" or "anti abortion" perhaps a better message would be to encourage premarital abstinence because of all the pain that will undoubtedly be caused by ANY of the options should the woman get pregnant. there is a reason it takes two to make a baby. this may sound horrible but thats really the best solution is to maybe wake up young girls as to the pricetag on premarital sex should they get pregnant. whatever their choice is.

I wonder whatever gave you the ridiculous idea that I am pro-premarital sex. I am not. However, since it happens, I don't think that the answer to it is raping women of their children, and raping children of their mothers. Clearly, you are very pro-blaming and pro-making people feel as completely like shit as possible once a mistake is made.

Punish them as brutally as possible, that'll fix it!!

the answer is not in planned parenthood going out and saying go ahead, have sex, abortion is your safety net. It is not in pro lifers saying "adoption is the way" because even though there is no abortion, there are, as you know, big problems with adoption.

Well, no shit.

It is not in beefing up services for single moms.

That's right. Make women and children both suffer! That'll keep it under control!

Hell, it's worked so far... (as long as you ignore the statistics which say that teen pregnancy is actually UP)

Because that has a way of just creating even more people who figure its no big if they get pregnant because people will help and there are so many single moms nowadays....as if the dad is just a sperm donor.

You have no idea what it does, because to date, we have never provided adequately for single mothers. You're just spouting rhetoric.

Indeed women do this deliberately and I think they are playing a big game of russian roulette just so they can have a kid before the biological clock stops ticking.

You clearly don't even remotely understand the psychology behind it. They're making a basic mistake- they think that having a child will keep the man around. They are trying to get a family, to get love.

Which is a mistake, but not for the stupid reasons you are saying. The reason it's a mistake is because MEN are NOT stigmatized, while women are.

Just look at your very proposal. All you care about is punishing WOMEN for becoming single mothers. I don't see anything about punishing men for dropping off a "sperm donation" and running for the hills.

You carry on with all the horror and shame that it is that women get pregnant, and you do remember to cite that they can't do it alone- but only for the purpose of further vilifying women.
Where's your chastisement of men for bailing on their children? Where's your chastisement of men for ACTING LIKE they are only sperm donors?

For every single mother, there's a father who's not there. Where's your vilification of these deadbeat assholes?

I'm missing it... BECAUSE IT'S NOT THERE!

I can't even begin to list all that is wrong with a casual attitude towards single parenthood.

But you are sure in a hurry to blame it all solely on women. Certainly interesting, but I guess it's convenient that you then forget the fact that it TAKES TWO.

Convenient memory you have there, sweetheart.

I lost a parent and it is NOT "just a different form of family".

Oh, you mean losing a parent HURTS?

But yet, you clearly find it impossible to believe that, even if you ended up with the child by an error in judgment, LOSING A CHILD HURTS, TOO.

The punishment does NOT fit the crime.

Just as pro adoption people can point to successful adoptees (and I know a few..but the one I am thinking of is a very open adoption, the first mother is more like an aunt and spends time with the girl...she is my daughters friend and when the kids had to write a paper on "their hero"...she wrote hers on her natural mother) statistically adoptees have more issues, sometimes severe; so it is that children without fathers in their lives statistically have much more troubles, despite individual accounts of success stories.

Yes, compared to two-parent BIOLOGICAL homes, they do.

But once the "mistake" has been made, then you do the best you can with it. Or, you can just vilify the woman, and drive her to compound her mistake with an even worse one.

I would love to see all "out of wedlock" pregnancies ended. But until that happens, your answer of vilifying mothers is the wrong answer.

So pretty much all the options hurt or kill your kid if you get pregnant out of wedlock. Abortion lends itself to denial more readily than the others, so maybe thats why it is such an attractive solution. i do sometimes wonder though, what all these pro adoption pro life people would really do though, if the abstinence message truly sunk in and their supply dried up.

Don't worry, their supply won't dry up. When they can't hit up single women, they hit up poor women and tell THEM that they're not fit to be parents.

Just like you are doing right now to single mothers.

So hey, have no fear that the adoption industry will run out of people to prey upon and exploit. As long as there are folks out there helping them out by vilifying mothers, their job is being done FOR THEM, by people like you.

It does seem sort of hypocritical..like they barely touch on preventing it...its just all about adoption.

It's not hypocritical, it's capitalism.

Adoption does seem to have gone from serving needy children to serving those who want a baby.
so yes, I see a lot of the points in the anti adoption voices, but I also have never seen anyone take responsibility for getting into the situation in the first place.

What exactly do you expect in this "taking responsibility"? Countless women take responsibility and feel shame and embarassment and CRY over the fact that they got pregnant when they didn't mean to. "Out of wedlock" as people like to put it.

The problem isn't a lack of people taking responsibility for it, the problem is that the punishment of losing a child FOREVER doesn't fit the crime. Not for the mother, OR the child.

You are going up to a rape victim, basically, and saying, "HAHA, you shouldn't have gotten in your date's car, YOU IDIOT! You DESERVED to be raped! What kind of loser gets into a guy's car and then refuses to admit how stupid that was after she gets raped??"

What, you can't cry about being raped without you have to run around saying, "but now that I WAS raped, it really was my fault, because I got into my date's car"?

Are you really so stupid that you don't think this rape victim regrets getting in that car by this point in time? And do you REALLY think that getting into the car with your date is a crime REASONABLY punishable by rape?

HELLO?

Because whatever they chose, there would have been pain or fallout in some fashion or another.

Yes. So really, we should make it the most severe possible punishment, once they've already passed the point and made the mistake, right?

I mean... it's not like there isn't enough problems with it that are naturally occuring consequences. No... we have to make sure they are REALLY punished for their HORRIFIC, UNSPEAKABLE crime by taking her child away.

I hope you've taken all of your mother's children away from her for her lifetime, for her CRIME of marrying a man who died.

I mean, who does she think she is anyway? What a horrible thing she did to you!!



Oh, and in case you are wondering, what do I think IS the answer? Well, very simple. Honor PARENTING children. Stop lying and saying that people are interchangeable. That people are disposable, replaceable, and that one parent or one child or one husband is just as good as another.

Honor, instead of vilifying, mothers. Honor, instead of vilifying, fathers. Acknowledge and stress the importance of parents in children's lives. Honor those who perform these functions to the best of their ability, regardless of how they got there. Instead of casually saying that poor people and young people and single people should have to give up their child to their "betters."

Stop shaming and guilting people every chance you get. Stop claiming that not continually being guilty about something you did means you must not be taking "responsibility" for it.

Responsibility and guilt are NOT THE SAME. Get that through your head.

Exactly how fucking long are women supposed to live with overwhelming guilt and shame that they made a mistake? And why aren't men supposed to be living with the guilt and shame of abandoning their children to be raised by single mothers?

Talk about fucking hypocracy...